Entryism and the Revolutionary Socialist Left in Britain (Routledge Studies in Modern British History) [1 ed.] 1032547995, 9781032547992

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Entryism and the Revolutionary Socialist Left in Britain

This book examines entryism in the context of the revolutionary socialist left in Britain, from the inception of the Communist Party of Great Britain in 1920 to the departure of Militant from the Labour Party in 1992. Entryism is a tactic of penetration of a political party by another, aimed at accomplishing objectives, the nature of which can change depending on the type of entry. This work shows to what extent there is not one type of entryism but several. The adopted methodology is chronological, with introductory chapters that study the context and the previous partial-only attempts to define entryism. The first part of the volume is dedicated to the relationship between the Communist Party of Great Britain and the Labour Party up until the middle of the 20th century. The following two parts are dedicated to British Trotskyists before and after the Second World War. In total, 17 organisations that have practised entryism are examined. Through their objectives, practices, and results, this work intends to formulate an exhaustive typology of the tactic, which fills a definitional gap in political science and covers an aspect of Labour’s History that has only been partially covered. This volume will be of use to students and scholars interested in the history of the Labour Party and the Far Left in the United Kingdom. Nicolas Sigoillot holds a PhD in English Studies and teaches at the Institut d’Etudes Politiques in Lyon. His dissertation focused on Entryism within the Labour Party. His research focuses on socialism in Britain, political strategy, and videogame representations of historical concepts related to socialism.

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Entryism and the Revolutionary Socialist Left in Britain Nicolas Sigoillot

First published 2024 by Routledge 4 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10158 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2024 Nicolas Sigoillot The right of Nicolas Sigoillot to be identified as author of this work has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library ISBN: 978-1-032-54799-2 (hbk) ISBN: 978-1-032-54800-5 (pbk) ISBN: 978-1-003-42755-1 (ebk) DOI: 10.4324/9781003427551 Typeset in Times New Roman by Apex CoVantage, LLC

Contents

List of figures List of tables About spelling conventions and abbreviations Trotskyist family tree Acknowledgements Introduction

vii viii ix xi xii 1

PART 1

Theoretical considerations

11

1 Social democracy, Leninism, and Trotskyism

13

2 A critical examination of the previous definitions of entryism

19

PART 2

The CPGB before the Second World War

23

3 The CPGB at its early days and the affiliation tactic

25

4 The CPGB in the 1930s: entryism at the service of the popular front

45

PART 3

The early days of British Trotskyism 5 The splits over entryism in the early British Trotskyist movement

69 71

vi

Contents

6 Flexibilities and sectarianisms: coherences and contradictions within the WIL and RSL 7 From the foundation of the RCP to the split over the question of entryism: a never-ending circle?

96 118

PART 4

British Trotskyism after the war: different traditions, different entryisms

141

8 From secrecy to sectarianism, the Healyite tradition in action

143

9 The peripheralists: the Cliffites and the IMG tradition

160

10 Militant, and the backlash against the successes of long-term entryism

185

Conclusion: a typology of entryism

215

Archive sources Index

227 246

Figures

0.1 4.1 6.1 6.2 6.3 6.4 6.5 8.1 9.1 10.1 10.2

Trotskyist family tree. A poster depicting Stalin and Churchill, the former facing the latter. People’s History Museum, Manchester. Header of the August 1941 issue of Workers’ International News, with no mention of the Workers’ International League connection on the cover. Header of the September 1941 issue of Workers’ International News, with mention of the link with the Workers’ International League on the cover. Cover of Workers’ Fight indicating to be published by the Revolutionary Socialist League. Cover of Workers’ Fight indicating to be the publication/organ of the Revolutionary Workers’ League. Copy of Workers’ International News mentioning the membership of the WIL in the Fourth International. Cover of Socialist Outlook vol. 1, no. 12, November 1949 with an emphasis on the participation of Ellis Smith to it. A representation of the peripheral recruitment strategy. Campaign poster for Dave Nellist, with no mention of Militant but an emphasis on the word “Labour”. Modern Record Centre, University of Warwick (601/C/3/14/2). Campaign poster for Pat Wall, with no mention of Militant but an emphasis on “Vote Labour”. Modern Record Centre, University of Warwick (601/C/3/14/2).

xi 62 100 101 107 108 110 147 169 197 198

Tables

3.1 3.2 6.1 7.1 9.1 10.1 11.1 11.2

Arguments raised by the Labour Party against affiliation and their CPGB counter-arguments A history of the votes against/in favour of CPGB affiliation from 1921 to 1924 Trotskyist organisations on the eve of the Peace and Unity Conference Summary of the positions of the majority and minority of the RCP in 1947 A sample of Rank-and-File papers produced by the International Socialists Theses and antitheses developed in Problems of Entrism Criteria and modalities of entryism Synthesis of the most significant forms of entryism in Britain throughout the communist left in Britain

36 37 101 130 174 190 217 223

About spelling conventions and abbreviations

There are two ways to spell the word referring to the followers of Trotsky; it may be spelled Trotskyists or Trotskyites. In this book, I have made the choice to use the word Trotskyist just to be coherent with the spelling of the ideology “Trotskyism”. The same logic is applied for entry; as such, I will use the “Entryism/Entryist” spelling and not “Entrism/Entryist” except when reproducing an extract from a text that uses the other spelling. However, when referring to the various British activists and traditions, I chose to use “Grantites”, “Cliffites”, and “Healyites” (after the names of Ted Grant, Tony Cliff, and Gerry Healy). Archives from the Modern Record Centre at the University of Warwick are indicated by the initials MRC, those from the Working-Class Movement Library in Salford by WCML, and those from the People’s History Museum in Manchester by PHM. I indicate the reference of the document mentioned right after the initials of the archive it is consultable in. Thus, “MRC: MSS.102/5/1/1” refers to the document listed as “MSS.102/5/1/1” at the Modern Record Centre, University of Warwick. Here is a list of abbreviations encountered in the book: BLG BSP CL CLP CND CPGB CWI CI ILP IMG IMT ICFI IS ISFI ISG

Bolshevik Leninist Group British Socialist Party Communist League Constituency Labour Party Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament Communist Party of Great Britain Committee for a Workers International Communist International Independent Labour Party International Marxist Group International Marxist Tendency International Committee for the Fourth International International Socialists International Secretariat of the Fourth International International Socialism Group

x

About spelling conventions and abbreviations

LLY LPYS LSI MG ML MLL MMM NLWM NMM NOLS NUWMC ILO CPSU PLP RCP RILU RSL SL SLL SLP SRG SWP TUC USFI VSC WIL WRP WSF

Labour League of Youth Labour Party Young Socialists Labour and Socialist International Marxist Group Marxist League Militant Labour League Miners Minority Movement National Left-Wing Movement National Minority Movement National Organisation of Labour Students National Unemployed Workers Movement Committee International Left Opposition Communist Party of the Soviet Union Parliamentary Labour Party Revolutionary Communist Party Red International of Labour Unions Revolutionary Socialist League Socialist League Socialist Labour League Socialist Labour Party Socialist Review Group Socialist Workers’ Party Trades Union Congress United Secretariat of the Fourth International Vietnamese Solidarity Campaign Workers’ International League Workers’ Revolutionary Party Workers’ Socialist Federation

Trotskyist family tree Family Tree of the Main British Trotskyist Groups

Balham Group Communist League (1932–1936)

Marxist Group (1934–1938) Bolshevik-Leninist Group Militant Group (1935–1938) Marxist League (1936–1938) Revolutionary Socialist League (1938–1944)

Workers International League (1937–1944)

Revolutionary Communist Party (1944–1949)

« The Club » (1947–1959)

International Socialist Group (1950–1957)

Socialist Labour League (1959–1973)

Socialist Review Group (1950–1962)

Revolutionary Socialist League (1957–1964) International Group (1961–1968)

Workers Revolutionary Party (1973–1985)

Militant (1964–1992)

International Socialists (1962–1977) International Marxist Group (1968–1982) Socialist Workers Party (1977)

Militant Labour (1992–1997)

Socialist League/Action (1982)

Evolution Socialist Appeal (1997)

Socialist Party (1997)

Split Ideological Continuum

Figure 0.1 Trotskyist family tree.

Change in the Entryist Tactic

Acknowledgements

I am immensely grateful as I write this acknowledgements section for my book, which is essentially a rewriting of my PhD thesis. Throughout my academic journey, I have always been fascinated by the enigmatic and often misunderstood tactic of entryism. Being able to pen a book on this subject fills me with immense pride and satisfaction. I owe a heartfelt debt of gratitude to my PhD supervisor-turned-friend, Agnès Alexandre-Collier, whose unwavering support and guidance shaped me into the academic I am today. I am also indebted to the staff at various archive centres, including the Modern Record Centre at the University of Warwick, the People’s History Museum in Manchester, and the Working-Class Movement Library in Manchester, for their invaluable assistance during my research. I would also like to mention Rob Marsden of the Splits and Fusions Online Archive for his work and having made so many Trotskyist sources available online. I would also like to thank my colleagues for their guidance and precious advice during my research: Marc Smith, Alain Bouley, Bénédicte Coste, Alix Meyer, Indiana Lods, and Beatrice Duchateau. I had the chance to have most of you as professors, and I owe you a lot for this. To my dear friends, thank you for your companionship and camaraderie. A special thanks to Samantha Toms, Lily Luve and Lauren Teng for their proofreading and language advice. They truly are the most patient people in the world for putting up with me. To my family, your unwavering support has been instrumental in my journey, and I am truly grateful. Lastly, I extend my deepest appreciation to my partner, Pauline, for her unconditional love and unwavering support throughout these years.

Introduction

What’s happened now is that we’ve had to make clear the difference between the Labour Party and Militant. That they are a parasite living on the Labour Party. They’re different because their ideology is not ours. Theirs is an ideology of revolutionary socialism, ours is of moderate reform and reconstruction. . . . The most important point though is that those ideological differences have taken organisational forms.1

These words were uttered by Austin Mitchell, a former Labour MP for Great Grimsby from 1977 to 2015, during a debate with Peter Taaffe, the Senior Editor of Militant, and Tony Mulhearn, a Militant candidate. This debate followed the publication of a party report that shed light on the activities of militants within the Labour Party. Mitchell’s remarks were part of the executive’s charge against the Militant, publicly revealing their entryist activities. During the debate, Austin Mitchell’s primary objective was to expose the Militant and accuse them of prioritising their own interests over the interests of the Labour Party. This accusation acting in a covert, interested manner within another party is not an uncommon occurrence in political history. Such allegations do not necessarily require full proof to achieve their objective, although in the case of the Militant, their entryism was well known and understood by the leadership of the Labour Party. However, it is important to note that, in many instances, these accusations are baseless. In France, for example, a country with a strong history of entryism within communist movements, numerous press articles and books have been written on the subject. However, many of these writings exhibit strong biases and are authored by individuals who are politically opposed to communism. As a result, these works tend to unfairly incriminate Trotskyist political groups, depicting them as manipulative entities, exhibiting sect-like behaviours, engaging in secretive practices, or acting insidiously within the French Socialist Party. Consequently, it has become a common occurrence on French television to witness political leaders attacking one another, accusing their opponents of being Trotskyists, often resorting to belittling terms equivalent to “trots”, implying that they are deceptive conspirators working towards a future coup. This rhetoric is only possible due to a set of preconceived notions and stereotypes associated with the concept of entryism. As such, the purpose of such accusations is to undermine the credibility of a political group or individual, aiming to neutralise a competing ideology, often of DOI: 10.4324/9781003427551-1

2

Introduction

a more radical nature, by linking them with the negative perception of deceitfulness. This is particularly evident in the case of communists engaging in activities within more moderate groups, creating an association with the notion of duplicity and subversion. Entryism was undeniably a tangible tactic; however, its magnitude and underlying principle were frequently embellished through enthusiastic usage of the term. Consequently, entryism exists as both a genuine phenomenon, with its boundaries vaguely defined in scholarly literature, and a myth perpetuated by the media as well as public perception. This dual nature emphasises the necessity for a comprehensive and scientific examination of the entryism phenomenon, which can be effectively achieved through studying its implementation within the British Labour Party. As a result, the primary objective of this book is to construct a comprehensive history of communist entryism within the British Labour Party, spanning from the establishment of the Communist Party to the departure of the last major Trotskyist group in 1992. This objective is closely intertwined with the need to present a comprehensive history of the involved groups, thus addressing a notable gap in the existing scholarly literature. For revolutionary factions, political theory is inherently intertwined with organisational practices and strategies. Consequently, exploring the various entryist approaches will facilitate understanding the ideological divisions among the groups that employed this tactic. In doing so, it will address certain gaps in the history of the British far left. This monograph will specifically focus on the observation of the entryist phenomenon within Great Britain, as Ireland’s unique political situation justifies this geographic limitation instead of encompassing the entire United Kingdom. Notably, the leading British parties exert a distinct influence in Ireland compared to the mainland. The chosen timeframe of 1920–1992 necessitates a comprehensive examination of Ireland’s specific issues, but integrating such analysis would render the text disjointed and challenging to navigate, as it would require separate analyses for each region with limited connecting elements. Nevertheless, further research on the subject is warranted and deserves initiation. This book can serve as a solid foundation for a comparative analysis between the two situations. The study of entryism encompasses a dual nature, necessitating an examination of both the groups that employ this tactic and the parties that have encountered it. Consequently, this work will approach the realm of British Labour, encompassing local sections, affiliated organisations of the Labour Party, and trade unions, from the perspective of the historical development of its political ideas and organisational structure. Corpus Given the intricate nature of British communism and the multitude of groups and factions involved, this analysis will focus on a limited number of specific groups. The selection of the groups to be studied has been based on two criteria. Firstly, these groups must have garnered attention from other significant political entities

Introduction 3 such as the Communist Party and the Labour Party. Secondly, their influence must have extended beyond a specific geographical area, encompassing more than just a single major city. Thus, here is the selection in the form of a breakdown according to major ideological and chronological traditions: Marxist-Leninist tradition: Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB) Pre WWII Trotskyism: Communist League (CL), Marxist League (ML), Marxist Group (MG), Militant Labour League (MLL), Workers International League (WIL), Revolutionary Socialist League (RSL 1),2 Revolutionary Communist Party (RCP). As far as the second half of the 20th century is concerned, it is easier to divide the Trotskyist movement into broad traditions. While ideological divisions have been suggested in the context of more global studies of Trotskyism, in the case of this book, which limits its study to the British case, a division by original or founding group is sufficient. Thus: Healyites (named after Gerry Healy): The Club, Socialist Labour League (SLL) and Workers Revolutionary Party (WRP). Grantites (named after Ted Grant): International Socialism, Revolutionary Socialist League (RSL 2), Militant, Militant Labour, Socialist Party (SP) and Socialist Appeal. IMG tradition (named after the most influential group of the tradition): Committee for the Regroupment of the British Section of the Fourth International, International Group (IG), International Marxist Group (IMG) and Socialist Action (SA) Cliffites (named after Tony Cliff, otherwise called State-Capitalists or State Caps): Socialist Review Group (SRG), International Socialists (IS) and Socialist Workers Party (SWP). Sources On communism and entryism

Academic sources on entryism are scarce, necessitating a reliance on works specifically focused on the groups practising entryism. However, even at this level, the availability of sources is limited and varies in quality across the groups under study. Only the Communist Party of Great Britain really benefits from a relatively abundant collection of sources that enable a multifaceted examination of the party across different historical periods. Noreen Branson,3 James Klugmann,4 John Callaghan,5 Matthew Worley,6 and Kevin Morgan7 have authored books that provide valuable insights into critical periods of the Communist Party prior to the Second World War. These periods include the party’s inception, the united front era, the Popular Front, and the tumultuous “class against class” period. On the other hand,

4

Introduction

academic sources specifically dedicated to the Trotskyist movements in Britain are extremely scarce, with the available material primarily limited to articles rather than comprehensive studies or books. Two collective works, Against the Grain8 and Waiting for the Revolution,9 have been published in the last ten years. While these books offer chapters that touch upon the broader far-left movement, they primarily focus on specific issues and are therefore insufficient to provide a general/comprehensive history of the Trotskyist movement in Britain. A dedicated book, Contemporary Trotskyism,10 was published in 2018, offering a detailed account of the entire Trotskyist movement in Britain today. This comprehensive and exhaustive book provides valuable insights into the history of the movement, offering a deeper understanding of each Trotskyist tradition. It is highly recommended for anyone interested in the subject. Additionally, there are two relatively short, comprehensive works on the far left, written by John Callaghan in the 1980s.11 While these books offer valuable historical perspectives, they may not cover recent developments in the movement or provide an updated analysis of the events of the 1970s and 1980s. Several PhD dissertations have also been published on the subject, such as the one by Martin Upham in 1980 on pre-World War II Trotskyism,12 which provides a comprehensive history of the movement in that period. Another by Matthew Worley details the Communist Party in the so-called “class against class” period.13 These academic works, combined with those of Klugmann, Worley, Morgan, and Branson, offer a comprehensive look at the communist movement of the first half of the 20th century. A journalist named Michael Crick wrote a book entitled The March of Militant,14 which focuses on the prominent British Trotskyist and entryist group Militant. While the book is well-researched and provides a substantial amount of data on the Militant group, it is important to note that it presents a critical perspective. Michael Crick was known to be a strong opponent of this political tradition. However, according to Peter Taaffe, the chief strategist of Militant, a significant number of the facts presented in the book are accurate. In 2016, a friendly debate was organised by the Socialist Party, the successor to Militant, where Michael Crick and Peter Taaffe discussed the accuracy of the facts presented in the book and the relevance of Crick’s analysis.15 On the other hand, there is an abundance of scientific literature on the Labour Party, which provides comprehensive insights into the party from various academic perspectives. Numerous textbooks offer general information about the party, while specialised works delve into specific areas such as the functioning of annual congresses or the historical development of the party’s ideological currents. Of these, one book that is instrumental in understanding entryism and the Labour Party’s approach to it is Eric Shaw’s Discipline and Discord in the Labour Party.16 The book focuses on issues of discipline within the party, with a significant portion dedicated to the treatment of entryism by the party apparatus. Shaw’s work complements the study of entryism by providing insights from the perspective of the entryist groups, offering a counterpoint to the party’s viewpoint. The book offers detailed information on the disciplinary processes and the Labour Party’s intentions in addressing entryism. It is based on Shaw’s doctoral thesis and includes

Introduction 5 a substantial bibliography. However, one limitation of the book, similar to John Callaghan’s work on the far left, is its publication date of 1988. As a result, it does not cover the second major “witch hunt” against the Militant in 1991, nor does it provide a comprehensive historical perspective on the events of the 1980s, making its analysis partial for that period. A book by Simon Hannah, A Party with Socialists in It,17 was also recently published in 2018. It examines the Labour Party from a socialist perspective and focuses on its left wing. Therefore, his book is extremely interesting in terms of studying the ideological tensions within the Labour Party, which the entryists have always sought to exploit. Ralph Miliband’s book, Parliamentary Socialism,18 despite its date (1961), provides any analysis on the subject with a set of facts and analyses helpful to understand the Labour Party’s link with socialist ideology and will also be used as a reference work for our book’s development. The more generalist works of other historians such as Martin Pugh,19 Henry Pelling, and Alastair Reid20 can also provide the reader with precise, older, or revised, analyses of the Labour Party. Historiographical debates

Intense historiographical debates animate the history of the left in Britain. The most prominent historians of the Marxist left are often Marxists themselves (Klugmann, Branson, and Kevin Morgan, for example), so it is worth bearing in mind their orientation, even if their methodology is exemplary. The historiography of the Labour Party is a complex subject. Given the party’s inclusive nature and its portrayal as a broad coalition where various socialist traditions coexist, the historiography reflects the internal debates and becomes a battleground for legitimising or rejecting certain traditions within the party. Historians like Stephen Haseler and Steven Fielding have written histories of the Labour Party that downplay or even exclude Marxists and left-wing elements, presenting them as having little or no place within the party. Their books and research have often provided arguments for the party’s right wing to maintain ideological boundaries against the radical left. On the other hand, other historians, such as Simon Hannah and Ralph Miliband, offer a socialist interpretation of the Labour Party. They describe it as a party that possesses the ideological potential to incorporate socialists but is deeply hostile to them in practice. They highlight the tension between the party’s grassroots base and its apparatus. These divergent interpretations of the Labour Party’s history shape the ongoing discourse within the party and influence its ideological landscape. The historiography becomes a reflection of the internal struggles and debates, showcasing different perspectives on the role of socialism within the Labour Party. This work is centred on these tensions – between, on the one hand, entryists trying to convert Labour activists to a communist ideology and, on the other hand, Labour Party activists and cadres trying to resist it. As such, one could easily exploit the historiographical debates mentioned earlier by using them as mirrors of the internal conflicts in the Labour Party and by interpreting them as providing

6

Introduction

academic and historical arguments to both sides. Thus, in order to understand the intentions and arguments of the Labour Party apparatus during the expulsion of the Healyite Trotskyists in the late 1950s and early 1960s, it is interesting to read Stephen Haseler, even if his work on the period is highly biased as he was himself a member of the Social Democratic Alliance, an organisation aiming at containing Trotskyist entry within the Labour Party. Primary sources

While secondary sources on British communism are scarce, this is not true for primary source material. Communist movements have a solid interest in history and tend to write books on the history of their parties or rivals. As such, the ancestors of the present Socialist Party and the Socialist Workers Party have had many books written about them by their members, such as Taaffe’s The Rise of Militant21 or Higgins’ More Years in the Locust.22 The parties have also written books on the prewar history of Trotskyism, that is, before the emergence of the major contemporary traditions. Thus, Grant’s History of British Trotskyism23 and Bornstein and Richardson’s War and the International24 provide interesting and enlightening factual material for internal debates within the movement. However, they must be treated academically with the utmost caution, and a cross-check of the information put forward by each tendency enables their readers to disentangle the truth from the tale. Party newspapers also indicate changes in the orientation of the different communist tendencies and provide interesting information about events and reactions to them. Most of these newspapers are available in archive centres or from the parties themselves. Archives

Physical archives are readily available in Britain. The People’s History Museum in Manchester houses the CPGB and Labour Party archives. In Manchester, there is also the Working Class Movement Library, which contains archives on the Communist Parties and the anarchist movements, as well as a fair number of boxes of Militant and the International Marxist Group’s archive documents. The Modern Record Centre at Warwick University is the most interesting archive to study British Trotskyism. The centre holds the papers of significant actors in the history of British Trotskyism (Tony Cliff, Denzil Harber, Jimmy Deane, and Ken Tarbuck) as well as the papers of the five major British Trotskyist traditions (Socialist Party/Militant, Socialist Workers Party/International Socialists, International Marxist Group, Alliance for Workers Liberty, and Socialist Labour League/Workers Revolutionary Party). As such, the Modern Record Centre is the archive centre that provided most of the documents examined in this book. Outline

The examination of Labour Party ideology has been a contentious task, fuelling debates among activists, party leaders, and even within the ranks of its own militants

Introduction 7 throughout the 20th century. This book aims to explore the relationship between Labour Party ideology and the compatibility between revolutionary groups’ maximalist and revolutionary beliefs and the reformist ideology of the party. The central question is whether the Labour Party has ever been receptive to Marxist ideas. In essence, this book delves into the extent to which the Labour Party, over the course of the 20th century, provided a suitable platform for various revolutionary groups in Britain and how it responded to their attempts to establish a presence within its ranks. The analysis unfolds through four sections, each comprising two to three chapters arranged in a logical order based on ideology, politics, and chronology. The outline of this work is as follows: Part 1 will be dedicated to setting up the main requirements to get an accurate view of the entryist phenomenon. Chapter 1 will examine the ideologies of the groups studied and how they can connect with the Labour Party itself. In this chapter, the connections between social democracy, Marxism, Leninism, and Trotskyism will be detailed, and the manner in which the links between each of those ideologies constituted entry points for the Marxists within the Labour Party will be examined. Chapter 2 explores previous attempts to define entryism. None of the previous definitions were comprehensive or fully accurate, but rather served a purpose for other studies. By examining them, this book will observe how the entryist tactic was understood by science so far. *** Part 2 focuses on the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB), the British section of the Communist International (CI or Komintern), from its foundation to the aftermath of the Second World War. The attitude of the CPGB towards the Labour Party reveals three distinct logics depending on the period studied, which will be explored in Chapters 3 to 5. Chapter 3 examines the logic of the Communist Party’s united front with Labour militants, from the foundation of the party in 1920 until 1926, at a time when Lenin himself suggested to Communist Party members to join the Labour Party and operate within it to propagandise more efficiently. Chapter 4 deals with the actions of the Communist Party of Great Britain from 1934 onwards to the Second World War and its attempts to build a popular front with the parties of the British left. In each of those two sub-sections, particular attention will be paid to the various attempts by the Communist Party to take its place within the Labour Party and examine the ways in which this was achieved. The regulations set by the Labour Party to counter the entry of the Communist Party will also be examined. *** Part 3 focuses on the Trotskyist movement, from its beginnings in Britain in 1930 to its division in 1947. The history of British Trotskyism at that time was intimately linked to the attitude of its militants towards the Labour Party.

8

Introduction The disagreements and first splits within this movement were all, except one, linked to the question of entry into a partisan component of the labour world. The study of this period will once again be done according to a chronological division. Chapter 5 examines the birth of the Trotskyist movement in Great Britain and its hesitations between independent existence, entryism within the Independent Labour Party, or within the Labour Party itself from 1930 to 1938. Chapter 6 focuses on the two main Trotskyist groups from 1937 to 1944, the Workers’ International League and the Revolutionary Socialist League, and will explore their different attitudes towards the Labour Party and how this will translate into success or failure for those two groups. Chapter 7 describes the period 1944–1947, the only period during which the British Trotskyist movement was united within a single party. However, the party soon fell prey to tactical divisions on the question of entryism, which were decisive for the future of the British Trotskyist movement. An in-depth study of the arguments of the opposing camps during this period will be conducted.

*** Part 4 is devoted to the study of the Trotskyist movement in Britain from the aftermath of the Second World War until the early 1990s. The analysis will be divided according to the major ideological and tactical traditions that were formed in the movement during this half of the century. Chapter 8 deals with the Healyite tradition, which broke with the official international Trotskyist movement and radically revised its tactical choices, moving from total and secret entryism to direct confrontation with the Labour Party in an attempt to build an independent mass party. Chapter 9 is devoted to the Cliffites and the legitimist tradition of the Fourth International. Although these two groups are very different ideologically, their strategy towards the Labour Party was similar in many respects, including a gradual move away from entryist tactics and a peripheralist approach, approaching Labour activists through ad hoc organisations and collectives rather than directly. Finally, Chapter 10 will explore the Grantite tradition, which was mainly organised around Militant and which achieved total entryism within the Labour Party for almost 40 years after having won two members of parliament, a dominance on the youth section of the party, and partially triggered the renowned conflict around Liverpool’s city council in 1986. Notes 1 “Labour and Militant”, TV Eye, Thames Television for ITV, September 30, 1982. 2 The 1937 Revolutionary Socialist League is abbreviated as RSL 1 because another major group took that name in 1957; this second group is abbreviated as RSL 2 because of the necessity to disambiguate the two of them. In the passages dedicated to each of these groups, RSL will be used without a number attached, as no confusion will be possible.

Introduction 9 3 BRANSON Noreen, History of the Communist Party of Great Britain 1927–1941, London: Lawrence & Wishart, 1987. 4 KLUGMAN James, History of the Communist Party of Great Britain Vol 1: Formation and Early Years 1918–1924, London: Lawrence & Wishart LTD, 1987. 5 CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left in British Politics, Oxford: Blackwell, 1987. 6 WORLEY Matthew, Class Against Class, The Communist Party in Britain Between the Wars, London: I.B. Taurus, 2001. 7 MORGAN Kevin, Against Fascism and War: Ruptures and Continuities in British Communist Politics 1935–1941, Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1989. 8 SMITH Evan & WORLEY Matthew (eds.), Against the Grain: The British Far Left From 1956, Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2014. 9 SMITH Evan & WORLEY Matthew (eds.), Waiting for the Revolution: The British Far Left From 1956, Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2017. 10 KELLY John, Contemporary Trotskyism: Parties, Sects and Social Movements in Britain, Oxon: Routledge, 2018. 11 CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left . . . op. cit. and British Trotskyism: Theory and Practice, Oxford: Blackwell, 1984. 12 UPHAM Martin, The History of British Trotskyism to 1949, PhD Dissertation, Hull University, 1980. www.marxists.org/history/etol/revhist/upham/upmen.htm (last accessed 14.04.2023). 13 WORLEY Matthew, Class Against Class: The Communist Party of Great Britain in the Third Period, 1927–1932, PhD Dissertation, Nottingham University, 1998. 14 CRICK Michael, The March of Militant, London: Faber and Faber, 1986. 15 This debate is watchable on the Socialist Party’s YouTube Channel: www.youtube.com/ watch?v=UEUwEOrf74c (last accessed 14.04.2023). 16 SHAW Eric, Discipline and Discord in the Labour Party, Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1988. 17 HANNAH Simon, A Party With Socialists in It: A History of the Labour Left, London: Pluto Press, 2018. 18 MILIBAND Ralph, Parliamentary Socialism: A Study in the Politics of Labour, London: The Merlin Press, 1972. 19 PUGH Martin, Speak for Britain!: A New History of the Labour Party, London: Vintage, 2011. 20 PELLING Henry & REID Alastair, A Short History of the Labour Party, Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire & New York: Macmillan Press, St. Martin’s Press, 1996. 21 TAAFFE Peter, The Rise of Militant, Croydon: Socialist Publications, 2013. 22 HIGGINS Jim, More Years in the Locust: The Origins of the SWP, London: Unkant, 2011. 23 GRANT Ted, History of British Trotskyism, London: Wellred Publications, 2002. 24 BORNSTEIN Sam & RICHARDSON Al, War and the International: A History of the Trotskyist Movement in Britain 1937–1949, London: Socialist Platform, 1986.

Part 1

Theoretical considerations

1

Social democracy, Leninism, and Trotskyism

In Great Britain, entryism within the Labour Party was practised by all the traditions of communist parties, whether they were Stalinist (as was the case of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB)) or Trotskyist. Therefore, a brief history of these traditions worldwide and then in Britain is necessary. A historical study will be conducted throughout this work to explain the changing attitudes towards each other of the parties representing these traditions in Britain. Social democracy In order to understand the attitude of Marxists towards social democratic parties, and therefore to understand entryism within the Labour Party, it is necessary to understand the origin and ideological evolution of these entryist groups. During the second half of the 19th century, social democratic parties were formed throughout Europe, notably the Social Democratic Federation (SDF) in Great Britain, the Fédération des Travailleurs Socialistes de France, and, above all, the Sozialistische Arbeiterpartei Deutschlands, which later became the Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands.1 These parties drew part of their ideology from Marxism by integrating class struggle into their thinking, but they also strongly believed in the parliamentary system. In England, for example, the expansion of suffrage in the 19th century, in 1832, 1867, and then 1884, with its expansion into a universal form, led many political actors to believe that socialism could be achieved through the institutions of parliamentary democracy.2 From the second half of the 19th century until the 1910s, these social democratic parties formed a rather heterogeneous grouping, combining gradualist reformists, seeking to establish socialism solely by parliamentary means, with more revolutionary militants. In Germany, for example, the Sozialistische Arbeiterpartei Deutschlands included radical Marxists from the Sozialdemokratische Arbeiterpartei Deutschlands and more reformist Lasallian moderates from the Allgemeiner Deutscher Arbeiterverein. This heterogeneous militant and ideological fabric made the nascent social democracy a common ground, or compromise, between Marxists and reformists (who, in any case, accepted for the most part the core theories of the Marxists).3 DOI: 10.4324/9781003427551-3

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Soon, many radical Marxist groups moved away from social democratic structures. These departures remained confined to minority groups. The disappointment of some with the non-action of the parties of the Second International during the First World War and the Russian Revolution of 1917 established a stricter boundary between reformist social democracy and revolutionary Marxists. Both camps would radicalise their ideas, the former towards parliamentarianism and the latter towards revolution.4 It is important to keep in mind this common root when studying the interaction between communists and other socialists because it shows that before the 1920s, cohabitation between revolutionaries and reformists was possible, even the norm, and took place within the social democratic parties. In Britain, this major social democratic party was the Social Democratic Federation (SDF), which carried within it the seeds of what became the British Socialist Party in 1911, the forerunner of the Communist Party of Great Britain. The SDF was also the organisation out of which the Independent Labour Party (ILP) emerged in 1893, which initiated the founding of the Labour Representation Committee in 1900 and changed its name to the Labour Party in 1906. Leninism The Russian Revolution of October 1917 gave Marxism a new lease on life by providing a living example of revolutionary socialism. In political terms, this translated in Europe into a final divorce between social democracy and revolutionaries. Thus, among communists, there is a before and after 1917. Since the difference between the latter and the reformists had to be marked and noticed, the revolutionary communists began to look for the ingredients of success in the ideological foundations of the Bolshevik revolution, which became a blueprint for them. Understanding the main elements of what constitutes the political theory and practice of Leninism is important when studying communist groups in the 20th century because it is in the writings of Lenin that most of them found the cement of their thought and articulated their practices.5 The Leninist theory was to have a profound effect on the local sections of the Third International, which took the Bolshevik party as a model and which, in the case of Great Britain, for example, led the Labour Party to refuse any alliance with the British Communist Party as it saw it as anti-democratic because the policies of the latter were too similar to those of the Soviets. Lenin is often seen as the leading thinker of the Russian Revolution. He developed a very different vision of the party from Marx. While Marx favoured a relatively inclusive mass party, Lenin imagined a more exclusive party and saw large-scale democracy as a weakness. The party leadership had to be all-powerful, and the party was composed of trained militants united by a single ideology. For Lenin, the party of the proletariat could only be effective if it functioned through iron discipline. I repeat: the experience of the victorious dictatorship of the proletariat in Russia has clearly shown even to those who are incapable of thinking or have had no occasion to give thought to the matter that absolute centralisation and

Social democracy, Leninism, and Trotskyism 15 rigorous discipline of the proletariat are an essential condition of victory over the bourgeoisie.6 In practice, it is possible to debate within the party as long as all follow the chosen action. This process is called democratic centralism. The number did not matter to Lenin, who was convinced it was easier to succeed in the revolution with 100 professional and trained militants, completely devoted to the working class, than with an alliance of a thousand men with different aspirations. The originality of Lenin’s thought compared to Marx’s is in the discipline and the limited number of members of the revolutionary vanguard. If in Marx’s works it is the working class that agitates and foments the revolution by itself, by conscience, and in a great revolutionary party, in Lenin it is the party supported by the working class (since it acts in its interest) and its organisation through its leadership that occupies the catalyst role of the revolution. In short, Lenin’s party was a revolutionary and enlightened vanguard. However, it should not substitute itself for the proletariat as a revolutionary class. French Historians like Dominique Colas or Philippe Némo explain that the Leninist party is the “creator of the class”. This interpretation of Lenin seems relatively free because, in Lenin, the party emerges from the class as it is explained in What Is to Be Done?. In the context of clandestinity described by Lenin, the party concentrates on the activities of the organisation and functions only in small numbers to be able to assure the continuity of the work and to be able to counter more easily the plans of the political police since a small number welded avoids, in effect, the infiltration and the manipulation. Lenin also emphasises that the party should not “think for others” and that the revolutionary crowd brings out the revolutionaries, not the other way around.7 For the Leninists, the party newspaper is not only a tool of information but also the party’s heart. Written by professional militants, the newspaper’s primary concern is to link the organisation to the working class and create an intellectual emulation within the party by reflecting on the ideas of Marxism and current society.8 This rigid party/journal structure is still relevant in the 21st century in the Leninist groups. It is also in Lenin that we find the concrete modelling of the theory of the dictatorship of the proletariat, a transitional phase towards the definitive abolition of the State because, for the Leninists, the State is only an instrument of oppression. The dictatorship of the proletariat is, in fact, a stage where the State, managed by democratic centralism, ensures the fair distribution of wealth among the citizens and assures socialism; it is only once socialism has been set up that we can do without the State.9 Lenin described the dictatorship of the proletariat as “a most determined and most ruthless war waged by the new class against a more powerful enemy, the bourgeoisie, whose resistance is increased tenfold by their overthrow.”10 However, one must be careful not to confuse Leninism with Marxism-Leninism. If the former refers to Lenin’s political thought and practices that conform to the theory of party and State, the latter refers today to the Stalinist doctrine. The privilege of using the label “Marxist-Leninist” by the Stalinists will serve, among other things, to deprive Trotskyists of the legitimacy – in the eyes of the public – of claiming the Leninist heritage (although Trotskyists are indeed

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Theoretical considerations

Leninists). This distinction has been crucial in British history, especially when the CPGB and Trotskyist groups were battling each other for the ideological dominance of the ILP, or the youth section of the Labour Party. Trotskyism The term Trotskyist is interesting because it was initially used to attack oppositionists within the Soviet Communist Party. Trotskyism is a particular form of Leninism that developed in reaction to the rise of the right wing of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union within the Comintern. It emerged from the Left Opposition within the International and later the Fourth International. It differs from MarxismLeninism, the doctrine of the Stalinist USSR, on several features, out of which four are major: the transitional programme, the emphasis on internationalism, antiStalinism, and the permanent revolution. The transitional programme is a political programme similar to that of any other party except in one regard: it doesn’t show the final objectives of the party itself. According to Trotsky, it is important that a vanguard party should be able to introduce demands that seem realistic and immediately winnable by the working class in order to maintain good contact with it and then, and only then, educate it to a revolutionary ideology. The demands of the transitional programme are called “transitional” in opposition to “maximalist” demands, which would be the call for a socialist State. They are supposed to be progressive, radical, yet in adequacy with the current expectations of the working class at the moment when the programme is introduced to them. The idea is that the transitional programme should be adaptable to the current “revolutionary temperature”: the more revolutionary the situation, the closer to socialism the programme should be. On the other hand, if the current social situation is calm and pacified, and the social movements are weak, then the programme should be just radical enough to help radicalise people but shouldn’t ask for more than some nationalisation, workers’ rights, and income increases. It is a tool to build a bridge between the maximalist revolutionary vanguard that the Trotskyist Party is and the working classes, which might not yet be convinced of the need for a maximalist programme.11 Even though it has existed since the original Marxist theory and even before, internationalism is a significant value for Trotskyists. International structures often link the different national Trotskyist groups. For them, the revolution must be worldwide or nothing, and this is one of their main differences from the Marxist-Leninists, for whom socialism must first be imposed and functional in one country to contaminate the others. A sign of the significance of this concept for Trotskyists can be seen in the fact that most groups published both a bulletin on the national situation and another on the international situation.12 This bulletin could be both an open publication for the general public and a closed publication for group/party members to ensure a solid education of their members or supporters on the state of the international situation. The concept of a “Permanent revolution” is opposed to the gradual establishment of socialism. It assumes that there is no victory, however small, until society is fully socialist. In practice, it would be a question of taking a social movement’s direction

Social democracy, Leninism, and Trotskyism 17 and leading it, without compromising with another force, until the socialist revolution, always ensuring that the intermediary forms that the State would assume on the path to socialism would not become permanent and degenerate. The originality lies in the fact that this doctrine would allow, in principle, non-industrialised societies (which is a prerequisite for Marx) to reach socialism without leaving the task of the development of capitalism to the bourgeoisie, the proletariat being in charge of transforming the country together with the political system.13 Leninist, Marxist-Leninist, and Trotskyist doctrines have profoundly influenced the ideas of the extra-parliamentary left in the United Kingdom and need to be understood to understand the developments of communist movements. Indeed, this is often how revolutionary Marxist parties present themselves: Marxist-Leninists or Trotskyists. Moreover, these two doctrines present their theories of the State and inscribe in the DNA of Marxist movements the rejection of parliamentarianism. Indeed, for the communists, the revolutionary theory must be concretised in practice and vice versa. Notes 1 For more details on the formation years of social democratic parties on a worldwide scale, see DROZ Jacques, Histoire générale du socialisme. 2, De 1875 à 1918, Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1997. 2 NEMO Philippe, Histoire des idées politiques aux Temps modernes et contemporains, Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 2013, pp. 989–1014. 3 DROZ Jacques, Histoire générale du socialisme. 1, Des Origines à 1875, Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1997, pp. 478–500. 4 The French Communist Party is a good example of this process. Its origin lies in the decision of the French Section of the Second International to join the Comintern and thus operate a transformation from a social-democratic party to a communist party. 5 To get a more precise understanding of Leninism, four books are usually considered to have had a strong influence on Leninist movements and are essential to understanding the Leninist viewpoint: What Is to Be Done (1902), Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism (1917), The State and Revolution (1917), and “Left-Wing” Communism: an Infantile Disorder (1920). Those books are still actively read in Leninist circles. 6 LENIN Vladimir, “Left-Wing” Communism: An Infantile Disorder, Chapter 2, 1920. www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1920/lwc/ch02.htm (last accessed 14.04.2023). 7 LENIN Vladimir, What Is to Be Done?, Chapter 4, Point c “Organisation of Workers and Organisation of Revolutionaries”, 1902. www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1901/ witbd/iv.htm (last accessed 14.04.2023). 8 Ibid. Chapter 5, Point b “Can a Newspaper Be a Collective Organiser?”, 1902. www. marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1901/witbd/v.htm (last accessed 14.04.2023). 9 The whole process of the Dictatorship of the proletariat and the abolition of the State is described by Lenin in LENIN Vladimir, The State and Revolution, Chapter “The Economic Basis for the Withering Away of the State”, 1917. www.marxists.org/archive/ lenin/works/1917/staterev/ch05.htm (last accessed 14.04.2023). 10 LENIN Vladimir, “Left-Wing” Communism: An Infantile Disorder, Chapter 2: An Essential Condition of the Bolsheviks’ Success, 1920. https://www.marxists.org/archive/ lenin/works/1920/lwc/ch02.htm (last accessed 14/08.2023) 11 TROTSKY Leon, The Death Agony of Capitalism and the Tasks of the Fourth International, The Transitional Program, 1938. www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1938/tp/ (last accessed 14.04.2023).

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Theoretical considerations

12 An example of an open publication is the Workers’ International News of the Workers’ International League, published in 1938 and acting as the public journal of the structure. It contained quantitatively more articles dealing with other nations’ situations than domestic political issues. On the other hand, Militant published an International Bulletin from the 1960s onward, reserved for its members only and consisting entirely of articles on different national situations around the world. 13 For more details, see TROTSKY Leon, The Permanent Revolution, 1931. www.marxists. org/archive/trotsky/1931/tpr/pr-index.htm (last accessed 14.04.2023).

2

A critical examination of the previous definitions of entryism

Entryism is a political tactic that, so far, has never benefited from a full-fledged analysis in an academic book. However, since entryism has often been an integral part of larger communist tactics, several attempts to define it have already been made in monographs dedicated to the study of communist group’s history. There is a scientific need to conceptualise and get a full analytical frame, which would provide tools for other historians or political scientists to analyse entryism, whatever the groups studied. Before providing such a frame, it is important to look at what other scientists have written on the subject before. Trotsky’s explanation A first description of entryism was given by Trotsky himself in 1933: A Marxist party should, of course, strive to full independence and to the highest homogeneity. But in the process of its formation, a Marxist party often has to act as a faction of a centrist and even a reformist party. Thus the Bolsheviks adhered for a number of years to the same party with the Mensheviks. Thus, the Third International only gradually formed itself out of the second.1 This was a piece of advice given to his followers in Great Britain in 1933. It does not really provide descriptive elements regarding the modalities of entryism, yet it is interesting because the tactic is said to be contextually necessary. This extract also shows that, tactic-wise, the end appears superior to the organisational means. Another interesting part of this recommendation is that it highlights the organisational link that can exist between reformist and revolutionary organisations. To Trotsky, such a link was not unnatural, even in the 1930s. There is also an implicit recognition that the divorce between social democracy and communism has not reached maturity in Britain, leading the communists to elbow their way into the Labour Party and use it as a platform to approach the masses and thus address them. Daniel Bensaïd Two other definitions of entryism are to be found in the works of Daniel Bensaïd, an academic and one of the main thinkers of the French Ligue Communiste DOI: 10.4324/9781003427551-4

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Theoretical considerations

Révolutionnaire (LCR). The first one of those, published in the Cahiers d’Étude et de Recherche, describes entryism as such: A clear distinction needs to be made between fraction work in an enemy organisation, entryism as a thing in itself (which implies a shift of the gravitational centre within the organisation in which it operates as well as a coherent redefinition of all interventions, whether they be in unions or to the youth, depending on the organisation), and our integration within friendly organisations which we want to help evolve in their entirety or their majority.2 Once again, the entryist tactic is not detailed in this extract. However, this description makes an interesting distinction between three modalities – or degrees – of entry: fraction, entry, and integration. Even if what Bensaïd calls “integration” is not detailed in its modalities, it seems to be an understatement for a fusion within another organisation. It appears that entry is thus a means to an end for the organisation that enters the other one while “integration” refers to a process that benefits both organisations. A second mention of entryism by Bensaïd is to be found in one of his academic works: Out of this, Trotsky drew some conclusions for Spain, Belgium, and France. The meagre forces of the Left Opposition have to participate in the united front against fascism by entering within social-democratic parties. This orientation, known as the “French Turn”, instantly became a subject of debate and discord. It constitutes the first experience of what would become “entryism”, which is often seen as characteristic of Trotskyist manoeuvres.3 This passage highlights the “French turn”, which refers to Trotsky’s recommendation of June 1934. However, it does refer to the earlier recommendation made by Trotsky to his English supporters in August 1933, in which he advised them to join the Independent Labour Party.4 Even though Daniel Bensaïd was well aware of this precedent, he chose June 1934 as the date marking the beginning of the entryist strategy. This choice calls for either a correction or, at the very least, a re-examining of the relevance of the English experience of 1933 as a founding experience by putting it into perspective through a comparison with the French situation of 1934. Academics specialised on the far left Another short attempt to define Entryism was made by John Callaghan, a specialist of the British far left, in one article in 1986. In it, Entryism is defined as: the infiltration of a mass organisation by a small revolutionary group that hopes thereby to grow at the expense of the larger party – but the modus operandi and spirit if not the goal of the exercise are the same.5 This excerpt presents two significant points of interest. Firstly, it shows that the question of political activism practised by one organisation within another is a strategy

A critical examination of the previous definitions of entryism 21 adopted by the Bolsheviks from the origins of their political tradition. As we have seen earlier, Trotsky used this experience of the Bolsheviks to legitimise his recommendations to the sections of the International Left Opposition. Callaghan’s definition’s second point of interest emphasises the factional nature of entryist activity. He also characterises entryism as a process of infiltration and explains that the goal of entryism is the growth of the entryist organisation. This definition thus incorporates the notion of modality and the purpose of entryism. However, like the others, it is incomplete because some entryist groups did not practise entryism out of a desire for growth but rather out of a desire for survival or even for more complex reasons, such as the development of a new faction within the infiltrated party (which would not necessarily be under the leadership of the entryist group). The term “infiltration” is also questionable here, as it seems to imply a form of secrecy or even illegality, which is confirmed by the earlier reference to “covert activities”. However, not all entryisms were covert or illegal. Another weakness of this definition is the reference to “small group” entryism, which is again inaccurate. Britain provides the most obvious example of this with Militant, which carried out overt and large-scale entryism so much so that the group was described by journalist Michael Crick as the fifth largest party in Britain in 1986.6 There is no doubt that John Callaghan was aware of such subtleties, and the definition he provided in his article had to remain short for format reasons. A more precise attempt to define Entryism is to be found in a book published in 2012 by French journalist and historian Christophe Bourseiller: There are two forms of entryism. In the first one, the revolutionary militant unfurls his banner and does not hide his convictions. In the second one, he enters a “fraction” and opts for absolute discretion. He conceals his real allegiances.7 This definition needs to be revised. Firstly, it mobilises the vague concept of “semiclandestinity”. Christophe Bourseiller also describes two forms of entrism: “unfurled banner” and “fraction”. If these forms of entrism do exist, the definition needs to be completed because other forms exist. Moreover, it seems to us that the choice of words is misleading: “fraction” work is not to be contrasted with going in with an “unfurled banner”. After examining other sources, “fraction” only defines a modality of entryism in which only a part of the group penetrates another organisation. However, it is not necessarily secret and does not describe the modalities of entryism of the fraction entering the host party. A last attempt to define the concept was made by two academics, Allan Campbell and John McIlroy, in an article dedicated to its application: Entrism can take different forms and dissolution of the invader’s own external organisation with all its members entering the host should be distinguished from partial entry and maintenance of the aggressor’s external organisation.8 This concise definition highlights the variety of genres of entryism and makes it clear that it is a plural set of practices. This inclusive definition appears as a critical reaction to other previous definitions. It is reasoned and rejects the idea of

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Theoretical considerations

infiltration and covert operations as the norm. It should be noted, however, that the terms “invader” and “aggressor” belong to the lexical field of war, which is a clear choice of the authors. This idea is probably supported by the article’s title: “The Trojan Horse: Communist Entryism in the Labour Party”. After examining such definitions as well as their strengths and weaknesses, the need for a new hypothetical definition to provide a clear theoretical framework for the study of Entryism appears necessary. As entrism is an integral part of the history of British communism, this framework will enable an extensive examination of the Entryist tactic, which can serve as a foundation for further academic work on the subject. Thus, this book shall examine all the experiences of the British far left that meet the following suggested broad definition of Entryism: the covert or open penetration of a host political body (an entered party) by another (an entryist group or party) in the short term or the long term (if carried out as part of sui generis Entryism). The entry’s objectives may vary, ranging from recruiting new members to ideological contagion of the whole host through propaganda. The group initiating the entry may send all its forces to the entered party or send only a fraction of them. Entryism ends when the entryist organisation considers that it has exhausted all its possibilities within the entered party, liquidates itself there, or is excluded from it. Out of the observations of the experiences that met this definition, a new, more precise, and exhaustive definition of Entryism will be detailed. Notes 1 TROTSKY Léon, Writings of Leon Trotsky, “Principled Considerations on Entry”, vol 6, September 16, 1933 (1933–34), New York: Pathfinder, 1975, p. 84. 2 BENSAÏD Daniel, “Les Années de Formation de la IVeme Internationale”, Cahiers d’Etude et de Recherche, n°9, 1988, p. 20. 3 BENSAÏD Daniel, Les trotskysmes, Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, Que saisje?, 2002. 4 TROTSKY Léon, Writings of Leon Trotsky, “On the Declaration of Four”, August 21, 1933, vol. 13. Supplement (1929–1933), New York: Pathfinder, 1979, p. 274. 5 CALLAGHAN John, “The Background to ‘Entryism’: Leninism and the British Labour Party”, Journal of Communist Studies, vol. 2, n°4, 1986, pp. 380–403. 6 CRICK Michael, The March of Militant, London: Faber and Faber, 1986, p. 2. 7 BOURSEILLER Christophe, L’extrémisme: Une Grande peur contemporaine, Paris: CNRS Edition, 2012, p. 72. 8 CAMPBELL Alan & MCILROY John, “‘The Trojan Horse’: Communist Entrism in the British Labour Party, 1933–43”, Labor History, vol. 59, n°5, 2018, pp. 513–554.

Part 2

The CPGB before the Second World War

3

The CPGB at its early days and the affiliation tactic

1918–1920 before the foundation Unlike many of its continental counterparts, the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB) had the originality of not finding its origin within a split from a social democratic party. The French Communist Party (PCF), for example, was the product of the will of a majority of the French Section of the Workers’ International (SFIO), then the French representative of the Second International, to create the French Section of the Communist International (SFIC). Thus, at the Tours Congress in December 1920, the communist majority of the SFIO founded what became the PCF.1 This party was then already strong, with a very organised base, and quickly counted 200,000 members only one year after its creation. The split from the SFIO would have taken 60% of the membership with it.2 This creation, out of a social democratic party, provided the newly founded PCF Communist Party with a solid base. This opportunity did not present itself to the British communists, who had to build their party from the Marxist sects3 already existing on the national territory. Five main factions took part in its foundation: the British Socialist Party (BSP), the Socialist Labour Party (SLP), the Workers’ Socialist Federation (WSF), the South Wales Communist Council (SWCC), and the Shop Stewards’ and Workers’ Committees.4 These groups represent only the most important ones involved in the party’s foundation. It is possible to count more than 20 of them.5 The BSP was the most influential group in the process of creating the CPGB. Born in 1911, the BSP was the official descendant of Hyndman’s Social Democratic Federation (SDF), considered the first Marxist organisation in Britain. The BSP had joined the Labour Party in 1916, in which it operated under a loose, federated rather than organised, centralised structure. At the time of the first discussions on the creation of the British Communist Party, the BSP claimed to have 6,000 members, with Klugmann describing this number as highly exaggerated.6 The BSP’s claimed membership was far greater than any other party involved, and it could still wield considerable influence at the time of the CPGB’s foundation. Many of the CPGB’s prominent leaders came from the BSP: William Gallacher, Albert Inkpin, J.F. Hodgson, Harry Pollitt, and Theodore Rothstein. This group had a decisive influence on the future shape of the CPGB in two ways. DOI: 10.4324/9781003427551-6

26

The CPGB before the Second World War

Firstly, the BSP was already active within the Labour Party and did not regard participation in the formal bodies of British representative democracy as taboo. Secondly, it was already used to working within the Labour Party and did not see social democracy as a toxic environment to be kept away from. He did not think that participation in the life of the Labour Party was a compromise of his own revolutionary ideology.7 The SLP, the second main founding party, was also a product of the SDF. It left the SDF in 1903 and claimed to have 1,250 members when the CPGB was founded. The SLP’s doctrine was resolutely anti-parliamentary, mainly because of its De Leonist influences, which saw the factory as the heart of the class struggle. The SLP’s vision of trade unionism was industrial trade unionism, close to a form of anarcho-syndicalism with the will to educate employees in self-management. The question of the link to the Labour Party was very present, and the SLP was essentially opposed to collaboration with the official party of the Trade Unions. On a related issue, for the SLP, participation in elections was permissible, and practised, but an acceptance of parliamentarianism as a means of social change was condemned. Parliament was to serve only as a platform to denounce bourgeois democracy. Out of the SLP, two other significant characters of British communism emerged: Tom Bell and Arthur MacManus. The third main organisation was the Workers’ Socialist Federation, which was organised mostly around Sylvia Pankhurst. This Marxist and feminist organisation strongly resented any possible association with the Labour Party. The fourth main group, the SWCC, was a syndicalist organisation founded in opposition to the Miners Trade Unions of South Wales, which they deemed opportunistic and too moderate. As such, the SWCC rejected any participation in the traditional institutions of social democracy. The fifth-biggest group was the Shop Stewards’ and Workers’ Committees movement, a federation of unionised, often Marxist workers. Those committees served as a pool of recruitment for revolutionary organisations. Two well-known leaders of the CPGB came from this organisation: William Gallacher and John Thomas Murphy. It might be worth mentioning that the Independent Labour Party (ILP) took part in the initial discussions around the creation of a British Communist Party but abandoned this idea and left the conversation as early as March 1919. However, some members of the radical left of the ILP, such as Rajani Palme Dutt, stayed and participated in the founding of the CPGB. Thus, two difficulties were apparent. The first one was the size of the groups founding the CPGB. With the electoral system of the UK and the recent emergence of the Labour Party as a powerful, hegemonic force on the left of the political spectrum, existing as a rival party would be near impossible without either a strong base of support or a strong membership, which those groups did not have. The second one, which is a consequence of the first one, would be the question of participation in elections and parliament through the Labour Party. The BSP and the SLP were in favour of participating in elections, while the WSF and the SWCC were strongly

The CPGB at its early days and the affiliation tactic 27 opposed to this idea. Moreover, while the BSP was convinced that affiliating the CPGB to the Labour Party was the only realistic strategy (as its own experience as an affiliated organisation proved possible), the SLP, SWCC, and WSF were adamant in not joining a Party they considered an enemy rather than an ally. Here is an extract of a provisional resolution formulated by Sylvia Pankhurst in the Workers Dreadnought, the main publication of the WSF, about the Labour Party at the time of the foundation of the CPGB: The British Labour Party is dominated by Opportunist Reformists, Social Patriots, and Trade Union Bureaucrats, who have already allied themselves with capitalism against the workers’ revolution at home and abroad. The construction and constitution of the British Labour Party is such that the working masses cannot express themselves through it. It is affiliated and will remain affiliated to the Second International, so long as that so-called International shall exist.8 Sylvia Pankhurst went as far as writing to Lenin himself, who was in favour of the affiliation of the CPGB to the Labour Party, to express her disagreement on the subject. The situation was thus blocked: a majority of the groups willing to form the Communist Party were against affiliation, while the most numerous group was in favour of it. A solution was found on April 3, 1920, with the constitution of the Communist Unity Group (CUG) at the 7th national conference of the SLP. The CUG was a minority group within the SLP but was formed by most of the active members of the organisation. The CUG published a manifesto arguing in favour of the necessity to create an official Communist Party, and even though it didn’t argue in favour of affiliation, it forced the party to make a move and resume the negotiation with the BSP and the other groups. The question of affiliation was relegated to being of lesser priority and would have to be discussed after the foundation of the CPGB.9 On May 29, 1920, a call for a Unity Convention was thus launched. The main idea behind the strategy of the CUG was that the isolation and continued existence of separate Marxist propaganda groups were not viable strategies. Although they differed on tactics, the CUG recognised that merging Marxist groups remained a priority, as evidenced by their contribution to The Call ahead of the London Unity Conference. No less disastrous, for our Communist movement is the wanton dissipation of revolutionary fervour and energy by the existence of so many isolated groups, which, while agreeing on fundamentals, remain separate on matters of tactics that are minor and secondary to the main object.10 Lenin on the nature of the Labour Party Lenin’s analysis of the Labour Party is very complex and has been the source of much confusion among British communists. While the debate about what to

28

The CPGB before the Second World War

do about the Labour Party was raging among Marxists in Britain, the question was simultaneously discussed in Moscow at the Second Congress of the Third International. A rather heated discussion involved Sylvia Pankhurst of the WSF, William Gallacher of the Shop Stewards Committees, William McLaine of the BSP, and Gregory Zinoviev and Vladimir Lenin for the Comintern. In this conversation, Sylvia Pankhurst expressed her refusal to associate in any form with the British Labour Party: If the English Communists are required to affiliate to the Labour Party the fate of the trades unions and the soviets would thus be given into the hands of the old, ossified trades unions. . . . The most extreme points of view must be defended in politics. That was proved in the question of support for the soviet power in Britain and everywhere that it was a question of coming out boldly. I stand by my point of view and therefore ask you not to adopt the motion on entry into the Labour Party.11 To which William McLaine answered: What is this Labour Party really? The Labour Party is nothing other than the political expression of the trade union-organised workers. The workers in the Labour Party defend the economic standpoint in one question or another. Nine tenths of those who belong to the Labour Party simultaneously belong to the trade unions.12 The idea that the Labour Party was, or was not, the political expression of the British trade unions became one of the keys to the debate on entryism in general in Britain. It was precisely this point, raised at the genesis of the CPGB, that crystallised all the debates throughout the 20th century within the far left and its attitude towards the Labour Party. To some extent, William McLaine was right: a British worker who was a member of a trade union was, in effect, a member of the Labour Party if that trade union was affiliated with the Labour Party. Moreover, the Labour Party was created at the behest of the British trade unions to have official representation in the House of Commons, which would no longer depend on the power and influence games that animated the Liberal Party in the early 20th century. It did not accept individual members until 1918, when a new constitution was adopted. Before this date, the Labour Party was only open to members of its affiliated organisations. Lenin was weighted in the discussion. To him, both points of view were wrong. He started by refuting William McLaine’s analysis by explaining how the Labour Party was not a workers’ party or the political expression of the trade unions. But rather, it was the Party in which the workers were. It was a bourgeois party aiming to “dupe the workers”. During this exchange, Lenin expressed a strong disdain for the leaders of the Labour Party, using their names

The CPGB at its early days and the affiliation tactic 29 as if they were common names for a category of treacherous people: “Let the Thomases and other social-traitors, whom you have called by that name, expel you. That will have an excellent effect upon the mass of the British workers”.13 Those were compared to German social democrats, whom Lenin hated too and with whom he used the same process, going as far as calling the leaders of the Labour Party “the British Noskes and Scheidemanns”.14 This hatred for the British Social Democrats, especially of Ramsay MacDonald and its ideological avatar “evolutionarism”, got a lasting legacy in Trotsky’s works on Great Britain, which would be available to the British audience from 1925 with the publication of Where Is Britain Going?. The main idea is that the Labour Party is a smokescreen for workers and that, as such, it is impossible to get anything revolutionary out of its actions. However, as a rebuttal to Sylvia Pankhurst’s argument, Lenin explained that the BSP has total latitude within the Labour Party for its own propaganda and that this could be weaponised both against the Labour Party and in favour of the nascent Communist Party. According to Lenin, the aim of the Communist organisation would be not only to organise the working class within a party but also to expose social democracy for what it was: a counter-revolutionary organisation. To him, this could have been doable from within the Labour Party for many reasons. Firstly, the experience of the BSP proved that this was possible; its main press organ, The Call, was very aggressive towards the Labour leadership and yet was still authorised within the party. Moreover, the BSP voted in favour of joining the Third International.15 Lenin’s second argument was that the Labour Party was indeed the party in which the working class had its trust. In December 1918, the Labour Party got 22% of the popular vote, a figure to be contrasted with the 1910 election, during which it got only 7.1%. The Labour Party was finally starting to be a major force on the national political landscape. Additionally, the Labour Party had just adopted its 1918 constitution, which, even though mostly symbolic, inscribed the party in a collectivist and socialist logic, assessing its aim as the socialisation of the economy. As a consequence, Lenin’s strategy was dual: the Communist Party had to join the Labour Party to stay as close to the masses as possible, while exposing Social Democracy as a smokescreen for workers. In Marxist phraseology, the idea was to, according to Lenin, “have [a] collaboration between the vanguard of the working class and the rear-guard, the backward workers”.16 To Lenin, isolation from the masses was the main obstacle for the nascent Communist Party. James Klugmann even characterised the period before the foundation of the CPGB as one of “great mass organisations without socialism, small socialist groups without the masses”. Lenin’s recommendation was based on a compromise: entry into the Labour Party was not ideal, but it was necessary and could be functional, as the freedom of speech from which the BSP benefited while inside the Labour Party proved. The role of the communist organisation was then to enter the Labour Party and support it “the same way a rope supports a hanged man”.17

30

The CPGB before the Second World War

One of the main obstacles to the application of Lenin’s recommendation was the dissension among the founding organisations of the CPGB. Most of those were already out of the Labour Party and wanted to join the Third International precisely because they resented social democracy and adhered to the clear revolutionary line promoted by the Comintern. The tension between their beliefs and the recommendation of an open penetration as well as the constitution of a united front with a “workers yet bourgeois” party confused the British Communists.18 This tension will remain central throughout the whole 20th century, leading to everlasting debates on the nature of the Labour Party and on the correct tactic to adopt towards it.19 This confusion could be seen as a possible explanation for the inability of the radical left to emerge as a perennial political force within the British context. The Labour Party was both a structural obstacle (a powerful, nigh-hegemonic big-tent party, being able to recruit on the whole left side of the political spectrum) and a theoretical obstacle (if it is the party of the working class, then what should be the attitude of the revolutionary socialists towards it?). The adoption of the affiliation tactic At the London Unity Convention on July 31 and August 1, 1920, the delegates of each founding organisation of the CPGB voted on which tactic to adopt towards the Labour Party. Two motions were debated. The first motion, suggesting that the Communist Party should be affiliated with the Labour Party, was carried by J.F. Hodgson, a member of the BSP, and therefore, in effect, by an individual already active in Labour. The second motion took the opposite position and proposed that the CPGB should not be affiliated with the Labour Party; William Paul, an SLP activist, carried it. The movers of the two motions were on opposite sides of the issue before the conference.20 It is also interesting to note that the phrase used by the Congress chair and many activists was “go in” Labour Party. The main arguments against affiliation in the convention discussion were that the Labour Party was far too corrupt and that if the Communist Party wanted to remain ideologically pure, it should not even get close to the Labour Party. Another argument that arose was more tactical: how to expose the reformists as the traitors they are while simultaneously being part of their organisation?21 Hodgson pointed out that the British had yet to have their own Scheidemann or Kerensky, alluding to the German and Russian experiences. The British working class had to go through the stages of a ruling social democracy to understand that it was useless to them. The parallel with the Soviet model was taken a step further by Hodgson, who referred to its flexibility. Membership in the Labour Party was to be only a step, a means, not a principle on which to remain flexible. He illustrated this example by saying, “A week or two before the outbreak of the October revolution for, Bolsheviks were getting ready their lists of candidates for the Duma”, concluding that “[t]hree weeks or a month after they abolished the Duma. That is the way to be flexible”.22

The CPGB at its early days and the affiliation tactic 31 The question of affiliation with the Labour Party was thus a question of tactics only. A peculiarity of the British communists was that few were from intellectual backgrounds, and the cadres were often members of the working class,23 preferring to refer to their experience rather than deepen Marxist theory. Thus, the resolution of these tactical questions was based on individual experiences. The downside of this non-intellectualism was that it quickly became a theoretical dependence on the Soviets, who did not necessarily have a very accurate understanding of the British context.24 Amongst the counter-arguments raised was the idea that the communists were active within the trade unions, which, incidentally, were where the members of the Labour Party were. As such, they were already leading the same fights as the Labour Party members in their organisations, so why shouldn’t that apply to the Parties themselves? If political cooperation was possible in the workplace, why wouldn’t it be possible within political parties?25 The arguments in favour of affiliation were roughly the same as those raised by William McLaine at the Comintern: the BSP members benefited from total freedom of speech within the Labour Party and could easily expose the Party’s leadership from within. Moreover, the pro-affiliations argued that the Labour Party could not be reduced to the actions of its leadership and that it was a workers’ party. From a tactical point of view, being part of the labour machine – and therefore the pool of workers of which it is composed – would make it much easier for communists to exercise their propaganda. It is also interesting to note that the conference presidency mentioned an intermediate position. This position consisted of “go[ing] half in”, in what could be called fractional entryism, where only one fraction of the organisation infiltrates the other party.26 It is easy to see the irony here. The pro-affiliation arguments are the opposite of Lenin’s. For the Soviet leader, it was a fundamental mistake to regard the Labour Party as purely a workers’ party. However, the pro-affiliations’ entire reasoning was based on this premise: the Labour Party was a workers’ party. Even before the creation of the first real communist party, there was a problem with interpretations of the Labour Party in the light of Leninist theory. Even though the affiliation tactic was adopted, it was difficult to describe the CPGB as convinced by its own decision. The tactic was adopted with a narrow majority of 100 votes in favour of affiliation against 85 against it. William Mellor, one of the advocates of affiliation, said just after the vote that it would be better to wait three months before setting the affiliation application in motion to manoeuvre cautiously on this issue, given the very relative victory for Labour Party affiliation. However, on August 10, 1920, less than two weeks after the Unity Convention, a letter of application for affiliation was sent to the Labour Party by the CPGB leadership. According to James Klugmann, this letter of application for affiliation was “no diplomatic document”.27 Indeed, it only presented the programme of the Communist Party: a revolutionary path to socialism, the fight against reformism, and the establishment of a Dictatorship of the proletariat as a transition before the abolition of the State. After this state of affairs came the formal application for affiliation.

32

The CPGB before the Second World War

Many sources and former members of the CPGB agree that the application for affiliation sent in 1920 was formulated in such a way that it would be rejected. Here is an example of the wording of this short letter: Believing as we do, that time and circumstances will ultimately lead the British working class to adopt the tactics that we propose, we consider it our duty to be in the ranks of the organised Labour movement, seeking to amend its policy in such respect as we hold to be necessary for the final emancipation of the working class.28 The tone and intention were clear and relatively aggressive politically, and they could be reinterpreted as follows: the Labour Party does not allow for the emancipation of the working class, and the Communist Party proposes to join it to correct its ideology. This idea was developed by Hugo Dewar, who argued that It [was] possible, even probable, that the crude manner of the party’s first approach to the Labour Party was due not so much to a lack of finesse as to the still strong feeling against having anything at all to do with the reformist. Dewar’s hypothesis can be confirmed by an article dated December 2, 1920, published in The Communist, the press organ of the CPGB. In this article, William Paul, the CPGB delegate in Moscow, reported on a discussion about the political synthesis within the party between the initially divergent positions of the BSP and the SLP on affiliation. During this discussion, he reported that Lenin confessed his optimism about rejecting the affiliation: Talking on the Labour Party, Lenin said he was very glad to learn that it had refused to accept the affiliation application of the Communist Party. It was a good move to have applied for affiliation, because the refusal of the Labour Party to accept Communists in its ranks showed the masses exactly where the Labour Party stood.29 Lenin remained consistent with himself and his logic of exposing social democracy. However, historians such as Klugmann and Callaghan seem to agree that British communists were then convinced that the days of Labour and social democracy were numbered, with a revolution to come in the next few years. The rejection or acceptance of the Labour Party was ultimately only of short-term importance to many in the CPGB. There was thus a form of contradiction here: on the one hand, affiliation to the Labour Party was a blocking point for unity, but on the other hand, sectarianism towards the Labour Party was an essential attribute of the CPGB. In the same article, William Paul reports that Lenin was quite optimistic about this schizophrenia as long as the organisation managed to maintain its cohesion:

The CPGB at its early days and the affiliation tactic 33 It was a good omen for the future that these two groups were able to come together. And it was a good thing that the ex-S.L.P. men, who were so keen against affiliation with the Labour Party, realised the value of revolutionary discipline by refusing to split the new party because their own position had not been accepted. Likewise, when the Labour Party threw out the request for affiliation it was the B.S.P. element that was tested and it stood firm. To have passed through two such severe trials, and to have maintained the solidarity of the organisation, was a tribute to the seriousness of the comrades who had formed the Communist Party.30 The question of affiliation with the Labour Party appears to be of secondary importance in those reports. To be able to confirm or deny such an observation, it is vital to conduct a proper examination of the reaction of the Labour Party to the repeated demands of the Communist Party to affiliate. 1920–1928: the formal requests for affiliation The August 1920 request for affiliation was immediately rejected by the Labour Party. The cause for rejection was that the principles and agenda of the Communist Party were incompatible with the Labour Party constitution. This led the communists to denounce this rejection as being in bad faith, as the major constituting organisation of the CPGB, the BSP, used to be an affiliated organisation of the Labour Party, with only minor ideological differences with the CPGB. The communists then intended to capitalise politically on this rejection and pursued an active correspondence with the Labour Party leadership. This correspondence was to be published and distributed among Labour Party ranks with propagandist intentions, initiating the CPGB’s strategy of exposing the Labour Party Leadership as refusing cooperation with the most militant elements of the working class. The BSP’s past history of being within the Labour Party might actually have been a reason for the refusal to affiliate the CPGB. While being active within the Labour Party, the BSP (which was affiliated to the Third International) had a long record of denunciation of Labour’s leadership. Furthermore, The Call, its press organ, used to publish virulent articles about the leaders of their host party. Here is a quote from a June 1919 article entitled Lackeys of the Master Class: “Oh, those ever-obedient lackeys of the master class, our Labour leaders! Will the workers ever realise how they are betrayed by them each time they charge them with some mission?”31 The BSP was no small group within the Labour Party and was able to get 25 candidates running at the 1918 election under the Labour Party label. It also had an MP sitting in Parliament, Cecil Lestrange Malone, who joined the BSP in 1919. The BSP was thus a well-known element of the Labour Party leadership. The Labour Party, through Arthur Henderson, pointed at the BSP’s past record and added that the objective of the CPGB was the destruction of the Labour Party. Even if this argument was strong, the CPGB countered it by saying that

34

The CPGB before the Second World War

only the methods employed by both parties diverged while their objectives were the same, and, as such, those could be debated from within a common structure as the Labour Party annual conference enabled it. This argument relied on the assertion that the CPGB would conform to the party discipline within the Labour Party, only using its freedom of expression to contribute to the debate. Thus, the presence of a revolutionary group within Labour would not be in contradiction with the Labour Party’s constitution since the revolutionaries would not act contrary to its rules. The affiliation was first rejected on November 20 at a Labour Party Conference in London by 380 votes against and 283 in favour. The CPGB argued that the affiliation got rejected only because of the block votes of the Trade Union leaders. The matter took a more serious turn at the June 1921 National Annual Conference of the Labour Party, during which affiliation was defended by Arthur Cook, the delegate from the Miners’ Federation, and the opposition to it was led by Arthur Henderson. The same arguments as the ones before were mentioned, with an emphasis on the subordination link between the CPGB and Moscow. Affiliation was once again rejected with a vote of 224,000 in favour of it versus 4,115,000 against it through a card vote. The CPGB used a technicality to delegitimise the vote, as it is apparent from a pamphlet of the party dating from August 6, 1921: the position of Brighton, therefore, was that on a straight vote for or against admitting the Communist Party a vote of approximately 2,000,000 was practical certainty in favour of admission and this, even if it did not carry the day, would be a severe blow for the Labour Party Executive. At any rate, the Labour Party Executive were taking no chances and by clever manoeuvre succeeded in shelving the matter by a motion for the “previous question” which was carried by a considerable vote.32 As such, the CPGB could justify new attempts to obtain affiliation with the Labour Party. In fact, this one was the first of a long series of nine attempts until the Second World War. And the CPGB attempted to politically capitalise on those rejections. The question of affiliation served the cause of the Communists from within the CLPs, as shown by an extract from the same pamphlet: The refusal of the Labour Party Executive to admit the Communist Party was in the nature of a boomerang which, having been launched, rebounded, and did much more damage to the Labour Party Executive than it did to the Communist party. It was immediately followed by protests from local labour parties all over the country and the Communist Party, its aims, objects and methods was the subject of discussion inside those bodies for a considerable time. Full advantage of these discussions was taken by C.P. members who were delegates on local Labour Parties.33

The CPGB at its early days and the affiliation tactic 35 CPGB members were often veteran trade unionists who enjoyed a certain level of prestige within the labour movement. As such, they were considered comrades by their Labour Party counterparts and welcomed into the CLPs. The debates surrounding affiliation were used as a means of education and revolutionary agitation by the communists. The issue of affiliation was shifted towards a debate on the methods and leadership of the Labour Party, which allowed the CPGB to assert that “[t]he difference between the revolutionary aims and methods of the C.P. and those of the reactionary leaders of the Labour Party, between dictatorship and democracy, and between the Third International and the Second were emphasised and driven home”.34 The debate provided a solid basis for the CPGB to openly infiltrate the Labour Party, mostly due to their ability to join through trade union membership. Furthermore, it appears that local sections of the CPGB requested local affiliation with a CLP. However, when the national decision was made to not admit the CPGB at a national level, local sections of the Labour Party were instructed to follow suit by “refus[ing] admission to C.P. branches that applied for local affiliation and expel[ling] those that had already been admitted”.35 The CPGB denounced this as unfair since, at a local level, things seemed to be working well for individuals who knew each other. If a balance sheet for the initial application were to be created, it would not be positive or negative. It is more precise to say that it was rather a “preparation” for the future of both parties. This refusal gave the CPGB the tools to lead the fight from inside the CLPs, which, in turn, led the Labour Party leadership to implement a range of measures to combat communist influence within the party. The Communist Party made a new application for affiliation in June 1921, less than a month after the first rejection. This triggered an active correspondence between the two parties, in which both parties adopted different strategies to counter each other’s arguments. The Labour Party attempted to avoid debating the compatibility of the Communist Party’s affiliation with its own constitution, instead focusing on the question of parliamentary democracy. Indeed, the Communist Party did not view parliament as a means to implement socialism but rather as a way to represent the working class and make their voices heard. The debate between the two parties was thus more about the conflict between “parliamentary democracy” and “dictatorship of the proletariat”, with the Labour Party making a tactical decision to focus on the former. Once again, the CPGB used the responses to the arguments of the Labour Party as propaganda by publishing them in short pamphlets addressed to both Labour and CP members, giving them arguments in favour of the affiliation. The high point of this correspondence was the March 1922 questionnaire addressed to the Communist Party by Labour’s NEC, which was previously published as such by the CP for propagandist reasons. The arguments can be summarised in Table 3.1:

36

The CPGB before the Second World War

Table 3.1 Arguments raised by the Labour Party against affiliation and their CPGB counter-arguments Labour Party criticism

CPGB rebuttal

CPGB counter-argument

This is not mentioned in The CPGB and the Labour Party The Labour Party’s aim share a common objective the constitution of the is to achieve “The through the Aim and Value Labour Party. political, social, and section (Clause IV) of economic emancipation Labour’s constitution. of the people by means of parliamentary democracy”. The Communist Party is not Nothing in the constitution The CPGB attitude towards legalism is not a principled of the Labour a legalist party. position. Working class Party forbids extra organisations tactics are parliamentary actions. conditioned by the intensity The ILP just joined a The Communist Party of the social movements. The belongs to another different international Vienna International, of which than that of the Labour worldwide organisation, the ILP is a member of doesn’t Party (the Vienna the Third International. exclude rebellions, direct International). action, and the use of strength if necessary. As such, why should the CPGB be treated differently? If one of the main core Labour Party MPs are free The ILP shares the component of the Labour Party of their own actions, while same principles as shares this principle, why Communist MPs would the Communist Party should the CPGB be treated a towards its MPs. Its be under the control of different way. constitution argues that their party. “If elected, [the ILP MP] will support the Party on all questions coming within the scope of the principles of the I.L.P.” If free speech is guaranteed and The CPGB would be more The current situation is because Labour and the CPGB different than it would loyal to the Comintern share the same objectives, be where the CPGB that it would be to the then, the CPGB would have no affiliated to the Labour Labour Party. Party. The CPGB would reasons to not be loyal to the Labour party. be loyal to the Labour Party as long as it enjoys the same rights as other affiliated organisations. Criticising the leadership of the Party is one of those rights.

Nevertheless, the arguments of the CPGB never enabled it to affiliate to the Labour Party. Here, Table 3.2 shows the results of the votes for affiliation at the Labour Party conferences:

The CPGB at its early days and the affiliation tactic 37 Table 3.2 A history of the votes against/in favour of CPGB affiliation from 1921 to 1924 Year of the vote on affiliation

Votes against

Votes in favour

1921 1922 1923 1924

4,115,000 3,086,000 2,880,000 3,185,000

224,000 261,000 366,000 193,000

Communist presence within the CLPs Despite the Labour Party’s refusal to accept the Communist Party into its ranks, the Labour Party faced a much more complicated problem to manage: the presence of communist activists within it as “individual members”. Although the Communist Party did not have the right to be affiliated with the Labour Party collectively, its activists could still be members through two entry channels: individual membership in the party (which became possible in 1918) and membership through a trade union. In fact, trade union members affiliated with the Labour Party were full members of the latter by right. Communist worker militants were, in principle, all members of a union, and often these militants were among the most involved and active in their structure. This intense activism of the Communists, combined with their tendency to take the lead in trade union struggles, made them valuable and appreciated representatives by their fellow fighters. As a result, many unions sent Communist delegates to party congresses. This strategy can be documented by circulars sent out by the communist leadership, which clearly explained the attitudes towards the CLPs, the actions to be taken there, and the positions to be taken. In this respect, the August 1921 circular signed by the party’s organisational secretary, Ernie Cant, is revealing. The circular gives a set of precise instructions to the London District Section of the Communist Party: • Apply for affiliation of local CP branches with the relevant Labour parties. • Apply only through the use of a uniform model letter accompanied by a permission request to send a Communist delegate to the Local Labour Party. • Do the same for delegates from cooperative party sections to local labour sections. • Intensify local propaganda on the question of affiliation. • Give up offices in local labour parties if those parties act against Communists or write anti-Communist motions in the branch in question. • Stand as a Labour candidate in elections only on the basis of a Communist Party-approved programme. • Support a non-Communist Labour candidate only after validation by the Communist Party. • Get elected to positions that could help fight against anti-communist positions.36

38

The CPGB before the Second World War

The Labour Party, therefore, tried to find a legal way to prevent the presence of communist activists in the party. The first attempt was made at the Labour Party’s annual conference in Edinburgh from June 27 to 30, 1922. Arthur Henderson brought a new proposed rule to the convention, which stated that individuals who wished to be delegates for local Labour Parties at national or local conferences of the Labour Party should accept the constitution of the Labour Party. Additionally, the proposal suggested that no one should be eligible to be a delegate if they were a member of any organisation whose objective was to return candidates to Parliament or local Government Authority other than those who have been approved to run in association with the Labour Party. Clearly, this rule had no purpose other than to block communist activists from becoming involved in local Labour branches and from being elected to representative positions. Despite a victory for the Labour Party Executive with 342 votes for and 161 against, opposition to the new rule was notable. At the local level, the implementation of the Edinburgh amendment met with much greater opposition. One reason for this is that although Labour activists were suspicious of the Communist Party as a rival, they accepted Communist activists on an individual basis, much like brothers in arms in their industrial struggles. In early 1923, many local labour parties and unions passed resolutions calling for the withdrawal of the Edinburgh Amendment or even went against it by electing recognised Communists as their leaders or delegates to local assemblies. The increase of more than 100,000 votes in favour of Communist Party affiliation with the Labour Party in 1923, as shown in Table 3.2, can be attributed to the backlash of local Labour parties and trade union branches against the Edinburgh Amendment. This is evident in the quality of the delegates sent to the annual convention. In 1922, only seven Communists attended the Edinburgh convention as delegates, whereas in 1923, 38 were present at the London convention. The Edinburgh Amendment was eventually repealed following a vote called by Arthur Henderson himself, on the grounds that it would be difficult to implement.37 The relationship between the Communist Party and the Labour Party was reexamined at the 1924 Annual Congress of the Labour Party. As a result, CPGB membership was once again denied, and there was a ban on Communist Party members being selected as “Labour” candidates in general elections. Moreover, the Congress completely abolished the option for a CPGB member to become an individual member of the Labour Party through classical membership.38 An examination of the figures here may confirm the theory that labour activists made a distinction between the Communist Party, which they rejected, and its activists, which they accepted. As mentioned earlier, the vote for affiliation of the CPGB with the Labour Party was 3,185,000 to 193,000 against affiliation. However, the vote on whether CPGB members should be able to join the Labour Party by way of individual membership resulted in a final result of 1,804,000 to 1,504,000 against the option of joining.39 Thus, the 1924 Congress, by prohibiting individual Communist Party members from joining the Labour Party in the traditional way, marked the beginning of underground Communist entry activities within the Labour Party. Until then, the entry

The CPGB at its early days and the affiliation tactic 39 of individual Communist activists was perfectly legal, so the question of the formality of their presence was not an issue. Many questions were raised about how the recent ban would be implemented and how far it would go. A sub-committee was set up to oversee the implementation of the measure, and on February 7, 1925, the Labour Party Executive Committee clarified the issue by stating that the exclusion also applied to Communists who joined the Labour Party through their trade union memberships.40 As a result of the committee’s findings, it was proposed that membership in the Labour Party would not be granted to anyone who is a current member of the Communist Party, including at the local level. Furthermore, if an individual had previously joined the Communist Party, they would not be allowed to retain their membership in the Labour Party. This proposal was discussed at the Liverpool Congress, and after a vote of 2,870,000 in favour and 321,000 against, it was put into effect.41 The setbacks faced by the CPGB prompted them to increase the production of militant material with the aim of gaining acceptance for the Communist Party’s presence within the Labour Party. This is exemplified by the publication of the pamphlet titled The Communist Party and Labour Party Affiliation in 1924. The pamphlet’s subtitle was Some Questions and Answers Addressed to ALL WORKERS Affiliated to the Labour Party, with an emphasis on “all workers”. The pamphlet, which was very short, consisted of only four pages and presented an argument in the form of a question-and-answer format.42 Its purpose was to equip both Labour and Communist activists with sound arguments on the issue. The process of expelling Communists from the Labour Party, which began in 1924 and was further reinforced in 1925, marked the end of the tactic of open infiltration and, at the same time, the beginning of the clandestine entry of Communists into local Labour Parties. The Trade Unions as doors to the Labour Party, the minority movement years Before delving into a more detailed examination of Communist activity within the Labour Party, it is worth discussing their involvement in the trade unions, which, as we have previously noted, served as their primary entry point to the Labour Party. In June 1923, a list was compiled identifying over 100 branches of trade unions and workers’ committees that supported the affiliation of the Communist Party with the Labour Party.43 Three unions backed the party on a national level: the National Amalgamated Furnishing Trades Association (NAFTA), the National Union of Distributive and Allied Workers (NUDAW), and the Garment Workers’ Union. The work of trade unions was of paramount importance to British communists, as the organisation of workers against their often reformist union leadership was one of the issues that animated the communist movement internationally. To address this, the Communist International (CI) established a provisional international trade union committee in 1920, which was commonly known as Mezhsovprof. After the Third Congress of the CI in the summer of 1921, this committee was rebranded as the Red International of Labour Unions (RILU, also known as

40 The CPGB before the Second World War Profintern). Following a centralising approach inspired by the functioning of the Comintern, the Profintern viewed the trade union as an extension of the party and directly under its control.44 In January 1921, the British communists established the British office of the organisation, with Ted Lismer as secretary in Manchester and Harry Pollitt as committee secretary in London. Local branches were established in Scotland, Yorkshire, South Wales, and the Midlands. Shortly after the formation of the Red Trade Union International, Harry Pollitt took over the secretariat of the British bureau. Despite its strong radicalism and sectarianism, the British bureau did not aim to split the trade union movement but rather to engage in internal struggles against the various union leaderships. During the provisional committee period, their propaganda was mostly general and theoretical, promoting Marxist ideas and revolution. However, after the establishment of the Profintern in July 1921, their propaganda became more concrete, militant, and focused on local workers’ struggles. They advocated for solidarity among trade union branches and their reorganisation. The CPGB was able to seize the opportunity in the trade union movement as the RILU sought a way to organise the left of the British unions. The solution came from the British miners in the form of the Minority Movements, formed in late August and early November 1922.45 These movements brought together the most militant members of the trade union sections who were disappointed with the lack of radicalism in their leadership and aimed to reorient it towards a more combative class struggle. The movements continued to grow, and on January 26, 1924, the first national centre of the Miners’ Minority Movement (MMM) was established. One of the initial and prominent outcomes of the formation of MMM was the appointment of Arthur J. Cook, a revolutionary who claimed to follow Marxist and Leninist ideologies, as the Secretary of the South Wales Miners’ Federation.46 The organised efforts of the British communists in the trade union movement were not limited to the miners’ movement. At the 6th National Congress of the CPGB in Manchester in May 1924, the party decided to support the Minority Movements and set a date for the establishment of a national structure to unite them. On August 23–24, 1924, more than 270 delegates from Minority Movements, representing over 200,000 workers, met and established the National Minority Movement (NMM). The NMM issued a manifesto to the Trades Union Congress (TUC), which convened the following month. The manifesto proposed various measures, including a one-pound wage increase, a minimum wage of four pounds per week, a 44-hour workweek, the reorganisation of trade councils, and the establishment of a general workers’ council. One of the measures that deserve particular attention is the establishment of factory committees. These committees were perhaps the clearest reflection of the CPGB’s influence within the NMM. The organisation of workers by factory rather than by trade was the first step towards the call for the creation of soviets. Harry Pollitt of the Communist Party was elected General Secretary of the organisation, and Tom Mann was elected Chairman.47 Like the MMM, the aim of the National Minority Movement (NMM) was not to form an opposition to the TUC, but rather to strengthen it and structure the British working class around a radical class struggle platform. This allowed the

The CPGB at its early days and the affiliation tactic 41 Communist Party to have an influence on the TUC that was disproportionate to its number of militants, bypassing the Labour Party and benefiting from a power of influence through the trade union movement. The NMM was more popular than the CPGB itself, and it was mainly through this organisation that the party took action with the workers during the 1926 general strike. The NMM had an additional objective, which was to broaden the influence of the Comintern within the British unions in order to integrate them into a unified national and international workers’ struggle. In January 1925, a Unity Conference was held in London, which gathered more than 630 delegates, representing nearly 600,000 workers. At this congress, resolutions were passed expressing the British workers’ solidarity with workers in the colonies in their struggle against the exploitation of imperialist powers. The importance of the intersectionality of the trade union struggle was also emphasised, with an eye on future struggles.48 The NMM published numerous pamphlets that aimed to build connections between Russian and British workers, and many publications by Soviet CP members were distributed as pamphlets within the movement.49 To sum up, the contrast between the Communist Party’s strong trade union activity and the process of rejection of communists by the Labour Party throughout 1925, culminating in the annual Liverpool Labour Party Congress, is noteworthy. The Liverpool Conference endorsed the idea that Communists could no longer enter the Labour Party through the trade union door. This measure was likely intended to be conservative and a reaction to the Communists’ influence within the trade union movement. Work within the CLPs after 1925 The Liverpool Congress sparked a strong reaction from the left wing of the Labour Party when it decided to exclude all communists, regardless of their reasons for being members. This drastic measure of purging communists was perceived as a right-wing shift in leadership that went against the socialist foundations of the party. In response, a dozen local Labour parties held their first meeting in Bethnal Green, London, on November 21, 1925, to organise themselves in the Greater London Left-Wing Provisional Committee.50 The emergence of a left-wing movement within the Labour Party was discussed by the CPGB, and in October 1925, the party passed a resolution in support of its creation.51 The Left-Wing Movement’s Provisional Committee’s second conference was held on January 23, 1926, again in Bethnal Green, and brought together around 50 local Labour sections. During this conference, a programme was adopted and a coordinating committee was formed. According to James Klugmann, the congress was given a general mandate by the committee to secure the support of Labour MPs and parliamentary candidates and to provide assistance to isolated or minority individuals within the movement, whether they were Communists or not, whose position might be endangered by the right. The sympathy shown for Communists can be explained by a sense of camaraderie on an individual level as well as the severity of the repressive measures that were being applied against them. Tensions

42

The CPGB before the Second World War

began to emerge within the local sections over the Liverpool decision, and some refused to expel the Communists, given that they had been working alongside them for many years. These refusals were met with a strong reaction from the party leadership, which expelled 27 local Labour sections for insubordination on this issue between 1926 and 1929, 13 of whom were expelled in 1926. On June 19, 1926, the third London Meeting of the Left Movement voted for the withdrawal of the measures against the Communists, among other socialist demands. The first national conference of what became the National Left-Wing Movement was held in September 1926. On October 16 and 17, 1926, the 8th Congress of the British Communist Party asked its Central Committee to work as much as possible to develop this Left-Wing Movement, both in terms of its programmatic goals and in terms of expanding its militant base. The infiltration of Communists into the Labour Party through oppositional groups to the leadership’s actions quickly proved to be effective. As of 1926, there were still 150 Communist Party fractions operating within the Labour Party, with 87 of them located in London. Additionally, 48 CLPs continued to advocate for Communist Party affiliation. In 1927, it was reported that the British Communist Party had 1,455 active members in the Labour Party. This figure is particularly impressive when compared to the 7,900 members claimed by the CPGB at that time, meaning that almost 20% of the CPGB’s membership was still active within the Labour Party.52 Despite the Labour leadership’s best efforts, the vote to expel the Communists only achieved a narrow victory. Even though Communists were excluded by statute and the Communist Party was permanently denied membership, it seemed impossible for the Labour leadership to completely eradicate the Communist presence in the party. Conclusion The entryist tactic adopted by the CPGB within the Labour Party ultimately proved to be a mixed success. Despite attempts to gain affiliation with the Labour Party, the CPGB was repeatedly denied official presence within the party, culminating in the Liverpool Congress of 1925, which banned any Communist Party members from joining. Nevertheless, the CPGB maintained influence within the British labour movement through their presence in trade unions, particularly through the National Minority Movement and their success in the unemployed movement. The party’s presence within local Labour parties suffered due to the leadership’s reaction, but the CPGB still maintained a strong underground presence through the National Left-Wing Movement. Overall, it is difficult to make a qualitative assessment of the Communist Party’s activity within the Labour Party during its first six years of existence. While the entryist strategy was effective in terms of its reach (with almost 20% of Communist Party members also being members of the Labour Party by the end of the 1920–1926 period), it did not lead to mass conversions. Moreover, changes in the Comintern’s directives led the CPGB to shift its tactics towards the Labour Party, adopting a “class against class” logic and ending efforts to gain acceptance within the party. The communists would thus withdraw progressively from the Labour

The CPGB at its early days and the affiliation tactic 43 Party, fighting against it openly and wherever they could. This temporary divorce would find an end with the start of the popular front tactic of 1934. Notes 1 VIGREUX Jean, Le Congrès de Tours, Dijon: EUD, 2020. 2 MARTELLI Roger, Prendre sa carte 1920–2009. Données nouvelles sur les effectifs du PCF, Bobigny: Conseil général de la Seine-Saint-Denis, Fondation Gabriel Péri, 2010, p. 62. 3 The expression sect is to be understood as political sect. The use of this concept has been chosen to provide continuity between the works of contemporary historians on the subject who are using the same concept. See, for example, KELLY John, Contemporary Trotskyism: Parties, Sects and Social Movements in Britain, London & New York: Routledge, 2018. 4 KLUGMAN James, History of the Communist Party of Great Britain Vol 1: Formation and Early Years 1918–1924, London: Lawrence & Wishart, p. 17. 5 A list of the groups involved in the founding of the party can be found in the section of the minutes of the first party convention naming the delegates from each group involved in the operation. Many of these were local groups, such as the Greenock Workers Social Committee, but others were national in scope, such as the Guild Communist Group, from which Arnot and Mellor, two Communist Party cadres, came. CPGB, Communist Unity Convention, London, July 31st and August 1st, 1920, Official Report, PHM: CP/CENT/CONG/01/01. 6 KLUGMAN James, History of the Communist Party of Great Britain Vol 1 . . . op. cit., p. 17. 7 See Chapter 11 of CHALLINOR Raymond, The Origins of British Bolshevism, 1977. www.marxists.org/history/etol/writers/challinor/1977/british-bolshevism/ch11.htm (last accessed 14.04.2023). 8 PANKHURST Sylvia, “The Communist Party: Provisional Resolutions Towards a Programme”, The Workers’ Dreadnought, 1920. www.marxists.org/archive/pankhurstsylvia/1920/resolutions.htm (last accessed 14.04.2023). 9 Communist Unity Group, Manifesto on Communist Unity: Issued by the S.L.P. Unofficial Conference, Held at Nottingham, Easter Saturday and Sunday April 3rd and 4th 1920, WCML: 36017274. 10 BELL Thomas, “The Communist Unity Group. Our Point of View”, The Call, July 29, 1920. 11 LENIN Vladimir, Collected Works, 4th English Edition, Vol. 31, Speech on Affiliation to the British Labour Party, Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1966, pp. 257–263. 12 Ibid. 13 Ibid. 14 Ibid. 15 KLUGMAN James, History of the Communist Party of Great Britain Vol 1 . . . op. cit., p. 32. 16 LENIN Vladimir, Collected Works, 4th English Edition, Vol. 31 . . . op. cit., pp. 257–263. 17 Ibid., p. 88. 18 CALLAGHAN John, “The Background to ‘Entrism’: Leninism and the British Labour Party”, Journal of Communist Studies, vol. 2, n°4, 1986. 19 TRANMER Jeremy, “Squaring the Circle: The Extreme Left and the Labour Party”, Revue LISA/LISA E-journal, vol. 12, n°8, 2014. 20 CPGB, Communist Unity Convention . . . op. cit. 21 Ibid. 22 Ibid., p. 33. 23 DEWAR Hugo, Communist Politics in Britain: The CPGB From Its Origins to the Second World War, London: Pluto Press, 1976, p. 35.

44 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49

50 51 52

The CPGB before the Second World War CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left in British Politics, Oxford: Blackwell, 1987, p. 28. CPGB, Communist Unity Convention . . . op. cit., p. 31. Ibid. KLUGMAN James, History of the Communist Party of Great Britain Vol 1 . . . op. cit., p. 167. Letter from the CPGB to the Labour Party leadership, August 10, 1920, available in the pamphlet The Communist Party and the Labour Party, published in 1921 by the CPGB at the attention of Communist Party and Labour Party members, WCML: 36002048. PAUL William, “Lenin on Communist Tactics in Britain”, The Communist, December 2, 1920. Ibid. ROTHSTEIN Theo, “Lackeys of the Master Class”, The Call, June 5, 1919, p. 1. CPGB, “The Communist Party and the Labour Party”, Pamphlet, August 6, 1921, p. 2, WCML: 36002048. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid., p. 3. CANT Ernest, A Summary of Decisions Made at Special District Council Meeting Help August 6th to Discuss Tactics to Be Adopted by Communists in Relation to the Labour Party, August 1921, PHM: CP/IND/DUTT/26/01. KLUGMAN James, History of the Communist Party of Great Britain Vol 1 . . . op. cit., p. 178. CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left . . . op. cit., p. 31. DEWAR Hugo, Communist Politics in Britain . . . op. cit., p. 38. KLUGMAN James, History of the Communist Party of Great Britain Vol 2: The General Strike 1925–1926, London: Lawrence & Wishart LTD, 1980, p. 52. Ibid., p. 59. CPGB, The Communist Party and Labour Party Affiliation, Some Questions and Answers Addressed to All Workers Affiliated to the Labour Party, Pamphlet, 1924, WCML: 36002983. KLUGMAN James, History of the Communist Party of Great Britain Vol 2 . . . op. cit., p. 177. WOLIKOW Serge, L’Internationale communiste (1919–1943). Le Komintern ou le rêve déchu du parti mondial de la révolution, Ivry-sur-Seine: Éditions de l’Atelier/Éditions ouvrières, 2010, p. 38. “Miner’s Minority Movement”, The Communist, September 9, 1922. CPGB, Speeches and Documents of the Sixth Conference of the CPGB, May 1924, p. 78, PHM: CP/CENT/CONG/01/06. KLUGMAN James, History of the Communist Party of Great Britain Vol 2 . . . op. cit., pp. 283. See, for example, UTLEY Freda, What is the Red International Union of Labour Unions, Pamphlet, PHM: CP/CENT/IND/11/03. Or DUTT Rajani Palme, Free the Colonies, Pamphlet, PHM: CP/CENT/IND/11/02. In the same archive, many pamphlets are dedicated to the construction of international workers’ solidarity, such as LOZOVSKY, “British and Russian Workers” or UTLEY Freda, The 10th Anniversary of the Russian Revolution and the RILU, PHM: CP/CENT/ IND/11/03. PARKER Lawrence, Communists and Labour, The National Left-Wing Movement 1925–1929, The Rotten Elements, 2018, p. 26. KLUGMAN James, History of the Communist Party of Great Britain Vol 2 . . . op. cit., p. 258. CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left . . . op. cit., p. 34.

4

The CPGB in the 1930s Entryism at the service of the popular front

The rise of fascism in Great Britain and the first negotiations Labour – CPGB On January 30, 1933, German President Von Hindenburg asked Adolf Hitler, the leader of the NSDAP, to become Chancellor and form the new government of the Weimar Republic. Faced with a divided Reichstag and lacking a clear majority in the German parliament, this move marked a turning point in history as Europe was grappling with a rise in extreme nationalism and fascism. Benito Mussolini’s fascist government had already been in power in Italy since 1922, and the Spanish nationalists attempted to seize power with a military coup by General Sanjurjo in the summer of 1932. Similarly, in Portugal, Antonio Oliveira de Salazar became president of the council on July 5, 1932, and gradually took full control of the country, establishing the New State and making his party, the União Nacional, the only authorised one. While Salazar’s regime was not explicitly fascist, its conservative, nationalist, and religious values, combined with strict anti-communist policies and severe restrictions on civil liberties, aligned with the emerging fascist ideologies in Europe. In 1933, except for a few neutral countries such as Ireland and Switzerland, the United Kingdom and France were the only functioning, centralised, liberal democratic major powers in Western Europe. They found themselves geopolitically isolated in a region dominated by radical right-wing ideologies. In response to the rise of fascist ideologies, various left-wing political formations organised themselves. On February 1933, the Labour and Socialist International (LSI), which included the British sections of Independent Labour Party (ILP) (now independent) and Labour, called for a joint congress with the Communist International following Hitler’s appointment as German Chancellor. On February 13, French, Polish, and German communist leaders also called for united fronts against fascism.1 These proposals were supported by another call from the LSI on February 19, 1933, urging workers in all countries to put aside their differences and join forces against fascism.2 However, on March 5, 1933, the Executive Committee of the Communist International (CI) rejected the LSI’s call for a joint congress. Instead, they asked the national CPs to contact the leaders of social democratic parties and organise joint DOI: 10.4324/9781003427551-7

46 The CPGB before the Second World War actions against fascism. This response was not well received by the LSI, which instructed its sections not to engage in negotiations with the communist parties until the Comintern agreed to discussions at the international level.3 The French and British communist parties opposed the Executive Committee’s decision and called for negotiations with the Social Democrats. They forged local alliances on their own, even if they were not necessarily initiated by the communists. The political situation in Britain and France was urgent, as fascist groups were starting to gain traction and establish themselves as major players in the political scene, even though the extreme right had not yet taken control of the governments. On March 6, 1933, the British Communist Party, having just moved away from its third period logic, convened a special enlarged meeting to discuss the formation of a united front with the Labour Party, the Co-operative Party, and the ILP. Agreement was quickly reached among the various delegates in attendance, and correspondence with the other parties was sent out the day after the meeting.4 On March 17, 1933, negotiations between the Communist Party and the ILP officially gave birth to the United Front. A first rally was organised for May Day, which attracted over 40,000 people. As a result, the Communist Party reconnected with the masses and finally broke out of the isolation caused by the “class against class” line. The party’s objective changed from a relatively sectarian line in 1933 to advocating, from 1935 onwards, the formation of an anti-fascist labour government aimed at defending the positions of the USSR,5 then referred to as “collective security”.6 The Labour Party leadership firmly rejected any proposal for joint action with the CPGB. In addition, the Labour Party released a statement entitled Democracy and Dictatorship, which blamed the Communists for Hitler’s rise to power in Germany and warned its members not to respond positively to the Communists’ demands.7 The main argument of the pamphlet was that the Labour Party was the only true bulwark against dictatorships, be they fascist or communist. By providing a parliamentary majority for the Labour Party, it was believed that the path to a peaceful socialist society would be opened. This was a shrewd argument, as it not only presented the Labour Party as the true party of democracy but also had the advantage of silencing any extra-parliamentary action on the part of the Labour rank and file.8 However, many Labour Party members and leaders joined trans-partisan antifascist organisations right from the beginning of the Nazi regime’s attacks on personal freedoms and the establishment of concentration camps in Germany. For instance, on May 1, 1933, the first conference of the Relief Committee for the Victims of German Fascism, led by Labour peer Lord Marley, was held. In June, another conference was held at Kingsway Hall in London and attended by over 2,500 people, including members of different parties. On the platform were Ellen Wilkinson, Bertrand Russell, Dorothy Woodman, and Lord Marley, all four members of the Labour Party, as well as Harry Pollitt for the Communist Party, James Maxton for the ILP, and Edward Frank Wise for the Socialist League.9 Dorothy Woodman went even further by proposing an emergency motion at the Labour Party’s annual congress to support the inquiry into the Reichstag Fire

The CPGB in the 1930s

47

and to express solidarity with the socialist and communist activists then on trial in Leipzig. However, her proposal was dropped from the agenda, and the Labour Party declared that the Relief Committee for the Victims of German Fascism was a subordinate organisation of the Communist Party. Any Labour Party member participating in it was liable to disciplinary action and expulsion. In September 1933, the Labour Party published a pamphlet entitled The Communist Solar System,10 largely written by Herbert Morrison, which listed 11 organisations deemed to be auxiliary to the Communist Party. All participation by Labour Party members was forbidden in these organisations, including the NUWCM and the Relief Committee for the Victims of German Fascism, of which Ellen Wilkinson, a Labour Party member and former Communist Party member, was treasurer.11 Despite the Labour Party’s efforts, enforcing such discipline on its members proved difficult. The threat of fascism was present and noticeable to its activists, who did not necessarily comprehend the ban on their participation in this nascent united front. Ellen Wilkinson criticised the Labour leadership by asking the question: “Why are not the great democratic forces of this country behind the efforts to unmask that great conspiracy of the Nazis which was used to destroy democracy in Germany”.12 The disruptive role of the CPGB in the crisis of the left wing of the Labour Party The Labour Party’s position can be attributed to the tensions that have developed on the left wing of the party in recent years. The party had not yet fully come to terms with the “betrayal” of Ramsay MacDonald and Philip Snowden, who had formed an alliance with the Conservatives in 1929 after the Labour Party refused to follow the government in implementing budget cuts, particularly on unemployment insurance. Furthermore, the split of the ILP in 1932 further compounded matters. Although the ILP no longer had many members, they were often among the most active and had significant historical importance to the Labour Party. Many prominent Labour leaders such as Keir Hardie, Ramsay MacDonald, and some Fabians had emerged from the ILP, and the party still boasted influential and very popular MPs such as James Maxton. As such, the split in the ILP was a significant event in the political scene, partly resulting from the entryist tactics of the British Communist Party. After the Great General Strike of 1926, the ILP became increasingly radical and critical of the Labour leadership. This radicalisation was further strengthened when its former cadres followed MacDonald in his split from the Labour Party. Soon, the ILP found itself infiltrated by two communist organisations. The first was the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB), which established in the ILP a faction called the Revolutionary Policy Committee (RPC), knowing that there were many Marxist sympathisers in the recently independent party.13 Its aim was to change the political line of the ILP and bring it closer to that of the Communist Party. The ILP leadership was aware of this infiltration and did not look upon it favourably. It defended itself from Stalinist principles by invoking Trotsky’s criticism of Stalin’s

48

The CPGB before the Second World War

USSR.14 This was not an ex nihilo phenomenon, as Trotsky, already in exile, maintained numerous correspondences with members of the British radical left in the hope of finding an embryonic revolutionary party for his project of founding an international and communist opposition to Stalinism. From 1931 onwards, Trotsky began to advance his pawns within the ILP. The Trotskyists and the CPGB clashed for influence in the ILP, which eventually led to the ILP’s split from the Labour Party. A faction of the ILP, which was more opposed to the communists at a structural level, chose to stay within the Labour Party. This group formed a pressure group and called itself the Socialist League. Some prominent Labour figures were part of the Socialist League, such as Clement Attlee, Stafford Cripps, and G.D.H. Cole.15 However, staying within the Labour Party did not shield the Socialist League from the influence of the Communists, and the Trotskyists were able to infiltrate it quickly as well. The influence of the CPGB among the Labour League of Youth The Labour Party’s youth organisation, the Labour League of Youth (LLY), was established in 1926 but was soon infiltrated by communists from all sides. Despite the formation of other youth organisations, such as the Communist Youths in 1921 and the National League of Young Liberals in 1903, the Labour Party was one of the last major political organisations in Britain to establish a youth structure. Initially, the Labour Party Youth League had no right to engage in independent political activity or create political formations. These bans were implemented by the party leadership to prevent the left wing of the party from taking over the youth organisation.16 Instead, the party leadership viewed the youth organisation as a space for socialising and recruiting young activists rather than a forum for debate and idea creation. However, the youth organisation’s side-lining of political discussions, combined with the demand for a political formation by its members, provided an easy opportunity for both Stalinist and Trotskyist communists to make their mark. The communists understood the significance of political training for the youth and recognised that young people were generally more politically radical than other generations. They saw the LLY as a fertile breeding ground for revolutionary ideas and political training and responded to the implicit demand for such training by young Labour members.17 The influence of communists from all sides led the LLY to formulate its own political line, which was often critical of the Labour Party leadership. Starting in 1933, the League of Youth went against Labour directives and participated in actions organised jointly by the Communists and dissident Labour members. The CPGB communists strengthened their influence, if not control, over the LLY by strongly supporting the publication Advance, which was produced by young radical socialists led by Ted Willis, who disagreed with the national Labour Party line.18 Young communists quickly took over Advance and circulated it freely within the league in 1935. The communists’ dominance within the league was such that

The CPGB in the 1930s

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Advance was soon considered the officious main publication of the youth leadership, which was mainly composed of infiltrated communist elements.19 The dominance of communists within the LLY was such that the factional fighting within the league was not between Labour and Communists but between Stalinists and Trotskyists. The leading figures in Advance quickly moved towards a rapprochement with the CPGB and called for a merger between the League of Youth and the Young Communist League. The Labour Party’s timidity on the question of the antifascist struggle, particularly regarding support for the Spanish Republicans, finally brought the League of Youth even closer to the Communist Party.20 The rise of the British Union of Fascist and the constitution of an anti-fascist front In the British political sphere, fascism was predominantly represented by the British Union of Fascists (BUF). This openly fascist party was founded by Oswald Mosley, a British MP whose political career is interesting to study. Initially a Conservative until the 1920s and then Labour from 1924 to 1931, he formed the New Party in 1931, a protectionist party with strong nationalist and imperialist leanings that combined protectionist measures with ideas of national preferences and State racism. After visiting Mussolini’s Fascist Italy, Mosley became convinced of the superiority of Fascism’s social and economic model, leading to the transformation of the New Party into the BUF. However, this transformation had consequences for the party’s militant and intellectual bases. Despite the initial attraction of the New Party (significant left-wing intellectuals such as John Strachey had joined the party), many members left as fascist ideas took hold. The number of activists in the BUF varies among historians, but several studies consistently estimate the number to be over 40,000. The BUF had a significant media presence, particularly through the Daily Mail, whose owner, Lord Rothermere, was a major financial supporter of Oswald Mosley’s political project.21 The fascist party quickly organised large rallies in Britain. The first one, held in April 1934 at the Albert Hall in London, sold out. Buoyed by this success, the British fascists planned a second rally, this time at the Olympia, a venue that could accommodate over 13,000 people. On 17 May 1934, the Committee to Support the Victims of German Fascism called for a major counter-demonstration and invited the London Trades Council, the London Labour Party, and its independent counterpart to collaborate. However, the Labour Party and the London TUC declined the invitation.22 Historians like Dylan Lee Murphy suggest that the anti-fascist rallies organised by communists in 1934 were initiated by the rank and file of the CPGB rather than its leadership, which was reluctant to engage physically in the antifascist struggle due to many internal divisions.23 Despite the Labour Party and the London TUC’s refusal to participate, the counter-demonstration drew 2,000 people who demonstrated their opposition to the 12,000-strong BUF, including nearly 2,000 black shirts, at the Olympia. Numerous clashes occurred, providing anti-fascists with an opportunity to expose the Blackshirts’ violent nature. Following this event, communists redoubled their efforts to

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The CPGB before the Second World War

expand their anti-fascist work beyond communist elements. Consequently, the Coordinating Committee for Antifascist Activity was established on July 25, 1934, with the intellectual John Strachey, a former Labour MP, among its leading figures. Although the committee’s creation was not solely due to the initiative of British communists, they devoted their efforts to it and made the fight against fascism their main activity. It is noteworthy that, at this point in history, the Communist Party had not abandoned its rhetoric of class struggle. In fact, following the BUF’s announcement of a new rally in Hyde Park on September 9, 1934, the Daily Worker said that “The fascist rally can be drowned in a sea of working-class activity”.24 Despite the attempts of the Labour Party leadership and the TUC to keep their organisations out of the anti-fascist activities organised by the Communists, many London trade union sections and Labour activists called for participation in the counter-demonstration on September 9, 1934. The counter-demonstration involved a procession of nearly 10,000 marchers and was followed by a rally with an estimated attendance of between 100,000 and 152,000 people. The Manchester Guardian reported on the success of the anti-fascist event the following day, emphasising that it was even more impressive because it was mainly due to the initiative of the numerically weak Communist Party: The point for Sir Oswald Mosley to ponder over is that if this counter-demonstration, which outnumbered his by about 20 to 1, could be gathered from such a small party as the Communists, with large numbers of Londoners acting on their own initiative, on what scale would the opposition have been had it had the whole force of organised labour behind it.25 The strategy of the Communist Party proved to be effective. As per Noreen Branson’s official history of the CPGB, anyone who wanted to join the anti-fascist movement in Britain became connected, directly or indirectly, with the members of the Communist Party.26 The alliance between the CPGB and the ILP The main ally of the Communist Party in the anti-fascist struggle in early 1930s Britain was the ILP. This alliance could be explained by the leftward shift of the ILP in response to the policies of the MacDonald government from 1929 onwards, as well as the consequences of the Great Depression, which served as a wake-up call for the left wing of the Labour Party. Indeed, gradualist and evolutionary ideas were increasingly challenged in favour of more radical ideas such as corporate socialism and theories of a planned economy.27 This resurgence of a more explicitly radical approach to socialism owed much to the model of the USSR, which had adopted a planned economy shortly before the Great Depression and seemed to suffer no ill effects from it, indeed appearing to be in the midst of an economic boom.28 The British Communist Party made the ILP their priority target, particularly after Jack Gaster established the RPC within the ILP. The CPGB directed all their infiltrated forces towards this committee. As previously mentioned, the RPC was

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responsible for the ILP’s split with the Labour Party in 1932, and those who refused to split formed the Socialist League. Although there were some ideological similarities between the CPGB and the ILP as well as proposals for the two organisations to unite from 1932 to 1934,29 attempts to unite into a single organisation ultimately failed. Only members of the RPC seemed open to the idea of organisational unity. The ILP’s newspaper, The New Leader, frequently criticised the CI, particularly after it refused to respond to the LSI’s call for negotiations on the question of a united front against fascism.30 The ILP’s criticism was that the Comintern only seemed to accept the united front tactic if it was beneficial to the local communist sections, which had to appear as its champions at any cost. Despite the resistance from the ILP, the Communist Party persisted in its efforts to unite the two parties. It worked closely with the RPC to achieve this goal, putting forward motions and organising its pro-unity faction at ILP congresses. The ILP Affiliation Committee was established in 1933 with the sole aim of uniting the two parties, and the CPGB collaborated closely with the committee to achieve this goal. In fact, the chairman of the committee, Eric Whalley, even published an article in Labour Monthly, the CP’s monthly press organ, to discuss potential strategies for bringing the organisations together. What’s particularly noteworthy about this effort is that it wasn’t a dialogue between two organisations but rather a faction within the ILP working in collaboration with another party. As a result, the Affiliation Committee essentially operated on behalf of the CPGB, as evidenced by a report from Whalley in Labour Monthly: There is no doubt that a united campaign of the R.P.C. and the Affiliation Committee expressing itself in a widespread and intensive campaign would result in a victory at the Easter Conference. No realistic observer can deny that the I.L.P. membership is clamouring for a clear lead. Let us give the lead, a lead that will direct the I.L.P. to revolutionary clarity, to the establishment of the revolutionary unity.31 In this excerpt, it is clear that the Affiliation Committee is serving the objectives of the CPGB, namely the absorption of the ILP into it. The major changes in European politics gained momentum in March 1934, when Maurice Thorez’s French Communist Party initiated a process of rapprochement with the French Section of the Workers’ International (SFIO) to politically oppose the French fascist far right leagues. The collapse of the German communist party in 1933 and the successful experiments with popular fronts, especially in France,32 compelled the leadership of the CI to entirely abandon the strategy of class against class. This shift was propelled by the positions of Dimitrov within the CI, who proposed that the united front of the working class against fascism should become the slogan of the national sections. At the 7th World Congress of the Comintern in July to August 1935, this idea gained endorsement, along with the theory that the united front of the working class should extend to the peasants and the lower middle class to effectively counter the rise of fascism.

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In the autumn of 1934, following their initial successes against the BUF, the English communists suggested to the ILP that they should unite and form a United Communist Party. However, the ILP declined this offer. Despite this, the CPGB persisted with the proposal and raised it again at its 13th congress in February of the following year. However, because of conflicting views on the invasion of Ethiopia by fascist Italy between the CPGB and the ILP and also within the ILP itself, The RPC took the opportunity to make a move and decided to split from the ILP. The split was triggered by the Ethiopian question, and the faction justified its departure by publishing a manifesto that condemned the pacifism of the ILP leadership. However, this split, which was orchestrated from afar by the CPGB, did not remain independent, and a part of the ILP ended up joining the British Communist Party. Noreen Branson characterises this split as having represented a significant part of the ILP,33 but in reality, the numbers were likely between 50 and 100 activists.34 It should be noted, though, that three years after breaking with the Labour Party, the ILP was in a moribund state, with only a few thousand activists, compared to the Communist Party, which had regained a militant base of more than 6,000 actual members by early 1935 (it exceeded 10,000 members in 1937), whereas at the end of 1930, it seemed doomed to disappear, with fewer than 2,300 members, many of whom were inactive.35 Going back towards the Labour Party In 1934 and 1935, the relationship between the Communist Party and the Labour Party took a new turn, symmetrical to the third period’s class against class period. Even some of the main advocates for the “class against class” line and the “socialfascist” interpretation of the Labour Party, such as Rajani Palme Dutt, had to moderate their views. This was highlighted in the concluding speech by Dimitrov at the 7th World Congress of the CI: Comrade Dutt was right in his contention that there has been a tendency among us to contemplate fascism in general, without taking into account the specific features of the fascist movement in the various countries, erroneously classifying all reactionary measures of the bourgeoisie as fascism, and going so far as calling the entire non-Communist camp fascist. The struggle against fascism was not strengthened but rather weakened in consequence.36 In this extract from the Dimitrov report, it is noteworthy that the sectarian doctrine of the third period was referred to as a mere “trend”, rather than an overarching strategic line. Critical observers of the CPGB have pointed to this reversal as evidence of a lack of ideological coherence and as a demonstration of the British Communist Party’s subordination to global party directives. Consequently, when the CPGB redirected its attention and efforts towards the Labour Party, which it acknowledged as the party of the working class, Trotskyists like Hugo Dewar labelled the move as opportunistic.37 This analysis requires nuance. The Communist Party had to tread carefully to avoid alienating British workers, and their emergence from the absolute marginality

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resulting from the class-against-class strategy could only be accomplished by making concessions. The ideological shift could easily be attributed to changes in the global context. While Hugo Dewar claimed that the Comintern never acknowledged the mistakes of the third period theory, this assertion appears to be an overstatement influenced by the Trotskyist historian’s political bias. In the report published by the International, the errors of the previous period were highlighted: The second series of errors arose from the fact that the question of a workers’ government was not bound up with the development of a militant mass united front movement of the proletariat. Thus the Right opportunists were able to distort the question, reducing it to the unprincipled tactics of forming blocs with Social-Democratic Parties on the basis of purely parliamentary combinations. The ultra-Lefts, on the contrary, shrieked: “No coalitions with counterrevolutionary Social-Democrats!” – considering all Social-Democrats as essentially counterrevolutionary.38 It is important to note that, once again, it is not the previous strategy that is being criticised but rather the actions of both the right and left factions within the national communist parties. Nevertheless, in this excerpt from the Dimitrov report, it is evident that the characterisation of the Labour Party as a haven for counterrevolutionaries is recognised as a mistake. At the local level, Harry Pollitt justified the change in attitude and tactics towards the Labour Party, initiating a U-turn from the previous strategy to focus on activists without questioning the analysis of previous years: The new tactical line of the Seventh Congress of the Communist International has not been determined by any opportunist reasons. It has been determined by the consciousness that the formation and strengthening of the united front is now the main link in the chain towards the successful carrying through of the world revolution. And that conscious aim of the world revolution will not be lost sight of for one moment by any Communist Party in the carrying out of the decisions of the Congress. On the contrary, everything that we do will be more consciously and in a more concrete and political way related to our final aims and final principles than ever before.39 His explanation was thus that the united front was now a crucial step towards achieving a world revolution. While the current shifts retain the objective of a global workers’ revolution, the anti-fascist popular front is deemed necessary. The rise of German Nazism and its swift destruction of all working-class organisations, including unions and parties, within a few months of taking power underscore the imperative for communist parties around the world to halt fascism. The Communist Party’s strategy for the 1935 general election was to call for the election of a Labour government. Consequently, the slogan “for Soviet Britain”

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was replaced with “for a Labour government”. This change in slogan sparked a debate within the Communist Party. By the end of 1934, Pollitt proposed that the priority should be to help the Communist Party re-enter parliament by supporting a Labour majority. Thus, according to Pollitt, only a handful of Communist candidates should be nominated to run as part of a popular front with the Labour Party. This move aimed to avoid splitting the working-class vote between the two parties. However, this strategy was criticised by the left faction of the Communist Party. William Gallacher argued that this approach was overly advantageous to the Labour Party.40 The matter was finally resolved in the summer of 1935 at the Seventh Congress of the Comintern. Harry Pollitt argued that the political landscape had shifted, particularly due to the Ethiopian conflict. He contended that a Labour government could not be elected if the Communist Party split the working-class vote in too many constituencies. The Comintern made the decision, and as a result, the CPGB only fielded two candidates in the election: Harry Pollitt and William Gallacher. Despite facing a Labour candidate, Gallacher was elected. Upon returning to the House of Commons, the Communist Party expressed their loyalty to the Labour Party by making numerous pledges. William Gallacher went so far as to apply to the Labour Party whip, thereby indicating his willingness to collaborate with the Labour Party. On November 25, 1935, the Communist Party formally applied to the Labour Party for registration as a socialist affiliate. This application was less austere than previous ones submitted earlier in the decade.41 The main arguments put forward by the Communist Party did not differ much from those presented in the 1920s. The subtlety lay mainly in the rhetoric, as the CPGB observed that the Labour Party had always presented itself as the united front entity of the British working class. The CPGB then argued that their application for affiliation had no secret aims, which differed from their objectives in 1921–1926, when they aimed to promote revolutionary ideology within the Labour Party. Instead, the CPGB claimed a common aim: “This would unite the working class and make it better able to face immediate fight against the National Government, against fascism and imperialist war”.42 On January 27, 1936, the Labour Party officially refused the Communist Party’s application, stating that the situation had not changed since 1922. They argued that the Communist Party was undemocratic and that the Labour Party was opposed to any form of dictatorship, including fascist and proletarian. The Labour Party also blamed the German Communists for Adolf Hitler’s rise to power by refusing to compromise with the German Social Democratic Party. In response to this rejection, the British Communist Party redirected their efforts to gain membership within the Labour Party through existing political channels.43 New attempts to affiliate The British Communist Party pursued its entryist strategy in Britain without interruption, even during the third period with its class-against-class slogan. Communist activists focused on trade union activity in particular. When the Labour Party

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refused to cooperate with the Communists in the hunger marches organised by the unemployed movement or in the anti-fascist struggle, many Labour activists wanted to join the Communist Party. The British Communists gave these defectors the option to remain in the Labour Party, but still granted them Communist Party membership, with the card held by the leadership. These defectors became infiltrated communists within Labour. The strategy was simple: these activists would be mobilised to facilitate affiliation with the Labour Party when the time came. Additionally, these infiltrators could easily disseminate communist propaganda or ideas within local Labour parties, giving the Communist Party a chance to capture some of the Labour activists if the affiliation tactic failed. This practice continued until Britain entered the Second World War in 1939, at which point it had to be stopped. The reason for this was that if communist activists had been discovered while working undercover, it could have resulted in the CPGB being charged with conspiracy. The British Communist Party initiated an intensive campaign for affiliation, starting with the central committee meeting on January 4–5, 1935. The party aimed to maintain the campaign externally through parliamentary cooperation in the context of the popular front and internally through the infiltration of Communists into the Labour Party and unions. The party relied on petitions from labour activists and the passing of resolutions in favour of Communist affiliation in trade union branches or cooperative guilds, using similar tactics as in the 1920s.44 The situation was vastly different from the early years of the Marxist Party. The first factor in favour of Communist Party affiliation was the idea of a popular front, which enjoyed the support of many intellectuals and activists within the Labour Party. One of the earliest advocates of a People’s Front was George Douglas Howard Cole, a prominent theorist in the Labour Party. Other influential figures such as Harold Laski, Stafford Cripps, and Aneurin Bevan also supported the idea of an alliance between all left-wing parties. These people believed that excluding the Communists from a front with the ILP would only strengthen their influence, while integrating them into the Labour Party would provide crucial militant support without giving them too much power as an independent political entity. In fact, both GDH Cole and Harold Laski publicly called for the Communist Party’s affiliation with the Labour Party. It is worth noting that Laski’s position on the affiliation of the Communist Party to the Labour Party underwent a significant change in April 1946 with the publication of his pamphlet, The Secret Battalion. In it, he revealed the Communist Party’s manipulations and tactics aimed at the destruction of the Labour Party, including their attempts to form popular fronts and obtain affiliation.45 The Communist Party’s affiliation with the Labour Party was aided by various factors, including the international context. In 1929, the capitalist world was hit by an economic crisis, resulting in high structural unemployment in market economies. Meanwhile, the USSR was experiencing an economic boom, partly due to its planning strategy. British left-wing theorists admired this approach, especially since the USSR had to revise its plans upwards precisely when the crisis had its strongest impact on European economies.46 The success of this planning strategy

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The CPGB before the Second World War

provided a readily available alternative to the evolutionary gradualism that dominated the Labour Party during the 1920s. The “betrayal” of Ramsay MacDonald in 1931 led to the abandonment of the Fabian evolutionary doctrine and a leftward turn by the Labour Party, which embraced the ideas of corporate socialism and adapted the main principles of what would become Keynesian theory. As a result, economic planning and the nationalisation of large companies became key priorities in Labour Party thinking in the 1930s.47 The campaign to affiliate the Communist Party with the Labour Party gained traction among Labour activists. On March 4, 1936, 200 organisations voted in favour of affiliation, including 100 trade union branches and 60 local labour parties. In the first week of May, this figure increased to 481 organisations, and by midJune, it had risen to 906. A month before the Edinburgh Congress was set to decide on affiliation, 1,400 labour organisations, including three major unions, voted in favour of the Communist Party’s affiliation.48 Despite the successful campaign among Labour activists, the affiliation proposal was ultimately rejected by the Edinburgh Congress in October 1936. This was largely due to the voting system, where each affiliated organisation sent delegates to the national congress with voting power proportional to the number of members they represented and the amount of political levy they paid to the party. However, this system proved unequal, granting disproportionate influence to two unions: the Transport and General Workers’ Union (TGWU) and the National Union of General and Municipal Workers (NUGMW). As a result, these unions blocked the path for Communist Party affiliation, and the proposal was defeated with 592,000 votes in favour and 1,728,000 against. The unity campaign In January 1937, the Communist Party, the ILP, and the Socialist League united and launched a final call for a British popular front through the “unity campaign” initiative. This campaign was initiated by the CPGB and the ILP, and it was the logical outcome of the various fragments of popular fronts initiated by the British left over the previous four years. The Relief Committee for the Victims of German Fascism in 1933 and its descendant, the Committee for Co-ordinating Anti-Fascist Activities in July 1934, provided platforms for the Communist Party and the ILP to politically capitalise on these committees. However, the idea of a left-wing union was not solely a product of Communist Party politics. As seen before, the idea of a popular front was present among a faction of the left of the Labour Party, particularly the fringe organised around the Socialist League, Harold Laski, and GDH Cole. The Committee for Co-ordinating Anti-Fascist Activities was designed as a nascent popular front with John Strachey, a former Labour MP who had joined Oswald Mosley’s New Party and later became a communist, at its head. The concept of the committee was supported by many influential Labour figures, but they declined to participate due to the leadership’s threat of penalties. GDH Cole was among those who advocated for the idea but did not take an active part in its implementation or the unity campaign.49

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The initiative received support from Marxist intellectuals within the Labour Party, albeit indirectly, through the publication of works by the Left Book Club. Victor Gollancz, a Marxist labour publisher who was closely associated with the Communist Party, founded the group in 1936.50 The Left Book Club served as a think tank for the British popular front and derived its credibility from its founder. Many leading British authors had already published their work through the club.51 Harold Laski and John Strachey of the Labour Party also contributed to the dissemination of Marxist ideas through the Left Book Club, which gained almost 46,000 members during the height of the unity campaign. The campaign for unity was launched by the three major organisations of the British socialist left: the CPGB (led by Harry Pollitt and Palme Dutt), the ILP (led by James Maxton and Fenner Brockway), and the Socialist League (led by William Mellor and Stafford Cripps). A manifesto was published, calling on other formations, such as the Labour Party and the trade unions, to join the initiative and create a British popular front. Unlike the popular front organised in France, the front in Britain was conceptualised as being achieved through unity within the Labour Party: OBJECTIVE: To attain unity of all sections of the working-class movement, within the framework of Labour Party and the Trade-Unions, in the common struggle against Fascism, Reaction and War, and for immediate demands of the workers, in order to develop the strength and unity of the working class for the defeat of the National Government pledged to fight for the demands of the United Labour Movement, as the next stage in the advance to working class power.52 The Unity Manifesto was written in overtly Marxist terms, as evidenced by references to the seizure of power by the working class, which could be attributed to Harry Pollitt’s probable greater contribution to it.53 However, the objectives remained measured and were largely within a social democratic logic, calling for the return of the Labour Party to power. Nevertheless, a paragraph in a second manifesto subordinated the demands of the popular front to the defence of the Soviet Union: To save the peoples of the world from the growing menace of Fascist aggression the working class must mobilise the maximum effective opposition; it must mobilise for the maintenance of peace, for the defence of the Soviet Union and its fight for peace, and for a pact between Great Britain, the Soviet Union, France and all other States in which the working class have political freedom.54 The inclusion of the paragraph about the defence of the Soviet Union in the Unity Manifesto signed by the ILP was surprising given the party’s history of tensions with the Soviet Union and its critical stance towards the Stalinist State, as evident in its newspaper, the New Leader. It is believed that the ILP leaders were initially

58 The CPGB before the Second World War opposed to the inclusion of the paragraph. The campaign triggered a significant amount of debate within the Labour Party and was the subject of intense discussions at the National Executive meetings. The results were mixed for the Communist Party, as the doors to the Labour Party remained closed to them, but many activists were welcomed into the process. By May 1937, the Communist Party had over 12,500 members, twice as many as at its last congress. However, the ILP suffered a near-total defeat as many militants continued to defect to either the Labour Party or the Communist Party. The situation was even worse for the Socialist League, as Cripps was heavily scrutinised by the Labour leadership, and the Labour Party proposed the disaffiliation of the Socialist League within the first month of the unity campaign. To prevent the wholesale expulsion of Socialist League members, Harry Pollitt suggested that the League disband. Nonetheless, the League’s members were able to maintain their presence, with three of their members (Pritt, Cripps, and Laski) joining the Labour Party’s NEC in October 1937, following a change in the voting system that was more advantageous for the local sections. Despite the setbacks, the campaign for a united front did achieve some successes. In March 1937, during a conference organised thanks to the communist Labour Monthly newspaper, Harold Laski once again defended the Communist Party and argued that it had a place within the Labour Party. This suggested that the idea of a united front within the Labour Party was still being discussed after the dissolution of the Socialist League. The combined efforts of communists who had infiltrated or joined the Labour Party and those of prominent figures like Laski and Cole kept alive the debate about the alliance of the two parties within the Labour Party structure, even after the rejections from the Labour leadership. The significant support for this proposed alliance among certain Labour activists can also be attributed to the Labour Party’s stance on the Spanish Civil War. The party did not take a firm position in support of the Spanish Republicans and only adopted a motion backing Spain’s right to arm itself against fascist aggression. Moreover, the Labour leadership opposed calls for workers’ actions to aid the Spanish Republicans. The Labour Party’s stance on the Spanish Civil War provided an opportunity for the Communist Party, the Socialist League, and the ILP to openly criticise the Labour leadership. Because of the weak implication of the Labour Party towards the Spanish conflict, for Labour activists, supporting the Spanish republicans meant, as with the domestic anti-fascist struggle, allying themselves with the Communist Party. As a result, many pro-republican committees were formed through the Aid-for-Spain movement. In the years that followed, almost 2,200 Britons went to fight in Spain through the Communist Party and the International Brigades. Promoting the popular front through the League of Youth During the 1930s, the Labour League of Youth (LLY) became increasingly aligned with the Communist Party due to the large-scale entryism carried out by young

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communists, who quickly gained a dominant position. The left of the league had always supported the Communist Party’s positions in the context of popular front attempts, as early as when the committees of support and relief for the victims of German fascism were set up. The turning point that created distance between the league and the Labour leadership came at the end of 1935, when a faction of the league’s left federated around the publication of Advance. This publication was, in fact, a propaganda organ of the Communist Party, masquerading as a young Labour editorial board led by Ted Willis. The Advance faction, which became the majority in 1936, supported full cooperation between the Labour and Communist parties. The drift was so extreme that the National Executive Committee of the Labour Party issued a memorandum proposing the dissolution of the League’s leadership in 1936: For some time, the NAC, instead of devoting themselves to the organisation of the League have spent their time in criticising the NEC and party policies, encouraging the branches in this opposition. There is clear evidence that the idea has been fostered that the League should be a “youth movement”. This is contrary to the original concept of the League as laid down in 1926.55 The Labour Party investigated the actions of the Communist Party until the League was disbanded.56 The Communist Party’s underground activities within the Labour Party and the League succeeded in mobilising around 100 local Labour parties to oppose the memorandum on the dissolution of the League. Ted Willis manifested early on his willingness to join the Young Communist League, the communist organisation counterpart. The Communist Party advised Willis to remain in the Labour Party, as it was more profitable at the time, and instead, urged for a rapprochement with the Labour leadership.57 The League’s support of hunger marches, Spanish Republicans, and the unity and popular front campaign led the Labour Party leadership to forcefully get the organisation back under its control through coercive measures. During the LLY congress in March 1938, branches were prohibited from proposing resolutions. A new central committee of 18 members was established, consisting of eight members directly elected by activists, three members of the National Executive Committee of the Labour Party, and seven league members directly appointed by the Labour executive. The Advance group cooperated to avoid exclusion, as it did not impede their main activities, which were primarily focused on propaganda through their newspaper.58 Several events led to the explosion of the League of Youth in mid-1939. The crisis in the Labour Party in 1937, which resulted in the proscription of the Socialist League, and the executive’s opposition to the nomination of “popular front” candidates by the Oxford and Bridgewater Labour Parties in 1938 increased tensions between Advance and the Labour leadership. The expulsion of Stafford Cripps and Aneurin Bevan from the Labour Party in 1939 and the end of Stalinist communist entryism into the Labour Party sealed the fate of the League of Youth.59 In June 1939, Ted Willis announced his departure from the LLY, and many

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young Labour members joined the more principled Young Communist League. The Labour League of Youth was abandoned after this mass exodus. Communist pacifism at the beginning of the war The Communist Party’s stance on the war was particularly challenging for its contemporaries to comprehend. Many historical observers, such as John Callaghan and Hugo Dewar, referred to the party’s “ideological zigzags”. The British party’s contortions caused it to vacillate between contradictory positions at times. Shortly before the war, as previously noted, the Communist Party opposed it strongly, except in a defensive sense. The popular front’s rationale was established to block the road to the fascist enemy within, but it was also part of an interventionist logic. The Communist Party urged the Labour Party to intervene in support of Ethiopia during the fascist invasion in 1935, and the same was asked about the Spanish Civil War. The Communist Party worked with numerous local labour parties to take up a defensive struggle in Spain and prevent Franco’s rise to power, but it was unsuccessful. To understand the link between the idea of frontism at home and support for an anti-fascist struggle abroad, it is necessary to grasp the overall political situation in Britain in the second half of the 1930s. The Baldwin and then Chamberlain governments chose to play the card of appeasement with Hitler, as Édouard Daladier did in France. The Communist Party regarded the strategy of appeasement as treachery towards nations oppressed by fascism. Its fight against the Baldwin government carried its front logic so far that in the Aylesbury by-election of May 1938, the Communist Party called for a vote for the Liberal Party candidate in the name of a progressive alliance for peace.60 The Labour Party refused to participate, putting up its candidate instead. As a result, the election was a unique and unprecedented contest between a Liberal candidate backed by the CPGB and a Labour candidate. The Munich Agreement, which ceded part of Czechoslovakia to the Nazis in September 1938, prompted the Communist Party to redouble its attacks on the Chamberlain government and the “Men of Munich” of the previous Baldwin government. The priority was no longer the return of a Labour government but the defeat of Neville Chamberlain’s Conservative government.61 At the outbreak of war, with Nazi Germany’s invasion of Poland on September 1, 1939, the Communist Party maintained its prior position. On September 12, Harry Pollitt spoke of a war on two fronts: domestically against Chamberlain and the “Men of Munich”, and externally against the Nazi foe, now a military enemy. However, for Rajani Palme Dutt, the other prominent figure in the Communist Party, the analysis of the war was quite different: it was an imperialist war on both sides. The conflict was not a matter of the Allied forces (British and French) opposing the “evil” ones (Germany and Italy), but of two imperialist camps vying for domination in Europe. Following the signing of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact on August 23, 1939, and the German-Soviet Demarcation and Friendship Treaty on September 28, 1939, the Communist Party adopted a pacifist stance, which was endorsed by its members. On October 3, 1939, a resolution in favour of peace was passed, and on October 7, a manifesto outlining this position was published.

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Consequently, Harry Pollitt resigned as General Secretary, and Rajani Palme Dutt took over the position on October 11, 1939. The Communist Party’s pacifist stance was mirrored by the militant base of the Labour Party, which was critical of the truce between their leadership and the Chamberlain government. On February 20, 1940, the Communist Party organised a large peace congress that was attended by many labour and trade union organisations, in defiance of their leadership. The Chamberlain government’s attitude towards the USSR during its invasion of Finland allowed the Communists to highlight the disparity in treatment between Finland, which received direct military aid from the British government (mainly in the form of arms), and Poland, which was relatively ignored.62 Many Labour intellectuals who were sympathetic to the Communist Party, including Pritt, supported the Soviet intervention in Finland and criticised the war against Germany as an imperialist one.63 These positions were mainly backed by the University Labour Federation (ULF), a socialist organisation affiliated with the Labour Party. The Labour Party, viewing this as further manipulation by the Communists, once again resorted to the same strategy and immediately disaffiliated the ULF after its stance in January 1940. Pritt was expelled on May 15 of the same year.64 In an effort to continue pressuring the Chamberlain war government, the Communist Party organised a convention for a “People’s Government” on July 7, 1940, in London. The convention’s demands included five points: expelling the “Men of Munich” from government, supporting the USSR, restoring democratic rights, ending private profit, and forming a new government. In response to increasing communist propaganda after the start of the Blitz on September 7, 1940, the new government took measures to contain it, such as banning the Daily Worker in January 1941. Despite this, the Communist Party organised a new “People’s Convention” to reiterate their demands for a people’s government. It’s worth noting that the government’s opposition to the Communists was led by Herbert Morrison, a member of the Labour Party.65 Final turnarounds and the end of entryism On June 22, 1941, the international situation was turned upside down when Germany launched an attack on the USSR and broke the German-Soviet pact. Churchill reacted quickly and decisively. His response can be explained by his interest in the idea of a strategic rapprochement with the USSR, which he had been advocating since 1939 despite his fervent anti-communism. The Communist Party applauded Churchill’s reaction and quickly offered him its official support, starting on June 26, 1941. After the Communist Party’s declaration of support, which marked a pro-war shift, Harry Pollitt was reinstated as General Secretary of the party. The British Communists revised their demands significantly, summarising them in three points: promoting cooperation between the USSR and the UK, mobilising production for victory, and rallying the people for victory through greater democratic cooperation between parties. The

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Communist Party’s slogans were thus transformed from protesting strikes for peace to defending the ban on all strikes to strengthen domestic production. The iconography of the party was politically striking, as an example, Figure 4.1 shows a poster featuring Winston Churchill and Joseph Stalin with the pun “Comrades in Arms”. After aligning with the government, the Communist Party regained the right to publish the Daily Worker in May 1942. With its impressive ability to mobilise its activists, the Party’s support for the wartime government resulted in almost 64,000 new members by September 1942. While the Labour Party was busy collaborating with the war government and experiencing a lack of militant activity, the Communist Party was campaigning on a variety of issues, such as communicating on the heroic Russian front, the demand for better shelter, and the denunciation of the “Men of Munich”, who still held government positions. The Communist Party’s strong presence in industry enabled it to galvanise workers and prevent numerous strikes. John Callaghan notes that there were 30 communist cells in companies in Coventry alone. The liquidation of the Comintern by Stalin in May 1943 gave national communist parties more leeway and the ability to develop their own tactics and strategies. Following its electoral successes in the 1945 parliamentary elections (2 Communist MPs elected to support Clement Attlee’s Labour government) and the 1946 municipal elections (over 250 Communist councillors elected), the Communist Party of Great Britain voluntarily pursued parliamentarianism in 1946. However, its electoral successes were short-lived. From this point onwards, the CPGB gradually abandoned its revolutionary character. Memories of the third period were still recent, and, observing the Communist

Figure 4.1 A poster depicting Stalin and Churchill, the former facing the latter. People’s History Museum, Manchester.

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Party’s recent successes at the ballot box, Harry Pollitt began to see a viable strategy for establishing socialism through the parliamentary route. The culmination of this thinking can be found in Looking Ahead, his 1947 book, in which he rejects the path of the dictatorship of the proletariat. The Communist Party adopted a new programme, The British Road to Socialism, published in 1951, which proposed a parliamentary and democratic path to socialism: British Communists declare that the people of Britain can transform capitalist democracy into a real people’s democracy, transforming parliament, the product of Britain’s historic struggle for democracy, into the democratic instrument of the will of the vast majority of her people.66 The transformation of the Communist Party into a socialist-democratic party was complete. However, the electoral successes of 1945 and 1946 were short-lived, and the difference between the CPGB and the Labour Party became so small that any hope of winning back a new electorate seemed complicated. The Labour Party’s rule in 1943 prohibited new applications from Communists, so they were no longer able to affiliate with the Labour Party. All entryism had been stopped since the advent of the Second World War due to the legal peril to infiltrators if they were discovered. Moreover, political activity within the Labour Party was at low ebb and was of no interest to a Communist Party that was no longer revolutionary. Conclusion In his book about the Communist Party during the interwar period, Trotskyist historian Hugo Dewar argues that by 1934, the Communist Party had completed its turn towards social democracy and was no longer a strictly revolutionary party. While the Communist Party continued to use pro-worker and anti-imperialist rhetoric, it shifted its focus away from revolutionary ideals and towards more democratic and republican values. Noreen Branson succinctly summarises the position of the British Communist Party during the Spanish Republican Aid Committees as follows: The aim was always that they should be as broadly representative as possible. Gone were the days of Class against Class when it had seemed important that every activity should be recognised as under Communist leadership. Now on the contrary, the object was to encourage members of the Labour Party to take the lead.67 The Communist Party’s adoption of the Popular Front strategy in Britain did not prove successful in the long run. While the party managed to attract some middleclass supporters, their attempts to join the Labour Party were met with resistance, resulting in the Communist Party being politically isolated. According to John Callaghan, the primary aim of CPGB entryism was to maximise its chances of affiliating with the Labour Party. However, we disagree with this assessment. During that time, the USSR was preparing for a world war despite

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the appeasement policies of some European governments, including its own in the form of the Soviet-German pact. The desire to make communist parties dominant in European countries was temporarily set aside in favour of alliance strategies to stem the rise of fascism and avoid repeating the German mistake. Nevertheless, it was not completely abandoned in the long term. However, Joseph Stalin found it increasingly challenging to manage the Comintern, and the doctrine of socialism in one country became a fact of life for the USSR. This is probably why European communist parties focused on the main objective of achieving peace in Europe on the eve of the Second World War. It was no longer time for a world revolution fostered by a USSR moving its pawns on the great international political chessboard, but for establishing a powerful counter-model for all nations worldwide. The Communist Party’s support for the parliamentary route via the popular front tactic did not yield a significant impact on the national political scene. However, its anti-fascist struggle and determination to establish alliances with Maxton’s ILP and Cripps’ Socialist League did help it gain support from many Labour activists. Additionally, by pursuing mass entryism into the Labour Party, the Communist Party was able to mobilise Labour locals and spread Frontist ideas within the party. This was evident in the successful campaign for unity within Labour. However, it is important to note that the views of Labour Party activists did not necessarily reflect those of the broader voting public. While the Communist Party was able to gain some support among Labour activists, its tendency to frequently shift its position on issues such as elections (united front, denunciations, and then united front again) and the war (pacifism and then militarism) may have ultimately alienated it from the working-class electorate. It was perhaps more natural for a worker to vote for the Labour Party, which was the party of their Trade Unions, than for the Communist Party, which in some elections, hindered the Labour Party, such as in Aylesbury in 1938 when it called for a vote for the Liberal candidate. Additionally, despite the “betrayal” of the MacDonald government, the Labour Party was forgiven as it began to challenge its legacy by redefining its ideology. At the time, the Labour Party was engaged in internal debates over which ideology to adopt. However, the discord and hostility between the factions meant that the party remained on a consensual political footing. It adopted a programme that was a blend of collectivism (nationalisation of businesses and development of public services) and market economics (Keynesianism and a model of private management for public enterprises). Although not yet fully theorised at the time, this programme had the virtue of gaining the support of its entire electoral base. The “Popular Front” strategy proved to be a significant failure for the CPGB, especially compared to its French counterpart. Its fleeting electoral gains in 1946– 1947 were likely attributable more to the post-war climate and a resurgence of left-wing sentiments among the electorate than a newly established, stable electoral base. The Labour Party had firmly shut the door on the Communist Party, and the radical left, which had been enticed by Popular Front tactics, was in decline. The Communist Party’s attempt at entryism came to an end in 1939 due to legal issues. Despite the Labour Party’s repeated refusals to grant it affiliation, the

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Communist Party persisted in applying until 1946, when the Labour Party issued a final refusal and established a new rule that prohibited the Communist Party from applying for affiliation again. This rule also served as a barrier to the entry of Trotskyists in the second half of the century, as it prohibited other “national” organisations from applying for affiliation. Despite the end of entryism and the Communist Party’s shift towards the middle class, it did not lead to the demise of the party. Even after the party’s rupture in 1956 following the Hungarian crisis, it still wielded some influence in intellectual and trade union circles, at least until the 1960s. Notes 1 HASLAM Jonathan, “The Comintern and the Origins of the Popular Front 1934–1935”, The Historical Journal, vol. 22, n°3, Cambridge University Press, 1979, pp. 673–691. 2 MURPHY Dylan Lee, The Communist Party of Great Britain and Its Struggle Against Fascism 1933–1939, PhD dissertation, University of Huddersfield, Huddersfield, 1999, p. 48. 3 BRANSON Noreen, History of the Communist Party of Great Britain 1927–1941, London: Lawrence & Wishart, 1987, p. 112. 4 Ibid. 5 REDFERN Neil, The Communist Party of Great Britain, Imperialism and War, 1935– 45, PhD dissertation, Manchester Metropolitan University, Manchester, 1997, p. 31. 6 A propaganda effort is made to promote the “brotherhood of peoples”. For further development, see LE BOURGEOIS Jacques, “La propagande soviétique de 1917 à 1991: paix et désarmement au service de l’idéologie?”, Revue LISA/LISA e-journal, vol. 6, n°1, 2008, pp. 94–123. 7 NEWMAN Michael, “Democracy vs Dictatorship: Labour’s Role in the Struggle against British Fascism, 1933–1936”, History Workshop, n°5, Spring 1978, p. 70. 8 LLACUNA HERNANDO Adria, Historia cultural del comunismo británico: Revolución, democracia y nación en la lucha antifascista (1928–1941), PhD dissertation, Barcelona Autonomous University, Barcelona, 2016, p. 153. 9 PENNYBACKER Susan, From Scottsboro to Munich: Race and Political Culture in 1930s Britain, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2009, p. 208. 10 Labour Party, The Communist Solar System, pamphlet, September 1933, PHM: LP/ID/ CI/39/28. 11 BRANSON Noreen, History of . . . op. cit., p. 116. 12 Quoted in BRANSON Noreen, History of . . . op. cit., p. 117. 13 UPHAM Martin, The History of British Trotskyism to 1949, PhD Dissertation, Hull University, Hull, 1980. Retrieved from www.marxists.org/history/etol/revhist/upham/ upmen.htm (last accessed 14.04.2023). 14 CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left in British Politics, Oxford: Blackwell, 1987, p. 42. 15 Ibid., p. 41. 16 WEBB Michelle, The Rise and Fall of the Labour League of Youth, PhD dissertation, Huddersfield University, Huddersfield, 2007, p. 39. 17 CALLAGHAN John, “The Background to ‘Entrism’: Leninism and the British Labour Party”, Journal of Communist Studies, vol. 2, n°4, 1986, p. 389. 18 WEBB Michelle, The Rise and Fall . . . op. cit., p. 68. 19 ATKINSON Julian, “Labour’s Youth Movements”, International, vol. 6, n°4, November 1981, pp. 20–24. 20 WEBB Michelle, The Rise and Fall . . . op. cit., pp. 69–70. 21 PUGH Martin, Hurrah for the Blackshirts! Fascists and Fascism in Britain Between the Wars, London: Pimlico, 2006, pp. 146–152.

66 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36

37 38

39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51

The CPGB before the Second World War BRANSON Noreen, History of . . . op. cit., pp. 118–120. MURPHY Dylan Lee, The Communist Party of . . . op. cit., p. 65. Daily Worker, August 15, 1934. Manchester Guardian, September 10, 1934. Quoted in POLLIT Harry, Speech at the Meeting of the Presidium of the E.C.C.I., Evening Session, October 11, 1934.www. marxists.org/archive/pollitt/1933/08/15.htm (last accessed 14.04.2023). BRANSON Noreen, History of . . . op. cit., p. 124. See the chapter “Emergence of Corporate Socialism” in FOOTE Geoffrey, The Labour Party’s Political Thought. A History, London: Croom Helm, 1985, pp. 149–188. CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left . . . op. cit., p. 40. CARR Edward Hallett, Twilight of the Comintern, 1930–1935, New York: Pantheon Books, 1982, pp. 225–226. WHALLEY Eric, “Towards the ILP Easter Conference”, The Labour Monthly, February 1934, p. 92. Ibid., p. 96. Parti Communiste, “Pacte d’unité d’action avec la SFIO”, see MANESSIS Dimitri, Les Secrétaires Régionaux du Parti Communiste Français du Tournant Antifasciste à l’Interdiction du Parti, PhD dissertation, Université de Bourgogne, Dijon, 2020, p. 303. BRANSON Noreen, History of . . . op. cit., p. 142. CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left . . . op. cit., p. 42. Another figure of 63 is provided by Martin Upham in his PhD dissertation as well. DEWAR Hugo, Communist Politics in Britain: The CPGB From Its Origins to the Second World War, London: Pluto Press, 1976, p. 93. DIMITROV Georgi, Unity of the Working Class Against Fascism, Concluding Speech Before the Seventh World Congress of the Communist International, August 13, 1935. www.marxists.org/reference/archive/dimitrov/works/1935/unity.htm (last accessed 14.04.2023). DEWAR Hugo, Communist Politics in Britain . . . op. cit., pp. 106–107. DIMITROV Georgi, The Fascist Offensive and the Tasks of the Communist International in the Struggle of the Working Class Against Fascism, Main Report Delivered at the Seventh World Congress of the Communist International, August 2, 1935. www.marxists. org/reference/archive/dimitrov/works/1935/08_02.htm (last accessed 14.04.2023). POLLITT Harry, “The Seventh Congress of the Communist International”, The Labour Monthly, October 1935, p. 612. BRANSON Noreen, History of . . . op. cit., p. 147. Letter from Harry Pollitt to Jim Middleton, November 25, 1935, PHM: CP/CENT/ SUBJ/02/03. Ibid. BRANSON Noreen, History of . . . op. cit., p. 147. CPGB, The Results of the Enlarged Meeting of the Central Committee of the CPGB, 9th January 1936, p. 5, PHM: CP/CENT/SUBJ/02/02. LASKI Harold, The Secret Battalion: An Examination of the Communist Attitude to the Labour Party, London: Labour Party Publication Department, April 1946, WCML: 36006207. FOOTE Geoffrey, The Labour Party’s . . . op. cit., p. 185. Ibid., p. 173. BRANSON Noreen, History of . . . op. cit., p. 152. DEWAR Hugo, Communist Politics in Britain . . . op. cit., p. 119. On the subject of Gollancz’s implication in the Popular Front attempts, see ROSCOE Jonathan, Balancing Politics and Publishing: Victor Gollancz and the Publishing Revolution of the 1930s, PhD Dissertation, Oxford: Oxford Brookes University, 2019. Elizabeth Bowen and George Orwell had had some of their early successes thanks to Gollancz’s insight before the Left Book Club.

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52 Agreement on the Unity Campaign, 1937. PHM: LP/WG/COM/23. 53 The Trotskyist historian Hugo Dewar, in his book on the history of the CPGB, attributes 50% of the writing of the Unity Campaign Manifesto to Harry Pollitt, with the remaining 50% divided equally between Fenner Brockway and Stafford Cripps. 54 CPGB, ILP & Socialist League, Unity Campaign Manifesto, January 18, 1937, WCML: 36024813. 55 ATKINSON Julian, “Labour’s Youth Movements”. . . op. cit., pp. 20–24 56 “Report on the unofficial League of Youth Paper”, Advance, March 1938, PHM: LP/ WG/LOY/20. 57 CALLAGHAN John, “The Background to ‘Entrism’ . . . op. cit., p. 390. 58 ATKINSON Julian, “Labour’s Youth Movements” . . . op. cit., pp. 20–24. 59 CALLAGHAN John, “The Background to ‘Entrism’: Leninism and the British Labour Party”, Journal of Communist Studies, vol. 2, n°4, 1986, p. 389. 60 DEWAR Hugo, Communist Politics in Britain . . . op. cit., p. 125. 61 DUTT Rajani Palme, “Labour and the People’s Front”, Labour Review, vol. 20, n°6, June 1938, p. 334. 62 BRANSON Noreen, History of . . . op. cit., p. 277. 63 For a full understanding of Pritt’s stance, see PRITT Denis Nowell, Must the War Spread, Harmondsworth, New York: Penguin Books, 1940. 64 BRANSON Noreen, History of . . . op. cit., p. 280. 65 Hansard, HoC debate, January 22, 1941, vol. 368, col. 186. https://hansard.parliament. uk/Commons/1941-01-22/debates/ae0c6acd-f6cb-41ea-bab3-a8fe89c6bfb6/CivilDefence (last accessed 14.04.2023). 66 CPGB, The British Road to Socialism: Programme Adopted by the Executive Committee of the Communist Party, January 1951. www.marxists.org/history/international/comintern/sections/britain/brs/1951/51.htm (last accessed 14.04.2023). 67 BRANSON Noreen, History of . . . op. cit., p. 229.

Part 3

The early days of British Trotskyism

5

The splits over entryism in the early British Trotskyist movement

The origins of the first Trotskyist group in Great Britain In the autumn of 1927, during the 15th Congress of the CPSU, Leon Trotsky, who was the leader of the Left Opposition within the CPSU, was expelled. Consequently, he was exiled to Kazakhstan in early 1928 and later deported to Turkey in early 1929. However, Trotsky did not remain inactive. He attempted to organise domestic resistance to Stalin’s policies within the Communist parties from his place of exile. On April 6, 1930, the International Left Opposition (ILO) held its first meeting in Paris. The ILO was the result of Trotsky’s manoeuvres. Trotsky had built up this international opposition by addressing the various groups of the international radical left through intensive correspondence. However, by the time of the first meeting of what became the embryonic Fourth International, not a single Briton had yet answered the call. Yet there were three groups in Britain that were of interest to Trotsky and seemed to align themselves with the ideas he had formulated. Trotsky had established this international opposition by extensively corresponding with various groups of the international radical left. However, at the time of the first meeting of what later became the nascent Fourth International, not a single Briton had responded to the call. Nonetheless, there were three groups in Britain that caught Trotsky’s attention and seemed to align with the ideas he had formulated.1 The first group was made up of independent Marxists who had gravitated towards the Labour Party and were organised around Ellen Wilkinson, Clare Sheridan, and Dick Beech. This group had strong potential, especially due to their criticism of the British Communist Party and the orientation taken by the USSR. Additionally, some members of this group had previously been members of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB), including Ellen Wilkinson, making them ideal for Trotsky, who still hoped to reform the CP from within. However, none of the members of this group joined him in his campaign. The second group was composed of Independent Labour Party (ILP) members and supporters, led by Chandu Ram, Frank Ridley, and Hugo Dewar. Dewar had ongoing correspondence with the Communist League of America, an early structured Trotskyist group, and had founded the Marxian League2 in Britain, an independent DOI: 10.4324/9781003427551-9

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propaganda group outside of the ILP. The group was extremely radical, stating that the British trade unions were pro-imperialist organisations and that Britain was on the path to fascism. While this line seemed similar to that formulated by the sections of the Comintern during the “class against class” line, this group rejected any reconciliation with the CI. Although this group partly met Trotsky’s expectations, he refused to make it the British section of his project for an International. He needed a group linked to the CPGB to inscribe its birth in an internal struggle for international communism, and the Marxian League was too opposed to the CPGB to fit into this perspective. There was also a group of CP activists based in South London, organised around Reginald Groves, Stewart Purkis, and Billy Williams. This group of friends had joined the party after the 1926 General Strike and had organised in opposition to the party leadership. Groves clashed with the party leadership over the editorial line of the Daily Worker, for which he wrote, and wanted to make the paper a tool for theoretical propaganda while maintaining its popular appeal, including the sports pages. This opposition to Harry Pollitt’s conciliatory line brought him into contact with more radical YCL activists like Stewart Purkis and Harry Wicks, who embodied a very combative left-wing line and were aligned with the ideas of the “Third Period”. This group was later joined by Henry Sara, an acquaintance of Purkis, who campaigned against the party leadership by advocating economic theses defended by Bukharin before his expulsion, which were unacceptable to the International. This group became known as the “Balham group” due to their location in South London, and they were exposed to Trotskyist ideas through reading the works of the Russian leader and articles in the Militant, the journal of the Communist League of America. Trotsky mobilised American activists to organise meetings with the British, and in the autumn of 1931, the Americans Arne Swabeck and Shachtman joined forces with the British opposition to form the British section of the ILO.3 Structuring the first Trotskyist party: from the Balham group to the Communist League The Balham group did not entirely meet Trotsky’s expectations. Despite being composed mostly of working-class individuals who could legitimately lead the workers, the group was still very small. Additionally, while the Balham group was formed in opposition to the CPGB, it seemed to lack theoretical training in its critique of the Comintern. Martin Upham suggests that the group was closer to the class against class line of the Comintern than to the CPGB, and its opposition was more of a formal opposition to the CPGB line and the lack of democracy within it than an opposition to the policies proposed by the International.4 However, this analysis is debatable. Balham group members had warned the Americans, who were attempting to recruit them into the ILO: We made it clear to the Americans that we were not prepared to set up a Left Opposition group in Britain. We went along with them on much, such as the

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restoration of full inner-party democracy in the national sections, a diminution of Russian command of the Comintern, and a recovery of the communism of the founding fathers. And we were deeply shaken by Trotsky‘s powerful indictment of Comintern Policy in Germany, based as it was on the formula that social democracy and National Socialism were “varieties of fascism”, or, in Stalin’s words “not opposite poles but neighbours”; by Trotsky’s warnings of the disaster that would follow for workers in Germany, Russia and throughout the world if that policy was persisted in; and by his call for a principled united front of the Social Democratic Party and the Communist Party to check and defeat the Nazis. All these things we would raise in the party, and fight for, but as members not outsiders. This excerpt from Reginald Groves’ account of the group’s history suggests that the Balham group was not strictly adhering to a “class against class” ideology. However, the group did criticise the CPGB’s lack of internal democracy, which was one of the main points of contention between the two. The question of forming a united front with the parties of social democracy was accepted, which was considered taboo within the Communist Party at the time. Therefore, the Balham group was characterised by pragmatism in its early days, and the radical shift at the Leeds Congress was seen as a victory by Groves and his comrades. They believed that William Rust’s very radical line for the Daily Worker was too removed from working-class concerns. Additionally, they rejected the characterisation of the Labour Party as a fascist party and did not rule out forming an alliance with it as part of a united front. Trotsky placed a significant emphasis on the potential involvement of the Wilkinson/Sheridan group in his project, as he believed their participation would provide a more clearly defined intellectual direction for the British Trotskyists. Despite the Americans’ persistent efforts to persuade them, the group ultimately declined to join the movement, leaving Trotsky to initially work with individuals who were more sympathetic to his criticism of the Soviet Union than to his overall project. Despite the arguments presented by the American Trotskyists, the Balham group was not willing to leave the Communist Party but aimed to reform it from within. In contrast, Trotsky envisioned the creation of an independent party, originating from within the CP and capable of reaching out to the masses on its own terms. The two sides’ expectations were thus fundamentally incompatible. The Balham group, therefore, established itself as an opposition force within the CP. In May 1932, they launched their own newspaper, The Communist, which contained a scathing critique of the Communist International (CI) and even published Trotsky’s banned article, Germany: The Key to the International Situation, in its entirety. The newspaper also helped to raise awareness of the explicit existence of a section of the ILO: The Communist International is unable to gain the leadership of the world proletariat.it is – at this critical moment – unable, unready and unfit to lead the world revolution, and there is no possible alternative. The Left Opposition – led

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The early days of British Trotskyism by Comrade Trotsky – is fighting to win back the CI to its task of leading the world revolution; the British group begins its work by the issue of this bulletin.5

The group, after being expelled from the Communist Party, established an independent and structured existence in September 1932 with the publication of the second edition of The Communist. In 1931, contacts had been made with members of the Marxian League, which was operating within the ILP at the time of its break with the Labour Party, and they joined the group.6 The advice of Trotsky himself prompted the group to definitively renounce changing the CPGB from within. Consequently, the group officially became the Communist League in the summer of 1933.7 The group’s structured and independent existence was largely due to the analysis of the defeat of the Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands, which was seen as a sign of the Third International’s disintegration. As early as July 1933, Trotsky advised the group to monitor the evolution of other leftist organisations in Britain to position itself in the revolutionary space left by the Communist Party. Some Trotskyists in the British group interpreted this as a strong argument in favour of their independence; however, this would actually mark the prelude to the adoption of the entryist tactic among the Trotskyists. Trotsky’s call for entry in the ILP and the split of the Marxist Group The Communist League was organised mainly around the person of Reginald Groves and was plagued by many internal and factionalist struggles over tactical issues very early on. As early as August 1933, the ILO requested its British section establish closer ties with the recently independent ILP. Trotsky himself corresponded regularly with the ILP leadership to counter the growing influence of the CPGB within it.8 The split from the Labour Party had transformed the ILP into a centrist9 formation that required monitoring and influence. In terms of tactics, this translated into the first recommendation of entryism. Trotsky supported the idea of the British group adopting a similar approach to that of the Brandlerites with the Sozialistische Arbeiterpartei Deutschlands (SAPD) in Germany, namely infiltrating the party.10 The ILO’s objective was to fully integrate the British section into the ILP, which was seen as a means to reach the British masses who were within the Labour Party. This approach was conceived as a shortterm entry with the aim of converting the ILP’s ideology as a whole. The idea was that if the ILP’s views could be influenced, then the Labour Party’s views would also shift accordingly.11 There were two opposing views regarding the manner in which the entry should be made. As previously mentioned, Trotsky recommended a full and open entry with the aim of emulating the Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands-Opposition (KPDO) minority in Germany. According to this strategy, the Trotskyists would openly declare their allegiance and fully participate in the activities of the ILP. This would, however, necessitate the abandonment of some of their newspapers, such as the Red Flag. Conversely, the ILO secretariat preferred a more covert form of entryism, whereby the entire group would infiltrate the ILP under a veil of secrecy,

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with only two members assuming responsibility for maintaining the Communist League’s front activity, which would include publishing the Red Flag and distributing select leaflets. To avoid accusations of factionalism and ensure the legality of their actions, Trotsky’s recommendation was ultimately adopted. On October 5, 1933, the majority of the Communist League leadership rejected the entryist strategy and argued that they could organise their influence on the ILP perfectly well from outside. Documents discovered in the Denzil Harber archive reveal that there were intense discussions from October to December of that year.12 On December 17, 1933, the British section adopted the Declaration of Four, a document that anticipated the creation of a Fourth International and strengthened the significance of the tactical advice exchanged between the various national sections.13 Trotsky responded to the decision made by the British Trotskyists with a letter in which he expressed his disagreement, describing it as a mistake: We do not exaggerate the significance of the ILP. in politics as in the physical world, everything is relative. in comparison with your small group, the ILP is a big organisation. . . . The jump from a thousand to ten thousand is much easier than the jump from forty to one thousand. You speak of influencing the ILP from the outside. Taken on a wide historical scale, your arguments are irrefutable, but there are unique, exceptional circumstances that we must know how to make use of by exceptional means. Today the revolutionary workers of the ILP still hold onto their party. The perspective of joining a group of forty, the principles of which are little known to them can by no means appeal to them. if within the next year they should grow disappointed with the ILP, they will go not to you but to the Stalinists, who will break these workers’ necks.14 For Trotsky, the entry into the ILP was also meant to restrict the advancement of the CPGB within the organisation. The years 1933 and 1934 saw the Communist Party and the ILP collaborate in a united front, and Trotsky was aware of the activities of the Revolutionary Policy Committee (RPC) within the ILP. He relied on the presence of Trotskyists to counterbalance their influence, and Ted Grant coined the term “countenance entry” to describe this phenomenon.15 This term will be utilised in establishing a precise typology of entryism, which will be proposed at the conclusion of this work. The success of the Trotskyists hinged on their legitimacy in the eyes of ILP militants. If they entered with sincerity, explaining that their aim was to reform the party rather than instigate a split, they should logically be welcomed, given the structural possibility of accommodating diverse ideological currents within the ILP. Trotsky communicated this to the British Trotskyists in the following manner: If you enter the ILP to work for the Bolshevik transformation of that party (that is, of its revolutionary kernel), the workers will look upon you as upon fellow workers, comrades and not as adversaries who want to split the party from the outside.

76 The early days of British Trotskyism Had it been a question of a formed, homogeneous party with a stable apparatus, entry in it would not only be useless but fatal. But the ILP is in altogether a different state. Its apparatus is not homogeneous and therefore permits great freedom to different currents. The revolutionary rank and file of the party eagerly seeks solutions. Remaining as an independent group, you represent in the eyes of the workers, only small competitors to the Stalinists. inside the party you can much more successfully insulate the workers against Stalinism.16 The actions of the Trotskyists within the ILP were in parallel with Trotsky’s negotiations to persuade its leaders to join his vision for a Fourth International, as some of them were receptive to his critique of the Third International and its authoritarian tendencies. A discussion paper from December 1933 outlines the latest developments in the debate, including the various positions within the Communist League and the corresponding strategies for each option. It notes that the factional entry proposal, which entailed joining the ILP while maintaining a separate organisation, recommended that while all members would enter the ILP, only two would stay aside to maintain a shell organisation for the Trotskyists.17 However, some members found this option unappealing as it contradicted the original purpose of the ILP entry, which was to establish a bridge between the two parties rather than erect an organisational barrier (the independent shell structure) between them.18 A document entitled British Section: draft statement of the present position of the Majority and Minority on question of entering the Independent Labour Party (ILP), signed by the “National Majority Committee Comrades” and dated December 17, reveals that the majority attempted to compromise on the vote on entry. In this document, the majority discloses their willingness to: aid our fraction inside to play an active and effective part in the present discussions and at the same time influence active militants not at present members of the ILP.19 This sentence is intriguing in many ways because it implies two possible outcomes: either the minority decides to defy the announced refusal to apply the strategy recommended by Leon Trotsky, leading to cooperation between the two groups in the future, or part of the Communist League was already working as a fraction within the ILP. The latter could have been possible, considering the provenance of some of its members. If the second case were true, it would demonstrate that dual membership or fractional work was not considered by CL members as a form of entryism per se, even though it somewhat complied with the demands of the International Secretariat. Thus, the CL’s refusal would have been more statutory than conceptual and would have reflected more of a desire to establish a new independent communist party than anything else. According to the accounts of Alexander, Upham, and Grant, it seems 40 members participated in the December 17 vote. The vote resulted in 26 votes in favour

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of the Communist League’s continued independence and 11 votes for joining the ILP.20 The Communist League adhered to a centralist-democratic culture, typical of Leninist groups, and therefore had to respect the decision of the majority, which was generally unquestionable. However, the first British Trotskyist organisation experienced its first split over the issue of pursuing entryist tactics. This event foreshadowed the future of British Trotskyism, as all significant divisions revolved around the question of entry, whether into the ILP or later into the Labour Party. This split also exposed the first strains with the International Secretariat, which wrote a letter of protest to the British Trotskyists the day after the vote.21 Subsequently, 12 Trotskyists (thus a small third of the Communist League) split, constituted the Marxist Group, and entered the ILP, led by Denzil Harber and Stuart Kirby. The goal of this entry was threefold: • To attract and convert the masses. The ILP presented an ideal opportunity for the Trotskyists to achieve this goal. Comprised mostly of working-class members with a centrist ideology, the party’s militants were viewed as a fertile revolutionary breeding ground by the Trotskyists. They believed that by engaging with the ILP, they could influence the party’s apparatus to adopt the ideas of the Fourth International, which was then being constructed. • To prevent the spread of Stalinist ideas within the party. By offering a critical assessment of Comintern policies and presenting an alternative model, the Trotskyists aimed to counter the influence of Stalinism and its adherents. • To reorient it towards the Labour Party. Trotsky believed that the ILP’s recent split from Labour was a mistake and that it was necessary to bring the party back towards Labour, which was still the party of the trade unions and therefore where the masses were. By positioning the ILP in relation to Labour’s policies, the Trotskyists hoped to either maintain a relationship with the masses, attract and convert them, or push the Labour Party to reorient itself to the left and reabsorb the ILP. These objectives were not mutually exclusive. In his later writings, Trotsky even advocated for the ILP to join the Fourth International and then redirect itself towards the Labour Party.22 Despite Trotsky’s efforts, his plans were ultimately unsuccessful. The ILP refused to abandon its centrist ideology, which limited its influence and kept it on the margins of British politics. Activists who found the ILP too radical turned towards the Labour Party, while the more radical ones gravitated towards the CPGB. The ILP leadership also resisted Trotsky’s ambitions and never joined his Fourth International project.23 Furthermore, Trotsky’s argument that the ILP could reorient the Labour Party towards the left was doomed from the start. By this time, Labour was already relatively left-wing economically, largely due to the influence of Keynesianism and the rise of corporate socialism.24 Therefore, any ILP’s effort to shift Labour’s position would have been redundant. The first entryist experience in Britain was not without controversy among Trotskyist commentators. Ted Grant notes that the Marxist Group was already plagued by doubt and factionalism in 1935. In a letter co-signed by Denzil Harber and

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Stuart Kirby to the ILO International Secretariat, Ted Grant explains that no real conversion has taken place since the Trotskyist infiltration. He argues that all the members who joined the Marxist Group had either been converted by the Trotskyists before or had converted on their own without the group’s help. Ted Grant also states that while there was a push for the ILP to join the Fourth International in the first year of the group’s activity (with 20 party branches in favour), this issue was no longer debated by 1935.25 According to Ted Grant, part of the Marxist Group was obsessed with working within the ILP and turned it into an end in itself, losing sight of the original aim of converting and reorienting the party. Those members who proposed to re-evaluate the value of remaining in the ILP were accused of disloyalty to the party, and a motion to expel them was proposed. This group, organised around Denzil Harber, eventually left the ILP and joined the Labour League of Youth (LLY), the youth organisation of the Labour Party. Ironically, by the time the Trotskyists joined, the LLY was already subject to entryism by CPGB communists, as was the ILP at the time of the Trotskyist infiltration. The CPGB was once again one step ahead of the Trotskyists, which may explain their difficulties. Duncan Hallas presents a more nuanced balance sheet on the first entry into the ILP.26 He notes that the number of activists increased significantly, from about 15 individuals to over 100. Hallas also highlights that the group served as a recruiting ground for future leaders of British Trotskyism, including Ted Grant, who founded Militant in the 1960s; CLR James, a renowned militant historian and Eddie Patterson, who became the general secretary of the Iron and Steel Trade Confederation. These individuals brought advanced theoretical thinking to the Trotskyist movement in Britain. Centrism as an ideal niche for Trotskyist entry? To better understand the coherence of Trotsky’s projects, it is necessary to examine his recommendation that his followers join the ILP, which he considered a centrist formation that would allow the small group of Trotskyists to grow. The Trotskyists used the term “ferment” to refer to centrist formations or left-wing currents within social-democratic parties, and Trotsky himself described the first group of British Trotskyists as an embryo. According to Hallas, this metaphor of the embryo corresponded to the idea that a womb was needed for development, thus highlighting the importance of entryist tactics within a centrist body.27 However, it is worth questioning whether the ILP was the ideal terrain for the development of Trotskyism in Britain, given that all subsequent attempts at Trotskyist entryism were in a Labour Party that was unambiguously reformist. To assess this, we will refer to the four conditions established by Ted Grant for considering entryist tactics, as he was the most successful architect of entryism in Britain. The first condition is a revolutionary or pre-revolutionary political situation. This condition was not objectively fulfilled in 1933; on the contrary, the situation in Britain was quite the opposite. It is interesting to note that this somewhat millenarian idea was invoked several times by some British communist thinkers, such as

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Gerry Healy, who used this argument to legitimise his manoeuvres throughout the second half of the century. The last large-scale social movement in 1926 was bitterly defeated, and despite the Communist Party’s attempts in the late 1920s, revolt was not a watchword among British workers in 1933. Furthermore, the rise of fascism across Europe did not lead to a polarisation of forces in Britain, as evidenced by the failure to create a popular front and the fascist party’s inability to gain a lasting foothold in the political landscape. On the contrary, it seems that the events in Europe have strengthened British confidence in their parliamentary system. In his letter recommending entryist tactics to the British, Trotsky emphasised that passage through a centrist formation was necessary for the second condition: the centrist parties being potential revolutionary breeding grounds: But in the process of its formation, a Marxist Party often has to act as a faction of a centrist and even a reformist party. Thus, the Bolsheviks adhered for a number of years to the same party with the Mensheviks. Thus, the Third International only gradually formed itself out of the Second.28 In his letter, Trotsky implies that achieving independence cannot be done out of nothing. A revolutionary group must form from an existing group. While Trotsky agreed with the ILP’s decision to split from the Labour Party, he believed that the separation occurred prematurely. The logical consequence of this analysis is that revolutionary ideas must be formulated clearly within a particular group, and the split must then serve to advance those ideas, not the other way around. At this point, infiltrating the ILP with Trotskyists was a coherent idea. The third condition for considering entryist tactics is the presence of a developing left wing within the infiltrated body. Although the ILP did have such a left wing, it was problematic. Stalinist communists had already infiltrated the ILP long before the Trotskyists, and the group within the ILP most ideologically aligned with Marxist ideas was clear about its desire to join the Communist Party. Therefore, despite the potential for the conversion of ILP militants to Marxist ideas, the Trotskyists found themselves compelled to first contain the CPGB’s influence within the ILP before attempting to win over the ILP’s militant base to the ideas of the ILO. This made their task even more challenging. The fourth condition concerns the possibility of a rapid crystallisation of a revolutionary tendency. In the case of the ILP, this question was similar to the previous one. A revolutionary tendency already existed around Jack Gaster and his RPC. However, the RPC was committed to the Stalinists and effectively served as a relay for the ideas of the CPGB. Unfortunately for the Trotskyists, the rest of the ILP was not very receptive to revolutionary ideas, and centrism in the ILP was more of a fixed doctrine than a state of indecision. Despite meeting certain conditions for entry, it was precisely at this point that the ILP leaders’ “hardened centrism” frustrated the Trotskyist entry into the party. As Duncan Hallas has pointed out, the ILP’s rhetoric was Marxist, but its culture was fundamentally parliamentary, and its break with the Labour Party was based on a parliamentary issue rather than an ideological one.29 In fact, the ILP enjoyed

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a certain degree of freedom within the Labour Party, and it was only when the discipline of ILP MPs was discussed that it decided to vote to leave the party at the Bradford Congress in July 1932.30 The refusal of some MPs to sign a rule change preventing members on the left from voting against the MacDonald government led to the Labour Party not supporting any ILP candidates in the 1932 election.31 Although the ILP leaders stood up to the Labour Party to preserve some independence, the question of parliamentarianism as a means of establishing socialism had never been properly debated. The ILP’s affiliation with the Vienna International in 1921 is one example of this in-betweenness.32 Although the ILP’s centrist position appeared to be an ideal breeding ground for British Trotskyists, reality was more complicated. Ultimately, the ILP was too closely tied to its dominant cadres and MPs, making it difficult for Trotskyist ideas to gain traction. These same cadres were resistant to any dealings with Trotsky33 and only invoked his theories to try and contain the advance of the Stalinists within their ranks. John Callaghan described this approach as “dousing flames with petrol”.34 The leadership’s invocations of Trotsky to counter the Stalinists gave the impression to the Trotskyists that they had a place within the ILP, which was not truly the case. The obstacles to entryism in the ILP were thus more structural in nature than ideological. Being centrist did not automatically make the ILP an apparatus convertible to Trotskyism. According to Marxist theory, centrism is an unstable position that can shift towards either reformism or revolutionary tendencies.35 However, the ILP remained firmly centrist and resisted any such evolution. Contrary to the original intent, this operation produced ideological contamination among some Trotskyists, such as CLR James, who became more loyal to the ILP than to Trotsky and eventually refused to leave the centrist party. Trotsky’s U-turn on entryism within the ILP As early as February 1936, Trotsky recommended to his British followers that they join the Labour Party: The ILP should never rest content; it must build its influence in the mass organisations with the utmost speed and energy. For the time may come when, in order to reach the masses, it must enter the Labour Party, and it must have tracks laid for the occasion. Only the experience that comes from such fractional work can inform the ILP if and when it must enter the Labour Party. But for all its activity an absolutely clear program is the first condition. A small axe can fell a large tree only it is sharp enough.36 The passage suggests that Trotsky’s instructions were directed towards the ILP, but in reality, they were intended for a hypothetical Trotskyist-led ILP that had already been converted to the revolutionary cause. The goal was for this revolutionary apparatus to infiltrate the Labour Party and spread its revolutionary ideas. However, the theoretical basis for this new approach differed from the previous strategy.

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According to the analyses of British Trotskyists during that period, their entry into the Labour Party was motivated by the desire to stay connected with the masses rather than a desire to capture the party entirely. Alan Bridges, a prominent Trotskyist activist, provides an account of his experience: When we had joined the ILP, back in 1934, we had wanted to counteract the influence of the Stalinists there and to win it over as a going concern to the fourth International, leaving behind only incorrigible pacifists and reformists. As to the Labour Party, on the contrary nobody suggested for a moment either that it could be won over as a whole, or that its apparatus could be captured and used for revolutionary purpose. Those fantasies date from a later period. We recognise our forces were small and that “entry” was the best way, given our small numbers, of placing ourselves in the correct position to approach the workers who were tending, for want of anything better, to fall under Stalinist influence.37 The Trotskyist analysis once again highlights the idea of combating the CPGB. By 1936, Third International militants had attained a strong position within the LLY, and according to Trotsky, the Stalinists represented a major obstacle to the revolution. Therefore, it was the responsibility of ILO militants to counter their advancement. The method of entry was also corrected, according to Alan Bridges’ account: We wanted to attract workers into struggle, on the basis of demands which would lead them beyond the minimum programme of the reformists and their Stalinist collaborators, towards the maximum programme, the seizure of power.38 The aim of the Trotskyists, who infiltrated the Labour Party, differed from that of other forms of entryism that emerged after the Second World War. They saw the Labour Party as a means to an end rather than an end in itself. Their goal was not to capture the party but rather to educate its working-class members about the idea of revolution by demonstrating the inability of its leaders to break with capitalism and their complicity with it. In many ways, this strategy was similar to that of the early days of the CPGB. Back to Lenin’s approach to the Labour Party The strategy employed by British Trotskyists upon returning to the Labour Party in 1936 was based on the principles established by Lenin in 1920 and 1921. Lenin had recommended that the British Communist Party seek affiliation with the Labour Party as part of a proletarian united front, with the aim of both reaching out to the masses and exposing their leadership. The CPGB, however, was repeatedly denied membership and ultimately abandoned the united front strategy during the third

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period. In 1934, they returned with a new strategy, the popular front, which they hoped would prove more successful. In 1936, the British Trotskyists took a different approach, as seeking affiliation with the Labour Party was not feasible, particularly as they had split from the Marxist Group, which was officially a faction of the ILP. Furthermore, the Trotskyists had to distinguish themselves from the CPGB communists by explicitly defining themselves in relation to Trotsky. This created additional challenges, as Trotsky had been denied political asylum in Britain twice, partly due to the opposition of Labour MPs.39 Consequently, any attempt to seek affiliation was bound to fail, and it was not a priority for the small Trotskyist group. Ultimately, the entry of the Trotskyists into the youth section of the Labour Party aligned with a fairly orthodox Leninist tactic. However, the Comintern put an end to this tactic right after Lenin’s death with the adoption of the new line, denouncing social democratic parties as being “social fascists”. The British Trotskyists did not share the CPGB’s third-period view of the Labour Party, which defined it without nuance. Instead, they held a more nuanced perspective, as explained by Alan Bridges: When Marxists say, therefore, what they think the Labour Party is, they define it as a contradiction: it is a counter-revolutionary workers’ party. It rests upon the working-class. Its leadership stands for policies which, in the present state of the world, not merely cannot meet the aspirations of the working-class but place it in great danger.40 The analysis of the British Trotskyists is similar to that formulated by Lenin, in that the Labour Party was considered to be a party “of workers”, which as a whole defended bourgeois interests. Trotsky believed that the question of exposing the Labour Party as reformist and traitorous to the workers’ cause had not been resolved under the MacDonald governments of 1924, 1929, and 1931. It is argued that the Labour Party already stands exposed by its past deeds in power and its present reactionary platform. For example, by its decision at Brighton. For us – yes! But not for the masses, the eight million who voted Labour. It is a great danger for revolutionists to attach too much importance to conference decisions. We use such evidence in our propaganda – but it cannot be presented beyond the power of our own press. One cannot shout louder than the strength of his own throat.41 This excerpt from Trotsky describes the Labour Party as a mass party and assumes the Leninist logic of going to the masses to prepare them for revolution in a vanguardist approach. Trotsky’s strategy went beyond organisational goals and included propaganda and education. He believed that the infiltrated Trotskyists should focus on recruiting future cadres for the coming British proletarian revolution rather than transforming the Labour Party into a revolutionary organisation.

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Another tactical split: the creation of the Bolshevik Leninist Group Several Trotskyists from the Marxist Group left it to join the Labour Party starting in April 1935. Their target organisations within the Labour Party were the Socialist League and the LLY. The work within the Socialist League was short-lived and complicated; only five Trotskyist activists were able to infiltrate it, and they were forced to leave quickly because of the League’s involvement in the campaign for unity with the CPGB. This was during the time when the Communist Party was launching an offensive against Trotsky’s followers. The Moscow trials, which began in August 1936, provided the Stalinists with a reason to discredit Trotskyists politically. They started labelling Trotskyists as “Fascists” or “Hitler’s agents”, claiming that refusing the popular front and criticising the USSR was equivalent to supporting fascist regimes.42 Exiles from the Marxist Group, including Stuart Kirby, Ted Grant, and Denzil Harber, joined other Trotskyists who had infiltrated the LLY. The young Roma Dewar, sister of one of the founders of the first British Trotskyist group, Hugo Dewar, had established a small group there that contributed to political debate and the dissemination of revolutionary ideas through the magazine Youth Forum, an alternative magazine within the League of Youth that brought together various dissident tendencies. Then, Stalinists and Trotskyists both contributed to the same magazine. This collaboration ended when Ted Willis, the young Stalinist leader, went on the offensive when the CPGB wanted to defend its interests in the youth league.43 The Trotskyists formed a group and adopted the name Bolshevik-Leninist Group. They started their own publication called Youth Militant in October 1935. Although the group had fewer than ten active members at the beginning of 1936, it had a disproportioned influence on the LLY. Roma Dewar, for instance, was elected to the national council of the organisation. The radical nature of the group and the inability of the Labour Party to provide political education to its youth led to the takeover of the organisation by various communists.44 Despite the successful election of Roma Dewar to the league’s national council, the Trotskyists were unable to gain dominance within the organisation as the Stalinists quickly took over. In 1936, the group also experienced some success in recruiting new members, growing from six to 60 members. This was a significant achievement for a group that had only been in existence for one year and had already surpassed the Marxist Group’s achievements in three years. However, the success in terms of recruitment did not meet the expectations set by Denzil Harber in September: Our task is to win from transport House and reformist ideology as many workers as possible within a certain period of time. A minimum requirement may be stated, namely that within a year some hundreds of Labour Party workers are ready to form with us a new party when the moment comes. If a year’s work by the group reaches less than this, then the step of joining the Labour Party has failed to bring the necessary results.45 The group’s objective was to “capture” as many militants as possible before eventually leaving the party, in a form of raid tactic. Thus, the Trotskyists of the

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Bolshevik-Leninist Group believed in using entryism as, first and foremost, a growth mechanism. The Communist League/Marxist League and entry within the Socialist League Following the split in 1934 regarding the matter of entryism into the ILP, the Communist League quickly recognised its political isolation within the British left. In order to make up for its limited number of militants, the league opted to take guidance from the recommendations given by Trotsky in the summer of 1934 to the French, Belgian, and Spanish groups. According to these recommendations, the smaller groups of the ILO needed to join the social-democratic parties to educate, learn, and recruit through them, following the principle of a united front.46 The league explained its stance in a leaflet that outlined its programme: A new party cannot be built by proclamation; a leadership does not spring up overnight. We must fashion our tools out the materials to hand. For this reason, the Communist League seeks to unite the advanced workers within the already formed organisations for the wining of the mass of the workers to revolutionary principles and understanding. Recognising however that only a minority of the workers support revolutionary policy the League works loyally with the mass of those organised within the labour, trades union and co-operative movements for certain common ends.47 However, unlike the Bolshevik-Leninist Group, the Communist League directed its entryism towards the Socialist League. This decision was based on a synthesis of Trotsky’s analysis of centrist formations and his recommendations to the other sections of the ILO. Compared to the failed attempt to integrate the Socialist League by the former Marxist Group Trotskyists who would form the Bolshevik-Leninist Group, the Communist League’s entry into the Socialist League was relatively successful. This success was likely due, in part, to the group’s settlement geography. The Trotskyists established branches of the Socialist League in Balham and Tooting, which were the birthplaces of British Trotskyism and brought a working-class flavour to the league. The success was also due to the group’s demographics. The founding members of the Communist League had been active in the area all their lives and had good links with the local labour sections. Their entryism was not kept secret and was not frowned upon by the Labour leadership. There, the Communist League renamed itself the Marxist League. According to Martin Upham, Herbert Morrison was even rather tolerant of them.48 However, conflicts still arose between the leadership of the Socialist League and the Communist League, particularly on issues such as the Ethiopian crisis or the campaign for unity with the CPGB. It appears that overall the Marxist League succumbed to what can be called “ideological contagion”, leading many of its members to abandon their revolutionary ideals in favour of seeking a career within the Labour Party. Reginald Groves, a prominent

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member of the group, was selected as a delegate to the party conference for the Tooting and Balham branches, while Henry Sara was pre-selected as a candidate for the general election. Reg Groves was the only member of the group to ascend through the ranks of the Socialist League, serving first as London Secretary in September 1935 and then as London representative on the National Council in September 1936. In 1938, he was Labour’s candidate for the Aylesbury constituency in a by-election that pitted him against a coalition between the Liberal Party and the CPGB. Although the Marxist League’s publication, the Red Flag, never questioned the Socialist League’s ideology, other groups were aware of the Marxist League’s ideological shift and expressed concerns and criticisms in their own publications. For instance, members of the Bolshevik-Leninist Group wrote a letter to the International Secretariat, describing the Marxist League as “grow[ing] ever more opportunistic” to the point where its programme “differs little from that of the Socialist League”. The letter also stated that the Marxist League refused to sell the Bolshevik-Leninist Group’s newspaper, which was targeted at young Labour members, and instead chose to promote the Socialist Youth publication. Finally, the letter concluded that the Marxist League had degenerated politically and could no longer be considered Bolshevik-Leninist, and that it was merely the “personal following of Groves and Dewar, who have steadily degenerated politically since the split in the English section in December 1933”.49 Despite this, the original aim of the Trotskyists in the Marxist League was to “ideologically contaminate” the Socialist League. However, very soon, any work of political education by challenging the organisation internally was put aside in favour of criticising the formation of a popular front with the ILP and CPGB. The main objective of the Trotskyists then became the safeguarding of the Socialist League against the attacks of the Labour leadership. The Geneva conference and the first attempt at Trotskyist Unity in Britain In 1933, the ILO changed its name to the International Communist League in preparation for the creation of a new International. As Trotsky’s plans began to take shape, efforts were made to unite Trotskyist groups worldwide. The Geneva Conference, which actually took place in Paris and used Geneva as a code name in correspondence, was held at the end of July 1936. The Marxist Group and the Bolshevik-Leninist Group sent CLR James and Denzil Harber, respectively, as delegates to the congress, while the Marxist League was unable to send a delegate but did contribute to the meeting of British Bolshevik-Leninist forces that was organised after the Geneva conference on October 11, 1936.50 At the Geneva conference, a resolution entitled Resolution on the Tasks of the British Bolshevik-Leninists aimed at the unity of the British Trotskyist forces was passed unanimously, thus signifying James’ and Harber’s agreement on its principle. The resolution was highly critical of the division of groups in Britain: Without there being apparent differences of principle, they are separate from one another and often work for opposed ends, thus preventing the

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The early days of British Trotskyism development of the progress of the Fourth International in Britain. The conference sees no principled reasons for such a division of the forces and demands a fusion on a democratic basis.51

The splits within the British Trotskyist movement were considered unfounded, according to the document, which stated that the groups would merge without the dissolution of any particular group. It was asserted that “[c]learly on this question of fusion, no group can demand that another dissolve itself and that its members join the first group individually”.52 However, despite this claim, it appeared that the conference had a bias towards the tactics of the Bolshevik-Leninist Group. The absence of the Marxist League is noted in the resolution, and with regard to the Marxist Group, the following lines are included: The Conference is further of the opinion that the experience of the BolshevikLeninists within the ILP must be brought to an end, and that this group which at this moment is working within that organisation must shift its field of work in the direction of the mass organisations, especially towards the Labour Party and the Labour League of Youth.53 The aim of the unification was to settle within the Labour Party, specifically in its youth section. The resolution described the ILP as a bankrupt and declining centrist sect and urged the Marxist Group to abandon it. The document strongly suggested that the merger should favour Harber’s Bolshevik-Leninist Group. It recommended that the merger be ratified by a democratic vote, but in reality, the decision would have had an authoritarian character anyway as it was a result of the ILO’s demands. This was ironic given that one of the reasons for the birth of British Trotskyism was to criticise the Comintern’s authoritarianism towards the CPGB. The Marxist League responded quite favourably to the demands of the International Communist League and decided to send three delegates to the National Congress of British Bolshevik-Leninists held on October 11, 1936. In contrast, the Bolshevik-Leninist Group sent 26 delegates, and the Marxist Group sent 39. However, the congress turned into a debacle as the militants of the Marxist League refused any compromise except for the creation of a central coordinating committee to increase collaboration between the groups. The merger proposal was rejected because, according to the Marxist League, pressure had to be brought to bear from all sides. Therefore, the regroupment would have deprived the Trotskyists of influence in the ILP and in the League of Youth.54 On October 10, 1936, on the eve of the conference, the Marxist Group held an internal meeting where they decided that it was time for the Trotskyists to exist independently, with the aim of building the single party of British Trotskyism outside of any other party. This decision posed the biggest obstacle to the hopes of the Geneva conference. The Marxist Group went ahead and declared its departure from the ILP to form the official section of the ILO on November 15, 1936, effectively burying the hopes of the Geneva Conference.55 However, on December 13, 1936, the International Communist League ruled the Marxist Group’s application

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invalid and repudiated the group organised around CLR James. Consequently, on December 16, the Marxist Group had to declare itself independent of the ILO,56 but it is evident that not all of the organisation agreed with the new line. Writings published by the BLG suggest that the former leadership of the group, organised around Arthur Cooper, favoured continuing their work within the ILP.57 On the side of the Marxist League, the signing of the Unity Agreement on November 29, 1936, between the Socialist League and the CPGB brought Groves’ group into direct conflict with the League’s leadership. The Trotskyists likely anticipated that the Labour Party would ban the Socialist League if it signed an agreement with the Communist Party. Groves attempted to persuade the League leadership to abandon its plans for unity with the CPGB and to remain within the Labour Party, but his efforts were in vain. At a Socialist League conference held on January 16 and 17, 1937, the Trotskyists’ proposal to apply united front tactics with the Labour Party and not with the ILP and the Communist Party was rejected. The Socialist League was disaffiliated from the Labour Party in March 1937 and forced to dissolve in May 1937. The key figures of the Marxist League, namely Sara, Wicks, and Groves, attempted to establish a replacement for the Socialist League by creating the Socialist Left Federation. However, this federation did little to consolidate Trotskyist forces in Britain and instead further scattered them. When the Socialist League collapsed, Harber proposed that the Marxist League join forces with the Bolshevik-Leninist Group, but Groves and Sara rejected the idea because they preferred to work with non-Trotskyist Labour members. In the end, the Socialist Left Federation proved to be a short-lived venture and never expanded beyond 100 members, making it a far cry from the relatively successful Socialist League it was intended to replace. The federation dissolved just six months after the Socialist League in December 1937. Following the Geneva conference, the remaining members of the Marxist League and the Bolshevik-Leninist Group held another meeting on February 14, 1937, but were unable to reach an agreement for the unification of the Trotskyist factions. The Red Flag was issued for the last time in October 1937, and the League disbanded in the same month.58 The rebranding of the Bolshevik-Leninist into the Militant Group: the consolidation of entryism In the summer of 1937, the Trotskyists of the Bolshevik-Leninist Group, led by Denzil Harber, restructured their publication Youth Militant, renaming it Militant. The removal of the word “Youth” from the title was a significant change, signalling the group’s intention to expand its influence beyond a specific demographic. Initially, the paper identified itself as “the organ of the Militant Group within the Labour Party”, but this was later changed to “Organ of the Provisional Committee of the Militant Labour League”, and finally to “Organ of the Militant Labour League” in 1939, reflecting the group’s evolution from being insular to open. The Militant Labour League (MLL) was a front organisation established by the Bolshevik-Leninist Group to engage with the Labour Party. However, according to

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Ted Grant, a member of the group, the organisation failed to attract new members: “There was only a tiny periphery in the Militant Labour League who was not already members. The whole thing proved to be an extra-burden with no results”.59 In reality, most Labour activists were aware that the policies adopted by the MLL were similar to those of the Militant Group, and therefore saw no need to join it. The shift towards the Labour Party itself rather than its youth wing can be attributed to the dominant position of Stalinists within the Labour youth, as well as the international context that required a new approach to entryism. The Moscow trials and the Spanish Civil War provided a platform for the Communists of the Third International to denounce Trotskyists as collaborators with the bourgeoisie. The Trotskyists were accused of opposing the Soviet regime in Russia and refusing to provide unconditional support to the Republican government in Spain.60 The Militant Group was primarily engaged in selling its newspaper and trying to convert Labour Party members to Trotskyist ideology. One of the group’s primary slogans was to hold meetings in local Labour Party branches to influence the international policy of the British labour movement. For instance, the MLL manifesto called on labour activists to take the following actions: “Demand special meetings of your local Labour Parties! Demand a special Labour Conference to change the entire foreign policy of the movement”.61 The objective of the Militant Group was to combat the enemy within, namely the British bourgeoisie. Additionally, the group’s manifesto stated its intention to prevent the corruption of the Labour Party by the ideas of “social-patriotism”, which was described as having an imperialist nature and, in practice, involved an alliance with the forces of capitalism against workers in other nations: The enemy is at home. The British capitalists who exploit us, who starve and oppress the colonial peoples, whose record is one of bloodthirsty rapacity, are the enemies which the working class must fight. We will join hands with the workers in Germany and Czechoslovakia in struggle against our own boss class. We will not fight each other but for the overthrow of Capitalism.62 The meetings organised by the MLL within Labour sections were not intended for debates but rather to provide a platform for Trotskyist activists to voice their ideas. It is important to note that the Militant Group had no intention of changing the ideology of the Labour Party; the manifesto slogans were simply a means of establishing contact with Labour activists.63 The aim was to present the Militant Group as an alternative to the Labour Executive, which was resistant to adopting leftist policies. In this way, British Trotskyism aimed to attract disillusioned Labour members and eventually convince them to adopt Trotskyist principles and establish a revolutionary party of the working class. At the group’s national conference in early August 1937, Denzil Harber praised the Militant Group for its stability and relative success. By that time, it had become the largest Trotskyist organisation in Britain, with militant numbers sometimes exceeding double figures in some local Labour Party branches. According to Martin

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Upham, this success was due to a stronger discipline within the group. Upham also explains that despite their efforts, it was challenging for British Trotskyists to reach a larger number of activists due to their lack of presence in industry and in the trade unions, which had always provided the Communist Party with a pool of activists.64 This analysis is supported by Ted Grant, who suggests that the Militant Group was primarily composed of “bohemian individuals” from the middle class: The social composition of the Militant Group was pretty bad. It was composed to a large degree of bohemians and people of that sort. There were people who wore cloaks and sandals, and grew beards, which, at that time, was a sort of exotic fashion in certain “intellectual” circles. You can just imagine the type of individuals. They were your typical Bloomsbury bohemians.65 However, it is important to approach this analysis with caution. Trotskyist groups have a tendency to criticise and denounce each other as “petty bourgeois”.66 It is difficult to verify or refute Grant’s personal statements in this case. Nevertheless, there is evidence to suggest that he was correct. When Grant and his group left the party, they were able to maintain a relatively strong presence in trade unions and working-class environments, where the Militant Group failed to maintain contact with the working class. The Militant Group Conference of August 1937 holds great historical significance in the British Trotskyist movement, beyond the consideration of successes and failures, as it marked the entry of Ralph Lee and his partner Millie into the group. Ralph Lee was a notable and successful trade union activist from South Africa who supported Trotskyism and was one of the key organisers of the movement. In the past, he had convinced many activists, including Ted Grant, and after considering both the Marxist League and the Militant Group, he eventually joined the latter, where his former comrade was already involved.67 Ralph Lee was actively involved in the Paddington branch, which seems to have been the most active despite having a membership of only nine by the end of the summer of 1937. Lee’s door-to-door canvassing methods and regular street leafleting were adopted by the group, which contributed to its high level of activity. As a result, two of its members, Jock Haston and Ralph Lee, were appointed to the national committee of the Militant Group. However, the presence of the two Paddington Group activists on the executive soon became a source of friction. Towards (yet) another split: the creation of the WIL, a tactical or a personal decision? By the end of October, rumours about Ralph Lee’s integrity began to emerge within the Militant Group. These rumours were spread by Herman Van Gelderen, a South African Trotskyist, and were passed on to Britain by his brother Charlie. According to Ted Grant’s account, the rumours alleged that Ralph Lee had embezzled funds raised for the labour movement before fleeing to Britain. In response, the party leadership, led by Harber, decided to suspend Lee from his responsibilities on the

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group’s executive committee without conducting any investigation. However, on December 13, 1937, at a special meeting of the Militant Group executive, which Harber did not attend, it was unanimously declared that Ralph Lee still had the confidence of the executive. The next day, during a general meeting, Jock Haston, Ralph Lee, and the Paddington group walked out of the meeting in protest against the attacks by Harber and Jackson, who were the de facto leaders of the Militant Group. They accused them of trying to create chaos in the section and demanded the temporary expulsion of the Paddington group.68 After the case was resolved, Ralph Lee was found to be innocent, and Harber, Van Gelderen, and Jackson were temporarily suspended for admitting to mismanaging the case. A new executive was elected without the inclusion of Lee or Harber. However, Harber, Jackson, and Van Gelderen protested against their suspension, claiming it was a breach of the group’s constitution. Ultimately, the new executive was dissolved and the old one was reinstated, but without Ralph Lee and Millie Kahn. The Paddington Group, which was the core of the Militant Group, refused to join the group again and instead founded the Workers’ International League (WIL) with its nine members, including Ted Grant, Jock Haston, Ralph Lee, Gerry Healy, and Millie Kahn. The discord that caused the split is interesting from a historical perspective. In addition to personal differences, there was a fundamental opposition in the practice of militancy that separated Lee and his comrades from the Militant Group. On the surface, the split seemed to be the result of a personal quarrel. However, it is evident from the writings of Ted Grant, Bornstein, Richardson, and the research of Martin Upham that the attack by Van Gelderen, supported by Harber, was perceived by the Paddington Group as a plot to remove Lee from the leadership of the Militant Group. Both sides accused each other of conspiring and trying to drive the group apart. It does not seem like either side intended to split, and the eventual split of the Paddington Group was more of an afterthought than a concrete intention at the outset. The Paddington Group’s decision to split and form the Workers International League (WIL) was based on the realisation that their activity was no longer aligned with that of the Militant Group. The Paddington Group was primarily workingclass, unlike the national group. Additionally, they were much more active than the national group, apparently selling just over 60% of the papers sold by the Militant Group while having only ten members, according to Ted Grant.69 Ralph Lee’s group had a different approach to Trotskyism, partly due to Lee’s trade union experience. They aimed to direct their work towards both youth and workers, while the Militant Group focused solely on the Labour Party. The Lee Group claimed they were expelled rather than having split themselves, and that their decision not to return to the Militant Group was due to incompatibilities between their militant practices. Martin Upham accurately notes that the separation of the Lee Group from the Militant Group was a symptom rather than a clear-cut intention. The Militant Group was stagnant, and no progress had been made outside of Paddington in 1937. While Harber’s group in the Labour Youth remained more stable than its rivals in the

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Marxist League and the Marxist Group, it had not made any concrete progress. Most of its publications and output consisted of debates with its rivals on Trotskyist theory and practice rather than articles in support of workers’ actions and real propaganda work. This stagnation would inevitably have led to the split of a more active group, as was the case with the nascent WIL.70 Conclusion The first five years of British Trotskyism were marked by a series of splits, starting from the CPGB to the Communist League, then from the Communist League to the Marxist Group, from the Marxist Group to the Militant Group, and finally from the Militant Group to the WIL. All of these splits had their origins in tactical disagreements and had one thing in common: their relationship to entryism and labourism. The Marxist Group left the Communist League to join the ILP, the Militant Group left the Marxist Group to join the LLY, and the WIL left the Militant Group to remain tactically flexible and develop its militancy. The tactical wanderings of the early British Trotskyists can be attributed to three main factors that influenced them: • The tactical reversals of Trotsky himself were one of the main influencing factors. He advised his followers to return to the ILP as early as 1934, only to ask them to leave it and return to the Labour Party two years later. This resulted in groups A and B splitting and later reuniting, each blaming the other for their failures. Despite this tension, Trotsky himself was never blamed for these disagreements. • The stagnation of Trotskyist forces resulted in a lack of dynamism in terms of recruitment, which prompted the Trotskyists to question their practices. Two interpretations were generally adopted: either there was a need for more concentration of forces at one point (like the Militant Group within the Labour Party) or there was a need to expand their efforts (like the Marxist League within the Social Left Federation). In both cases, this stagnation led a faction to question the group’s practice, hold it responsible for the lack of progress, and ultimately adopt a new tactic. • The CPGB’s superiority in terms of power and flexibility in pursuing entryism is notable. Within both the ILP and the Labour League of Youth, the CPGB was always one step ahead of the British Trotskyists. The operation to infiltrate the ILP led to the RPC’s split from it. The same was true in the LLY, as Advance had almost gained complete control by the time the Trotskyists seriously approached the LLY. The degree of Stalinist influence within the LLY was such that the British Trotskyists could not convert the infiltrated party to their ideas without first containing Advance’s progress, which proved impossible for them. As a result, their discourse became less interesting and more complicated to understand for the infiltrated party’s pool of activists. Their discourse was thus perceived as “reactionary” in the original sense, as they spent their time denouncing the positions of the British Communist Party.

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The tactical wanderings mentioned earlier resulted in a significant stagnation of British Trotskyism, which failed to gain momentum in the 1930s despite being delayed. This fragmentation of Trotskyist forces on the eve of the formal creation of the Fourth International conditioned British Trotskyism to search perpetually for a stable partisan form for the next 50 years. Despite the challenges faced by British Trotskyism, it is possible to view the rise of the Militant Group as the beginning of a stabilisation phase. Although the group was not able to achieve massive recruitment or become a true Trotskyist party, it did establish itself as the most stable and coherent among the ML, MG, and BLG groups, with the International Secretariat showing support for it over the others. This modest success could have been attributed to several factors, including a strong sense of ideological coherence, a well-theorised approach to entryism, and effective leadership from Denzil Harber. The early Trotskyists were more concerned with the Communist Party’s activities than those of the Labour Party. The tactical reversals responded to the need for responsiveness on the part of Trotskyists, who still believed in the imminence of a world revolution inspired by the October Revolution. Jeremy Tranmer’s conclusion about the relationship between the British far left and the Labour Party applies perfectly to the early British Trotskyists. The British left has always struggled to define itself, failing to find a real audience, and has always defined itself in relation to the Labour Party. This conclusion can be extended to the relationship with the CPGB, given the oppositional nature of early Trotskyism.71 As the history of the Trotskyist movement progressed, its construction evolved towards a definition in relation to social democracy, particularly in Britain, where the Communists of the Third International never imposed themselves as a major force in the political field. During the classic period of British Trotskyism, these groups acted as pressure groups: pressure against the Communist Party and pressure on the Labour Party. The nature of the pressure exerted is also interesting. It was characterised by pressure on the activists of the target organisations and not directly on the political apparatus, as the Campaign for Labour Party Democracy did in the 1970s, or its cadres, as the “Printemps républicain” did in France or Blue Labour did in the United Kingdom in the 2010s. Notes 1 UPHAM Martin, The History of British Trotskyism to 1949, PhD dissertation, University of Hull, Hull, 1980. www.marxists.org/history/etol/revhist/upham/upmen.htm (last accessed 14.04.2023). 2 Sometimes called the Marxist League in some sources, such as Martin Upham’s PhD dissertation, for the sake of readability, the name Marxian League, used in particular by Albert Glotzer, will be used in this book. 3 GROVES Reginald, The Balham Group: How British Trotskyism Began, London: Pluto Press, 1974, p. 49. 4 UPHAM Martin, The History of . . . op. cit. 5 GROVES Reginald, The Balham Group . . . op. cit., p. 9. 6 Ibid., p. 61. 7 UPHAM Martin, The History of . . . op. cit.

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8 See TROTSKY Léon, Is Soviet Policy a Matter on Which Only Russian Socialists Are Competent to Decide, letter dated August 9, 1933, available in Writings of Leon Trotsky [1933–1934], New York: Pathfinder, 1975, p. 33. In this letter, Leon Trotsky offers his assistance to the ILP in formulating an analysis of the international context. His approach is subtle, as he does not directly invite the ILP to join him but instead offers them theoretical tools to strengthen their position. 9 The term “centrist” is used to describe a position that lies between reformist and revolutionary strategies. 10 The Brandlerites, a group of oppositional communists in Germany, were expelled from the Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands (KPD) in 1928. Subsequently, they established the Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands-Opposition (KPDO) in 1929, while some of them opted to join a splinter group of the Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands (SPD), known as the Sozialistische Arbeiterpartei Deutschlands (SAPD). For more information on these events, refer to Jacques Droz’s Histoire générale du socialisme, which covers the period from 1918 to 1945. Specifically, pages 219 and 226–227 provide details on the SAPD and KPDO, respectively. 11 TROTSKY Leon, How to Influence the ILP, letter dated September 3, 1933, available in Writings of Leon Trotsky [1933–1934], New York: Pathfinder, 1975, p. 71. 12 Papers of Denzil Dean Harber (1909–1966), Trotskyist, MRC: MSS.151/1/1/1–4. 13 The Declaration of Four: On the Necessity and Principles of a New International, August 1933. www.marxists.org/history/etol/document/1930s/four.htm (last accessed 14.04.2023). Republished in the American Militant: “Joint Declaration for New International”, The Militant, vol. 6, n°44, September 23 1933, p. 1&4. 14 TROTSKY Leon, The Lever of a Small Group, letter dated October 2, 1933, available in Writings of Leon Trotsky [1933–1934], New York: Pathfinder, 1975, p. 125. 15 GRANT Ted, History of British Trotskyism, London: Wellred Publications, 2002, p. 31. 16 TROTSKY Leon, The Lever of a Small Group . . . op. cit., p. 125. 17 Communist League, For Discussion, December 1933, MRC: MSS.151/1/1/2. 18 International Left Opposition, British Section: Draft Statement of the Present Position of the Majority and Minority on Question of Entering the Independent Labour Party (ILP), December 19, 1933. MRC: MSS.15/3/1/52. 19 Ibid. 20 UPHAM Martin, The History of . . . op. cit. 21 Letter from the International Secretariat to the British Section of the International Communist League, undated (probably, December 1933), MRC: MSS.151/1/1/2. 22 To Comrade Sneevliet on the IAG Conference, letter of February 26, 1935, available in TROTSKY Léon Writings of Leon Trotsky, 1934–1935, New York: Pathfinder, 1971, p. 187. 23 HALLAS Duncan, “Revolutionaries and the Labour Party”, International Socialism Quarterly Journal of the Socialist Workers Party, series 2, n°16, Spring 1982. 24 FOOTE Geoffrey, The Labour Party’s Political Thought. A History, London: Croom Helm, 1985, pp. 83–188. 25 GRANT Ted, History of British . . . . op. cit., pp. 41–42. 26 HALLAS Duncan, “Revolutionaries and the Labour Party” . . . op. cit. 27 Ted Grant is a regular user of this kind of metaphor. See, for example, GRANT Ted, Problems of Entrism, Revolutionary Socialist League pamphlet, 1959, MRC: 601/C/2/2/6. 28 TROTSKY Leon, Principled Considerations on Entry, letter to the Bolshevik-Leninist section of the British section, dated September 16, 1933, available in Writings of Leon Trotsky [1933–1934], New York: Pathfinder, 1975, p. 84. The letter was republished in an internal bulletin of the British section in October of the same year. Internal Bulletin, October 24, 1933. MSS.151/1/1/2. 29 HALLAS Duncan, “Revolutionaries and the Labour Party” . . . op. cit. 30 PUGH Martin, Speak for Britain, a New History of the Labour Party, London: Vintage Books, 2011, p. 218.

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31 HANNAH Simon, A Party With Socialists in It: A History of the Labour Left, London: Pluto Press, 2018, pp. 54–55. 32 DONNEUR André, “Internationale Deux-Et-Demie Et Internationale Communiste: Échec Du Congrès Ouvrier Mondial, Tentative De Front Unique International”, Le Mouvement Social, n°74, 1971, pp. 29–41. www.jstor.org/stable/3807157 (last accessed 14.04.2023). 33 Many of Trotsky’s writings published in the period 1932–1934 are directed at the ILP. It seems that during this period, Trotsky sought to advise the ILP on the way forward (with the aim of getting them to join his International). See, for example, the letter Wither the Independent Labour Party, letter dated August 28, 1933, available in TROTSKY Léon, Collected Writings 1933–1934, New York: Pathfinder Press, 1975, pp. 52–57 or The ILP and the New International, dated September 4, 1933, available in the same book, pp. 72–78. 34 CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left in British Politics, Oxford: B. Blackwell, 1987, p. 42. 35 Trotsky commented extensively on the ILP’s centrist position in the mid-1920s. See TROTSKY Leon, “A Forecast to the Future”, in Where Is Britain Going? 1925. The text itself is available in Leon Trotsky on Britain, New York: Pathfinder Press, 2012, pp. 175–192. 36 TROTSKY Leon, “Once again the ILP”, New International, vol. 3 n°1, February 1936, pp. 5–10. www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1936/xx/ilp.htm (last accessed 14.04.2023). 37 BRIDGES Allan, “Trotskyists and the Entry Tactic”, Marxist Bulletin, n°1, Summer 1975, p. 26. 38 Ibid. 39 See “Mr Trotsky”, Hansard, HoC debate, July 24, 1929, vol. 230, col. 1424–1446. https://hansard.parliament.uk/Commons/1929-07-24/debates/8e398d2e-7f7f-49f6b35d-46487fd8001f/MTrotsky (last accessed 14.04.2023) or “Mr Leon Trotsky”, Hansard, HoC debate, April 20, 1931, vol. 251, col. 615. https://hansard.parliament. uk/Commons/1931-04-20/debates/81058b09-6633-429d-b13f-e7b0848f1afb/MrLeonTrotsky (last accessed 14.04.2023). 40 BRIDGES Allan, “Trotskyists and the Entry Tactic” . . . op. cit., p. 19. 41 TROTSKY Leon, “Once again the ILP” . . . op. cit., pp. 5–10. 42 HALLAS Duncan, “Revolutionaries and the Labour Party” . . . op. cit. 43 UPHAM Martin, The History of . . . op. cit. 44 ATKINSON Julian, “Labour’s Youth Movements”, International, vol. 6, n°4, November 1981, pp. 20–24. 45 WILLIAMS Robert, On the Work of the Bolshevik-Leninists in the Labour Party, Internal document. Quoted in RADCLIFFE Bob, “British Trotskyism, Social Democracy and the Entry Tactic: The Experience of the Thirties”, Revolutionary Communist Papers, Theoretical Journal of the Revolutionary Communist Party, n°8, September 1981, p. 26. 46 BENSAÏD Daniel, Les trotskysmes, Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, Que saisje?, 2002, p. 32. 47 Communist League, The Communist League and Its Immediate Programme, leaflet, 1934, MRC: MSS.15B/1/2. 48 UPHAM Martin, The History of . . . op. cit. 49 All the quotes are extracts from Statement to the Bureau for the Fourth International from the B.L. Group in the Labour Party Regarding the Fulfillment of the Geneva Resolution on the Question of the Unity of the British Groups, MRC: MSS.151/1/1/1. 50 ALEXANDER Robert J., International Trotskyism 1929–1985, A Documented Analysis of the Movement, Durham & Londres: Duke University Press, 1991, pp. 447–448. 51 Resolution on the Tasks of the British Bolshevik-Leninists, Unanimously agreed by the “Geneva” Pre-Conference, July 31, 1936. www.marxists.org/history/etol/revhist/ brittrot/archer2.htm (last accessed 14.04.2023).

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52 Ibid. 53 Ibid. 54 HARBER Denzil, The Labour Party Bolshevik-Leninist Group and Fusion, 1936, Document of the Bolshevik-Leninist Group. MRC: MSS.151/1/1/1. 55 The Marxist Group’s initiative greatly upset the British groups and led to many discussions between them; many of the exchanges are available in the Denzil Harber archive. MRC: MSS.151/1/1/1. 56 UPHAM Martin, The History of . . . op. cit. 57 Statement to the Bureau for the Fourth International From the B.L. Group in the Labour Party Regarding the Fulfilment of the Geneva Resolution on the Question of the Unity of the British Groups, MRC: MSS.151/1/1/1. 58 UPHAM Martin, The History of . . . op. cit. 59 GRANT Ted, History of British . . . op. cit., p. 45. 60 The Trotskyists were active in the Spanish War but never joined the International Brigades to oppose Franco. In contrast, the Trotskyists operated mainly within the POUM in collaboration with the Catalan left-wing nationalists. A famous episode of the Spanish War was the assassination of the Trotskyist leader André Nin by the government of the Second Spanish Republic at the instigation of Stalinist communists controlled from Moscow by the NKVD. For more information on the subject, see CHRIST Michel & BERGER Denis, Le POUM Histoire d’un Parti Révolutionnaire Espagnol: 1935–1952, Paris, Budapest & Torino: L’Harmattan, 2006. 61 Militant Group, Manifesto of the Militant Labour League, 1938, MRC: 601/Q/6/1. 62 Ibid. 63 This initial strategy was confirmed afterwards and developed in a March 1944 document entitled “Militant Group – Resolutions to RSL-WIL merge”, in which the Militant Group took stock of its entryist strategy with a view to merging with the Workers’ International League group. Available from Ken Tarbuck’s archive. MRC: MSS.75/3/3/18. 64 UPHAM Martin, The History of . . . op. cit. 65 GRANT Ted, History of British . . . op. cit., p. 53. 66 John Kelly develops and typologise this propensity of Trotskyist groups to attack each other by calling themselves “bourgeois”, “opportunist”, “petty bourgeois”. See KELLY John, Contemporary Trotskyism: Parties, Sects and Social Movements in Britain, London & New York: Routledge, 2018, p. 78. 67 UPHAM Martin, The History of . . . op. cit. 68 GRANT Ted, History of British . . . op. cit., p. 52. 69 Ibid., p. 51. 70 UPHAM Martin, The History of . . . op. cit. 71 TRANMER Jeremy, “Squaring the Circle: The Extreme Left and the Labour Party”, Revue LISA/LISA E-journal, vol. 12, n°8, 2014. http://journals.openedition.org/lisa/7110 (last accessed 14.04.2023).

6

Flexibilities and sectarianisms Coherences and contradictions within the WIL and RSL

The seeds of discord: the tensions among the future RSL constitutive elements The year 1938 marked a significant turning point in the history of world Trotskyism and, by extension, in the history of British Trotskyism. That year, Trotsky’s plans came to fruition, and the Fourth International was founded on September 3, 1938, near Paris.1 Along with the creation of the new International came the publication of the Transitional Programme, which served as both a programme for the national sections and a working tool to help them engage with the masses by proposing transitional measures that linked the maximum programme of the revolution with the programme of social democracy.2 The Fourth International was founded against the tide, without any real momentum to propel it forward, by 11 national sections that were on the political fringe in their respective countries.3 The British section, which consisted of only 170 members, was to be known as the Revolutionary Socialist League (RSL).4 The RSL was formed in August 1938, only a month before the establishment of the Fourth International. Its objective was to unite all British Trotskyist groups, with the purpose of providing the International with a local section. While this goal was partially accomplished, it was not without its share of difficulties. As mentioned in the previous section, the Trotskyist groups were deeply divided. In fact, a previous attempt to unify them took place during the “Geneva” conference from July 29 to 31, 1936, which actually happened near Paris. The conference recommended that the groups ally themselves within the Labour Youth and thus, in theory, under the leadership of the Militant Group, which was then known as the Bolshevik-Leninist Group. However, this initial attempt failed, primarily due to the Marxist Group’s split from the Independent Labour Party (ILP) with the goal of forming an independent party. This split occurred just before the national conference that was to discuss the Geneva Declaration, rendering it ineffective. The context of the Declaration had changed, thus altering its tactical assumptions. Furthermore, the Geneva Declaration tended to promote a Trotskyist activist orientation towards the Labour Party, making the Marxist Group’s independence counterproductive. Their assertion of a strategic reorientation on the eve of a national conference that aimed to coordinate the groups tactically was a clear negative signal sent to their partners. DOI: 10.4324/9781003427551-10

Flexibilities and sectarianisms 97 Many documents prove that despite frequent correspondence between the Marxist Group and the Militant Group, joint work proved to be impossible, as the former prioritised independent work while the latter insisted on working within the Labour Party and making entryism a guiding principle.5 Even the Marxist League, which was established by the two groups as an entryist organisation, failed to foster collaboration due to personal disagreements. The Marxist League eventually gravitated towards the Marxist Group, perhaps because it felt its own working environment (first the Socialist League, then the Socialist Left Federation) was disintegrating and it made a point of not working exclusively with Trotskyist militants. In contrast, the Marxist Group was more open to collaboration, as it was no longer engaged in underground activity within another party. Consequently, the Marxist League started merging with the Marxist Group in April 1938 to form the first RSL, after several discussions that had begun as early as February. After losing its Paddington branch through the foundation of the Workers’ International League (WIL), the Militant Group was greatly weakened, but it continued to work in the Labour League of Youth (LLY). However, this effort did not yield much recruitment, as most of the league’s communists had already left to join the Young Communist League, the youth section of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB). The end of the debates between Advance and the Militant Group also deprived the latter of strong political competition within the league and pushed it to shift its focus towards the Labour Party as a whole.6 When the International Secretariat of the ILO announced its plan to establish a Fourth International by the end of 1938, the Militant Group had to reconsider its positions. Although its entryism was not based on a short-term goal or quick exit strategy, it was neither intended to be a long-term approach. Given the impending threat of war, the timing of the entry was now in question. The American Trotskyists, who largely controlled the unification of the British Trotskyists, used this argument to persuade the Militant Group to join the newly formed RSL. However, even in the preliminary discussions, the old debates about tactics could not be set aside, despite the best efforts of the International Secretariat. To ensure the Militant Group’s participation in the merger, commitments were made to guarantee the group’s right to continue its underground activity within the Labour Party. This condition was non-negotiable for the Militant Group.7 Therefore, the RSL statutes included the right for entryists within the youth section of the Labour Party and the party itself to form largely autonomous sections or fractions. These sections’ sole prerogative was that “Its task shall be the carrying out of the policy of the League in the Youth Movement” and “the carrying out of the League’s policy in the LP”. Interestingly, the statutes were later amended to refer to the section within the LLY as a “fraction” like the section within the Labour Party, showing that the unity of these groups was not natural.8 Another group that claimed to be Trotskyist and that participated in the negotiations was the Revolutionary Socialist Party (RSP), which was mainly based in Scotland. It was a direct descendant of the Socialist Labour Party, which had refused to join the CPGB at its inception due to the question of affiliation with the Labour Party. The group already harboured a strong hostility towards the Labour

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Party and, by extension, any activity within it. However, the ILO still requested the RSP’s participation in the creation of the British section of the FI. In its proposals to the International, the RSP emphasised the need for a revolutionary organisation that remained independent and that “Never must the revolutionary banner be lowered in capitulation to such a party”, implying its opposition to entryism.9 The process of unification was thus initiated, and the date of formalisation was set for August 1938. However, as previously mentioned, tactical disagreements, which had caused previous splits between the three main groups, remained during 1938. The International Secretariat was already aware of these disagreements and had been asked to arbitrate conflicts between the British groups or had intervened directly to condemn the positions of certain groups.10 Despite this, the project of the new International was behind schedule, and given the imminent threat of a worldwide military conflict, the Trotskyists needed to move as quickly as possible. Trotsky himself was aware that no mass party would be able to support his new International and that it was founded against the tide. This might explain why the ILO was willing to overlook the tactical disagreements between the British groups: the country section had to be built up as quickly and with as much support as possible. According to Daniel Bensaïd, the goal of the new International was not to create a massive world party but rather to create a cohort of cadres who could guide the masses in the manner of an enlightened vanguard on the eve of a period of great global political change.11 There was one last group to be associated with the unification of British Trotskyists: the WIL. The WIL was, in many ways, the most dynamic Trotskyist group in Britain. Ralph Lee’s group had developed a relatively effective trade union strategy for its size, enabling it to establish itself in trade unions while maintaining its independence from the Labour Party. Additionally, the group had managed to recruit over 20 members, tripling its membership in just a few months, while other groups had been stagnant for several years.12 However, it was this group that frustrated the International Secretariat’s plans and caused the most problems in the unification of the British Trotskyists. The WIL’s resilience to unification In July 1938, James Cannon, a leader of the American Socialist Workers Party, arrived in Britain with two objectives: to assess the existing forces and to persuade the WIL to join the unification process. However, the WIL was reluctant to unite with its former allies, especially considering that the split with them had happened less than a year ago. This reluctance was also due to the numerous attacks it had faced from other groups throughout 1938.13 However, the WIL’s reluctance did not amount to a complete refusal on principle to merge. The group’s leadership, mainly comprising Ted Grant, Ralph Lee, Jock Haston, and Gerry Healy, informed Cannon that they would not participate in any unification process until a clear decision had been made on the tactics to be adopted by the future group: At that time, given the fundamental differences between the groups, you had to face up to the immediate problem of how to work: entry or non-entry,

Flexibilities and sectarianisms 99 independent work, or work in the Labour Party. We told Cannon that before we could get unity, we had to agree on one clear policy. Any united organisation would have to agree either a policy for entry or a policy for independent work.14 The WIL’s insight into the British situation can be attributed to several factors. Firstly, it was the last group to split from the British Trotskyist landscape before the war, which gave it an added degree of detachment from the other groups. Secondly, the group’s leadership was primarily composed of exogenous elements who joined British Trotskyism later in life and only briefly passed through the Militant Group before departing. Thus, the South Africans Millie Khan, Ralph Lee, and Ted Grant chose the Militant Group on a matter of principle and left as soon as personal conflicts arose and the group’s real activity waned. Another of its cadres, Gerry Healy, was a defector from the CPGB and was naturally more accustomed to the applied discipline of democratic centralism at the time, where lively debate within the party was encouraged but the majority’s line had to be clear and followed by all. Additionally, the two previous major splits, from the Communist League to the Marxist Group and then from the Marxist Group to the Militant Group, resulted from significant tactical disagreements and were executed by members who had been present in British Trotskyism since its early years, such as Denzil Harber, Hugo Dewar, and Reginald Groves. The WIL was free from these early cadres of the movement and was primarily composed of a second generation of militants who were more inclined to put a defined strategy into practice than their predecessors, who established a movement without fully understanding which direction to take. Cannon’s failure to convince the WIL leadership led him to request a meeting with the WIL rank and file, which he did not do with the other groups. Thus, the preliminary discussions for unification were only held between him and the leaders of the different groups, forcing Cannon to act as a mediator between them. In Ted Grant’s account of the meeting, which may be biased, he explains that Cannon was surprised by the number of effective WIL activists. The other groups had informed him that the WIL only had about 15 members (suspecting the WIL to boast bigger numbers than it really had), but in reality, there were about 30 who met with the American Trotskyist. The response of the WIL rank and file was essentially the same as that of the leadership: no merger was possible without a prior agreement on tactics. Cannon spoke forcefully to our members, arguing for unity at all costs. However, his arguments fell on stony ground and he failed to convince a single comrade. The WIL membership was homogeneous, firm, and clear on the unity question, both the leadership and the rank and file.15 Cannon was probably aware that conditioning the unification of the Trotskyist groups on the acceptance of a common tactic was impossible. This was due, in part, to the tension on this issue between the RSP and the Marxist Group of the recent RSL on the one hand, who were firmly against the idea of working within the Labour Party, and the Militant Group on the other hand, who were unwilling to leave the Labour Party.

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Regarding the tactical question, the WIL had focused its entryist activity on the Labour Party but was simultaneously preparing for the formation of an independent group. This entryist tactic was only seen as a way to build the revolutionary party, as stipulated in the Geneva resolution of 1936, and was not an immovable principle. The WIL not only had its forces infiltrated into the Labour Party, but it also had its own independent publication entitled Workers’ International News (possibly named after the acronym WIN, although this is not confirmed by any sources). Ted Grant’s book on the history of his tendencies suggests that the group operated openly and without concealment. However, the first few issues of Workers’ International News made no mention of the WIL and instead read “printed by voluntary labour”, indicating a level of secrecy surrounding the publication. It wasn’t until September 1941, in the ninth issue of the fourth volume, that the words “organ of the Workers’ International League” were finally added (see images 6.1 & 6.2). The first issue was published in January 1938. Although Cannon had disregarded the idea of a predefined, specific tactic, the WIL still agreed to participate in the unification conference without providing any guarantee to Cannon of its participation in the future British section of the Fourth International. As a result, on the eve of what would become the Peace and Unity Conference in August 1938, the British Trotskyist forces were divided in the manner presented in Table 6.1. The Peace and Unity Conference In July and August of 1938, the Peace and Unity Conference was held under the supervision of American Trotskyists Max Shachtman and James Cannon. The goal of the conference was to unify the different Trotskyist groups under a document called the Peace and Unity Agreement. However, according to Sam Bornstein, the groups were given only around 20 minutes to read and sign the document.16

Figure 6.1 Header of the August 1941 issue of Workers’ International News, with no mention of the Workers’ International League connection on the cover.

Flexibilities and sectarianisms 101

Figure 6.2 Header of the September 1941 issue of Workers’ International News, with mention of the link with the Workers’ International League on the cover.

Table 6.1 Trotskyist organisations on the eve of the Peace and Unity Conference Name

Creation

Origin

Revolutionary Socialist Party (RSP) Militant Group (MG) Revolutionary Socialist League (RSL)

1912

Socialist Labour Party Yes

No

1935

Split from the Marxist No Group Absorption of the Yes remains of the Marxist League by the Marxist Group Split from the Militant In Development Group

Total

Workers’ International League (WIL)

1938

1937

Independent group

Entryism

Weak

Yes

Source: author.

The previous month’s intervention by James Cannon with the WIL had foreshadowed that the document offered no clear tactical line. Instead, it only presented policy points and a merger that did not resolve any of the tactical differences between the groups. Robert Alexander summarised the agreement as follows: It was finally agreed to set up a single organisation, to be known as the Revolutionary Socialist League, which was to have a full-time secretary and was to bring out a new periodical merging Fight, Revolutionary Socialist, and Workers’ International News. It was also agreed that, although major efforts were to be concentrated for the time being on work in the Labour Party, no RSL member

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who did not want to join the Labour Party would be required to do so. Militant would still continue to appear as the organ of the Militant Labour League and the would be an RSL internal bulletin put out every two months. A new executive was to be made up of five people named by the RSL and Militant Group respectively, and two each by the RSP and the Workers’ International League.17 In effect, the main guideline for British Trotskyists remained the Geneva resolution, which recommended working within the Labour Party. However, it was not mandatory, as sections that wished to work outside the Labour Party were still permitted to do so. The merger was intended to be as consensual as possible and aimed to avoid offending any of the groups present by allowing them to retain their own practices. The smallest possible point of convergence was sought, which was adherence to the transitional programme. With the benefit of hindsight, it is clear that the choices made by the International Secretariat were doomed to failure. This is because the British sections had not been in political disagreement in the years preceding the conference. The splits in pre-war British Trotskyism were not based on programmatic issues but rather on tactical and strategic issues. It was precisely this point that led the WIL to reject the agreement while the other groups accepted it: We made it clear we would have nothing to do with an unprincipled agreement like the one proposed. Lee gave a speech in which he said, “Cannon is like the man who tied the tails of the two Kilkenny cats together, and they will end up tearing each in other to pieces.” He predicted that by joining these three groups together, what you would be doing would be to “unite” three organisations into ten.18 Ralph Lee’s prediction only partially came true: the three groups that united in the RSL eventually split into five groups, divided mainly by tactical issues.19 The founding of the Fourth International The official British section of the Fourth International took the name RSL. Although the WIL did not sign the Unity Agreement, they did see themselves as members of the Trotskyist International and initially had no animosity towards the International Secretariat. In fact, a significant portion of the Workers’ International News featured texts by Trotsky and the International Secretariat of the Fourth International (ISFI).20 Despite being unable to attend the founding conference, the WIL sent a sealed letter requesting affiliation as a sympathising group, which was read out by Denzil Harber. However, their application got rejected, and James Cannon initiated a powerful charge against them during the conference. As a result, most of the agenda items regarding Britain at the founding conference were dedicated to criticising the WIL: The present conference signifies a conclusive delimitation between those who are really in the Fourth International and fighting every day under its

Flexibilities and sectarianisms 103 revolutionary banner, and those who are merely “for” the Fourth International, i.e., the dubious elements who have sought to keep one foot in our camp and one foot in the camp of our enemies.21 This paragraph holds double significance. Firstly, the WIL’s application for affiliation was refused in the name of the International’s inability to admit two sections in the same country. Secondly, and perhaps more interestingly, the WIL was portrayed as an opposing section within the enemy camp. This theme would be repeated throughout the document. [The British groups] signify at one and the same time the unification of the genuine and sincere adherents of the Fourth International and their organisational separation from pretenders, saboteurs, and hidden enemies.22 The second half of the report is marked by Cannon’s continued attacks, which present very one-sided arguments that, in retrospect, appear to express more personal animosity than a genuine analysis of the situation. As far as the Lee group is concerned, it is necessary to point out: (1) This group came into existence some months ago as the result of purely personal grievances which impelled Lee and his friends to an organisational split. There was not then, and there is not now, any justifiable political basis for the separate maintenance of this group.23 As it has been previously demonstrated, the disagreement between Ralph Lee and the leadership of the Militant Group was not only a personal conflict but also symptomatic of a deep tactical and practical disagreement between the Militant Group and its Paddington section. This section had become increasingly autonomous and had rejected the “Labourocentrism” of the Militant Group. Despite the intervention of the International Secretariat at the time, the future WIL refused to reintegrate the Militant Group due to these tactical differences. The Paddington branch sought to get closer to the working class through direct and pragmatic methods, such as meeting with striking workers. Cannon’s argument continues as follows: Under these circumstances it is necessary to warn the comrades associated with the Lee group that they are being led on a path of unprincipled clique politics which can only land them in the mire. It is possible to maintain and develop a revolutionary political grouping of serious importance only on the basis of great principles.24 The argument presented by Cannon in this context appears to be rather weak. The WIL’s rejection of the merger was based on its opposition to compromising the founding principles of revolutionary socialism, specifically democratic centralism. By giving the groups within the RSL a free hand on tactical issues, this principle would have been denied. The WIL had clearly stated its reasons for refusing to

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sign the Unity Agreement. Cannon attempted to argue that the WIL’s isolation on the international stage made it a national group and, thus, in Trotskyist theory, a reactionary one. However, this argument was purely rhetorical, as the WIL’s isolation was created by the IFSI itself. The greater irony lies in the fact that the WIL continued to publish material produced by other sections of the International and was in agreement with all policies of the American SWP, of which Cannon was the leader, while the RSL had stopped doing so after 1939. The RSL in a dead end: tactical disagreements and interpersonal strife The WIL criticised the RSL primarily for what it saw as an “unprincipled” and “sectarian” merger.25 They believed that the principle of democratic centralism had been abandoned in favour of complete member autonomy. Although the Geneva Declaration suggested that British Trotskyists should work within the Labour Party, only the Militant Group continued to do so. The Unity Conference did not resolve the issue of entryism. The RSP was fundamentally opposed to the Labour Party and did not join the Communist Party at its inception on this ground. The first RSL, consisting of the Marxist Group and the ex-Marxist League, was intended to operate independently of the Labour Party. Two significant issues quickly emerged and were interrelated: a significant tactical disagreement and a high degree of factionalism. To begin with, it is worth noting that despite the signing of the Unity Agreement in summer 1938 and its acceptance by the party rank and file in December of the same year, the RSP, which was primarily based in Scotland, had never truly become a part of the RSL. One of the guarantees given to the RSP was editorial control over the RSL’s propaganda paper, the Workers’ Fight. This control was critical for the RSP, as it was a small organisation located outside the hub of British Trotskyism, London, and needed a medium to communicate with the masses at newspaper sales in towns and villages as well as at their open-air rallies. However, the first two issues of Workers’ Fight (October and November) were published late, and the December issue was never released. These incidents only served to increase the RSP’s mistrust of the RSL, which appeared to be overly focused on the Militant Group’s activities within the Labour Party. Maitland, one of the leaders of the RSP, wrote to the RSL leadership expressing these concerns: The unified organisation left us absolutely in the lurch . . . besides, Headquarters was so busy arranging to go into illegality in the event of war that it had not time to help make the party position known to the workers.26 The response of the RSL leadership to the RSP’s concerns was to deny them access to the league and to exclude them from attending the RSL conference in February 1939. Thus, the RSP was never truly integrated into the RSL. To understand the extent of the debates within the volatile RSL around the question of entryism, it is necessary to refer to certain motions that were adopted by the

Flexibilities and sectarianisms 105 organisation in its early days, which highlight the tactical disagreements that began to emerge from 1940 onwards: Under these conditions the main field of work for the RSL for the coming period must continue to lie within the L(abour) P(arty). Our main task must be to prepare for the coming leftward movement so as to be in a position to lead it away from reformism and centrism to the formation of a new revolutionary party, the British Section of the Fourth International.27 The statement clearly declares that the primary focus of the RSL was to work within the Labour Party, with the ultimate goal of initiating a split. The strategy of entryism aimed to mask the connection between the RSL and the Militant Labour League, which was the front organisation of the Militant Group. However, the group was supposed to remain openly active in various mixed forms: We must . . . build up now an open centre inside the L(abour) P(arty) round which the movement can crystallise. Such a centre cannot openly stand for the Fourth International and the creation of a new party. The main work, therefore, of the R.S.L. in the coming period must consist of fraction work in the L(abour) P(arty) under cover of the M(ilitant) L(abour) L(eague), which must fight inside the L(abour) P(arty) [and for] the preparing of its members for entry into the revolutionary organisation.28 Thus, the primary activity of the RSL was well-defined as entryism within the Labour Party. The entryist fraction was meant to be kept separate from the RSL so as to conceal the connection between the two. However, this operating method rendered the link between the two organisations nearly useless, as there was little coordination in terms of strategy, leadership, recruitment, and theory. In fact, it might have been more practical to establish organisational coordination between the independent and entryist groups after the eventual split in the Labour Party referred to in the first excerpt. As a result, the RSL was essentially two artificially combined organisations. Despite the de facto division between the RSL’s independent and entryist groups, it is worth noting that the majority of the league’s work was focused on the Labour Party and that internal policy issues of the party were discussed by the entire league. For instance, the November 1939 edition of the group’s internal newsletter contained an article on William Jowitt joining the Labour Party. Jowitt was a former Liberal who had helped MacDonald establish the National Labour Party in 1931. The article, written for Labour activists, asked how they felt about a “traitor” being selected for the Labour constituency of Ashton-under-Lyne in Manchester.29 The newsletter also included articles outlining the strategy for the league’s activists within the Labour Party, such as raising specific issues at local Labour branches and union sections associated with the party. The form of entryism described in these articles demonstrates a clear intention to remain within the Labour Party, without any immediate or short-term plans to break away.

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Given that the executive of the RSL was largely composed of activists from the non-Labour group when the league was formed, this division between the two organisations could have been successful. Interestingly, the original constitution of the league also stipulated that recruitment should be made to the independent group after a probationary period of six months, which is a rather lengthy period for a small organisation.30 However, tensions within the Islington branch led to exclusions at the RSL’s first congress in February 1939. The independent faction, organised around Duncan and Hilda Lane, clashed with the entryist faction, organised around Van Gelderen. Duncan and Hilda Lane were expelled from the RSL, and Jackson (an entryist) replaced them. In addition, Harry Wicks and Henry Sara, early cadres of British Trotskyism, were expelled from the party for their pacifism. As a result of these expulsions, the new executive was largely composed of Militant Group members. Duncan and Hilda Lane went on to form a new group, which would become the Revolutionary Workers League, but which, at first, continued to claim to be the RSL. This claim was made on the front page of their publication, Workers’ Fight, until September 1939, after which the publication mentioned the name Revolutionary Workers League.31 The rapid political ascendancy of the Militant Group, which was still organised around Denzil Harber, drew strong criticism from its peers regarding the democratic functioning of the RSL. In January 1940, a group of 14 RSL activists, led by Arthur Cooper and Sid Bone, presented a document entitled Our Present Task at the organisation’s national Easter conference.32 The paper questioned Harber’s leadership and called for a critical evaluation by the entryist faction of the practical results of their entryism. Harber was offended by this accusation and had Arthur Cooper expelled the following year, on February 5, 1941, on the pretext of disagreement with the RSL’s programme. The 14 signatories of Our Present Task then formed a new group called the Socialist Workers Group. The fragile balance within British Trotskyism united in the RSL was upset by a second event, which was the attitude of its factions towards the upcoming war. Following the transitional programme of Leon Trotsky, the Trotskyists of the Fourth International adopted a “proletarian military policy”, contrasting both revolutionary defeatism and pacifism. The pacifist doctrine was deemed to be incompatible with the working class’ sentiments, and the revolutionary logic dictated that fascism must be stopped at all costs because it was the working class’ primary enemy. Revolutionary defeatism was a doctrine that emphasised that the ongoing military conflict was between imperialist powers, and in the end, regardless of whoever won, the working class would always be defeated.33 The proletarian military policy was developed by Trotsky and the American Socialist Workers Party and championed by James Cannon. The policy aimed to create a connection between the working class’ patriotism and fear of fascism and the Trotskyists’ desire to arm the working class. In essence, the policy advocated placing war production under union control, allowing them to train and lead workers into war. The objective was to defeat fascism, use the armed workers to overthrow capitalist powers, and carry out the world revolution envisioned by Trotskyist internationalists.34 The proletarian military policy caused a significant theoretical conflict between the ISFI and the RSL. Initially, some ex-Marxist League activists had joined pacifist

Flexibilities and sectarianisms 107

Figure 6.3 Cover of Workers’ Fight indicating to be published by the Revolutionary Socialist League.

associations such as the Socialist Anti-War Front in September 1938,35 which led to the expulsion of some of their members. However, revolutionary defeatism and pacifism soon became the dominant doctrines within the RSL, particularly after Denzil Harber took control of the league’s apparatus. As a result, the American proletarian military policy was rejected by a vote of 49 to 26; moreover, the rejection of it even became a condition for RSL membership starting on August 22, 1942.36 Those who opposed the RSL’s decision to reject the proletarian military policy were expelled on November 14, 1942, and subsequently formed a group called the Trotskyist Opposition, which merged with the Socialist Workers Group in 1943.37

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The early days of British Trotskyism

Figure 6.4 Cover of Workers’ Fight indicating to be the publication/organ of the Revolutionary Workers’ League.

The lack of democracy within the RSL caused significant factionalism within the organisation. Following the expulsion of the Trotskyist Opposition, Denzil Harber went on to expel the “left faction” of the RSL, claiming that they refused to sign a loyalty decree. The number of activists within the organisation plummeted from 170 at its inception to just 25 by 1943. The RSL’s political activities had ground to a halt, and its publications were struggling to be produced and distributed.38 The creation of the RSL was ultimately a failure, as the numerous tactical and political disagreements within the organisation led to a high level of factionalism. In addition, the British national section’s actions were increasingly at odds with the world party, making it difficult for the ISFI to continue supporting it. As a result, the International Secretariat urged the RSL to resume negotiations with the WIL in the hopes of reuniting the British Trotskyists.39 The WIL, in contrast, had experienced a tenfold increase in membership, a rise in newspaper sales, and had successfully established independence from the British Labour Party. These factors, combined with the WIL’s support of the American proletarian military policy, ultimately led the International Secretariat to recognise its mistake.40 The 1942 conference of the WIL and the progressive re-examination of the entryist tactic After experiencing a period of growth from 1938 to 1942, during which it pursued a direct approach to the workers and engaged in propaganda work outside the

Flexibilities and sectarianisms 109 Labour Party (even though it remained an official tendency within the party),41 the WIL began to reassess its approach to the entryist tactic. On August 23 and 24, 1942, the WIL held its first national conference. During this conference, various resolutions were passed, including one entitled The Labour Party Tactic, which described the Labour Party as follows: Far from growing in activity and political membership, the Labour Party machine in most areas has fallen to pieces. Branches and wards, executives of divisions and towns do not meet for months on end. Under these circumstances total submersion into the Labour Party could serve only to separate the revolutionaries from the real struggles of the workers. Such a perspective is farcical and can serve only as a cloak for complete inactivity.42 The first sentence characterises the Labour Party as an inactive and bloodless party. In some ways, this was accurate. The Second World War had caused British political activity to come to a halt due to men being requisitioned by the army and the formation of a Conservative-Labour coalition government, which had reduced the level of political competition within British governing parties. However, recent research suggests that political life was not as inactive as it appeared from the Trotskyist perspective. Martin Pugh, for instance, suggests that the Labour Party suffered far less from the electoral truce than the Conservative Party did and that it was an electoral truce but not a political truce.43 Nonetheless, there is evidence to support the Trotskyist view, as the loss of the Labour Party’s militant base was very real. According to figures provided by Duncan Tanner44 the number of individual members dropped from 409,000 to 266,000 between 1939 and 1944, and according to Martin Pugh, from 239,000 members in 1939 to 157,000 members in 1944.45 Regardless of the exact figures, the data indicate a seemingly 35% disintegration of the party’s militant base. This loss of activists may have contributed to the Trotskyist interpretation of declining activity within the Labour Party, given that Trotskyists placed greater emphasis on militant activity than other political traditions would when evaluating a party’s performance. The second paragraph in the quoted extract contains a thinly veiled critique of the RSL. The WIL was well-informed about the issues plaguing the RSL, especially since it recruited several defectors46 from the organisation and maintained dialogue with dissidents like those who formed the Trotskyist Opposition in November 1942.47 The WIL’s actions were also motivated by its aspiration to become the recognised British section of the Fourth International. Despite being rejected at the 1938 founding conference, the WIL sent its publications to Leon Trotsky and the International Secretariat and republished and distributed documents produced by the world party. Additionally, the WIL had adopted the proletarian military policy of the American SWP, and it made sense to expose the RSL’s lack of activity and confinement within the Labour Party to claim official section status. This is illustrated by the words “published by Workers’ International League. Fourth International” found under the front pages of the Workers’ International News, despite the WIL’s non-membership in the Fourth International.

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The early days of British Trotskyism

Figure 6.5 Copy of Workers’ International News mentioning the membership of the WIL in the Fourth International.

Flexibilities and sectarianisms 111 In 1942, the WIL re-evaluated its approach to entryism and made the decision to distance itself from the Labour Party as a means of recruitment: The whole idea motivating the entrist tactic is to enter a reformist or centrist organisation which is in a state of flux. Where political life is at a high pitch, and where the membership is steadily moving towards the left. It is essentially a short-term perspective of work in a milieu where favourable prospects exist for obtaining results in a relatively short space of time. It is dictated principally by the isolation for the revolutionary forces and the relative difficulty of reaching the ear of the masses.48 The issue of isolation mentioned in this paragraph not only critiques the RSL’s fetishism for Labour Party work and the consequences of sectarianism but it also reflects the WIL’s recruitment strategy. During the conference, the WIL assessed its activity and concluded that entryism was no longer the best route for recruitment. Instead, the WIL directed its efforts towards three distinct poles for three specific reasons: the ILP,49 the Communist Party,50 and, most importantly, the trade unions. The turn to the ILP was a consequence of the Trotskyists’ analysis of weak political activity and factionalism within the Labour Party. WIL members believed that the political situation in Britain was pre-revolutionary, as regardless of the outcome of the war, the masses would rebel. If Britain surrendered, the masses would rise up against the Nazi regime out of a simple survival instinct since “their own heads would be at stake”.51 In the case of an Allied victory, they would rebel due to their indignation against the colonial system and the broken promises of the capitalist system. It is noteworthy that the Trotskyists’ argument is based on a petitio principii: [A victory] could not prevent revolutionary repercussions among the masses. The programme of finance capital us Utopian and insane. The idea that the British masses would tolerate the forcible holding down of the Continent of Europe and Asia, not to mention Africa, is absurd. Once the masses compare the glittering promises about “after the war,” of which they are sceptical even to-day, their indignation will rise to unprecedented heights when confronted with reality. Free from the nightmare of victory for the Nazis, neither the workers not the soldiers would tolerate for long the outcome of the conflict which the capitalist class is preparing. Revolutionary explosions would be inevitable.52 The argument presented here is a case study of circular logic: the masses will make revolution because they are revolutionary. The war was seen as exacerbating class antagonisms: proletarians suffered from the war by being deprived of some of their rights due to conscription and physically threatened at the front, while the bourgeoisie administered the masses or fled the conflict. In 1942, the Labour Party joined the coalition government and, according to the Trotskyists, became part of the bourgeois apparatus of government. As per their analysis, a divorce between the left of the party and

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the leadership was inevitable. The left, cut off from its “natural party”, could not join the CPGB due to the latter’s support for the government coalition. Naturally, it had to turn towards the ILP. Numbers of workers, especially from the youth, disgusted with the policy of the Labour Party and hostile to Stalinism, particularly in its present shameless phase of support for Churchill, are moving towards the ILP. In addition, the long-standing tradition of the ILP within the working class as the left wing of the workers’ movement makes it inevitable that without any other organisation in sight, leftward moving workers should gravitate almost automatically towards the ILP.53 Due to these reasons, the WIL shifted its recruitment efforts towards the ILP and specifically its youth section, the ILP Guild of Youth,54 emphasising its militaristic ideology in contrast to the pacifism of the ILP. The adaptability of the WIL distinguished it from the RSL, which could only observe the departure of potentially revolutionary elements from the Labour Party to its rival section. Additionally, it is noteworthy that the change in political context prompted the Trotskyists in the WIL to attempt to convert ILP members through ideological influence from outside the party. This approach had been rejected in the early 1930s by the Marxist Group, which aimed to operate from within the ILP. Especially necessary is the supplementing of the pressure of the revolutionaries with by pressure on the ILP from the outside. Proposal for joint activity against the bourgeoisie as well as against the Stalinist slander campaigns, etc., can break down the hostility which the leadership attempts to foster towards the Trotskyists.55 The WIL’s approach to the ILP could be seen as a demonstration of their awareness. Even if the Trotskyists’ assumptions about the attitude of the masses turned out to be incorrect, party members, especially Ted Grant, had learned from the past mistakes of their predecessors. They had recognised the risks of getting too comfortable within the groups and the dangers of ideological contamination. Therefore, if they were to engage in entryism, it had to be fractional, targeted, and politically motivated by a specific short-term goal. The second area of activity for the WIL was the Communist Party. While there are no documents indicating a massive entryism campaign by the WIL into the party, it appears that fractional work was nonetheless carried out from at least the first half of 1941. In any case, the WIL conducted intensive outreach to radical worker activists within the Communist Party, primarily through leaflets specifically targeted at them.56 For instance, in the early 1940s, many new members joined the WIL from the Communist Party, which was the result of various factors. The pro-government stance of the Communist Party had made it more appealing to the middle class, leading to an influx of new members.57 These new members, in turn, shifted the

Flexibilities and sectarianisms 113 party’s policies, and its willingness to support the coalition government resulted in the Communist Party rejecting alliances with Labour and sometimes aligning itself with more right-wing parties, such as the Liberal Party. Many Communist activists had joined the party in the 1920s to find a revolutionary socialist alternative to Labour, and they saw the party’s turn towards the middle class and support for the coalition government as a betrayal of the working class. Consequently, they turned to the Trotskyists as an alternative. While this defection was considered significant by authors such as Bornstein or Grant, it must be noted that only a small number of individuals were involved. The defectors were mainly young people who were generally more radical than their elders. It is worth remembering that during the war, the Communist Party was opposed to strikes organised in factories, primarily because it supported war production.58 In addition, these strikes provided a revolutionary breeding ground for the Trotskyists. The support offered by the Trotskyists to the strikers prompted the Communist Party to react with counter-propaganda, labelling the members of the WIL as agents of Hitler.59 When Herbert Morrison, Labour’s Home Secretary in the coalition government from October 1940 onwards, was questioned in the House about the actions of the WIL, he quipped about the Stalinists’ hatred for the Trotskyists: Herbert Morrison:

The Noble Lord the Member for Horsham (Earl Winterton) raised a point about “Socialist Appeal”. I think it is a monthly publication. It is published by the Fourth International, in other words the Trotskyists. If the Communist Party of Great Britain hate anybody more than they do me, it is the Trotskyists. Sometimes, when I see front page advertisements of this paper in the Press, especially in the Conservative newspapers, I often suspect, not altogether unintelligently, that the Conservative Press is inspired to denounce the Trotskyists by the Communist party [Interruption.] The hon. Member for West Fife (Mr. Gallacher) is getting into respectable bourgeois company lately.60 The WIL exerted pressure on the Communist Party through three different methods. The first method involved attending labour meetings where the Communists were present to provide an alternative perspective and counteract their influence. Sometimes, WIL Trotskyists would also sell their paper, the Socialist Appeal, outside rallies where Communists were present. This practice led members of the YCL to complain to their leadership about the Trotskyists interfering with their propaganda work.61 The second method was the distribution of leaflets that encouraged Stalinist activists to denounce their leadership and leave the party. As early as 1939, an open letter to communist militants in line with this approach can be found: Communist workers, there is only one road to “Socialism and Peace”. That is the road of Lenin. The road of the class-struggle. There is no other. In

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peacetime or wartime, THE MAIN ENEMY IS AT HOME. Our only hope is in unrelenting opposition to our own exploiters. Your leaders have betrayed you to the edge of the abyss. . . . once again let Lenin’s slogan be our guide. TURN IMPERIALIST WAR INTO CIVIL WAR. We in the Workers’ International League appeal to the militants who still remain in the Communist Party to join us in this task. It can only be accomplished by unrelenting opposition to the traitors who have sold out. DOWN WITH THE COMMUNIST PARTY LEADERS! FOR A REVOLUTIONARY PARTY.62 It is worth noting that the WIL made a clear call for revolutionary civil war in a leaflet while still operating within the Labour Party. This can be explained by the fact that, when it operated within the party, it did so under the name of its newspaper, as is customary in Trotskyist circles. Thus, the WIL was mainly known as Youth for Socialism and later Socialist Appeal, which allowed it to avoid being excluded or dissolved. The WIL primarily targeted the trade union milieu as its most important source of recruitment, aiming to undercut the CPGB. Following its successes during the entryist period, the WIL sought to strengthen its activity there and became independent from the Labour Party. This was achieved by providing unconditional support for strikes and by organising some unions into new federations, such as the Militant Workers Federation. The industrial successes of the WIL were due to the experience and local knowledge of its two industrial organisers, Roy Tearse and Gerry Healy. The Trotskyists’ support for strikes, combined with the upsurge in trade union activity, enabled the WIL to rapidly increase its membership. By 1943, it had between 250 and 300 members63 and a circulation of the Socialist Appeal estimated at between 18,000 and 20,000 copies. Conclusion The late 1930s and early 1940s represented a crucial period in the history of British revolutionary movements, characterised by two distinct approaches. On the one hand, the RSL, the official British section of the Fourth International, began its existence with a range of partisan and organisational practices, which ultimately led to its downfall due to excessive factionalism. These internal divisions resulted in several purges and caused the majority faction, the ex-Militant Group, to become entrenched within the Labour Party, which was not a conducive recruiting ground. Moreover, the RSL’s theoretical approach to the phenomenon of war differed from that of the Fourth International, which eventually led the latter to withdraw its support for the RSL, resulting in its eventual collapse. During the same period, the WIL, which was the smallest and youngest Trotskyist group, exhibited flexibility by leaving the Labour Party when it deemed conditions unfavourable for its growth and activities. This openness and adaptability helped increase its active membership by almost tenfold between 1938 and 1943.

Flexibilities and sectarianisms 115 The WIL’s success was also due to its consistent publication of Fourth International literature and adherence to the militarist principles of the Fourth International. As a result, the world party of Trotskyists sought to merge the WIL with the dying RSL to form the new British section. The WIL’s tactical success can be attributed to its entryism into the Labour Party, which it did not view or apply as an end in itself but rather as a means to an end. By reorienting itself towards independent party work while maintaining factional activity, the WIL managed to survive and even thrive in a political context that was unfavourable to all parties except the Communist Party in terms of activism. Notes 1 See the proceedings of the founding conference available online here: www.marxists.org/history/etol/document/fi/1938-1949/fi-1stcongress/index.htm (last accessed 14.04.2023). 2 TROTSKY Leon, The Death Agony of Capitalism and the Tasks of the Fourth International, The Transitional Programme, 1938. www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1938/tp/ (last accessed 14.04.2023). 3 Eleven sections sent a delegate to the founding conference: the United States, France, Great Britain, Italy, the USSR, Poland, Brazil, the Netherlands, Greece, and Belgium. However, a total of 28 national sections could be counted as affiliated. 4 The number of 170 activists is given in BORNSTEIN Sam & RICHARDSON Al, War and the International: A History of the Trotskyist Movement in Britain 1937–1949, London: Socialist Platform, 1986, p. 18. However, both authors describe this figure as “optimistic”. 5 See the archive boxes containing the numerous tactical discussions between the groups on this subject: MRC: 601/R/18/1 or MSS.151/1. 6 A later document, from the West Riding youth faction in 1941, refers to the need for a massive reorientation towards work within the Labour Party itself. Work within the youth section was described as being primarily in the service of the section’s greater aims, that is, propaganda work within the Labour Party. See RSL, The Labour League of Youth and our Perspectives, Pamphlet, MRC: 601/R/10/8. 7 RSL, Constitution of the RSL, 1938, MRC: MSS.151/1/3/1. 8 Ibid. 9 These proposals can be found in the document The Revolution in Britain – Thesis on the Present Situation in Britain Submitted by the Revolutionary Socialist Party. The document is not dated but was probably published in 1938, which can be inferred from the last lines of the document indicating that it could not be approved by the majority of the party due to lack of time, which corresponds to Martin Upham’s account of the RSL’s founding congress in his PhD dissertation. This document is available in the RSP archive on the Splits and Fusions blog. www.dropbox.com/sh/6yjh1np251vzbyd/ AABbFXLFEqRg6y24Q3WU__Pfa?dl=0 (last accessed 14.04.2023). 10 For example, during the split between the Marxist Group and the Communist League, the Secretariat condemned both the minority group that had infiltrated the ILP against the decision of the majority of the section and the majority section for having voted against joining the ILP. 11 BENSAÏD Daniel, Les trotskysmes, Paris: Presses universitaires de France, Que saisje?, 2002, p. 33. 12 UPHAM Martin, The History of British Trotskyism to 1949, PhD dissertation, University of Hull, Hull, 1980. www.marxists.org/history/etol/revhist/upham/upmen.htm (last accessed 14.04.2023).

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13 The RSL documents in Denzil Harber’s personal archive include many documents attacking the WIL, including several open letters from the RSL to WIL members. Much of this correspondence is held at the MRC. MRC: MSS.151/1/3/2. 14 GRANT Ted, History of British Trotskyism, London: Wellred Publications, 2002, p. 45. 15 Ibid., p. 61. 16 BORNSTEIN Sam & RICHARSON Al, War and the International . . . op. cit., p. 21. 17 ALEXANDER Robert Jackson, International Trotskyism, 1929–1985: A Documented Analysis of the Movement, Durham & London: Duke University Press, 1991, p. 454. 18 GRANT Ted, History of British . . . op. cit., p. 62. 19 The groups that emerged out of the RSL were the Trotskyist Organisation, the Socialist Workers Group, the Revolutionary Workers League, and the Left Fraction. The RSL continued to exist, making a total of five groups. We explain these splits later in this section. See also BORNSTEIN Sam & RICHARSON Al, War and the International . . . op. cit., pp. 20–51, chapter “Unity and Disintegration: The R.S.L. 1938–1943”. 20 Of the first ten issues of the publication, nine begin with a text by Leon Trotsky and one with a text by Max Shachtman. Number 9 of the second volume, dated September 1939, is entitled “For a New International”, clearly showing the WIL’s desire not to move away from their International. 21 On the Unification of the British Section, document from the founding conference of the Fourth International, 1938. www.marxists.org/history/etol/document/fi/1938-1949/ fi-1stcongress/ch13.htm (last accessed 14.04.2023). 22 Ibid. 23 Ibid. 24 Ibid. 25 BORNSTEIN Sam & RICHARDSON Al, War and the International . . . op. cit., p. 20. 26 Quoted in Ibid., p. 33. 27 RSL, Political Statement of the Executive Committee to the 1939 Conference, 1939, MRC: MSS.151/1/3. 28 Ibid. 29 Internal Bulletin of the Revolutionary Socialist League – Fourth International, November 1, 1939. Document available in the Internal Documents folder of the RSL archive on the Splits and Fusions blog. www.dropbox.com/sh/40yqbfsohn1jm74/ AACc61KWJMiCIlwDaromkYbXa?dl=0 (last accessed 14.04.2023). 30 RSL, Constitution of the RSL . . . op. cit. 31 We were unable to verify this for the October and November issues. 32 The text of Our Present Tasks is included in the Socialist Appeal. COOPER Arthur, BONES Sid, For the Building of the British Section of the Fourth International, April 30, 1941, MRC: MSS.75/3/1/7. 33 GRANT Ted, History of British . . . op. cit., pp. 72–73. 34 BENSAÏD Daniel, Les trotskysmes . . . op. cit., pp. 49–55. 35 See, for example: Socialist Anti-War Front, Say No to the National Register, Pamphlet, 1938, MRC: MSS.15C/5/94 or the group’s Manifesto, MRC: MSS.206/1/2. 36 See RSL, Resolutions on ARP, 1942, MRC: MSS.151/1/3/5. 37 The Socialist Workers Group was torn between the WIL and the RSL, but its merger with the Trotskyist Opposition brought the former back into the RSL. However, the group continued to correspond with the WIL and cooperate with them regularly, as evidenced by the correspondence between these groups and Jimmy Deane, which can be found in the MRC archives. MRC: MSS.325/5/A43(107). 38 BORNSTEIN Sam & RICHARDSON Al, War and the International . . . op. cit., p. 41. 39 It seems that it was the WIL that opened the dialogue between the two organisations, despite pressure from the International for the RSL to take the lead. See Letter from Millie Lee to Margaret Johns, dated July 21, 1941. MRC: MSS.325/2/A41(82). 40 The WIL had published a pamphlet entitled “War and the World Revolution” in 1940 or 1941, in which the essence of American militarist policy is developed. The January 1941 issue of Workers International News published James Cannon’s speech on military

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41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63

policy. CANNON James, “Military Policy of the Proletariat”, Workers’ International News, vol. 4, n°1, January 1941. Workers’ International League, “How to Work in the Mass Movement”, Internal Bulletin, (undated), MRC: MSS.151/1/4/1. Workers’ International League, “Preparing for Power, Revolutionary Perspectives and the Tasks of the Fourth Internationalists in Britain: The Labour Party Tactic”, Workers’ International News, vol. 5, n°6, September 1942, pp. 20–23. PUGH Martin, Speak for Britain! A New History of The Labour Party, London: Vintage, 2011, p. 261. TANNER Duncan, Labour’s First Century, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007, p. 395. PUGH Martin, Speak for Britain . . . op. cit., p. 263. BORNSTEIN Sam & RICHARSON Al, War and the International . . . op. cit., pp. 33–34. Letter From Stuart to JL, dated February 4, 1943, MRC: MSS.75/3/2/37. Workers’ International League, “Preparing for Power, Revolutionary Perspectives and the Tasks of the Fourth Internationalists in Britain: The Labour Party Tactic”, Workers’ International News, vol. 5, n°6, September 1942, pp. 20–23. WIL, An Open Letter to National Conference, undated but probably 1942. Intended to rally the ILP to the WIL policy, MRC: MSS.75/4/1/10. See WIL, An Open Letter to Communist Party Supporters, undated but probably 1939, MRC: MSS.325/43/N39(4). Workers’ International League, “Preparing for Power, Revolutionary Perspectives and the Tasks of the Fourth Internationalists in Britain: The Labour Party Tactic”, Workers’ International News, vol. 5, n°6, September 1942, p. 29. Ibid. Ibid. UPHAM Martin, The History of . . . op. cit. Workers’ International League, “Preparing for Power, Revolutionary Perspectives and the Tasks of the Fourth Internationalists in Britain: The Labour Party Tactic”, Workers’ International News, vol. 5, n°6, September 1942, pp. 20–23. See WIL, An Open Letter to . . . op. cit. On the subject, see MORGAN Kevin, “Socialists and ‘Mobility’ in Twentieth-Century Britain: Images and Experiences in the Life Histories of British Communists”, Social History, vol. 36, n°2, 2011, pp. 143–168. BRANSON Noreen, History of the Communist Party of Great Britain 1927–1941, London: Lawrence & Wishart, 1987, p. 332. CPGB, Clear Out Hitler’s Agent, pamphlet, August 1942, MRC: MSS.102/4/3/48. HoC Debate, Hansard, July 21, 1942, vol. 381, Col. 1515. https://hansard.parliament.uk/ Commons/1942-07-21/debates/3ff3f65e-dfb9-45d3-ad09-db049ac23adc/DefenceRegulation18B? (last accessed 14.04.2023). BORNSTEIN Sam & RICHARSON Al, War and the International . . . op. cit., p. 57. WIL, An Open Letter to . . . op. cit. Both primary (Grant, Richardson, Bornstein) and secondary (Upham, Alexander) sources give different numbers from each other, but always within this estimate.

7

From the foundation of the RCP to the split over the question of entryism A never-ending circle?

The RCP, the first real Trotskyist party? The failure of the Revolutionary Socialist League experiment resulted in the Fourth International engaging in further discussions with the Workers’ International League to attach the remnants of the official British section of the Fourth International to it. The WIL, however, refused any merger unless it was on its own terms. It insisted on having a democratic centralist leadership, which would allow the formation of minority factions but impose unity of action. The organisation also demanded the unification of tactical orientations, with ILP fractional work being the primary focus of the group. Additionally, the WIL insisted on accepting the American military policy as the guiding doctrine towards war. Despite the International Secretariat’s pressure on its British section to accept these conditions, the RSL refused several times due to its disagreement with the American militarist policy. The RSL was ultimately forced to merge with the WIL after numerous purges and a membership reduced to two warring factions. The resolution for unification of the British sections was adopted on September 26, 1943, after the WIL sent the proposed merger plan to the International on September 7, 1943.1 The merger conference between the two organisations took place on March 11 and 12, 1944. However, it appears that the congress was more of a formality in favour of the WIL, which had the majority representation with 52 delegates compared to the RSL’s 17. The RSL delegates themselves were divided into three groups: the Trotskyist Opposition (six delegates), the Left Fraction (four delegates), and the Militant Group (seven delegates). This uneven distribution of delegates reflected the difference in strengths between the Trotskyist groups.2 A new party emerged from the congress, but its ideological and strategic lines were essentially just extensions of those of the WIL. The American military policy was accepted by 58 votes to 11, with the number of votes in favour being the sum of the votes of the Trotskyist Opposition and the WIL.3 The question of entryism into the Labour Party was resolved through a discussion that presented three different positions for consideration: John Archer defended the position of Denzil Harber’s Militant Group, which proposed that the new party should be located within the Labour Party to prepare

DOI: 10.4324/9781003427551-11

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for the arrival of the radicalised masses. The expectation was that the masses would turn to the political tool that they had created at the beginning of the century, and when they would, political life within the Labour Party would change. At that point, the revolutionary party would steer them towards the path of proletarian revolution. This proposal differed from the group’s earlier proposal in that it acknowledged the need to prioritise the industrial field, i.e., the trade unions, while awaiting more intense political activity in the Labour Party. Full entry into the Labour Party was only to be made once the working-class masses had joined it. Meanwhile, an independent open group, in addition to an entryist faction, was necessary. This mention of the importance of work within the unions was a concession to the WIL and an acknowledgment of its success. The second proposal, championed by John Robinson of the Left Fraction, was more urgent and argued that a massive radicalisation of British proletarians was imminent. The proposal was for the new organisation to immediately enter the Labour Party after the merger conference. The tactics proposed by the Militant Group and the WIL were rejected as being influenced by third period Stalinism. Instead, the most correct tactic was considered to be the united front, as proposed by Lenin at the creation of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB), which involved taking a place within the Labour Party while exposing the social democratic leadership.4 The joint motion proposed by the WIL and the Trotskyist Organisation was championed by Jock Haston, the effective leader of the WIL, and Arthur Cooper, a TO activist who had always been active in the Labour Party. The resolution began by postulating that it was an intermediate position, reflecting the WIL’s past tactical flexibility: To raise the tactic of entry as a question of principle is extreme sectarianism whether it comes from the entrists or anti entrists and must therefore be combatted as harmful to the revolutionary party.5 This passage highlights the WIL’s intention to avoid becoming a fully entryist group, which may have foreshadowed its future development into a “party” form. However, it also indicates that the WIL did not completely reject the positions advocated by the Militant Group entryists. The resolution acknowledged that, although it may not have been true at the time it was written, the global movement of the masses would eventually lead them to join the Labour Party. However, the resolution also stated that the continuation of this movement would eventually result in these same masses leaving the party, disillusioned with its leadership. As a result, the primary goal of the new organisation was to attract these disenchanted masses, who would leave the Labour Party and the Communist Party should they falter. This analysis was based on the observation that while the CPGB was growing in terms of activists, the Labour Party was shrinking in numbers. It was also noted that the CPGB’s growth was accompanied

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by a loss of its more radical elements, who would likely move to a new organisation. Hence, it was necessary to maintain an independent existence in anticipation of a potential CPGB implosion. One issue remained unresolved: the Independent Labour Party posed a challenge as it had the potential to attract radical cadres and the masses. At the time, the ILP was experiencing growth in numbers. The WIL’s analysis suggested that if the masses would move back towards the Labour Party, the ILP would likely seek re-affiliation. The resolution concluded that the priority target of Trotskyist entryism should be the return of the ILP to the Labour Party, initially through fractional engagement, with full entryism in the event of a significant swing of the Labour Party to the left.6 However, it was emphasised that full entryism into the Labour Party (either with or without the ILP) was highly unlikely at the moment, and the current focus should be on industrial action. In this regard, the Trotskyists had an advantage as the trade unions were involved in the government via the Labour Party and were thus supporting the war effort. Meanwhile, the CPGB had a pro-war stance and opposed strikes as a means of action until the conflict with the fascists was resolved. The joint resolution put forward by the WIL and TO was ultimately adopted, receiving 58 votes in favour and 11 votes against. The newly formed Revolutionary Communist Party (RCP) adopted the same programme as the WIL, which was drawn up by Ted Grant in 1943. It appears that strict adherence to tactics was not a priority within the RCP, despite the discipline of its members. The organisation respected the wishes of those who preferred to remain undercover in the Labour Party, possibly because they had done so throughout their lives. However, it seems this entry was to be seen as an individual venture rather than a definite party tactic: We were never advocates of the “big stick” approach of Cannon but were always flexible in internal Party affairs. Those who had been in the Labour Party could remain in the Labour Party for the time being. We wouldn’t insist that they leave the Labour Party. On the contrary, we said they should participate in our LP fraction, which in any case had two or three times as many members in the Labour Party as the RSL had!.7 When reading these lines, one may be tempted to think that the RCP, with its tolerance of entryism, was not so different from the RSL in terms of organisation and that the WIL was simply applying in 1944 what it had criticised the other Trotskyists for at the 1938 Unity Conference. However, in reality, despite an apparent similarity in organisation, it was the structure and leadership of the party that distinguished them from each other. In the case of the RCP, it was clear from the start that entryism was to be secondary to working in the unions. Additionally, the RCP had a clear partisan form with strong leadership and a willingness to assume power, including participation in elections such as the Neath by-election in 1945. On the other hand, the RSL was fragmented into originally rival factions, which were, in practice, autonomous due to the lack of a real central leadership. Each of these factions wanted to direct the organisation towards a specific orientation, inevitably leading to the hegemony of the strongest group, which was most capable

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of manipulating the others. In contrast, the RCP’s party constitution established a relationship of subordination among individuals and possible factions to the ultimate goal of the group: the founding of a mass revolutionary party. The party’s statutes were explicit on this subject: (d) Disciplinary action, including censure, reduction to probationary membership, suspension of membership, and expulsion may be taken but the body having jurisdiction over any member committing a breach of discipline or acting in a manner detrimental to the interests of the Party and the working class. ALL MEMBERS OF THE R.C.P. ARE REQUIRED TO ENTER THE MASS ORGANISATIONS OF THE WORKING CLASS UNDER THE DIRECTION OF THE PARTY ORGANISATION FOR THE PURPOSE OF FULFILLING THE AIMS OF THE PARTY.8 The RCP had successfully adopted a party form and established discipline, even adopting the name of a party, which sparked a debate between those in favour of a league and those in favour of a party. This structure was new to British Trotskyism: The RCP managed to unify all major Trotskyist groups in the nation and organise them into a party, in the sense suggested by La Palombara and Weiner.9 This meant that the RCP became a sustainable organisation that sought to win supporters, had regular means of communication, a will to win power, and the ability to stand for election. Its existence as a party not only garnered greater recognition but also led to several clashes with other major British political parties. The RCP’s actions led the Labour Party to become increasingly suspicious of Trotskyists, ultimately conditioning their relationship for the rest of the 20th century. Confrontations with the Labour Party In March 1944, after its formation, the RCP gained unprecedented publicity for a Trotskyist grouping following the imprisonment of three of its key leaders. Prior to this, in December 1943, Ernest Bevin, a Labour man and the Labour Minister in Churchill’s coalition government, had set up a system of requisitioning the country’s young people to help with the war effort in the mines, giving rise to the term “Bevin Boys”. Soon, a protest movement emerged in the Tyneside region of northeast England, initiated by the local Apprentices’ Guild. The WIL (and subsequently the RCP) supported the strike by bringing its forces in and publishing articles in the Socialist Appeal in support of it. However, the Home Secretary, Herbert Morrison (also Labour), was asked by various political groups to act against the strike and the Trotskyist party.10 Police took action against several party premises to gather evidence, resulting in the arrest of four leaders: Heaton Lee and Ann Keen, who operated as WIL leaders in the Newcastle area; Roy Tearse, who was the party’s industrial action coordinator; and Jock Haston, who was the group’s national leader. This arrest brought the WIL, and later the RCP, out of the shadows. The arrest was made under the Trade Disputes Act of 1927, which had been designed as an instrument of social coercion

122 The early days of British Trotskyism after the 1926 general strike but had not been used since. The application of this law by a Labour minister allowed the Trotskyists to organise a large anti-Trade Disputes Act movement, which was joined by many elements of the British left, such as the ILP or Aneurin Bevan.11 Similar to the Streisand effect,12 the government’s desire to suppress the influence of the Trotskyists offered them much more publicity and propelled them into the national news. The movement against the Social Movements Act achieved some success, leading to its repeal a few years later by the Attlee government, to which Bevin and Bevan belonged. The Trotskyist leaders were sentenced to various penalties, and only Ann Keen avoided imprisonment.13 The Tyneside episode led to a Home Office report on the RCP’s activities, which was well-informed and provided precise figures on the number of RCP militants in March 1944. This report demonstrated that the authorities were closely monitoring the Trotskyist party’s entryist activities: The Trotskyists, like the Stalinists, attempt to increase their influence by penetrating other organisations. Attempts to penetrate Trade Unions have met with little success, but some progress has been made in the ILP, which the Trotskyists regard as the party commanding the largest following of militant workers. This progress is most marked on Tyneside, where the divisional representative on the ILP national Committee is also a member of the Central Committee of the Revolutionary Communist Party.14 Interestingly, the report does not make any reference to the RCP’s activities within the Labour Party. The Trotskyists were not seen as a significant threat and were perceived to be relatively harmless. Some analysts, including Grant and Upham, speculate that Herbert Morrison was not particularly hostile towards the Trotskyists, as he did not perceive them as a serious threat. Instead, he was more likely to be wary of the insincerity of the Stalinist Communists, as evidenced by his verbal exchanges with William Gallacher in the House of Commons: Mr. Morrison I reserve the right to suppress the paper [Socialist Appeal, le journal de la WIL] under Regulation 2D, in which case I should have the warm support of the hon. Member for West Fife – Mr. Gallacher (Fife, West) Why does the right hon. Gentleman want to bring me into it? Mr. Morrison – He and I know – and of the noble lord; before doing so or taking some of these people under 18B – and I reserve the right to do so – I must remember that these powers were given in order to protect the State against something which had a material significance and was a danger to the State. I am not yet convinced that the existence of “Socialist Appeal”, – which has not had anywhere near as long a run of naughtiness as the “Daily Worker” had at the beginning of the war – is of such danger to the State that I ought to use Regulation 2D against it.15

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Therefore, despite the increased surveillance by the authorities and, supposedly, by the Labour Party, the Trotskyists did not seem to pose a significant threat to the latter, and there was no question of a “witch-hunt” before the end of the Second World War, except, logically, against the Communist Party. The RCP’s second confrontation with the Labour Party took place during the Neath by-election held on May 15, 1945, in South Wales, where Jock Haston, the leader of the RCP, contested the seat against Labour. This was the first time a Trotskyist party fielded openly a candidate in a British election. Despite losing the election, Ted Grant believed that the experience was generally positive. The Trotskyist party secured almost 5% of the vote and recruited several individuals while establishing numerous contacts with the miners in the region. According to Grant, Jock Haston’s campaign was so successful that it forced the Labour candidate to campaign actively in an area where he typically had support and did not need to actively campaign.16 However, following the Neath episode, the RCP did not field any candidates in the general election and adopted the slogan “Labour to Power”.17 An apparent, yet fragile stability The RCP appeared to be a stable party at first glance. This stability was achieved through the continuity of the WIL, as all its component groups were officially dissolved the day after the party’s founding. The only faction that did not dissolve was the minority “left” faction, which left the RCP less than a year later and eventually faded into obscurity. In his account of the period, Ted Grant notes that even Denzil Harber, who was responsible for two of the three major splits in pre-war Trotskyism in Britain, seemed to have accepted the consensus on the unification of tactics with the founding of the RCP. Due to his leadership of the second-largest group and his acceptance of the new rules, Denzil Harber inherited a seat on the central committee of the new party. However, despite the absence of official factions at the time of the RCP’s creation, factionalism still persisted, with conflicts inherited from the WIL continuing to plague the RCP. As early as 1942, much infighting within the league erupted around the character of Gerry Healy, who had a strong tendency to threaten to resign from his position whenever a decision was made against his will or in his absence. This led to his removal from the party’s central committee and from the editorship of the magazine Youth for Socialism. On February 15, 1943, the Political Bureau unanimously decided to expel Gerry Healy from the League.18 Although he was allowed to join the League on a probationary basis, he soon formed an official, active, and structured minority in southwest London. Many of the individuals involved at the time, including Bornstein and Grant, who came from different political backgrounds, suggest that Healy formed a minority group in retaliation for being repeatedly dismissed from the party’s leadership and that his motivations were more personal than political. Even if those accounts are biased, the archives seem to demonstrate that they were accurate. Healy had engaged in several discussions with the Trotskyist Opposition, one of the factions within the RSL, and had organised his minority group around the goal of persuading the WIL to join the

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Fourth International. He published numerous pamphlets advocating for unification with the RSL at all costs, at a time when the WIL was still lukewarm on this issue. The Trotskyist Opposition argued that unification with the RSL was necessary to rejoin the Fourth International as an official section and oppose the bureaucratisation of the FI from the inside. If it is true that Cannon adopted a bureaucratic outlook when dealing with the British situation, this tendency will continue to reflect itself on the International. It can only be fought by a section of the International, not by an organisation outside the International. Surely this is elementary. . . . To remain outside the International is to maintain an ultra-left sectarian attitude in the struggle against bureaucratic tendencies in the I.S., and at the same time to strengthen any false policies that may arise there.19 According to Ted Grant and Sam Bornstein, Healy’s push for the WIL’s admission to the Fourth International was driven by personal ambition, exacerbated by his proximity to some of the ISFI leaders such as Pablo, Frank, Mangan, and especially Cannon (who harboured a strong resentment towards WIL leaders who had refused the merger in 1938). Despite this, when the RCP was formed in 1944, Healy did not form an official minority, claiming no political dispute with the leadership. However, from that point onwards, he built up a powerful unofficial opposition to the leadership.20 The prevailing factionalism within the ISFI and its consequences on the British section’s tactics The RCP founding/merger conference was overseen by Sherry Mangan, a member of the American Socialist Workers’ Party (SWP), who came to oversee the process on behalf of the IS. In reality, the International’s plans were more secretive. On the evening of the conference, Sherry Mangan brought together the leaders of the Trotskyist Opposition and the former WIL minority, organised around Gerry Healy, at the hotel where he was staying. According to Ted Grant, the purpose of this post-conference meeting was to organise a faction capable of leading an offensive against the newly formed RCP leadership.21 After reviewing primary and secondary sources, it appears that the International’s motives were driven more by personal grudges than by political strategy. Both Harber and the former WIL leadership had opposed Cannon, who was close to Mangan, in various ways. The WIL had publicly criticised and rejected Cannon’s plans in 1938, and Harber had opposed the International’s recommendations, which led to the sinking of the RSL. Furthermore, the WIL leaders and Harber had responded harshly to the International’s various injunctions, which were led by the American SWP at the time. This personal grudge against the British leaders by the SWP leaders may explain the choice of Healy as the local agent to carry out their plans. Healy was in strong personal opposition to the WIL leadership and was an ambitious and ruthless individual who would stop at nothing to achieve his

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goals.22 Moreover, as previously mentioned, the events of 1943 and the publication of Our Most Important Task demonstrated to the International Gerry Healy’s willingness to cooperate with it at any cost. This strategy of disruption by the Fourth International in the British section was not an isolated incident. Since the death of Trotsky, the international Trotskyist movement had been plagued by numerous disagreements due to the absence of strong symbolic and theoretical leadership. These dissensions mostly stemmed from the fragmentation of the American Socialist Workers’ Party (SWP) following the departure of Shachtman and Burnham’s minority faction. Their divergence from Trotsky’s earlier analysis of the USSR as a degenerate workers’ State came with their portrayal of it as a new imperialist power.23 Their economic analyses, considered heterodox within the International, further reinforced this. The majority economic and political analysis within the International, formulated by Pierre Frank and Ernest Mandel, predicted the imminent collapse of capitalism after the war, the fall of the USSR, and the onset of a Third World War, in line with Trotsky’s predictions.24 Conversely, Felix Morrow’s theory argued that capitalism would have learned its lessons in the new world order and would use social democracy as a tool of mass control, rendering the choice no longer between dictatorship and socialism: The pressure of the American workers will be countered by a change in manoeuvres of US imperialism, changing from leaning on the Francos to leaning on the Social Democrats and other reformist parties, i.e., leaning on bourgeois-democracy. The choice, from the Roosevelt-Churchill point of view, is a Franco-type government or the spectre of the socialist revolution.” [is a] False [analysis] because the two choices are not the only ones to which capitalist strategy is limited. Roosevelt-Churchill are unfortunately much more flexible than are the writers [the Cannon majority] of the subcommittee resolution.25 Morrow’s analyses aligned with those of the minority faction within the RCP, which argued that the end of the war would usher in a period of economic stabilisation supported by bourgeois democracy. The SWP leadership was so opposed to the RCP’s position that it accused its own minority of providing theoretical tools to Jock Haston and Ted Grant in their struggle against the Healy faction.26 The tactical debates over entry between the Grant/Haston majority and the Healy minority In Britain, the debates within the International soon turned into tactical discussions. Following the Neath episode and the Labour Party’s victory in the 1945 general election, it became clear that the RCP’s membership was in decline. Additionally, Clement Attlee’s Labour government began delivering the socialist measures promised in its programme. This included nationalisations such as the Bank of England in 1946, coal, railways, and telecommunications in 1947, as well as gas

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and electricity in 1948. The end of the coalition government also caught the Trotskyists off guard, as it had been one of their main demands. The Labour government also repealed coercive laws such as the Trades and Dispute Act of 1927, which had been used to convict RCP leaders in 1946. Furthermore, Attlee’s government established social security, creating the NHS in 1946 based on the recommendations of the Beveridge report of 1942. The implementation of a Keynesian economic programme resulted in widespread satisfaction with the Labour Party. Although the Labour Party was not re-elected in the 1951 elections, its share of the vote had risen from 48% when it won in July 1945 to 48.8% in October 1951. Consequently, it became challenging for the Trotskyist party to recruit by capitalising on the discontent of the masses with the Labour Party, which had become more popular than ever. In periods of low social protest, revolutionary parties often shift from applying tactics to discussing them, often leading to divisions and, consequently, splits. Thus, with the election of the Labour government, the RCP began to experience a decline in membership, leading to much debate about tactics. However, as previously established, the debates within the British section mirrored those of the international Trotskyist movement. In the case of the British section, it became evident that the main point of contention was the question of entryism: should they continue their independent work or return to the Labour Party? Two factors influenced the various factions, one local and one international: the state of the Labour Party and the RCP, and the impending global economic outlook. The minority, led by Healy and Goffe, favoured a return to the Labour Party, while the Haston-Grant majority advocated for continuing their independent work. Regarding the first factor, which is the state of the Labour Party, the minority’s arguments in July 1945 reverted to the strategy of fractional entryist work, which was to be subordinated to the work of the independent party according to the RCP constitution: But if the RCP has to enter the Labour Party at some time in the future, then the conclusion should obviously be that, instead of the fraction operating in accordance with the perspective of a split to the independent party, . . . it should conduct its work as a preparation for the total entry of the RCP. That is our position.27 This programme was supported by the following arguments: Is it not perfectly clear that we are witnessing such a development today for a certain period during the war we were forced to conduct independent propaganda work because the Labour Party was stagnant. But the situation is now entirely changed and we must orientate accordingly. Unless you can show that the successes of open work in the last few years supply the necessary evidence that it may be possible to by-pass total entry, then there can be no differences between us.28 Here, Gerry Healy’s analysis echoes that of Ted Grant’s Preparing for Power in 1942, which was written during the time of the WIL. In this document, Ted Grant

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explained that carrying out total entryism within a Labour Party in the midst of a militant haemorrhage would have amounted to severing the link between the revolutionaries and the masses.29 From then on, entryism was to be limited to fractional action and the service of the independent group. This perspective was taken up in the document of fusion/creation of the RCP in 1944. However, the minority’s questioning of the fractional strategy led to untimely exchanges between them and the RCP leadership. On July 20, 1945, the party’s political bureau responded in a lengthy 33-page document to Gerry Healy, explaining that the turn of the masses towards the Labour Party was, for the moment, only electoral: Where is this “left wing of the Labour Party” to which Comrade Healy wants us to “turn the organisation” and with whom he wants us to “open friendly relations”? How does it manifest itself? To these questions there is not the shadow of an answer. . . . At the moment the mass swing to Labour has reflected itself in the electoral field. As yet no appreciable developments have taken place in LP organisational and political life upon which to make a clear prognosis. Certainly no left wing has emerged of any significance which requires the special attention of the Party.30 This was supported by evidence, according to the RCP leadership, that a reverse movement was taking place: In the more advanced areas, where we hope primarily to make recruits, the Labour Party branches remain largely moribund, due undoubtedly to the cynicism with which the advanced workers regard the Labour Leaders. It would be monstrous, therefore, to base our tactics of today on the possibilities of tomorrow when the concrete conditions indicate the need for different tactics.31 The analysis formulated by the party leadership failed to capture the changes in the Labour Party in the aftermath of the war, as history has shown. Labour Party’s participation in the wartime coalition government was a seminal experience that allowed the party to build a strong relationship with the British public, reflected in its excellent results in the next three general elections: 1945, 1950, and 1951.32 The party had already begun to move towards becoming a “catch-all” party with a rhetoric inherited from its more radical past. Except for Aneurin Bevan, most of the party’s senior staff in the 1950s were no longer working-class but of bourgeois extraction, and the Gaitskellite current was already beginning to seriously consider removing Clause IV from the Labour Party constitution.33 The RCP leadership misjudged the post-war Labour Party movement as a move to the right. This was a significant miscalculation, as the Labour Party seized the moment and successfully convinced the country’s workers to support them by embracing strong social reforms. The paradoxical aspect here is that the majority of the RCP had always rejected the catastrophist analyses formulated by the International, which predicted a return to world war, fascism, or an imminent socialist revolution. In fact, as early as 1945, the RCP leadership explained that the war would be followed by a period of

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economic growth, which the bourgeoisie would use to obtain social peace through social democratic parties. However, it appears that the RCP leadership stopped short in their analysis and failed to anticipate that the Labour government would actually take socialist measures. Instead, they relied on the traditional notion of the “disillusionment” of the masses with social democracy. Their proposed solution was to raise the level of class consciousness while waiting for a more favourable situation: Under these conditions, it was a question of holding on to our forces, defending the fundamental ideas and raising the theoretical level of those people we could influence.34 When the RCP leadership acknowledged their mistake, they still rejected Healy’s suggestion of entry within the Labour Party, arguing that his analysis and motives were inaccurate. Nevertheless, the organisation’s decline bolstered Healy’s stance among its members, and his ideas gained traction. It appears that Gerry Healy amplified his catastrophist analysis of the European political and economic situation: The world position of British Imperialism has been undermined during the war by the loss to the United States of the major part of its overseas assets and markets. The decline of income from foreign investments, shipping and other services necessitates a reduction in imports and will thus lower absolutely the living standards of the working class.35 The analysis of the RCP minority appeared to be based on the Leninist positions of the early 1920s as formulated by the CPGB, with the goal of building a left-wing faction within the Labour Party to challenge the party leadership with a transitional programme in opposition to their reformist programme. One of the main differences between the Healy/Goffe minority’s analysis and that of the Grant/Haston majority was that, according to the minority, the most advanced and revolutionary elements of the working class had already returned to the Labour Party and were only looking for revolutionary leadership. Ultimately, the clash between the two perspectives was not simply a dispute over tactical direction, but a clash between two visions of the post-war Labour Party. The analysis formulated by Healy was influenced by the theses of Ernest Mandel, a prominent economist of the International Secretariat of the Fourth International (ISFI). Mandel supported Healy’s thesis by arguing that the majority of the RCP’s analysis, which predicted a period of capitalist economic revitalisation, was flawed because it assumed an economic boom across Europe. The International, on the other hand, maintained that the world capitalist economy would stagnate and collapse in the coming years. Pierre Frank, who later became one of the main strategists of the International Secretariat, argued that an independent party had no possible revolutionary perspective. This analysis was further elaborated in 1951 by Michel Pablo’s analysis of the world political situation, which predicted the collapse of the Soviet bloc and a major world conflict.36 Mandel, Frank, and Pablo

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advocated entry into the major social democratic and even communist parties as a solution. Despite increasing support in 1946, the Healy minority did not have enough activists to overthrow the RCP leadership. According to Ted Grant, Healy had the support of only 60 to 70 RCP members out of a total of 350.37 In June 1946, the Executive Committee of the International Secretariat intervened by passing a resolution calling for the RCP to join the Labour Party. This direct support by the International for the minority in its British section marked the beginning of a long series of manoeuvres aimed at overthrowing the RCP leadership and making Gerry Healy the leader of the British Trotskyist movement. The International Secretariat’s first actions against the RCP leadership In March 1947, the RCP’s internal bulletin published a letter from the Central Committee of the Fourth International entitled A turn towards the Labour party masses is becoming ever more urgent.38 The letter had been sent to the British section two months earlier, in January. It was published later to allow the Grant/Haston majority to publish their response at the same time. The Secretariat’s letter challenged all of the British section’s previous analyses. The first half of the letter, about seven pages, was a response to the majority’s analysis that the conditions for entryism as formulated by Trotsky were not present. Table 7.1 summarizes the two analyses. The argument put forth by the International Secretariat was based on the interpretation that the recent massive vote for the Labour Party was a sign of radicalisation among the working masses. The question then was whether it was possible to use the Labour Party to reach out to these masses, who were demanding more collective action, educate them, and eventually rally them to the ideas of proletarian revolution. It appears that the International has learned from past attempts at entryism: Whereas previously, the entry of revolutionists into the Labour Party of necessity had more circumscribe and limited objectives – the winning over of relatively restricted layers of advanced workers to the programme of Trotskyism or Communism, individual recruitment for the revolutionary party preparing for action outside the limits of the Labour Party – the present situation sets new objectives for entry: the setting into motion of the entire awakened British working class along the path of revolutionary action, this time within the framework of the Labour Party itself.39 The emphasis on the Labour Party framework here reflects the fact that past entryist experiences in Britain have always been centred around the uncertainty of the path that would lead to the proletarian revolution. The splits that occurred, such as those of the Marxist Group and the Bolshevik-Leninist Group, were founded on the ILP/Labour Party debate. After the war, the ILP became an empty shell, likely due to its pacifism failing to meet the expectations of the working class, who were

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Table 7.1 Summary of the positions of the majority and minority of the RCP in 1947 Condition for entry

Haston/Grant majority analysis

The country is entering a pre-revolutionary period.

Different situation from The massive victory of 1929, political consenthe Labour Party in the sus around the action polls is a symptom of a significant radicalisation of the Labour Party. of the masses. The economic crisis will There is no crisis in the be global and intense, immediate future. Britthe United Kingdom is ain is entering a period no longer the economic of economic boom. centre of the world. The opposition exists but No concrete opposition is not yet organised and was organised against therefore not yet visible. the Attlee leadership.

The country is entering a major economic crisis.

International Secretariat counterpoint

Creation of a centrist, radical current within the mass parties of social democracy. Invalid argument because Past experience has Inability of the revoluthe issues and the situshown that this conditionary party to grow ation are not the same tion never allowed or influence the masses today as before. British groups to grow outside the apparatus of when they joined the social democracy. Labour Party. Source: author.

convinced of the need to participate in a great war against fascism. This analysis can help explain the differing growth trajectories of the Communist Party (which experienced strong growth with a pro-militarist stance) and the ILP (which suffered a militant exodus due to its pacifist position). With the end of the ILP and the Comintern in 1943, it became clear to the Trotskyists in the International Secretariat that the British revolution would have to go through the Labour Party. Another important distinction was the duration of the entryist activity: Entry into the Labour Party today therefore signifies for the Trotskyists a campaign of relatively long duration. The task is not so much the winning over of individuals here and there to the full program of Trotskyism at the moment, but the winning over of whole sections of the workers in the Labour Party and in the trade unions affiliated with it to revolutionary action on the basis of transitional demands.40 The International Secretariat’s request in this paragraph is interesting for several reasons. Firstly, it was the first time that a long-term entry strategy had been proposed, laying the groundwork for the sui generis entryism that characterised some

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post-war entries. Previous entries into British parties had all been intended to lead to a split in the short or medium term, and none of these entries had been entirely secret. Secondly, the Secretariat did not suggest converting Labour Party members into Trotskyist activists or push for the implementation of a maximum programme. Instead, it was a matter of educating members for the proletarian revolution by engaging them with transitional demands. The International’s guidelines for entryist activity were described as illegal and included defined objectives, a fixed position, and attachment to a specific structure for each infiltrator, as well as coordination between them to launch the same campaigns and slogans at different points within the host party. In practice, these recommendations were incompatible with independent work and couldn’t be implemented through simple fractional work. This could partly explain the reluctance of the RCP cadres to follow the recommendations, which seemed to demand the dissolution of the RCP. The International denied that it was advocating liquidation and emphasised that the aim was to build a revolutionary organisation within the Labour Party: [P]arty control will be assured at each step of the execution, . . . entry, far from signifying dissolution or even a loosening up of the revolutionary cadre, means a tightening up of control and activity all along the line. . . . Every member must feel that he or she is entering into a planned action on the road to place the party at the head of the revolutionary masses.41 The new practice of entryism was the result of the reflections of Michel Pablo and Pierre Frank, who were the main instigators of this illegal and sui-generis method. The length of the document and its imperative tone showed the difficulties between the International Secretariat and its British section, which eventually caused the section to disintegrate in the following two years. The RCP leadership was wary of entryism, and their experience with the WIL had shown that British Trotskyism’s only successes, however limited, had been achieved outside the Labour Party and, to some extent, against the International’s recommendations. This perhaps explains why, at the end of its letter, the International explained that the need for entry was not based on any democratic principle but rather on a particular context. This indication was in fact filled with dramatic irony, as the International flouted its own democratic principles when it forcibly split its British section in the face of the latter’s reluctance to join the Labour Party. The majority’s resistance to the pressure of the International Secretariat The majority’s response to the International Secretariat’s call for the dissolution of the RCP into the Labour Party was also published in the same Internal Bulletin. In this response, they deconstructed the arguments put forward by the International Secretariat point by point.

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The first argument presented by the International Secretariat was that, according to Michel Pablo, Pierre Frank, and Ernest Mandel, Britain was entering a period of intense economic crisis that would exacerbate class antagonisms. However, the RCP leadership responded by scrutinising every sector of British economic activity and pushing back against the International. They argued that the International’s misunderstanding of the situation stemmed from a lack of understanding of Marxist theory. The RCP’s counter-argument was that there was no limit to capitalist production, and that the processes of market destruction were inherent in the capitalist functioning of a cycle of destruction and reconstruction (as in the idea of Kondratieff/Juglar cycles). In the RCP’s view, the world party had made the mistake of interpreting the British crisis as one of overproduction when, in reality, it was a crisis of underproduction and thus had no revolutionary potential.42 According to the theses of the RCP majority, the purchasing power of the British people had increased after the war due to the end of restrictions, and the market was failing to provide what people wanted not because of a decline in their standard of living but rather because of the inability of the productive apparatus to produce it. The Secretariat made the mistake of thinking that the overall decrease in the share of added value accruing to workers necessarily indicated deterioration in their living conditions, which for the majority was mathematically incorrect. If the share of value added attributed to employees decreases but overall growth increases faster than this share decreases, then the value added in volume recovered by employees will have increased. This argument was supported by an analysis of the comanagerial role of the Labour government in the post-war economy, particularly through its nationalisation of strategic sectors of the British economy such as transport, energy, communication, and finance: In the normal development of free capitalism, the market conditions determined the flow of capital and the relation between the elements of means of production and means of consumption. The “planning” of the Labour Government and its manipulation of priorities and finance disrupts the normal practice of the market, but only within certain limits. In the long run, the value of the means of production must be incorporated in a tremendous amount of means of consumption.43 The response of the RCP majority highlighted that the post-war situation in Britain was more in line with their interpretation. As a result, they rejected entryism as a strategy. However, according to Sam Bornstein and Al Richardson, while the British section correctly analysed the situation, they had failed to draw the right conclusion. Specifically, the RCP leadership had not fully realised that the party’s small size and lack of influence during a period of Labour Party success would result in their rapid decline. Despite this, the party’s minority continued to criticise the political bureau, which then tried to put an end to the discussion on entryism once and for all during the party’s annual conference.44 The attempt by the RCP leadership to close the debate provided further arguments for the minority, who took the opportunity to attack the leadership on the lack of internal democracy in

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the party. As a result, the leadership was forced to justify itself on this issue.45 According to Martin Upham, regardless of the outcome of this debate, it was already clear that the party was being harmed: the exodus of militants continued, and party activity was paralysed by these discussions.46 Indeed, none of the internal party bulletins between the beginning of the year and the summer of 1947 dealt with anything other than entryism. It appears that the 1947 RCP was repeating the mistakes of the RSL, showing that any period of militant inactivity was turning into a rise in factionalism in the smaller parties of the British far left.47 The RCP leadership’s attempt to close the debate allowed the International to intervene more directly in the organisational life of the party. The forced splitting of the RCP by the International Secretariat On June 14 and 15, 1947, the pro-entry minority officially formed themselves into a faction and released an open letter to the Political Bureau, demanding the right to carry out factional entryism into the Labour Party. This letter marked a turning point in the minority’s manoeuvres, as it was the first formal appeal to the Executive Committee of the International to intervene in the democratic life of the British section: We are organising a faction of all those in favour of entry on the basis of the programme of the Fourth International, for the purpose of gaining the greatest possible support by the next Congress. In the event of the faction not gaining a majority, then confident in the correctness of the entrist tactic, we shall request the I.E.C. to so organise the British Section as to allow the supporters of entry to work within the Labour Party under their own control subject to the supervision of the I.S.48 In politics, such a demand is quite unusual. The minority had anticipated its defeat at the annual party congress (28 votes to seven) and was asking the higher authority, the International, to split the British group itself. The RCP majority issued a statement denouncing the actions of the minority, accusing them of behaving irresponsibly: The minority declare, in Paragraph 5, that if they do not get a majority at the forthcoming 1947 Congress, they will request the IEC to so organise the British Section as to allow the supporters of entry to work within the Labour Party under their own control. Every member knows that the Minority will not gain a majority at the Congress. This declaration, therefore, is nothing short of an ultimatum: adopt the entrist tactic or we split the Party. Every loyal member of the RCP, majority and minority alike, must brand this ultimatum as criminally irresponsible, and combat the threat to split with every possible means.49 This document reveals several things. Firstly, it suggests that despite three years of intense debate, the minority failed to convince, a majority, even though according

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to the interviews conducted by Bornstein and Richardson, this debate consumed the entire internal life of the party in 1947, to the point of exhausting the militants in charge of internal publications.50 As a result, the debate merely paralysed the party’s apparatus. The second element is that the document exposes the extent of the concessions made by the majority to the entryist minority. These include the publication of all their communications and a total right of reply, even if it means releasing internal bulletins outside the normal publication schedule. Moreover, the document reveals that the minority leaders had been granted the right to act within the Labour Party since the party’s founding to demonstrate the value of entryism. Nevertheless, there is no record of the actions of the small cell already established within the Labour Party in 1944, nor does any minority document mention this practice. The third element is that the document produced by the minority is exposed as a threat to the party’s integrity, which could result in splintering or splitting, and as a product of the International’s meddling within the British section: It is reported that the question of separate organisations was discussed between Comrade Stuart, I.S. representative and the leaders of the Minority on the occasion of his recent visit, just prior to the Minority Conference. We have called upon the I.S. to make an unambiguous statement as to its attitude and to immediately repudiate the threat of a split.51 Thus, the conflict between the RCP leadership and the International became open. Numerous exchanges took place in August, during which the International repeatedly attacked the RCP leadership, accusing it of opposing the positions of the world party due to its former membership in the WIL. Some RCP leaders, despite being ex-RSL members, supported the political bureau and cleared it of accusations of acting on the basis of personal feelings and former factional sentiments. Finally, at the 4th Plenum of the International, a resolution was passed that required the RCP to accept the split and permit the minority faction to enter the Labour Party: For this reason, and with the additional aim of persuading the British comrades as a whole of the correctness of its orientation by practical example, the IEC declares itself in favour of the entry of the Minority of the RCP into the Labour Party.52 This motion, which passed by a vote of eight to five, was accompanied by a second motion that requested the British section confirm the entry of the minority faction through a national conference to be held before the end of October 1947. This second motion outlined the organisational details of the minority’s entry: 1) The minority as a group, when it enters the Labour Party, shall function independently under the direct discipline of the executive bodies of the International. 2) Both organisations are recognised as an integral part of the Fourth International with all rights and obligations. On the IEC there shall be one majority

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and one minority representative. On the IS there shall be one majority representative. At the World Congress, representation shall be accorded in proportion to numerical strength. 3) There shall be a coordination committee of the RCP and the Entrist Group to supervise collaboration wherever possible of the work inside and outside the Labour Party, of both organisation.53 The motion appears to be a restatement of the terms that led to the unification of the Marxist Group, the Marxist League, and the Militant Group into the RSL in 1938. The two groups were entirely independent and had nothing but a coordinating committee with the power to coordinate work “wherever possible” to link them. In practice, the entryist group had all the characteristics of a new party, not under the leadership of the RCP but under that of the International. Therefore, it was not truly a faction but rather an effective new party, a section of the International.54 The dissolution of the ashes of the RCP in the Labour Party The departure of the entryist minority at the end of 1947 accelerated the decline of the RCP. The party’s activity had already slowed down due to the constant debates on entryism that had dominated its internal life in 1946 and 1947, resulting in paralysis. Another significant issue was the lack of funds, which forced the party to reduce its staff from 16 to seven or eight and downgrade the Socialist Appeal from a bi-weekly to a monthly publication.55 This reduced level of activity, coupled with a deep moral exhaustion, led Jock Haston to reassess the entryist tactic from the autumn of 1948 onwards and officially put it on the agenda of the Political Bureau in December.56 Haston’s proposed entryism was to be carried out after a public announcement of the dissolution of the RCP. This entryism was more of a conservative measure aimed at preserving the core group of activists acquired over the past ten years than a real strategic move towards the Labour Party. Indeed, no short- or long-term perspective had been established by the advocates of this final retreat. Only two RCP leaders opposed the dissolution: Ted Grant and Jimmy Deane. In February 1949, the opposition to dissolution within the Labour Party formed the Open Party Faction. In his account of the period, Ted Grant states that the party was divided as follows: a quarter in favour of Haston’s proposed entry, a quarter in favour of continuing the RCP, and half undecided.57 The Open Party Faction argued that getting back into the Labour Party would be political suicide and that the presence of the Healy group, which had already been officially infiltrated for over a year, made the prospect of two separate groups impossible due to the ensuing competition. Additionally, it was pointed out that the International was on Healy’s side and that any regrouping of RCP members within the Labour Party would necessarily be on the ex-minority leader’s terms, as highlighted by the Open Party Faction. Furthermore, the International characterised Jock Haston’s proposal to join the Labour Party as a form of pessimistic liquidationism, aimed solely at preserving the core group of the RCP and carrying out propaganda work, and thus refused to provide any support to the RCP.58

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The Open Party Faction did not completely reject the idea of entering the Labour Party. Their stance was that if they were to adopt entryism, it should be a short-term strategy, with the RCP remaining the central structure. Once again, it appeared that British Trotskyism was unable to move past its history of division and had reverted to the same debates that took place in the 1930s. In fact, the tactics proposed by the Open Party Faction were not new but had already been proposed by the Marxist Group in the ILP and the Militant Group in the Labour Party: a short-term entry with the intention of a split after new militant members had been converted to the central structure.59 The congress held from June 4 to 6, 1949, was the decisive event to determine the future of the RCP. According to Sam Bornstein and Al Richardson, the balance of power within the party was upset by Grant and Deane’s final stand in favour of entry, leading to the decision in favour of dissolution, which was ultimately announced in the final issue of the Socialist Appeal in 1949.60 Conclusion In 1943, the RCP achieved what had always seemed impossible in Britain: the unification of the various Trotskyist sects into a party with a clear outline and strategy. The episode of the Bevin Boys and the Neath by-election demonstrated a strong organisational capacity on the part of the RCP and its potential to mobilise around revolutionary ideas, even if on a small scale. The report produced by the Ministry of the Interior on the RCP acknowledged that the party compensated for its small membership with the militant energy of its members. Even the most dissident prewar Trotskyists, such as Denzil Harber, had come to accept that there were no longer any serious possibilities for Trotskyists to engage in political action outside the tried and tested methods of the WIL from 1938 to 1943. The various groups that refused to adhere to the rules imposed by the WIL, such as the Left Fraction of the RSL, sank into oblivion and did not survive the Second World War. Although the RCP successfully united Trotskyist militants in Britain, it also inherited pre-war Trotskyism’s problems. The International leadership, while overseeing the merger, fostered factionalism within the RCP by merging previous oppositions from the WIL (the Healy minority) and the RSL (the Trotskyist Opposition). This interventionism could be explained by resentment towards RCP leaders like Harber, who resisted International injunctions during his leadership of the RSL, and towards the WIL members who refused to merge on International terms in 1938. But it was also justified by a deep political disagreement regarding the international situation and its tactical consequences. The International believed in the imminent collapse of the USSR and a great capitalist crisis, whereas RCP leaders revised their analyses as the situation evolved and concluded that the Western world would experience an economic boom. Additionally, the International Secretariat was plagued by incipient factionalism, which spilled over into the national sections, in part because of its leaders’ desire to maintain a certain hold on local leadership. Eventually, the old debates of Trotskyism resurfaced within the RCP, which found itself paralysed for nearly three years due to the pugnacity of its minority

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organised around Gerry Healy, who proposed a return to total entry within the Labour Party. The party was fractioned by the International Secretariat when its majority refused, effectively leading to a split as the two groups did not collaborate at any time thereafter. With the loss of almost a quarter of its militant base, the RCP found itself grappling with the age-old debates that had fuelled early British Trotskyism: how to survive in a context that was hostile to the propagation of revolutionary ideas? The question of joining the Labour Party once again became the centre of the debate and was ultimately decided upon without any real conviction or perspective in the short or long term. This decision marked the birth of survival entryism. The Open Party Faction proposed a short-term entryism similar to that initiated in the past by the Marxist Group and the Militant Group, but their proposal did not gain traction. Thus, as the war came to an end, the Labour Party once again became a central topic in the tactical debates of British Trotskyism, with many seeing it as an unassailable horizon. Even those who advocated for an independent Trotskyist party fought under the slogan “Labour to Power”. In the end, British Trotskyism in the first half of the 20th century demonstrated that it was unable to offer a sustainable organisation outside of the Labour Party, even in its most successful partisan form. By 1950, after more than 18 years of trying to distance themselves from it, British Trotskyists had all infiltrated into the Labour Party. This suggests that the success of entryism or the independent existence of a far-left group in Britain depends not only on its own organisational capacities but also, and above all, on the successes and failures of the Labour Party itself as well as its political orientation. Notes 1 E. Grant (Ted Grant), Dear Comrade Loris, letter to the International Secretariat, September 7, 1943, MRC: MSS.151/1/3/3. 2 ALEXANDER Robert Jackson, International Trotskyism, 1929–1985: A Documented Analysis of the Movement, Durham & London: Duke University Press, 1991, p. 460. 3 BORNSTEIN Sam & RICHARSON Al, War and the International: A History of the Trotskyist Movement in Britain 1937–1949, London: Socialist Platform, 1986, p. 105. 4 Ibid., p. 109. 5 Workers’ International League, RSL-WIL Fusion Conference 1944: Resolution on Entrist Tactic, Submitted by WIL, 1944, MRC: MSS.151/1/3/9. 6 Ibid. 7 GRANT Ted, History of British Trotskyism, London: Wellred Publications, 2002, p. 108. 8 Revolutionary Communist Party, Constitution, 1944, MRC: 601/R/10/1. 9 SEILER Daniel-Louis, Les partis politiques, Paris: A. Colin, 2000, p. 23. 10 UPHAM Martin, The History of British Trotskyism to 1949, PhD dissertation, University of Hull, Hull, 1980. www.marxists.org/history/etol/revhist/upham/upmen.htm (last accessed 14.04.2023). 11 Revolutionary Communist Party, A Victory for Labour! The Case of Jock Haston, Roy Tearse, Heaton Lee and Ann Keen, pamphlet, 1944, MRC: 601/R/10/15. 12 The Streisand effect is a term used to describe the unintended consequence of any attempt to censor or cover up information online, which can lead to the information becoming more widely propagated or even to the creation of a controversy that one was seeking to avoid. 13 GRANT Ted, History of British . . . op. cit., p. 110.

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14 War Cabinet, The Trotskyist Movement in Great Britain, Memorandum by the Home Secretary, April 13, 1944. Available as an appendix to GRANT Ted, History of British . . . op. cit., pp. 233–239. www.marxists.org/history/etol/document/britain/brit01. htm (last accessed 14.04.2023). 15 HoC Debate, Hansard, July 21, 1942, Vol. 381, Col. 1515–1516. https://hansard.parliament.uk/Commons/1942-07-21/debates/3ff3f65e-dfb9-45d3-ad09-db049ac23adc/ DefenceRegulation18B (last accessed 14.04.2023). 16 GRANT Ted, History of British . . . op. cit., p. 120. 17 BORNSTEIN Sam & RICHARSON Al, War and the International . . . op. cit., p. 140. 18 Letter from Gerry Healy to Jimmy Deane, February 18, 1943. MRC: MSS.325/5/ A43(40). 19 HEALY Gerry, “Our Most Important Task”, Internal Bulletin, August 10, 1943, MRC: MSS.325/S/45/16. 20 BORNSTEIN Sam & RICHARSON Al, War and the International . . . op. cit., p. 110. 21 GRANT Ted, History of British . . . op. cit., p. 108. 22 This idea will be developed in the section dedicated to what would eventually become Healyism. 23 This analysis finds its origins, in part, in the USSR’s invasion of Finland. 24 FRANK Pierre, “The Imperialist War and Revolutionary Perspectives”, Fourth International, vol. 6, n°2, February 1945, pp. 56–61. 25 MORROW Felix, “The First Phases of the Coming European Revolution”, SWP Internal Bulletin, vol. 6, n°4, September 1944. 26 GRANT Ted, History of British . . . op. cit., p. 131. 27 HEALY Gerry, An Open Letter to the Central Committee, July 18, 1945, MRC: MSS.75/3/4/32. 28 Ibid. 29 GRANT Ted, “Preparing for Power, Revolutionary Perspectives and the Tasks of the Fourth Internationalists in Britain: the Labour Party Tactic”, Workers’ International News, vol. 5 n°6, September 1942, pp. 20–23. 30 RCP, “1945 Conference Discussion: ‘Entry’ and the Revolutionary Party, PB Reply to the Discussion”, Internal Bulletin, July 20, 1945, p. 25, MRC: MSS.325/32/F45(8). 31 Ibid. 32 PUGH Martin, Speak for Britain! A New History of The Labour Party, London: Vintage, 2011, pp. 278–285. 33 For more information on the early contestation of the socialist dimension of the Labour Party constitution, see HASELER Stephen, The Gaitskellites: Revisionism in the British Labour Party, 1951–64, London: Macmillan, 1969. 34 GRANT Ted, History of British . . . op. cit., p. 164. 35 HEALY Gerry, FINCH Harry, GOFFE John & LAWRENCE John, “The Turn to Mass Work”, RCP Internal Bulletin, July 17, 1946, MRC: MSS.325/S/43/16. 36 PABLO Michel, “Where Are We Going”, SWP International Information Bulletin, March 1951, pp. 1–8. 37 GRANT Ted, History of British . . . op. cit., p. 164. 38 A Turn Towards the Labour Party Masses Is Becoming Ever More Urgent, letter from the International Secretariat to the RCP Central Committee, published in RCP Internal Bulletin, dated March 1947. MRC: MSS.325/S/43/19. 39 Ibid. 40 Ibid. 41 Ibid. 42 In Marxist theory, the fall of capitalism can only be due to its own contradictions. One of these is the presence of crises of overproduction. These crises therefore have revolutionary potential. See Karl Marx’s Capital: Books II and III, Chapter XIV. 43 Political Bureau of the Revolutionary Communist Party, “The Real Situation in Britain – A Reply to the IS by the Political Bureau, RCP for the Central Committee”, Internal Bulletin, RCP, March 1947, p. 27, MRC: MSS.325/S/43/19.

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44 GRANT Ted, History of British . . . op. cit., p. 171. 45 LEE Mildred, “On the Limitation of the Discussion on ‘Entry’”, Internal Circular of the RCP, unknown date, MRC: MSS.75/3/4/65. 46 UPHAM Martin, The History of . . . op. cit. 47 In fact, this is still the case in the years 2010–2020, with, for example, the split of the Socialist Alternative from the Socialist Party. 48 RCP Minority, Statement From the National Conference of Minority Supporters in London on June 14 and 15, MRC: MSS.325/30/E47(8). 49 Political Bureau of the Revolutionary Communist Party, Statement of the Political Bureau on the Minority Threat to Split the Party, June 27, 1947, p. 2, MRC: MSS.325/30/ E47(1). 50 Interviews of Mildred Lee and Jock Haston mentioned in BORNSTEIN Sam & RICHARSON Al, War and the International . . . op. cit., p. 199. 51 Political Bureau of the Revolutionary Communist Party, Statement of the Political Bureau on the Minority Threat to Split the Party, June 27, 1947, p. 2, MRC: MSS.325/30/ E47(1). 52 Executive Committee of the Fourth International, “Resolution on the British Question”, SWP Internal Bulletin, vol. 9, no. 7, 1947, containing the main political resolutions passed by the plenum of the Fourth International in September 1947. 53 Ibid. 54 CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left in British Politics, Oxford: B. Blackwell, 1987, p. 60. 55 GRANT Ted, History of British . . . op. cit., p. 181. 56 Ibid., p. 182. 57 Ibid., p. 185. 58 ALEXANDER Robert Jackson, International Trotskyism . . . op. cit., p. 470. 59 BORNSTEIN Sam & RICHARSON Al, War and the International . . . op. cit., p. 227. 60 HASTON Jock (on behalf of the Committee of Dissolution), “Declaration on the Dissolution of the Revolutionary Communist Party and the Entry of Its Members Into the Labour Party”, Socialist Appeal, Special Number, July 1949.

Part 4

British Trotskyism after the war Different traditions, different entryisms

8

From secrecy to sectarianism, the Healyite tradition in action

The Club and its near liquidation in the Labour Party After the dissolution of the Revolutionary Communist Party (RCP), the former members of its majority had little option but to join the entryist group formed by Gerry Healy in the Labour Party. The International Secretariat of the Fourth International (ISFI) denounced this entry as a form of liquidationism, reproaching the British section for joining the Labour Party in a desperate manner without any perspective.1 In Trotskyist circles, liquidationism is a serious accusation that implies the abandonment of all forms of organisation and ideology. In practice, it involves the infiltration of another political party without any clear structure or ideological or practical coherence. It is ironic that the International Secretariat denounced the dissolution of the remaining members of the RCP into the Labour Party as liquidationism since from 1950 onwards, Pablo, who technically controlled the Fourth International, began advocating for sui-generis entryism, a type of entryism where the majority of the section infiltrates working-class parties with a low profile, extremely limited independent activity, and a press organ that Daniel Bensaïd described as “confidential”, serving only as a cover for the organisation.2 Despite having fewer members, the ex-minority led by Healy gained control of the British section of the Fourth International after its reunification at the end of 1949. This was due to the Healyites’ excellent relationship with the International Secretariat and the fact that the dissolution of the RCP proved that Healy’s line had been correct since 1945, when he began advocating for re-entry into the Labour Party. The reunited organisation was called The Club, but its existence was publicly denied. The Club was a loyal section of the International Secretariat and, with Pablo’s assistance, developed a more advanced form of entryism into the Labour Party, where the revolutionary leadership (the Trotskyist party organisation) merged completely with the masses (the grassroots of the Labour Party), known as “deep entryism”. The difference between deep entryism and sui-generis entryism, as described by Daniel Bensaïd, is that in the case of deep entryism, no clear organisation is retained. The secret dimension of The Club is illustrated many times in the group’s internal discussion bulletins. In one of the first of these identifiable bulletins in May 1954, one of the group’s activists, named “Miller”, explains that the hostility of DOI: 10.4324/9781003427551-13

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the other tendencies of the Labour Party towards the Trotskyists is such that the Trotskyist group members had to obey clear instructions: [Our members] MUST (repeat, MUST) not discuss the affairs of the group, locally, nationally or internationally, with anyone who is not a member, or even with any member who they think may talk carelessly to non-members.3 It is also mentioned in the same bulletin that “Keep[ing] one’s mouth shut” was a necessary condition to the activity of the group and that “The less the Centrists know about our group the better” and that, all in all, “The greatest danger lies among those who may seem nearest to us”.4 The issue of entryism was also discussed in terms of training, particularly due to the difficulty of putting this tactic into practice. In another text by Miller in the same internal bulletin, this time written with another member under the name of “Lofthouse”,5 entryism is described as a “profoundly difficult task for a revolutionary party”, and that “Its success depends more than anything else on the party members understanding quite clearly what they are trying to do”. In this document, the group was instructed to hold a training session every three months to discuss and review the practical application of entryism in their daily tasks. This highlights the importance that was placed on not just the practice of entryism but also on understanding its theoretical principles. These training sessions were essentially meetings led by a designated leader where members would discuss and review each other’s activities within the Labour Party. A 1957 discussion paper provides a written account of The Club’s theory of entryism. According to this paper, entryism is not primarily aimed at transforming the Labour Party but at educating and leading the most “conscious” elements within it. It is mentioned that members of The Club “are in this party to educate and guide, to give a political character to revolutionary potentialities that exists”,6 which would only have been possible within the Labour Party since it is within this party that the masses of British workers are located. Both John Callaghan and John Kelly classify the Healyite tradition as part of Orthodox Trotskyism, firmly adhering to the original Trotskyist doctrine. In their works, they emphasise the numerous reminders and quotations from Trotsky’s 1938 Transitional Programme in the discussion bulletins of the group. The premises set out in the Transitional Programme are considered authoritative arguments and incontrovertible data, with Trotsky’s words carrying a significant truth value. In a bulletin that takes the form of a reply to a political opponent, the presence of the Trotskyist organisation within the Labour Party is presented as natural since the revolutionary character of the masses is described as a natural law. Getting in charge of a Labour Paper: the Socialist Outlook Starting in December 1948, the Healyite group published the journal Socialist Outlook, which was edited by John Lawrence.7 The paper was not officially Trotskyist, and many Labour members and even some MPs (such as Ellis Smith, Herschel Austin, and Tom Braddock) wrote in it as well.8

From secrecy to sectarianism, the Healyite tradition in action 145 The paper purported to be socialist and had a considerable readership. This was attributed to the efforts of The Club members, who had gained substantial influence within the party by organising a left-wing section into a group called the Socialist Fellowship. The fellowship was established in June 1949 and had formal participation from some MPs. It played a pivotal role in distributing the newspaper, and in the eyes of the Labour Party, it was the Socialist Fellowship and not The Club that was responsible for its publication.9 Another layer of security was added to the secrecy of the Trotskyist actions, as the Socialist Outlook was neither the central nor the press organ of the Socialist Fellowship.10 The Socialist Outlook was not a revolutionary publication. It argued that the Labour Party was fundamentally a socialist party but had been distorted by its leadership. The paper was the focus of The Club’s entryist work. In the editorial of its first issue, a section entitled Our Aim made it clear that the desire was to merge with the left wing of the Labour Party without federating Labour activists around a revolutionary programme as had been attempted in previous entryist experiments in Britain. Here is an excerpt: To give a voice to this newly awakened movement is the aim of the Socialist Outlook. We intend to give expression to all those points of view which have as their aim the hammering out, in comradely discussion the solution to our main problems.11 It is worth noting the reference to the “newly awakened movement” in this context. This term was used to interpret the 1945 Labour Party victory as an indication of a radicalisation of the masses and the emergence of a centrist current within the party that fell between reformist and revolutionary ideas. This notion is reminiscent of the arguments made by the former Healy minority, who proposed the full integration of the RCP into the Labour Party. The publication made significant efforts to emphasise its allegiance to the Labour Party and its ecumenical reach, which was also a new development in British Trotskyism. In this regard, the final part of John Lawrence’s editorial was revealing. Next to it, readers could find a box written entirely in bold and entitled “Editor’s Note”, indicating that the views presented in the paper were those of the authors and that the “views of the editorial board” (understood to be the Trotskyists of The Club) “will be expressed only in the editorials”.12 It is important to note that the Socialist Outlook positioned itself primarily as a platform for ideas exchanged within the left wing of the party. However, the strategic position of the editorial as a link between all the articles in the issue made it possible to rhetorically compose more radical ideas and also allowed the Healyites to play their cards. While the newspaper’s articles presented problems, revealed scandals, and exposed situations, the editorial remained propagandist and, more often than not, Marxist-sounding. This flexibility was in line with the idea of the transitional programme, where the solutional measures presented in the editorial were never maximalist or revolutionary but instead adjusted to the current need for radicalism among its readers and the current political context.

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Despite this, the Socialist Outlook attempted to maintain a low profile, primarily due to concerns about party discipline. Previous publications, even those from entryist groups like the Militant in the 1930s, argued that reformism was a dead end and an illusion for the working class. The Socialist Outlook, on the other hand, abandoned this rhetoric and did not mention the idea that bringing about socialism through reform was impossible. In fact, Ernie Roberts, a trade union activist who later became a Labour MP in 1979, wrote in the second issue: Beside the Labour Party all other working class political organisations are insignificant. What does this mean? Surely that the workers feel that the Labour Party must have its chance in full and that, outside this party, there is nothing to be done. With such a sentiment, mountains can be moved, but to move mountains, efficient and responsive machinery is required. In the Trade Unions, the Co-ops and the Party itself we have the raw materials of that machinery. A first step in transforming it into an effective weapon in the struggle for Socialism is for the Labour Party to assert its legitimate authority over its Parliamentary representatives . . . including the Cabinet Ministers.13 In this excerpt, the legitimacy of the Labour Party is clearly affirmed. Furthermore, the parliamentary route to implementing socialism is not openly rejected; rather, it is the actions of the PLP that are criticised. This may seem minor, but it represents an important departure from Leninist theory, which holds that parliamentary action cannot be the source of socialism and is merely an illusion that revolutionaries must dispel among the masses. The Socialist Outlook breaks with this theory by apparently asserting that the elements of socialism already exist within the Labour Party and that the issue with reformism is not inherent but rather a matter of practice. The cover of the Socialist Outlook shown here is a perfect example of the paper’s apparent openness. The sub-heading’s mention of Ellis Smith as a Member of Parliament, in capital letters, presents the paper as a respectable publication that is well integrated into the Labour Party’s sphere.14 The Socialist Outlook continued to be the primary newspaper of The Club, albeit not its official press organ, until it was banned in 1954 by the National Executive Committee at the Scarborough Labour Party Conference. The decision to ban the paper was made by a card vote, and it is believed that the support of some unions led to the paper being banned by a margin of 4,475,000 votes to 1,500,000.15 The paper enjoyed considerable success, transitioning from a monthly publication during its early days to a weekly publication in less than three years. Until 1951, it was a serious competitor to the newspaper Tribune, which rapidly became the rallying point for the radical left within the Labour Party. The Club also published the Labour Review, which, in line with the Socialist Outlook, aimed to be open to the outside world but defended a line closer to orthodox Trotskyism. In its very first editorial, the paper declared its support for the Labour Party and its desire to bring it to power on radical socialist lines, while also making its opposition to the Attlee leadership clear.16 Labour Review served as the theoretical publication of The Club and provided a platform for the further training of supporters before they were brought into the heart of the group.17

From secrecy to sectarianism, the Healyite tradition in action 147

Figure 8.1 Cover of Socialist Outlook vol. 1, no. 12, November 1949 with an emphasis on the participation of Ellis Smith to it.

The use of the Socialist Fellowship as a vehicle within the Labour Party As mentioned in the previous section, the Socialist Fellowship was the main recruiting and operating ground for The Club during a time when Trotskyists had decided to integrate themselves into the Labour Party. The origins of the Socialist Fellowship post-date the creation of the Socialist Outlook. Although the Trotskyists played a significant role in its formation, it is important to stress that they were not entirely in charge of it.

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The decision to establish the Socialist Fellowship was made during a convention attended by around 160 delegates, which took place on the side-lines of the Labour Party’s annual national conference in Blackpool in June 1949. This initiative was spearheaded by Labour MP Ellis Smith. The founding conference of the Socialist Fellowship was held on November 27, 1949, and was attended by almost 100 delegates from over 29 towns and cities.18 The leadership of the Socialist Fellowship was composed entirely of Labour MPs, with Ellis Smith serving as chairman and Tom Braddock and Ron Chamberlain as vice-chairmen. An executive committee consisting of six members was elected, including Fenner Brockway, the former leader of the Independent Labour Party (ILP) during the attempted popular front with the CPGB, and John Lawrence, the editor of the Socialist Outlook. Lawrence’s presence on the executive committee of the Socialist Fellowship gave the Trotskyists significant influence within the organisation and enabled them to use the Socialist Fellowship to promote the development of the Socialist Outlook through a symbiotic relationship. The leaders of the Socialist Fellowship wrote extensively for the Trotskyist journal from its inception, and according to Mark Jenkins, the Socialist Outlook was regarded as a publication that was loyal to the Socialist Fellowship. The lack of a formal link between the group and the publication allowed the paper to survive the Labour Party’s dissolution of the Socialist Fellowship in April 1951.19 The Socialist Fellowship served as a platform for debates, where the Trotskyists were able to assert their views and gain influence within the group. The issue of Britain’s military intervention in Korea is a notable example of this influence. Initially, the Fellowship’s President, Smith, had a pro-Korean War stance, which was not in line with the Trotskyist position. However, the Socialist Outlook quickly took a firm stance against the war, publishing a special issue on the topic.20 The anti-war campaign launched by the Socialist Outlook gained significant support within the Socialist Fellowship, leading to the removal of Fenner Brockway and Ellis Smith from their positions in the National Committee on July 5, 1950.21 At the second national congress of the Socialist Fellowship, a new executive committee was elected, which reflected the Trotskyists’ preference for the structure offered by the Socialist Fellowship. Out of all the former Fellowship executives, only John Lawrence, who was still the editor of the Outlook, remained on the group’s national committee. This change in the national committee resulted in a leftward turn for the Socialist Fellowship. Although Tom Braddock, the new chairman, was not a Trotskyist himself, he worked closely with them. Under Braddock’s leadership, the group published a political manifesto entitled From Labour to Socialism, which was much more radical than the one formulated after the Fellowship’s first conference.22 As a direct consequence of this result of this programme, the Socialist Fellowship was placed on the Labour Party’s proscribed organisations list in April 1951 by the decision of the party’s National Executive Committee.23 According to Mark Jenkins, the fact that the Socialist Fellowship was banned can be seen as evidence of its success.24 It is surprising that the banning of the Socialist Fellowship was successful, considering that it was far from guaranteed at first, especially after the debate over the Korean question, which effectively split

From secrecy to sectarianism, the Healyite tradition in action 149 the group in two. The decision to outlaw the Fellowship was relatively late and targeted only the organisation itself, not the Socialist Outlook. It is likely that this surgical ban was due to the Labour Party NEC’s awareness that if it also banned the paper, the contributing MPs would have defected to Tribune, the other main radical left-wing activist paper within the organisation, consolidating it as a threat to the party’s leadership. Furthermore, Jenkins notes that the proscription of the Socialist Fellowship was agreed upon at the same conference that approved the military budget formulated by the rising star within the party, Hugh Gaitskell. This led, a few days later, to the resignation of Aneurin Bevan, who became the de facto leader of the left-wing opposition within the Labour Party. As such, this left-wing opposition became structured around the Tribune newspaper, for which Trotskyists began to write in 1954. The tactical recommendations of the ISFI to its British Section Starting in 1950, the International Secretariat, led by Pablo and Mandel, developed a new analysis of the global situation that forecasted a collapse of the capitalist bloc and a rise in the power of the Soviet bloc. This new world order was expected to result in the dominance of so-called degenerate workers’ States like the USSR. Consequently, a new strategy was deemed necessary for the various Trotskyist organisations around the world. Given that advanced countries had social democratic parties that were already well-established, it was believed that it was the duty of the Trotskyists to join these parties and work within them.25 After officially joining the Labour Party in late 1947, The Club was ahead of the Secretariat’s recommendations. The similarity between the Secretariat’s 1951 recommendations and the practices of the British Trotskyist movement is not coincidental but rather a result of modelling one on the other. Michel Pablo played a major role in the split of the RCP into an entryist fraction and an independent party, and his tactical recommendations in 1951 were essentially modelled on what he believed was right for the British section in 1947. This makes sense since Britain was seen as an example of a country where the political situation on the left was locked by the presence of a hegemonic social-democratic party. However, this analysis was not original and did not diverge from Trotskyist-Leninist theory, which stated that the social democratic party, being the main party of the working class, was bound to be the vehicle for the radicalisation of the masses leading up to the revolution. The International’s recommendation was primarily notable for its official recognition of the need for long-term work within the Labour Party. The only real differences from Lenin’s recommendations to the British Communist Party in the early 1920s were the duration of entryism and the possibility of claiming leadership of the organisation. The aim was to transform the party, not expose its leadership. However, an observer might assume that the Trotskyist tendency sought to dominate the social-democratic party or transform it into a revolutionary party of the working class. This notion was countered by Pablo in the same document, where he explained that transforming a social-democratic party into a revolutionary party

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was impossible, but transforming it into a centrist party moving to the left should be the Trotskyists’ objective. The Secretariat’s document also mentions the duration of the entry. Although it was not designed as a short-term strategy, it was not intended to be decades-long either. This was due to the belief that the Secretariat held in the imminent proletarian revolution in capitalist countries. While Pablo’s recommended entry strategy was not overtly secretive, it did require a significant degree of submission to the discipline of the party being entered by the entryist group: Every manoeuvre and every policy which runs the risk of prematurely cutting us off from the great mass of these parties must be considered false. The big danger threatening us is not as it was in the case of the small organisations we had entered (Young Socialists) to remain there too long when the situation became rotten; the great danger is to advance too fast, to mistake the movements of a limited vanguard for the radicalisation and revolt of the great mass, which will in practice coincide with the outbreak of a real revolutionary crisis in the country. Our objective is a dialogue with tens and hundreds of thousands of workers whose revolt against rearmament and war is inevitable. This is the objective for which our instruments of work must be fashioned. This is the objective for which our political platform inside the Socialist parties must be adapted.26 The Club had already put this recommendation into practice in 1951 through its collaboration with the Socialist Fellowship and the publication of the Socialist Outlook. This is also why the ban on these two entities was perceived as merely a minor setback by the Healyite organisation. After each hurdle in establishing permanent sub-organisations within the Labour Party, the Healyites’ guiding principle was to dissolve the sub-organisation to prevent further disciplinary action and then set up, or move, to a new one.27 The process that occurred during the dissolution of the Socialist Outlook and the subsequent move to Tribune was precisely the same. This approach garnered much criticism from dissident Trotskyists, who accused The Club of practising liquidationism and succumbing to ideological conformity by maintaining a low profile within the Labour Party. The Healyite paradox: criticising total entry, adopting total entry In 1953, the Fourth International split into two new international organisations: the “legitimist” International Secretariat of the Fourth International (IFSI), led by Pierre Frank, Michel Pablo, and Ernest Mandel, and the International Committee of the Fourth International (ICFI), led by James Cannon and Gerry Healy. The split was not political but rather personal. Cannon suspected that Pablo was organising a faction against his leadership within the American SWP, as he had done in England within the RCP. This suspicion led to a pre-emptive split by the SWP majority, led by Cannon. Healy, on the other hand, had not participated in these debates, and his

From secrecy to sectarianism, the Healyite tradition in action 151 departure from the International Secretariat to the International Committee was more based on questions of personality and friendship with Cannon than on any deep political disagreement with the Pablists. As we have shown, the official Pablist strategy recommended in 1951 by the International Secretariat was modelled on the recommendations made to the British section, and then defended by Healy himself. Healy had modelled his practice on the tactical recommendations made by Pablo to his minority in the RCP as early as 1945. Even as tensions between Pablo and the SWP escalated, Healy continued to defend the Pablist line, and it was only after the divorce between the Americans and the International Healy chose to side with Cannon. The split in the International resulted in the ISFI organising its own faction within The Club, led by John Lawrence and Hilda Lane. Gerry Healy had anticipated this move, as Pablo had used similar methods in the 1940s, as mentioned earlier. Consequently, a purge was carried out at the head of The Club, and on November 20, 1953, the Pablists were expelled. Bob Pitt notes that Healy did not make any significant political contribution to the global debate due to his previous history of defending Pablist positions until early 1953. As a result, The Club Trotskyists split over issues of personal affinity rather than politics.28 The only accusations used as pretexts for the British split were the shifts in the ISFI’s positions towards what Healy deemed Stalinist and revisionist positions towards the USSR, which he had always defended. The achievements of Healyism within the Labour Party were minimal. The split with the Lawrence group led to the loss of half of The Club’s membership. Additionally, it was challenging to engage in a conflict with the splinter group since it had good relations with the Bevanites and the Labour Party youth section. Publicly attacking the group would have risked alienating these two factions, which were, incidentally, the primary targets of The Club.29 However, despite the difficulties with the Lawrence group, Healy was able to establish a working relationship with the Bevanites. One example of this is The Club’s involvement in the series of strikes conducted by the dockers of Birkenhead starting in 1954. Through lobbying efforts, The Club was able to convince the dockers to break away from the Transport and General Workers’ Union (TGWU) and join the more moderate NASDU union, which had the support of the Bevanites. While this move did not provide significant benefits to the dockers in their union struggle (as the NASDU bureaucracy was not more supportive than that of the TGWU), it did win the sympathy of the Bevanite left, who were eager to gain a foothold in the industrial sector. Moreover, it dealt a blow to Bevan’s opponents in the TGWU leadership, who held significant power at the Labour Party’s annual conference, and thus offered the Bevanites strong support against the Labour Party leadership. The Club encouraged the dockers to read, sell, and write for the Tribune, which in turn provided them with unconditional support and coverage. However, the Bevanites’ influence began to decline as the Labour Party leadership enforced strict measures against them, and Bevan’s defeat in the 1955 Labour leadership contest brought the rebellion to an end, ending the Tribune connection’s fortunes.

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Healy’s contributions to Tribune solely comprised consensual, moderate articles that did not promote the ideals of the Fourth International. Furthermore, it appears that as early as 1952, the relationship between the Trotskyists and the Bevanites was unidirectional.30 In the end, the proposition of liquidation advocated by the Trotskyist adversaries of the Healyites, which Healy himself disapproved of, could be regarded as being in effect by an astute observer at that time. The Marxist critique of parliamentarianism was subsumed within the rhetoric of the Healyite entrists. The Labour Review portrayed Aneurin Bevan as the leader of the British masses, and the question of parliamentary engagement was reframed from being an “unnecessary” one to a “possible road”, as can be seen from the following excerpt: In a sense it is somewhat idle to debate whether or not Parliament will be the only road to socialism, because that question will not be decided either by Aneurin Bevan or by Parliament itself. It is destined to be determined in the course of the struggles ahead by the social forces involved. Mr. Bevan says “Parliament interprets its own authority, and from it there is no appeal.” This approaches the matter only on the constitutional level. But within the country and beyond the constitution, there are classes in motion and in conflict. The representatives of these classes appeal from the verdicts of Parliament not only at election times but constantly in many ways.31 In 1956, the Healyite organisation experienced a shift in fortunes with the collapse of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB), which followed revelations made at Khrushchev’s 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU). This event provided the Healyites with a new pool of activists from among the disillusioned members of the Communist Party. Although there was no formal invitation extended by the Healyites, they had advised Communist Party dissidents to remain in the CPGB to challenge its leadership.32 As a result, seemingly more than 100 CPGB members left their party and joined The Club. These well-trained and very active new members gave the Trotskyist organisation a second wind, especially among the youth of the Labour Party, where the CPGB had always exerted significant influence.33 Starting in June 1957, The Club Trotskyists became involved in the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) and played an active role in its early success. They seconded a resolution at the Labour Party Conference that called for Britain’s unilateral nuclear disarmament. Although this resolution was defeated at the conference, it helped to create an official campaign, which allowed various Trotskyist groups to recruit actively on issues that were not directly related to class struggles. This was a first for Trotskyist groups, which had previously focused mainly on material/class issues. In 1957, a challenge to The Club’s entryist strategy arose when a number of its activists, led by Brian Behan, advocated for an independent party strategy. However, Gerry Healy, who had a strong influence on the infiltrated group, disagreed and wished to continue the entryist tactic. The issue was resolved through the

From secrecy to sectarianism, the Healyite tradition in action 153 creation of an internal but distinct Labour Party organisation, known as the Socialist Labour League (SLL), similar in form to the Socialist Fellowship.34 The foundation of the Socialist Labour League: orchestrating one’s expulsion On February 28, 1959, The Club announced the establishment of a new front organisation called the SLL, with its founding conference held three months later in May.35 The SLL was essentially another front organisation for The Club, with Gerry Healy elected as its secretary. The official position was that the SLL would not function as an external organisation beyond the Labour Party. However, in March of the same year, the Labour Party banned it.36 The Newsletter, The Club’s primary propaganda publication, explained that the SLL welcomed members from trade unions, the Labour Party, and even the CPGB, with the goal of achieving unity in political action and discussion to form a new revolutionary leadership to confront the pro-capitalist, reformist leadership of the Labour Party.37 Although the name change of the organisation seemed like a mere facelift, subtle differences emerged in the SLL’s new programmatic lines. For one, the League’s programme now includes Communist Party members as potential allies while condemning only the leadership of the CPGB (with Palme Dutt singled out as a lackey of the trade union leadership). This was a further effort by the Trotskyists to capitalise on the 1956 communist crisis that had prompted some CPGB members to leave their party. Moreover, the issue of total liquidation within the left wing of the Labour Party was no longer a priority, and the Bevanite experiment was now presented as a failure that should not be repeated, as shown in this excerpt from The Newsletter: Left-wing movements inside the Labour Party hitherto have not been led by Marxists, have not based themselves on the working class as the decisive force for change, have seen alliances and manoeuvres as the key factors, and have collapsed as soon as their leaders went over to the Right wing.38 The SLL’s programme and rhetoric brought Marxism and class struggle back to the forefront, a departure from the writings of Club activists in the Socialist Outlook and in Tribune. The question of parliament was briefly addressed, and participation in traditional instances of British democracy was no longer described as a means of implementing socialism but rather as a way of supporting the class struggle, which was to be resolved outside parliamentary instances through direct, revolutionary action. Interestingly, the SLL sought affiliation with the Labour Party as a socialist society, much like the Communist Party’s attempts in the 1920s and again in the late 1930s. It is likely that the creation of the SLL had three main goals. Firstly, to take advantage of the Communist Party’s weakened state following the 1956 crisis. Secondly, during the late 1950s, many prominent Trotskyist thinkers, such as John Lawrence, Ted Grant, and Tony Cliff, left The Club due to the leader’s authoritarianism and

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established their own organisations with modernised analyses and practices. Therefore, creating a new organisation like the SLL allowed the Healyites to maintain their visibility and exert a certain form of hegemony in the British far-left milieu. Finally, founding an openly declared organisation with its own constitution could potentially lead to a confrontation with the Labour leadership and allow the Trotskyist party to leave Labour with sympathetic members in a coup d’éclat. This ideal scenario was meant to help the SLL establish itself as an embryonic mass party of the working class. The corollary of this last point is the abandonment of the long-term entryist approach in favour of the short-term version of entryism “with the prospect of a split”, which was the dominant practice before the war. Thus, the ghosts of British Trotskyism were once again beginning to re-emerge. Recruiting from the Labour Party’s Young Socialists In 1961, the national conference of the Socialist Labour League marked a new orientation as the League shifted its focus towards the Labour Party Young Socialists. The Young Socialists were founded in 1960, in the aftermath of Labour’s election defeat.39 The Keep Left tendency, named after the publication Keep Left, was the SLL vehicle within the Young Socialists. It quickly gained a hegemonic position within the Young Socialists and their leadership, overtaking the rival publication, Young Guard, published by the two other main Trotskyist groups that had infiltrated the organisation, namely Ted Grant and Jimmy Deane’s Revolutionary Socialist League and Tony Cliff’s Socialist Review Group. Keep Left and, incidentally, the SLL’s successes were largely due to their early involvement in the CND, which had attracted and politicised many young people in the nation. Unilateral disarmament was a contentious issue, and while the youth of the Labour Party were generally in favour of disarmament, the Gaitskellite faction continued to fight against it. The 1961 Labour Party conference voted to abandon the demand for unilateral disarmament, which only pushed its youth section further into the arms of the Trotskyists.40 The success of the SLL and Keep Left among young people could also be attributed to two other factors. Firstly, the Young Socialists had not received extensive political training and therefore lacked the theoretical knowledge to comprehend the manoeuvres of Gerry Healy’s group. Healy had lost all his previous supporters either due to his authoritarian behaviour or through the expulsion of dissident members from the party.41 The fundamentally authoritarian nature of Healyite power within the organisation was not recognised as such by the young members. Additionally, a minor contributing factor was Keep Left’s uncompromising tone towards the Labour Party leadership. In contrast, Young Guard was a more conciliatory publication, likely due to the more discreet approach taken by its two umbrella organisations in their operations within the Labour Party (and possibly because of their weakness at the time as well). The 1961 Labour Party annual conference prompted the SLL to rethink its strategy and adopt a new analysis of the political landscape in Britain. They saw the Labour Party as a right-wing shell that was ineffective and hollow. The SLL also

From secrecy to sectarianism, the Healyite tradition in action 155 predicted an impending economic crisis of such severity that it would force a choice between dictatorship and fascism. On the basis of this analysis, they believed it was time to establish independent Marxist parties.42 The SLL’s consideration of forming an independent party (which was already technically and constitutionally separate from the Labour Party, having been expelled in 1959) may also be attributed to the turmoil in the global Trotskyist movement. Towards the end of the 1950s, the International Committee and the International Secretariat began to reconcile and initiated discussions towards reunification. This eventually led to the merger of the two groups in 1963, forming the United Secretariat of the Fourth International (USFI). However, Gerry Healy vehemently opposed the merger, leaving his organisation isolated on the international stage. The fractional model as the only viable system The Healyites had a considerable advantage over their two rival organisations due to their ability to manoeuvre easily within Labour’s youth wing. The hyperactivism of the youth presented two advantages for the SLL. Firstly, it allowed the League to carry out hard-hitting actions and develop a shorter-term analysis of the impending crisis. While normally this perspective is not sustainable as the expected crisis does not materialise, leading activists to leave the party, it functions well within youth organisations, which naturally experience high turnover. This prevented a critical tendency from growing within the league. Moreover, organising the youth section’s activities required a lot of time, occupying most of the League’s time and preventing endless debates, as was typically the case during moments of militant lull. The question that arises is the evaluation of the SLL’s entryist strategy. It appears that the organisation did not manage to attract a significant number of members until 1962, with membership oscillating between 150 and 300 during different periods, reaching a peak in 1956 during the crisis within the CPGB. However, fractional entryism in the Young Socialists enabled the organisation to grow from 300 to 1,000 members in just two years, from 1962 to 1964, making the SLL the largest Trotskyist group in Europe. For instance, at the peak of its militant activity, the SLL was able to mobilise spontaneous demonstrations of between 3,000 and 4,000 young activists, such as during the “Fight the Tories” march in September 1964. According to John Kelly’s figures, it appears that the SLL had almost 4,000 activists at its peak in 1974.43 In the summer of 1964, the SLL asked the Keep Left group to leave the Young Socialists, citing increased pressure and a witch hunt organised by Transport House, the headquarters of the Labour Party. However, Bob Pitt believes that this argument was spurious, as only around 50 Keep Left members had been expelled by early 1965. The real reason for Healy’s order to withdraw from the Young Socialists was the betrayal of the main Trotskyist party in Ceylon, which had joined the coalition government in the country. As the Labour Party returned to power in Britain, Healy wanted to position his party as an opponent and avoid the difficult task of giving critical support to the government, as its sister party in Ceylon was doing. Therefore, he decided to break away entirely from the Labour Party, severing its final

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tie with it: the youth section fraction. At the 1965 conference, the SLL, after years of ideological contortions towards the Labour Party, finally presented itself as an independent base and an embryonic revolutionary party, with the intention of providing a serious and credible opposition to Harold Wilson’s Labour leadership.44 However, the wave of attacks on the Healyites orchestrated by Transport House should not be underestimated. As previously mentioned, proscriptions of organisations had little effect on the Healyites, who had a strong capacity to jump from one political entity to another. Eric Shaw noted that the Labour leadership employed two main tactics to combat the Healyites: ideological regulation (defending the party as a social democratic party and allowing for individual expulsions) and reorganisation of local party components (allowing the party to position itself as a defender of the rights of a majority locally oppressed by a Trotskyist minority). While the tool of local reorganisation was only used six times,45 it had a significant impact, effectively blocking the rise of Trotskyism in the 1950s and early 1960s, according to Shaw.46 The balance sheet of Healyite entryism: was the SLL ever independent from the Labour Party? After the split of the Young Socialists in 1964, the SLL held an ambiguous position regarding its rhetoric. Although it operated as an independent political party, its language of internal opposition to the Labour leadership remained unchanged. This inconsistency is reflected in an excerpt from a pamphlet published by the SLL in 1967, entitled “The Alternative to Wilson”: The League is also different in other respects. We do not want people to join us simply to be normal members. We work to politically educate and prepare them to be active inside their trade unions and other working-class organisations, so that they in turn can educate and organise wider layers coming into politics for the first time. We have a constant series of education classes in all the main cities for this purpose. A working-class leader has to understand the history of the Marxist movement. Only the Socialist Labour League provides such a training.47 Although the passage is quite ambiguous, it is the most concrete statement regarding the role of the league in the entire pamphlet. It presents the League as an educational structure whose role is to educate the working class, with some mention of leadership. However, it does not aim to lead the working class. There are also traces of an infiltrative strategy from the outside, as the League aims to create active militants within other organisations, which is a paraphrase for the Labour Party, as the trade unions had already been named and the other parties of the far left were still part of the Labour Party. Another passage in the same pamphlet is revealing in this regard: If the left MPs now break from Wilson and challenge him in the Parliamentary Labour Party, they will also have our critical support. We are concerned here with taking the working class through all the experiences necessary in order

From secrecy to sectarianism, the Healyite tradition in action 157 to expose the bankruptcy of the right-wing Labour leaders and the fake left MPs, thus preparing the way for the building of revolutionary leadership.48 Despite the constant reference to the struggle within the Labour Party and the concern for supporting any socialist tendency emerging within it, the pamphlet also contains strong revolutionary rhetoric. It makes several references to the inevitability of extra-parliamentary struggle, direct action, and the dead end of peaceful revolution. The SLL effectively played on this ambiguous position between being a pressure/education party and a revolutionary vanguard, between independence and dependence. Unlike the International Socialists, who quickly positioned themselves as independent, or Militant, who executed a constant and unambiguous type of entryism, the League never took a fixed position towards the Labour Party. This rather unique stance of the SLL is probably due to its heritage from the WIL and the RCP, which never had a fixed position towards the Labour Party, oscillating between fractional entryism, adversity, and critical support. The doctrine of the SLL was built upon the Leninist framework of the Labour Party being the mass party of the working class, and it failed to take an ideological position against this obstacle. Additionally, Gerry Healy’s reluctance to align with the Unified Secretariat of the Fourth International contributed to the League’s various shifts in approach. While its stance as an independent structure was a form of resistance to the Pablist tactics of the early 1950s (sui-generis entryism), at the same time, the implementation of entryism was consistent with the theories formulated by Cannon and Pablo in 1947, which enabled Healy to seize the leadership of British Trotskyism as a whole in a power grab. Conclusion The Healyite strategy was likely the result of much improvisation on the part of its principal architect, driven by a desire to maintain leadership within the British Trotskyist movement. The founding of The Club by the RCP minority within the Labour Party was the result of intrigue by the International. After the Fourth International split up, Gerry Healy, despite agreeing with its policy and strategy, broke away to avoid being overthrown by a minority tendency within his own group. The founding of the SLL was partially a reaction to the emergence of rival groups and the desire to maintain a foothold after the witch hunt within the Labour Party. The final iteration of Healyism, the Workers Revolutionary Party founded in 1973, was an attempt to keep the work of the Healyites alive despite a declining number of activists and the rise of groups with more clearly defined strategies, such as the International Socialists and Militant. The Workers Revolutionary Party was ultimately a failed attempt and exploded in 1985 after the revelation of Gerry Healy’s increasingly authoritarian and abusive behaviour, which led members to rebel against him. The catalyst for this rebellion was the revelation of sinister cases of rape and beatings. This led to the split of the Workers Revolutionary Party into two factions, each claiming to be the legitimate successor to the original party. However, both factions eventually collapsed, and neither was able to re-emerge as a significant force on the British Marxist left.

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Despite the Healyite organisations’ organisational zigzags and improvisational turns, a certain consistency in their inconsistency could still be observed. The Labour Party remained an insurmountable obstacle, and all the activities of the various Healyite organisations were defined in relation to it. The Healyites never managed to overcome the contradictions of Trotskyism inherited from the first half of the 20th century, constantly oscillating between independence, critical support, and dependence on the Labour Party for their projects. Therefore, the orthodoxy of the tradition may have been more in its ability to repeat the mistakes of British Trotskyism’s past than in its adherence to the precepts of Trotsky’s doctrine. It must be acknowledged that the Healyite tradition was the only Trotskyist tendency that succeeded in growing its number of activists in the early 1950s. The SLL remained the dominant organisation until the mid-1970s, and its significant growth enabled it to surpass 1,000 militants in the early 1960s, followed by 2,000 at the end of the same decade, and reach its peak of 4,000 activists in the early 1970s during what John Kelly referred to as the “bleak years” of British Trotskyism.49 Notes 1 GRANT Ted, History of British Trotskyism, London: Wellred Publications, 2002, p. 183. 2 BENSAÏD Daniel, Les trotskysmes, Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, Que saisje?, 2002, p. 78. 3 MILLER, “Problems of Growth”, Discussion, for Club Members Only, n°1, May 1954. 4 Ibid. 5 MILLER & LOFTHOUSE, “Education”, Discussion, for Club Members Only, n°1, May 1954. 6 PATERSON Ernie, “The Revolutionary Movement and the Labour Party”, Forum, May 1, 1957, p. 11. 7 CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left in British Politics, Oxford: B. Blackwell, 1987, p. 61. 8 PITT Bob, The Rise and Fall of Gerry Healy, June 2002. www.marxists.org/history/ etol/writers/healy/pitt/index.html (last accessed 14.04.2023). 9 ALEXANDER Robert Jackson, International Trotskyism, 1929–1985: A Documented Analysis of the Movement, Durham & London: Duke University Press, 1991, p. 471. 10 JENKINS Mark, Bevanism: Labour’s High Tide, Nottingham: Spokesman, 1979, p. 95. 11 LAWRENCE John, “Back to Socialism”, Socialist Outlook, vol. 1, n°1, December 1948, p. 1. 12 LAWRENCE John, “Editor’s Note”, Socialist Outlook, vol. 1, n°1, December 1948, p. 2. 13 ROBERTS Ernie, “Industrial Democracy”, Socialist Outlook, vol. 1, n°2, January 1949, p. 4. 14 Socialist Outlook, vol. 1, no. 12, November 1949. 15 “Outlook Has Right to Make Contribution Says Jenny Lee”, Socialist Outlook, n°149, October 8, 1954, p. 2. 16 “Labour and Its Future”, Labour Review, vol. 1, n°1, January/March 1952. 17 Trotskyist parties always tend to publish both a newspaper and a theoretical paper. The newspaper is written in conventional columns, and articles are no longer than a double page spread with a photograph and serve both as party propaganda and fundraising. The theoretical newspaper (often published in magazine format at the end of the 20th century) has long, often signed articles and is used for the continuing education of activists and sympathisers; it does not really serve as a daily propaganda tool. In the case of

From secrecy to sectarianism, the Healyite tradition in action 159

18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32

33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49

The Club, we find this duality in the Socialist Outlook and the Labour Review; for the WIL, this duality was found in the Socialist Appeal/Workers’ International News couple. Contemporary examples of this thesis would be the publications of the Socialist Party, with the newspaper The Socialist and the magazine Socialism Today. JENKINS Mark, Bevanism . . . op. cit., p. 93. Ibid., p. 95. Socialist Outlook: Hands of Korea!, Special issue, July 4, 1950. JENKINS Mark, Bevanism . . . op. cit., p. 99. Socialist Fellowship, From Labour to Socialism: A Program for the Next Election, Pamphlet, 1950, MRC: MSS.126/TG/RES/X/1004A/1–2. SHAW Eric, Managerial Control in the Labour Party 1951–1986, PhD Dissertation, Manchester University, Manchester, 1987, p. 224. JENKINS Mark, Bevanism . . . op. cit., p. 104. PABLO Michel, “The Building of the Revolutionary Party, Report to the Tenth Plenum of the International Executive Committee”, SWP International Information Bulletin, June 1952, pp. 1–23. Ibid. ALEXANDER Robert Jackson, International Trotskyism . . . op. cit., p. 473. PITT Bob, The Rise and Fall of . . . op. cit. Ibid. CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left . . . op. cit., p. 66. HEALY Gerry, “The Road to Socialism in Great Britain”, Labour Review, vol. 1, n°2, May/August 1952. Rather, it seems that members of The Club sought to theoretically arm CPGB supporters against their leadership by providing them with classic arguments that Trotsky was right about the direction of the USSR from 1924 onwards and that Stalinism had been a trap from the start. See HEALY Gerry, Trotskyism Vindicated: An Open Letter to All Members and Supporters of the Communist Party, Pamphlet, 1956. Retrieved from the Healyite archive on Splits and Fusions. https://splitsandfusions.wordpress.com/ (last accessed 14.08.2023). CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left . . . op. cit., p. 69. PITT Bob, The Rise and Fall of . . . op. cit. ALEXANDER Robert Jackson, International Trotskyism . . . op. cit., p. 474. CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left . . . op. cit., p. 71. Editorial Board (Very Probably Healy Himself), “The Socialist Labour League Looks to the Future”, The Newsletter, vol. 3, n°97, April 11, 1959. Ibid. CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left . . . op. cit., p. 76. For more details on the position of the centrist faction of the Labour Party opposed to unilateral disarmament, see chapter “The Alliance and the Bomb” in HASELER Stephen, The Gaitskellites, London: MacMillan, 1969, pp. 178–208. CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left . . . op. cit., p. 76. PITT Bob, The Rise and Fall . . . op. cit. KELLY John, Contemporary Trotskyism: Parties, Sects and Social Movements in Britain, London & New York: Routledge, 2018, p. 40. “The Seventh National Congress of the Socialist Labour League”, The Newsletter, vol. 9, n°399, June 12, 1965. Islington East in 1954, Holborn & St. Pancras in 1958, Norwood & Streatham in 1959 then Paddington South in 1965. SHAW Eric, Discipline and Discord in the Labour Party, Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1988, pp. 129–136. HEALY Gerry, The Alternative to Wilson, Pamphlet, 1967. MRC: MSS.164/1A/6/1. Ibid. KELLY John, Contemporary Trotskyism . . . op. cit., p. 41.

9

The peripheralists The Cliffites and the IMG tradition

The theory of State capitalism and the origins of the Socialist Review Group The Socialist Review Group (SRG), which was born in 1950 as a Trotskyist group, eventually evolved into the International Socialists (IS) in 1962 and the Socialist Workers Party in 1975. These three parties constitute the historical lineage of the Cliffite tradition in Britain and are classified as being part of the Trotskyist “third camp”, according to John Kelly.1 However, the literature on the origins of the SRG often oversimplifies the group’s birth. For instance, Mark Jenkins’ book on Bevanism explains that the main reason for the group’s emergence was the debate over the outbreak of the Korean War between the various Trotskyist factions operating within the Socialist Fellowship.2 Nevertheless, the reality is more nuanced. To understand the group’s inception, one must look back to the internal activity of the RCP after the split of the Healy group, which represented the pro-IS and pro-entry minority. In June 1948, the internal bulletin of the majority faction was dedicated to the theory developed by Tony Cliff, a Trotskyist who had arrived from Israel the previous year.3 The concept presented in The Nature of Stalinist Russia challenged Trotsky’s theory that the USSR was a “degenerate workers’ State”. According to Tony Cliff, the Soviet bureaucracy formed a separate class that exploited the proletariat by absorbing a portion of the value it produced without producing anything itself. This form of exploitation, which concentrated property in the hands of the State and deprived the proletariat of its freedom, is characteristic of State capitalism.4 As a result, Cliff’s theory rejected the systematic defence of the USSR, which went against orthodox Trotskyist traditions. The group around Cliff consisted of only a dozen people when the remnants of the RCP joined the Healyite organisation that operated within the Socialist Fellowship and reluctantly entered the Labour Party.5 Ken Tarbuck, under the name John Walters, explains in an article tracing the birth of the SRG that militant life within The Club was difficult due to the organisation’s liquidationist strategy, which required working with other traditions in the Socialist Outlook magazine. The magazine’s positions were contrary to those of the State-Capitalists,6 who found themselves having to defend “the Stalinist trade Union leaders or fellow-travelling Labour MPs”.7 Additionally, Gerry Healy’s DOI: 10.4324/9781003427551-14

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authoritarian attitude led them “as ex-majority supporters” to be “treated like second class citizens” up until the major purge of the opposition to his leadership.8 Indeed, the State-Capitalists group was one of the first targeted by Healy’s methods, which caused some of its members who disagreed with Healy to join Tony Cliff’s group. Ted Grant mentions that the group around Cliff had around a dozen members before the collapse of the RCP, and Jim Higgins says that the SRG had just over 30 members at its inception.9 Cross-checking this information, it seems legitimate to assume that, while escaping the Healyite organisation, the group took with it around 20 additional members. Indeed, the State-Capitalists took advantage of the Healyite purges to trigger their own expulsion from the group and use it for political gain. Jim Higgins explains that the first expulsion occurred after Percy Downey, a former RCP member, proposed a motion at a Birmingham trade union meeting that contributed to a debate on North Korea and advocated the State-Capitalist position, which was unacceptable to the Healyites.10 Ted Grant adds to Higgins’ version by stating that Tony Cliff was also expelled after being asked to explain the positions held by his supporters. Cliff’s expulsion was decided by a vote of the sections, and it appears that a second purge was extended against the activists who opposed Cliff’s expulsion.11 Higgins describes this event as a trap set by the State-Capitalists and draws a positive conclusion from the experience. The Healyite purges gave the State-Capitalists a reason to form an independent group with some initial visibility.12 The SRG was founded between September 30 and October 1, 1950, in Camden, with a membership of 33 individuals, mainly former RCP activists and young supporters. The group’s name was inspired by the British State-Capitalists’ publication, the Socialist Review, which was first published in November of the same year. The group’s centre was based in Birmingham, while its youth section’s secretariat was in London. The group’s tactics were primarily entryist, and, like The Club, their primary vehicle within the Labour Party was initially the Socialist Fellowship.13 Throughout the 1950s, the SRG continued to refine its theory of State capitalism, primarily through various writings and debates in its journal. The main proponents of this theory were Tony Cliff and Michael Kidron, who introduced the theory of the “permanent arms economy” to explain the post-war economic boom, which orthodox Trotskyists found challenging to explain. The permanent arms economy theory posits that the added value produced by labour is reinvested in the military economy after the war. Since the military economy becomes obsolete quickly, it requires regular reinvestment. This perpetual transfer of capital prevents the accumulation of too much capital in the speculative realm, thereby avoiding financial bubbles’ bursting and preventing a capitalist crisis of overproduction.14 The theory of the permanent arms economy had two corollaries. Firstly, sustained post-war growth was not seen as the result of demand-increasing policies introduced by the Labour Party in 1945, following a Keynesian logic. Instead, it was viewed as the result of increased activity in the military industry. Secondly, this conception of the economy made the SRG even more heterodox in relation to the traditional Trotskyist theory of permanent revolution, which itself was derived from Lenin’s theory of imperialism, formulated in Imperialism, the Highest Stage of

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Capitalism.15 In short, with the increasing integration of the world economy, decolonisation was more likely to benefit national bourgeoisies than the wars of national liberation that were supposed to provide power to the proletariat.16 According to this theory, the development of these new bourgeoisies led to the exploitation of their own proletariats, thereby transforming the national problem into a class problem. Consequently, the proletariat had to be transformed into a revolutionary class. This theory held that the world revolution must originate from the developed nations rather than the former colonies, as the proletariat in the former is more advanced and therefore better able to emancipate itself. The people’s democracies, such as North Korea and China, are not regarded as workers’ States as the emancipation of the proletariat has not been achieved there. The revolutions in these countries were aimed at creating new bureaucratic elites, which further separated the workers from effective ownership of their means of production.17 Thus, with its critical ideology towards the USSR and its questioning of fundamental points of Trotskyist theory that were accepted prior to the 1950s and continued by other traditions, the Socialist Review Group can be seen as a Trotskyist group with a heterodox theory. Entryism during the early days of the Socialist Review Group The group’s primary activity was propaganda through its publication, the Socialist Review. However, due to its small number of members, it was necessary for the group to pursue entryism within the Labour Party to carry out this propaganda effectively. Jim Higgins’ book mentions the group’s collaboration with both the Socialist Outlook (and, incidentally, the Socialist Fellowship) but it seems that the group had a closer collaboration with Tribune.18 This may be due to Socialist Outlook being technically controlled by the Healyites, who were hostile to the Socialist Review Group. Furthermore, Tribune was entirely opposed to the foreign policy of the USSR at that time.19 At the founding of the Socialist Review Group, 33 members were present, with 19 members being part of the Labour youth organisation (then known as the Labour League of Youth). This presence provided them with a good recruiting ground, however. The Club was more dominant in this field, partly due to its head start and perhaps also due to its more “affordable” theory. The members of the Socialist Review Group did not publish their own journal, Rebel, until the late 1950s. Rebel was a small publication in A5 format consisting of only four pages per issue, technically closer to a pamphlet than a real paper. Like the early days of Socialist Review, the publication was highly theoretical. However, the State-Capitalists soon carried out a reflexive analysis of their journal content and found it too focused on international news. This led to editorials focusing on British news and fewer articles that were directly anti-Stalinist. The SRG maintained a theoretical dimension in the review to work with the youth section of the Labour Party, providing it with advanced political education. Additionally, the group was fairly open to outsiders, inviting anyone who agreed with their theory to join and providing them with documentation. As such, there was no probationary period for recruitment, as was the case with the Healyites.20

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The Socialist Review Group’s entryist strategy shared some similarities with that of the Healyites, involving a discreet infiltration into the Labour Party. However, there were also some notable differences. Firstly, the group was identifiable by a specific name, and their objective for entry was not the same as that of the Healyites. Unlike them, the Socialist Review Group aimed for a conservative entry for the survival of their group. This might be due to the fact that the group’s intelligentsia was largely composed of former members of the Revolutionary Communist Party (RCP), who had already had to reluctantly disband their organisation to join the Healyites within the Labour Party before. Jim Higgins explains that the Socialist Review Group’s entryist experiment was considered unwanted because adjustment to the Labour milieu did not offer great potential or freedom of expression. Recruitment was a challenge, given the group’s adaptive strategy, and was carried out on an individual and ad hoc basis.21 The Socialist Review Group’s theory had a unique feature in the Trotskyist landscape, which was its analysis of the British economic situation. Unlike the Healyite group The Club, the State-Capitalists did not anticipate an imminent collapse of the capitalist economy, thanks to the analysis provided by their theory of the permanent arms economy. Thus, the main objective of the group’s entryism was not to change the nature of the Labour Party but to obtain a temporary platform for maintaining contact with the working-class milieu and adopting a strategy of gradually increasing propaganda as the group grew in size and influence. The Socialist Review Group’s entryist activity developed more intensely around Birmingham, where its central secretariat was located. In the lead-up to the local elections, the group launched a campaign to openly criticise Labour’s economic and social policies, aiming to challenge the local leadership. This was done through a document titled Twenty Questions, which was around 20 pages long and intended for local Labour members.22 While about 20 people contributed to the document, only two, Peter Morgan and David Mumford, signed it. As a result, the two of them were expelled from the local Labour branch at the request of Denis Howell, a Labour councillor at the time. The expulsion was carried out by a vote of 108 to 96. However, the two activists were eventually allowed back into the Labour Party two years later.23 In the early 1950s, the Socialist Review Group was less inclined than The Club to dissolve into the Labour Party, despite having fewer activists. The group’s open and identifiable publication wasn’t moderate towards the Labour Party, and no attempt was made to form an alliance with some of the party MPs. The group, composed mainly of young intellectuals, had a more liberal view of revolutionary theory and practice than other rival Trotskyist organisations. The idea of the revolutionary vanguardism of the working-class party was not put forward theoretically. Consequently, the rigid principles of Leninism were effectively set aside in the early years of the group.24 The record of the Socialist Review Group’s early years of entryism was not successful, as their recruitment strategy of prioritising former RCP members and Socialist Fellowship members failed. However, it is important to put this into historical perspective.25 Indeed, the period between 1950 and 1956 was a difficult

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one for British Trotskyism, which can be attributed to three main factors. Firstly, the number of trained militants who remained active after the Healyite purges was very small. Out of the 400–500 members of the RCP, only around 100 were still active. Furthermore, this small number of active Trotskyists was divided between three groups that were not inclined to cooperate: The Club, the SRG, and what later became Ted Grant’s Socialist Rally Group. This fragmentation made it almost impossible to carry out important actions within the Labour Party. The second reason was the dominance of the Healyites within the Labour Party. The few opportunities available to Trotskyists had already been invested in by the Healyites, who had a highly adaptive, almost liquidationist strategy that did not provide optimal conditions for propaganda by other groups. Moreover, The Club’s activity within the Socialist Fellowship had led to more intense control by Transport House, the headquarters of the Labour Party. This forced the Trotskyists to take limited action to avoid possible disciplinary sanctions that could have ended the group’s militant activity.26 The third factor was actually a simple consequence of the first, but it had the characteristic of setting in motion a vicious circle. The slowdown in activity within an organisation, especially in militant parties, leads to the departure of militants. The British Trotskyists were caught in this cycle until the international crisis in the communist movement due to the revelations of Khrushchev in 1956, which provided an opportunity for their radical critique of Stalinism to gain a new lease of life. This was particularly true for the SRG, which refused to defend the USSR. The period between 1951 and 1956 was thus a difficult one for the Socialist Review Group in the labour milieu. The decrease in activity resulted in the departure of many of its figureheads, including Ken Tarbuck and Duncan Hallas.27 The crisis in the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB) only provided an opportunity for The Club to recruit new members. However, as Jim Higgins explains, it was the concomitant legitimisation of non-Stalinist Marxism that marked a turning point in the SRG’s history. In December 1956, the Socialist Review changed its format to a more affordable and reader-friendly magazine style, with the subtitle “Neither Washington nor Moscow, but International Socialism”.28 Beyond the communist crisis, 1956 was a year of important changes in politics, including the Suez Canal crisis and the Hungarian Revolution. These events led to the emergence of spontaneous social movements focused on specific issues outside the control of political parties.29 The SRG decided to orient itself towards these new social movements, which became known as the New Left, and initiate a new strategy. From the Socialist Review Group to the International Socialists The Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) marked a significant turning point in the history of British Trotskyism. The shift of social protest from class-based issues to specific issues championed by the emerging New Left led the SRG to take a radically different direction than that of the sectarian and orthodox Healyites and embrace this new political field. This openness was reflected in the founding of the journal International Socialism in 1960, which had originally been started as

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a quarterly for Marxist propaganda in 1958 but was abandoned shortly after. The decision to revive the publication was driven by the desire to include different currents of thought and reflected the State-Capitalists’ ambition to gain a foothold in the Labour Party: A word on origins. International Socialism is not a new name. A first, duplicated, version appeared in the autumn of 1958; nos. 2 & 3 appeared in print as a political biography of Rosa Luxemburg (by Tony Cliff) in January 1960. They were successful in every way, but they were the responsibility and expression of one stream of socialist thought, that centred on Socialist Review. This is no longer true: International Socialism is to be completely independent of Socialist Review financially, administratively, and in personnel. The success of this journal will depend on the extent to which it is nourished by the currents of socialist thought within the labour movement.30 There are several indicators of intent that can be observed in this context. Firstly, there is a sort of acknowledgement of the previous version of International Socialism, which was perceived as ideologically “pure”. Next, the matter of the editorial team’s independence from the Socialist Review is raised as a way to broaden its readership and establish credibility. This passage may be interpreted as a jab at the Socialist Labour League (SLL). International Socialism presented itself as an open journal that was free from the influence of any particular Trotskyist group and open to debate, in contrast to the SLL, which, despite its seemingly open nature within the Socialist Outlook, was eventually revealed to be a group under the control of a dogmatic and sectarian Trotskyist leadership. Finally, the third aspect is that of facilitating discussion and debate, as the journal was created primarily as a platform for the exchange of ideas. It would be worthwhile to evaluate the true sincerity of this approach. According to John Callaghan, the Socialist Review Group was genuinely free of the dogmatism typically associated with traditional Trotskyism. This could be attributed to two key factors. Firstly, one of Cliff’s primary sources of inspiration was Rosa Luxemburg,31 from whom he drew a more democratic approach to revolutionary party theory than that of Lenin. Consequently, the SRG’s structure was more federalist than centralist, with a central committee that was purely functional rather than political. Here is how Higgins describes it: In these days of harsh “Leninist” orthodoxy, it is hard to recall the atmosphere at the cusp of the Socialist Review Group and the International Socialism Group. The regime was relaxed, and activity was directed by persuasion and moral pressure rather than the threat of sanctions. The leading committee was, for most of the time, called the Working Committee because it dealt with correspondence, finance, future activity, branch reports and development plans – all the boring housekeeping that has to be done if the Group was to survive. Politics came up and were developed at meetings of editorial boards and at aggregates.32

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Ian Birchall, a in-house historian of the SRG, went so far as to characterise the organisational form of the group as having a “libertarian attitude” with a cohesion based more on comradeship than on the structural discipline of the organisation.33 Therefore, the new version of International Socialism can be seen as an entryist approach aimed at maintaining strong contact with the labour movement, embodied by the Labour Party, rather than an attempt to exert leadership over it. This concern was evident in the political theory of the SRG, which called for the invitation of other socialists, in the broadest sense, to engage in dialogue.34 One of the most interesting articles in this regard was a debate on the question of reformism, which invited advocates of reformism, such as the academic Henry Collins, to present their views.35 This strategy enabled the group to expand its readership and disseminate its ideas in a non-sectarian way through dialogue with the wider Labour activist base without dissimulating their own views, as was the case for The Club within the Socialist Outlook. Many articles emphasised the idea that CND was a symptom of the working-class identity of the Labour Party rank and file when they successfully opposed its leadership at the Scarborough conference.36 In this regard, it is interesting to note that the SRG’s youth magazine for Labour, Rebel, was subtitled “For Socialist Youth Against the Bomb”, linking the issue of anti-nuclearism to socialism.37 The minutes of meetings held in the South London branch of the SRG during 1960–1961 reveal, as with the other groups, a particular focus on Labour youth. These minutes contain reports from members of the group on their activities in local Labour Party branches and express difficulties in collaborating with older, more experienced Labour members. For instance, on November 6, 1960, “Browne”, an SRG member, reported that the Norwood Labour branch was “pretty dead and apathetic on politics” due to a restructuring sponsored by Transport House. He suggested that the youth section was “more progressive” and therefore a better target.38 To gain a better understanding of how central Labour youth was to the SRG’s strategy, here is an extended excerpt from the minutes of a London branch meeting. At this meeting, each member was asked to give an individual report on their observations or actions. This excerpt is taken from the South London Branch meeting on January 8, 1961: Vester: Had been elected a Polling District Secretary for the Party. Eltham Young Socialists. . . . Left should chose a candidate for the imminent election of a delegate to YS Conference. It was also suggested that a new YS Secretary was needed. Atkinson: CND was wanting to group YCND branches into groups of 5 and give them one delegate per group at CND Conference. If this was an antiYCL move it might misfire.39 This excerpt highlights the SRG’s strong focus on labour youth and Youth in general. Youth tend to be more receptive to radical ideologies and are more likely to seek out an organisation that can provide political education or, as in this case, an organisation that is actively engaged in the political struggles that are important to them. The SRG’s peripheralist strategy, with its strong involvement in campaigns such as the CND or the Vietnam Solidarity Campaign (VSC), positioned them as a

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key player for Labour youth, who were preoccupied with post-materialist themes and seeking information and structures that met their needs. Moreover, the balance of power within the Labour youth structure appears to have been particularly favourable to socialist groups during the organisation’s congress in April 1961, as evidenced by the votes in favour of Gaitskell’s resignation, NATO departure, unilateral nuclear disarmament, and nationalisation of the means of production under workers’ control, with an average ratio of three votes to two.40 It is, however, crucial not to take the intellectual shortcut of assuming that Labour’s youth were solely manipulated by the far-left organisations operating within the party. In fact, the logic worked the other way around: since the youth sections of the Labour Party were more radical, the far-left groups could operate within them without having to conceal their intentions too much. Fighting Keep Left within the Young Socialists through Young Guard During the period of 1960–1964, an interesting development occurred in the history of British Trotskyism. Despite having differing revolutionary theories, two groups engaged in an editorial collaboration. While the Socialist Review Group was already publishing its journal, Rebel, within the Young Socialists, the dominant presence of the SLL (through its publication, Keep Left) prompted the State-Capitalists to publish a journal in conjunction with the official section of the secretariat of the Fourth International, the 1957-founded Revolutionary Socialist League, headed by Ted Grant and Jimmy Deane. The publications of the two organisations were merged under the name Young Guard, and the first issue appeared in September 1961. The collaboration was difficult and precarious, as described by Jim Higgins.41 The two groups had diametrically opposed traditions, and meetings were tense.42 Collaboration could only be achieved at the lowest common denominators, namely containing Keep Left’s progress and keeping their own organisations alive. Tensions within the journal’s meetings increased with the publication of the third issue, including accusations from the Rally tendency (the former RSL publication) that the editorial board was promoting the StateCapitalist positions too much.43 Young Guard marketed itself as “a paper with a programme for youth”, and featured a programme in an insert on the last page and entitled “Our Aims”.44 This nine-point programme advocated for unilateral disarmament, withdrawal from NATO, the return of a Labour government that would control the country’s major industries and banks, withdrawal from the colonies, full voting rights for 18-yearolds, free higher education, cultural and recreational activities, and several demands for apprenticeship rights. Despite its relatively small influence, the Labour Party leadership took notice of the Young Guard and considered banning it. After an investigation, the magazine was conditionally banned due to its disruptive content.45 The editorial board had to accept four conditions imposed by the National Executive Committee of the Labour Party on September 22–23, 1962. These conditions included softening the tone of the publication, clarifying that the paper was open to young members of

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Labour of all views, and ceasing the practice of having official spokespeople at meetings.46 The magazine accepted these conditions by a vote of 21 to seven and was allowed to continue publication. According to Eric Shaw, the Labour leadership’s decision not to ban Young Guard may have been motivated by their stronger fear of Keep Left. By keeping Young Guard alive, they were indirectly countering the influence of the SLL within the Labour youth.47 However, it is still worth noticing that, despite their enmity, Young Guard published an article in its first issue criticising the Labour leadership for its censorship of Keep Left.48 Young Guard represented the sole effort at organised collaboration between the State-Capitalists and Grant’s RSL. In terms of quantity, the magazine was relatively successful as it provided the SRG with a solid foundation within the Labour youth movement, serving as a permanent audience and prime recruitment centre. For instance, Tony Cliff himself conducted seminars on socialist theory for the YS, with the final one being a course on the responsibilities of Marxist revolutionaries within the Labour Party. This course emphasised the need for Marxists to combat “right-wing tendencies” to safeguard the Labour Party’s identity as a party of the working class while simultaneously uniting with the centrist (in the Marxist sense) currents in the party to maintain an ideology that was as far as possible from mere reformism.49 Thanks to its involvement in the Young Socialists, the Socialist Review Group succeeded in recruiting nearly 200 members by 1962. Young Guard’s main political rival within the Young Socialists was neither the right nor the pro-Tribune group, but rather the Trotskyist group Keep Left. As mentioned earlier, Keep Left’s dominance made it difficult for other groups to coexist alongside it as a counter-model, which led to the alliance between the SRG and RSL. The situation within the Young Socialists from 1960 onwards resembled that of the Labour League of Youth in the 1930s, with the Advance group in a dominant position and an effective vehicle for the CPGB on the one hand and the Militant Group, an effective vehicle for the Bolshevik-Leninist Group, on the other. Once again, the youth section of the Labour Party had become a recruiting battleground for external political forces. It is worth noting, however, that most of the entryist groups in the second half of the 20th century did not see themselves as external forces but rather as legitimate members of the Labour Party. This was crucial in defending against disciplinary measures introduced by the Labour Party against Marxist groups, first in the 1960s and later in the 1980s. The tendency to view themselves as legitimate members of the party raises questions about the limits of the definition of entryism. Can entryism be considered to occur when a group is established within the Labour Party and only linked to an independent group by ideological heritage? This question is relevant to the case of the Socialist Review Group, as the group has never existed outside the Labour Party, and one could therefore argue that their Entryism is rather a form of “Exit-ism”. Even if the group’s independent history has to be traced back to the RCP, even at the furthest back as 1948–1949, historians continue to refer to the organisation as entryist. Young Guard’s brief period of success ended in 1963. Despite the Labour Party leadership’s proscription of Keep Left in June 1962, the Healyite faction still managed to gain a majority on the national board of the Young Socialists, resulting

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in the ousting of Young Guard supporters. As a result, Young Guard lost a strategic advantage. Furthermore, the magazine broke down when its RSL wing departed in September 1963 to establish what later became the Militant newspaper,50 which is now considered the most successful example of an entryist paper in the British political landscape. Assessing the impact of the Young Guard experience is not an easy task, but one can certainly describe it as a significant and transformative period for the IS. It provided a platform for recruiting many of the future cadres of the Socialist Workers Party. The recruitment process usually involved initial contact through the CND or other social movements, followed by recruitment into the Young Socialists, and then participation in Young Guard activities. Once the new activist became involved in Young Guard’s operations, they were brought closer to the core group, the IS, and eventually recruited as a full-fledged member.51 Through this channel, the group was able to reach nearly 400 members by 1965. Although the Young Guard experiment did not transform the IS into a mass party, it did establish them as a robust group capable of distinguishing themselves from the many unsustainable Marxist sects in the British far-left political landscape. In summary, the modus operandi of the SRG and then the IS can be defined through the concept of a peripheral recruitment strategy, modelled in the following illustration in Figure 9.1:

Figure 9.1 A representation of the peripheral recruitment strategy.

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The proliferation of front organisations or publications, oriented towards very specific topics, aimed to enable these groups not to directly educate in Marxist theory but rather to lead recruits to Marxist theory through information and questioning on these subjects. The Trotskyists utilised membership in the Labour Party as a sign of moderation in their recruitment strategy, which focused on drawing in individuals from the periphery and bringing them towards the centre. This type of entryism employed the Labour Party as a buffer zone, allowing for the recruitment of workers, employees, and young people who were protesting over specific issues (such as nuclear disarmament or problems related to their profession) into a moderate political organisation that was oriented towards class-related issues. Once they had been integrated and accepted into this organisation, the next step was to radicalise these new members by introducing them to revolutionary ideology. The IS departure from the Labour Party The Healyite actions in 1964 resulted in the Young Socialists splitting into two factions, leaving the remaining loyalist section without much support and unable to function effectively from the perspective of the other entryist factions.52 In his book, Jim Higgins compares the Labour Party to a survival system or hospice for Marxist groups, in which it was impossible to grow, despite the possibility of recruiting cadres for the movement.53 In the early 1960s, the IS underwent a practical reorientation. The group began to advocate for a shift towards trade union activism, starting with the Labour Party, which allowed them to maintain contact with the working class. The formation of the Industrial Worker magazine in 1961 was a clear indication of this desire. When a Labour government was elected in 1964, the magazine was renamed Labour Worker, possibly to reinforce its ability to attract workers disillusioned with a new reformist government through a title that addresses more explicitly members of the Labour Party.54 The decision to depart from the Labour Party was a gradual process that started taking official shape in July 1965, with the adoption of a resolution acknowledging the Labour Party solely as a vector and explicitly disavowing its potential as an instrument of social change in itself.55 In November 1965, an article penned by Jim Higgins in the Labour Worker provided a more detailed explanation of the shift in strategy: The plain truth is, that only a small minority of Labour’s millions are in any way politically active, and a large percentage of the active are masochistically obsessed with the tote tickets and marking up electoral registers. Obviously, Marxists should take those positions which give direct access to the workers’ organisations. But in the wards and GMCs the practice of buying the right to discuss politics by overfulfilling the canvassing norms, should cease or be reduced to the minimum. For the left the Labour Party is a platform for political discussion and the winning over of individuals to a revolutionary programme.56

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The passage is interesting for the study of entryism as a tactic because it marks a change in the approach to the “host” form of the Labour Party. The Socialist Review Group, which preceded the IS, was born within the Labour Party, which provided a framework for its existence and prevented it from being forgotten. This is an example of survival and propaganda entryism. However, the new analysis, as formulated by Jim Higgins, shows a form of opportunity entryism. The Labour Party is now seen as just a recruitment platform. Another point of interest is the abandonment of the tactic of cooperation with Labour. Entryist groups usually participated in party activities to show themselves as among the party’s best activists, which served as a mechanism of legitimisation among non-Marxist activists since the early days of CPGB infiltration in the 1920s. Moreover, this tactic also had the effect of protecting the infiltrators from possible witch hunts, as it became very difficult for Transport House to justify the expulsion of a very active and loyal activist. The IS’ change of analysis of the Labour Party represents a break with the Trotskyist tradition, which had always advocated for the return of the Labour Party to power and provided critical support for it. This break had already been partially made by the Socialist Labour League with its exclusion in 1959, but for the latter, the objective of the Labour Party as a political tool for change had never been totally abandoned up until its transformation into the WRP. It is also worth mentioning the changes that occurred in the group’s ability to attract new activists. According to Ian Birchall, the path of a new recruit involved first being contacted at CND demonstrations, followed by recruitment into the Young Socialists through Labour as a training ground, and then entry into the IS. He concludes that “the process was not, in strict terms, a radicalisation inside the Labour Party. Those who came to IS at this time were not longstanding Labour Party members, but young people who had come in around the CND mobilisation”.57 This passage suggests that the party stage may have been dispensable after all. However, it would be inaccurate to interpret the early 1960s as a simple, deliberate attempt to distance themselves from the Labour Party. While it’s true that CND had become their preferred recruiting ground, in 1962, Tony Cliff wrote: Marxists should not set themselves up as a party or embryo of a party of their own. They should remember that the working class looks to the Labour Party as the political organisation of the class (and no doubt when a new wave of political activity spreads among the working-class millions of new voters will flock to its banner and hundreds of thousands will join it actively).58 Thus, despite significant progress in terms of recruitment from 1965 to 1968, the IS remained a predominantly student and middle-class organisation. John Callaghan described the group as “more visible at the London School of Economics than in any part of British industry”.59 The peak of global radical activism in the Western liberal democracies in 1968 saw the group double its membership to almost 1,000. In the United Kingdom, one of the main avatars of this youth radicalisation drive was the VSC, which began in 1966. This campaign and the large demonstrations associated with it were highly beneficial to Trotskyist groups because the CPGB

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was absent from it at the time of its emergence and therefore left a significant recruitment ground open for other revolutionary organisations in the early years of the campaign. The lack of a revolutionary outcome to the events of May 1968 in France, combined with the rapid growth of Cliffite organisations in the student milieu, caused the International Socialists to make an organisational U-turn and, now estranged from the Labour Party, to seek a way to reconnect with the nation’s working masses. The 1968 “Leninist turn” of the IS As we previously noted, despite the IS’ efforts to increasingly focus on workers from 1965 onwards, the group remained largely composed of students. However, 1968 was a significant turning point in the history of the IS. The CPGB’s struggle to position itself within the radical left by presenting itself as a reformist but radical alternative to the Labour Party created a political opening for less reformist organisations. The upheaval within the Healyite faction and the entryist strategy of Militant paved the way for the IS to give more concrete shape to their organisation after their departure from the Labour Party. Tony Cliff’s proposals aimed at bringing the IS closer to working-class circles by adopting a more effective approach that challenged the group’s relatively decentralised and libertarian attitude. One of the main changes proposed was to abandon the group’s federalist functioning and adopt a centralist-democratic approach. Prior to 1968, the organisation operated under a system where a central committee made up of delegates sent by local sections defined the general policy of the group. Cliff’s proposal suggested the installation of a central committee elected by a conference based on a political programme.60 The group’s newspaper, the Labour Worker, was renamed Socialist Worker, anticipating the future name of the party. This “Leninist turn”, as John Callaghan named it, brought not only a change in practice within the IS but also an important theoretical change. By re-adopting Leninist practices, the group reformulated its approach to the working class. Until then, the State-Capitalist group had rejected the substitution of the party for the class, that is, the interpretation of the party as a revolutionary vanguard. Indeed, in the literature of the IS, the group was never described as a party or even as an embryo of a party. This precaution on the part of the IS is rooted in the Luxemburgist foundations of Tony Cliff’s ideology. In short, in Luxemburgist theory, the revolutionary party is not a vanguard party. The masses are supposed to be “spontaneous”, and the role of the party is to learn from them, not to infuse them with a revolutionary theory and become their organisational structure, as this would have contours defined by the masses themselves. According to Luxemburg, centralism appears as a consequence and not as a prerequisite: Centralism in the socialist sense is not an absolute thing applicable to any phase whatsoever of the labour movement. It is a tendency, which becomes real in proportion to the development and political training acquired by the working masses in the course of their struggle.

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It is a mistake to believe that it is possible to substitute “provisionally” the absolute power of a Central Committee (acting somehow by “tacit delegation”) for the yet unrealisable rule of the majority of conscious workers in the party, and in this way replace the open control of the working masses over the party organs with the reverse control by the Central Committee over the revolutionary proletariat.61 Leninist party theory is based on the idea of the party as a revolutionary vanguard and emphasises a high degree of centralism. In the past, Tony Cliff used to be sceptical of this idea and saw it as specific to the context of Russia during the 1917 revolution: When the Communist International was discussing its statutes, Lenin argued against those that were being proposed because, he said, they were “too Russian” and overemphasised centralisation, even though these statutes did provide for freedom of criticism within the parties and for the control of the party leadership from below. Overcentralisation, Lenin argued, did not suit the conditions of Western Europe. (It is true that in Lenin’s own party at the time the organisation was highly centralised, even semi-military, but this form was forced upon it by the dire conditions of the civil war.) Lenin’s views on organisation, his bending of the stick too far over to centralism, must be considered against the background of conditions in Russia.62 Yet, starting in 1968, the IS adopted the theory and practices of the Leninist party, based on the idea of the party as the revolutionary vanguard and a high degree of centralism. They did this by centralising their executive committee and believing that the party had a vocation to create the revolutionary movement, as it was its very expression. Thus, the Leninist revolutionary party creates the class by making its consciousness emerge. According to Lenin, real class consciousness can only come from outside, and the party’s role is to help the working class access it. This is not seen as a paternalist attitude because the party itself is the expression of the working class. The difference between the party and the working class is that the militants embody the working class, informed by the analytical spectrum of historical materialism. The party does not educate the workers but infuses the movement with the tools and analyses necessary to understand the class struggle, capitalism, and socialism. It must, therefore, have a strong and symbolic unity in action while allowing for internal debate in the form of factions or tendencies (as it happened within the IS). It must also be entirely turned towards the workers, of whom it is the vanguard. The concretisation of the party form and the total emancipation of the Labour Party In line with their turn towards Leninism, the IS accelerated their industrial activity between 1968 and 1973. Rank and File sections were established in various

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sectors of the economy, such as the teachers’ unions, the car industry, local government, mines, and ports. These sections had their own publications to address their militants and were subject to the authority of the organisation’s central committee. Some of the publications are listed in Table 9.1. According to the numbers provided by John Callaghan, the party’s increased industrial activity led to a slow start with a small loss of members between 1968 and 1970, resulting in a membership decrease of 20% (a loss of 200 members compared to a membership of 1,000 in 1968). However, there was a significant increase in membership between 1971 and 1974, with a gain of 3,100 members, representing an increase of 387%. The new Leninist strategy also succeeded in changing the party’s composition: in 1972, 26% of the party consisted of workers, while 31% were employees, making a total of 57% non-retired workers.63 The organisation made efforts to engage workers in writing articles for the Socialist Worker, particularly in reporting on strikes or local struggles, which some former Socialist Review members opposed as they preferred to maintain a more theoretical and political journal. In fact, as early as 1968, the IS had begun its transformation into a genuinely partisan form, which culminated in the formation of the Socialist Workers Party in Table 9.1 A sample of Rank-and-File papers produced by the International Socialists Name of publication

Audience

Date

Cab News Labour Teacher Building Worker NALGO action Council Worker Rank and File Teacher Underground Blackbored Advance – Electricity Workers Printworker Carworker Dockworker Redder Tape The Collier Hospital Worker Journalists Charter College Rank and File Post Office Worker Public Worker NAFTHE Action The Platform Red Collar Women in the NUT Rank and File Fireman The Miner/Rank and File Miner Red Clerk

Cab drivers Education workers Public works workers City council workers City council workers Education workers Rail workers Education workers Energy sector workers Publishing industry workers Car industry workers Dockers Civil servants – South London Miners Health Industry workers Journalists Higher education workers Postal sector workers City servants – Lambeth Education/Higher education workers Bus drivers Executives/engineers Women in education Firemen Miners Civil servants – South London

c. 1958 1963 c. 1966 1969 c. 1969 c. 1969 c. 1970 c. 1970 c. 1971 1971 1971 1972 Before 1973 c. 1973 1973 1972 c. 1977 c. 1972 c. 1972 c. 1976 1976 1978 c. 1979 1979 1984–1985 1986

Source: author.

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1975. This transformation achieved what had been impossible for all other British far-left organisations until the end of the 20th century: the creation of a radical leftwing partisan structure that was permanent and unambiguous in its independence from the Labour Party. The party began fielding candidates under its own banner as early as the 1978 elections and did not provide any support, even critically, to the Labour Party. Labour was viewed merely as an electoral machine with such a low level of political activity that no action, whether purely propagandist or entryist, was deemed necessary. The birth of the IMG tradition: a new section for the Fourth International in Britain To understand the ideology and practice of entryism of the International Marxist Group (IMG), it is necessary to examine its specific origins as one of the four main Trotskyist entryist traditions in the United Kingdom. The IMG can trace its roots back to the Committee for the Regroupment of the British Section of the Fourth International, a group primarily based in Nottingham that formed in 1955. The group was fiercely loyal to the Pablo/Mandel tendency of the Fourth International, but it was in a severe minority in Britain and mostly composed of foreigners. This was because Gerry Healy, the dominant British Trotskyist leader in the 1950s, had violently broken with the International Secretariat of the Fourth International (ISFI) to take over the leadership of the International Committee for the Fourth International, which emerged from the 1953 split between the American SWP, the French Lambertists, and the International Secretariat. Healy had managed to eradicate support for the Secretariat within The Club through numerous purges and conspiracies. Additionally, the British Trotskyists had developed a kind of insularity towards the conflicts within the International Secretariat. This insularity was partly due to the Workers’ International League and the RCP’s hegemony in the 1940s, which had been built on an antagonistic relationship with the International Secretariat. Consequently, few British Trotskyists had taken sides in the theoretical conflicts within the International, content to follow the lead of the primary organisation. The isolation of the legitimist forces from the International Secretariat caused the committee for the regroupment of the British section to seek alliances with other dissidents. As the Socialist Review Group was ideologically incompatible with the ideas of the International Secretariat, the committee decided to join forces with the newly formed International Socialism Group (ISG), led by Ted Grant and Jimmy Deane, who shared their hostility towards the Healyites. The ISG had the added advantage of having a long history of entryism, which made it compatible with Pablist theory. This merger with the ISG allowed the latter to receive official section status from the International Secretariat in 1957. The new group took the name Revolutionary Socialist League. However, this merger was largely artificial, and the two groups did not collaborate extensively. Geographically, the ex-committee members were mainly active in Nottingham, while the ex-ISG members operated around Liverpool and Glasgow.

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There were notable ideological differences between the two groups. The ISG members focused on the political crisis in the British labour movement and economic issues, while the ex-committee members did not consider the colonial question to be a top priority (although it was not entirely overlooked), despite its significance within the International Secretariat. Additionally, the ex-committee members supported collaboration between Trotskyist groups infiltrated into the Labour Party, while the ex-ISG members refused to work with the Healyites.64 These differences led the two groups to divorce in practice. The pro-International Secretariat faction organised itself around the figure of Pat Jordan and took the name International Group in 1961. This group published two magazines: The Week and The Internationalist. An attempt was made to force back a reunion by the International Secretariat, but the plan failed. The International Group’s activity in its early days, in Nottingham As previously mentioned, the International Group was primarily located in the Nottingham area. This increase in presence can be attributed to the 1956 crisis over the Hungarian question in the CPGB, which resulted in the expulsion of two prominent members from the area: Ken Coates and Pat Jordan. Both activists had a wealth of experience and joined the RSL after unsuccessful attempts to join the Healyites. The amalgamation of these two dissident CPGB members, who had a theoretical tradition that strongly diverged from that of the other Trotskyists, with the members of the ex-committee for the regroupment of the Fourth International, contributed to making the new organisation more of a motley crew of communists than a disciplined and united party in the Leninist sense.65 The International Group’s first publication, The Week, targeted a broad audience in line with the entryist strategy adopted by Trotskyist groups within the Labour Party during the 1950s and 1960s. Tariq Ali viewed the group as responding to the expectation that a left-wing reaction to the Wilson government’s policies would emerge, leading to the coalescence of a powerful left-wing movement.66 However, this did not come to pass, and due to the predominantly young, middle-class composition of the group’s activists, the International Group remained relatively unknown within the Labour Party and had little impact at the national level besides being monitored by the secret services by the end of the 1960s.67 In 1965, events within the Nottingham Labour Party disrupted the group’s status quo. Ken Coates, who had risen to the position of local Labour branch chairman, used his influence to remove Jack Caughty, a right-leaning candidate, in favour of a left-leaning member, Peter Price. Caughty appealed to the National Labour Party Executive Committee, resulting in the expulsion of Coates and three other local left-wing leaders, Geoff Coggan, Bob Gregory, and Peter Price. The Labour Party leadership cited Coates’ excessive criticism of Nottingham City Labour Council’s actions as grounds for his expulsion and accused him of promoting Trotskyist ideology through his affiliation with another organisation. The case lasted nearly three years, and the Nottingham expellees were eventually allowed to rejoin the party in November 1968.68

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The reinstatement of the Nottingham expellees was one of the early steps taken by the Labour Party to promote diversity of opinion within the party. Eric Shaw attributed this relaxation of the party’s attitude towards Trotskyists to the appointment of Ron Hayward as the national officer, replacing Sara Baker, who was a committed social democrat centrist and more rigid on matters of opinion. Another factor that likely played a role in the readmission was the defection of two of the agents who had sought Ken Coates’ expulsion to the Conservative Party.69 The support provided by Ron Hayward to the Nottingham Trotskyists sets an interesting and ironic precedent. It is worth noting that the first charge against Militant was mainly spearheaded by the same Ron Hayward, and his report on the tendency was to constitute the basis for the witch hunt against the entryists in the 1980s. The IMG’s peripheralist strategy and the new left The International Group did not achieve success within the Labour Party, as it failed to establish itself on a national level or exert political influence. Additionally, the absence of a strong left-wing reaction to the Wilson and Callaghan governments prevented the formation of a faction that could have been led by the IG. The group’s failure to recruit from within the party may have been due to an excessive emphasis on maintaining secrecy and anonymity. According to Tariq Ali, a faction within the IG leadership refused to accept new members to avoid angering the Labour Party leadership.70 John Callaghan confirms this interpretation, stating that the IG’s inability to recruit was due to strong secrecy.71 Ken Coates’ departure from the group in 1968 further hindered its ability to connect with working-class circles, as his background as a communist activist had made him efficient as a movement organiser for local working-class struggles. In the absence of a significant radical workers’ movement within the Labour Party, the International Group, which renamed itself the IMG in 1968, shifted its focus to peripheral movements outside the Labour Party. This peripheral strategy was the same one as that adopted by the IS and can be defined as follows: to concentrate the militant activity of a revolutionary organisation on a specific social issue that was suitable for radical actions by its form and radicalising potential. The objective was to recruit new militants who could later be brought into the party and converted to the Trotskyist programme. In other words, the aim was to be part of all struggles and recruit militants who had not been politicised on traditional class issues or who initially did not have the desire to join the Labour Party. The peripheralist strategy employed by Marxist groups like the IMG and the IS was unique in its adaptability to the individualist logics of post-modern society. These groups targeted “new left” questions from 1967 to 1968 onwards, which were characterised by a shift from class and economic issues to social issues of individual liberties. These new struggles were based on various social relations, such as sexism, racism, and post-colonialism, and were used by the IMG and IS to recruit new members who were not necessarily politicised on traditional class issues or inclined to join the Labour Party.72

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The IMG’s success in reaching a new student milieu that was not affiliated with the Labour Party was largely due to its involvement in the VSC, which enabled the IMG to double its membership. Unlike the IS, which viewed these struggles as a means to an end, the IMG believed that the struggles themselves had a class character and that the relationship to Marxism was inherent in the issues raised by these struggles. In other words, the IMG saw these struggles as both means and ends in themselves. The limits of the IMG strategy The success of the VSC encouraged the IMG to multiply monothematic struggles and to involve its activists in all the movements that could concern them. We can then speak of hyper-militant logic or hyper-activism, as John Callaghan puts it. For example, an IMG activist who was a student and an Irishwoman had to attend meetings of the party’s student section, the feminist section, and the section for Irish independence. This is how John Callaghan described the IMG in the early 1970s: as a federation of organisations rather than a centralist party. He also counts nearly 30 organisations founded by the IMG, most with their own publications.73 The party’s hyper-activism was characterised by its effectiveness in the short term but ineffectiveness in the long term. It should also be noted that the short-term effectiveness of the strategy was highly dependent on the issues driving society at the time, due to the reactive nature of the activism. The disadvantages were numerous, and the strategy was bound to fail because it was too restrictive. Members quickly succumbed to activist fatigue due to the excessive number of meetings that the group’s strategy demanded, resulting in a high turnover rate. The group’s strategy of multiplying struggles failed to build a strong, coherent party identity. The organisations were often named “socialist + a category” (e.g., socialist teacher and socialist woman), making it difficult to identify the group’s political orientation. Furthermore, the emphasis on post-modern issues tended to attract a militant base closer to the middle class than that of other groups. The working class, which is structurally less likely to identify with these issues, did not fully participate in the group’s activities.74 As a result, the IMG refocused its efforts on students, who were at the forefront of the new left’s struggles. This student orientation was reinforced after the social movements in the Western democracies in 1968. Ernest Mandel’s analysis recommended that Trotskyists make universities the central places of struggle for the coming revolution. Mandel’s theory from 1968 to 1970 stated that students were temporarily radicalised and did not constitute a ruling class in the making. Rather, they were a group of potential revolutionary individuals. Educating receptive individuals could train the future cadres of the revolutionary movement and also turn them into educators. Mandel focused his analysis not only on the students but also on the universities themselves. The staff, students, and premises could serve as centres of education for self-management, which Mandel designated as the cradle of a real revolution in the making.75 To channel student movements, the IMG founded the Spartacus League in 1970, which published Red Mole, among other publications. The group’s focus on student movements and the

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issues of the new left effectively turned it into a student movement itself, according to Callaghan.76 The decision to leave the Labour Party was partly motivated by the ineffectiveness of traditional party channels in structuring student struggles. A first, involuntarily temporary, exit of the Labour Party The IMG left the Labour Party towards the end of 1969, with the decision to leave being made at the Brighton Conference held from September 29 to October 3, 1969. According to John Blair’s article in International, the failure of the Wilson government to deliver major social reforms and the abandonment of most of the pledges made to the left of the party during the election demonstrated the Labour Party leadership’s complete adoption of market economy values.77 The Tribune left was also criticised for failing to influence the movement and organise a real opposition to Wilson, which led to the desertion of new socialist elements from the party: Many Labour Party and trade union activists are profoundly disturbed by the contempt with which the radical youth often appear to view their organisations. They should understand that this is a fundamentally healthy reaction which is a mirror of their own disillusionment with a bankrupt conservative leadership.78 The IMG left the Labour Party precisely because they believed that the main issue for revolutionaries was to understand the dynamics of the new social movements. John Blair stated that it was not a matter of asking all IMG activists to leave Labour but rather that a structure was needed to channel the disillusionment of the newly radicalised generation who did not want to go through the Labour Party. This argument was similar to the one that led Militant to leave Labour in 1992. The IMG considered itself to be a new vanguard that could bridge the gap between the labour movement and the emerging movements of the new left. The question of whether to completely sever ties with the Labour Party was heavily debated within the new group, particularly during the June 1970 elections when the issue of IMG support for Labour was raised. An article by Robin Blackburn, titled “Let it Bleed”, published in Red Mole, was a response to Pat Jordan’s recommendation to support the Labour Party. Blackburn reiterated the fundamental analysis of Labour as a bourgeois party of workers. He believed that the Leninist argument of the Labour Party’s proletarian nature through its links with trade unions was no longer tenable, as it was no longer a link of subordination between the party and workers but rather a financial link between the party and the conservative union bureaucracy. The Wilson government’s experience had shown that even in power, the left of the party was no longer capable of organising necessary reforms for British workers and that it no longer embodied the class interests, or at least those of the working class. Blackburn proposed a new approach to the two dominant parties, both of which were considered equally bourgeois: Our aim in the campaign should be to do two things: (1) Make it known as widely and vividly as possible that we reject Wilson as much as we reject

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Heath. (2) Urge the most advanced workers and youth to organise for the coming period of more intense class struggle with no illusions about the Labour Party.79 While Blackburn’s article did not determine the IMG’s stance on the Labour Party, it did reveal new perspectives that were emerging within the group regarding Labour. Thus, Blackburn’s article marked a significant departure from traditional British Leninist theory and highlighted the tenuous balance within the IMG and its theoretical diversity. The support for the Tony Benn campaign: inside the Labour Party again In 1979, the IMG attempted an entryist experiment within the Labour Party again, albeit fractional. It was followed by a quasi-total entryism in 1982 due to the lack of theoretical homogeneity and a permanent audience of the group. The adoption of the policy of unilateral disarmament by the Labour Party and the success of the CND prompted the Trotskyists to return to the Labour Party to recruit from this new, enthusiastic, militant core. To mark this occasion, the organisation renamed itself the Socialist League in 1982. However, the resurgence of the Campaign for Labour Party Democracy within the Labour Party and the emergence of the Bennite movement were the primary reasons that led to the abandonment of entryist tactics in the first place. The IMG decided to join Tony Benn’s campaign for a reorientation of the Labour leadership, but their support for him was not unconditional and remained somewhat distant, as this pamphlet officially published by Socialist Action shows: The dominant left-wing trend in the Labour Party is that associated with the policies put forward by Tony Benn. . . . While making common cause with the Bennites on any anti-capitalist policy, Socialist Action does not give political support to Benn’s overall political platform.80 The argument put forward by the IMG was that while they would fight alongside the left of the party to ensure Benn’s election as Labour leader, his programme remained reformist and did not call for a break with capitalism. They insisted on demanding a clear break with the capitalist system and State. Therefore, it would be more prudent to qualify John Callaghan’s rationalisation of the Benn leadership campaign as the main reason for the return of IMG members to the Labour Party.81 Instead, the renewed interest in CND and the group’s lack of dynamism should be considered the primary reasons, with Benn’s campaign serving as a convenient catalyst. This would characterise the Socialist League’s entryism as a form of opportunity entryism, given the structure of the group and the arguments developed. In 1985, new tensions in the International Secretariat caused the Socialist League to disintegrate, resulting in the editorial board of International leaving to form a new organisation, Socialist Outlook. The Socialist League was later renamed

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Socialist Action, but it struggled to regain its audience, find a militant core, or wield any significant influence, as Militant held sway over both sympathisers and media attention. Socialist Action continued to exist through the 2010s, but only in a secondary capacity. It supported Ken Livingstone’s London mayoral campaign in 2000 and worked within the Labour Party to help elect Jeremy Corbyn as Labour leader in 2015. Simon Fletcher, who served as Corbyn’s chief of staff, was reportedly a member of Socialist Action, according to The Telegraph.82 Conclusion Once the question of theorising the nature of the USSR is put aside, the Cliffites and the IMG share many practical similarities. Both groups quickly moved to work on the margins of the Labour Party, within the social movements surrounding it. They both attempted to apply a peripheralist strategy, which aimed to first bring individuals into a militant dimension through contact with the group through their Labour label and then gradually introduce them to a communist and revolutionary militant dimension by participating in the activities of the Trotskyist groups. The Labour Party’s resistance to embracing a class struggle ideology in favour of post-materialist themes caused the IS, who had been at the forefront of these post-modern issues, to distance themselves from Labour and embrace a more classical Leninist strategy. The recruitment of members to the Labour Party only made sense if the focus was on educating recruits about the necessity of a mass party that prioritised class issues. However, once these issues took a back seat, it became natural for the two groups examined in this section to distance themselves from the Labour Party. In the early 1980s, the resurgence of radical ideas within the Labour Party, especially through Tony Benn’s campaign for the party leadership, elicited different reactions from the two peripheralist groups. The IMG returned to Labour, while the Socialist Workers Party fully embraced its new identity as an independent party, positioning itself as an alternative to Labour. Both parties seemed to have adjusted to their new environments, but the remnants of the IMG had to wait until the brief resurgence of the left wing in the party leadership in 2015 to enjoy a few more years of favourable conditions, which ultimately did not yield significant benefits. In contrast, the SWP remains, as of 2023, one of the two major Trotskyist parties in Britain. Notes 1 The doctrine of Trotskyism of the third camp can be summarised by the following slogan: “neither Washington nor Moscow”. This large ideological family of Trotskyism abandons the idea of defending the USSR as a degenerate workers’ state. However, the analyses of the USSR diverge within this family. See KELLY John, Contemporary Trotskyism, Parties, Sects and Social Movements in Britain, Oxon: Routledge, 2018, p. 85. 2 JENKINS Mark, Bevanism: Labour’s High Tide, Nottingham: Spokesman, 1979, p. 97. 3 CLIFF Tony, “The Nature of Stalinist Russia”, Internal Bulletin of the RCP, June 1948, MRC: MSS.15/5/6/5.

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4 BENSAÏD Daniel, Les trotskysmes, Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, Que Saisje?, 2002, p. 70. 5 GRANT Ted, History of British Trotskyism, London: Wellred Publications, 2002, p. 190. 6 We use the term “State-Capitalists” to refer to the Socialist Review Group because this is the term that was (and still is, to some extent) used in Trotskyist circles. This choice allows us to clearly identify the group while recalling its ideological specificity and to maintain a consistent identifying name despite any changes in the group’s name or form. 7 WALTERS John, “Origins of the SWP”, Worker News, Paper of the Workers International League, n°30, April 1991, p. 8. 8 Ibid. 9 HIGGINS Jim, More Years in the Locust, the origins of the SWP, London: Unkant Publishers, 2011, p. 43. 10 Ibid. 11 GRANT Ted, History of British . . . op. cit., p. 191. 12 HIGGINS Jim, More Years . . . op. cit., p. 43. 13 Ibid. 14 CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left in British Politics, Oxford: Blackwell, 1987, pp. 90–91. 15 LENIN Vladimir Ilyich, Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism, 1917. www. marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1916/imp-hsc/ (last accessed 14.04.2023). 16 TROTSKY Leon, The Permanent Revolution, 1931. www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1931/tpr/pr-index.htm (last accessed 14.04.2023). 17 BENSAID Daniel, Les trotskysmes . . . op. cit., p. 70. 18 HIGGINS Jim, More Years in the Locust . . . op. cit., p. 46. 19 CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left . . . op. cit., p. 63. 20 BIRCHALL Ian, “History of the International Socialists. Part 1: From Theory to Practice”, International Socialism, n°76, March 1976, pp. 16–24. 21 HIGGINS Jim, More Years in the Locust . . . op. cit., p. 46. 22 MORGAN Peter & MUMFORD David, Twenty Questions, Socialist Review Group Pamphlet. MRC: MSS.325/62/Y50/20. 23 HIGGINS Jim, More Years in the Locust . . . op. cit., p. 47. 24 CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left . . . op. cit., p. 94. 25 HIGGINS Jim, More Years in the Locust . . . op. cit., p. 54. 26 SHAW Eric, Managerial Control in the Labour Party 1951–1986, PhD dissertation, Manchester University, Manchester, 1987, p. 233. 27 The contribution of Duncan Hallas to the Socialist Review continued occasionally, and he resumed his activity within the organisation in the 1960s as one of its leading theorists. 28 Socialist Review, vol. 6, n°3, December 1956. 29 FOOTE Geoffrey, The Labour Party’s Political Thought. A History, London: Croom Helm, 1985, p. 287. 30 International Socialism, n°1, Spring 1960, p. 4. 31 CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left . . . op. cit., p. 95. 32 HIGGINS Jim, More Years in the Locust . . . op. cit., p. 87. 33 BIRCHALL Ian, “History of the International Socialists” . . . op. cit., pp. 16–24. 34 Editorial Board, “Letter to Readers”, International Socialism, n°4, Spring 1961, p. 10. 35 COLLINS Henry, “The Case for Left Reformism”, International Socialism, n°6, Fall 1961, pp. 15–19. 36 Editorial Board, “Labour and the Bomb”, International Socialism, n°3, Winter 1960/1961, pp. 1–2. 37 Rebel, n°6, April/May 1961. 38 SRG, Minutes of SRG – South London, 8pm, 6.11.60. Available in the archives of Splits and Fusion.www.dropbox.com/sh/3yhsps9byzgsr7l/AACbPhn5cmAK2lxEqEQv4cpka/SRG %20South%20London%20Minutes%201960–62?dl=0&subfolder_nav_tracking=1 (last accessed 14.04.2023).

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39 SRG, Minutes of SRG – South London, 8.1.61. Available in the archives of Splits and Fusion. www.dropbox.com/sh/3yhsps9byzgsr7l/AACbPhn5cmAK2lxEqEQv4cpka/ SRG%20South%20London%20Minutes%201960-62?dl=0&subfolder_nav_track ing=1 (last accessed 14.04.2023). 40 SRG, Minutes of SRG – South London, 9.4.61. Available in the archives of Splits and Fusion. www.dropbox.com/sh/3yhsps9byzgsr7l/AACbPhn5cmAK2lxEqEQv4cpka/ SRG%20South%20London%20Minutes%201960–62?dl=0&subfolder_nav_track ing=1 (last accessed 14.04.2023). 41 HIGGINS Jim, More Years in the Locust . . . op. cit., p. 87. 42 Grant and Deane’s Revolutionary Socialist League was in line with the logic of the International Secretariat, which implied a softened critique of Soviet imperialism, the defence of the USSR’s possession of nuclear weapons, and the theory of “degenerate workers’ States”. Opposition to these three points was, as explained earlier, in the DNA of the Socialist Review Group. 43 RUDGE John, Rebel Rebel, the Youth Publications of the SWP from the 1950’s to the 1980’s, available on Ian Birchall’s website: http://grimanddim.org/tony-cliff-biography/ rebel-rebel/ (last accessed 14.04.2023). 44 “Our Aims”, Young Guard, no. 1, September 1961, p. 6. 45 SHAW Eric, Managerial . . . op. cit., p. 235. 46 RUDGE John, Rebel Rebel . . . op. cit. 47 SHAW Eric, Managerial . . . op. cit., p. 235. 48 Young Guard, n°1, September 1961, p. 4. 49 HIGGINS Jim, More Years in the Locust . . . op. cit., p. 80. 50 Ibid., pp. 83–84. 51 RUDGE John, Rebel Rebel . . . op. cit. 52 As explained in the previous chapter. The section that remained in the Labour Party took the name “Labour Party Young Socialists” to differentiate it from the breakaway group, which kept the original name “Young Socialists”. 53 HIGGINS Jim, More Years in the Locust . . . op. cit., p. 80. 54 CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left . . . op. cit., p. 95. 55 BIRCHALL Ian, “History of the International Socialists” . . . op. cit., pp. 16–24. 56 Quoted in Ibid. 57 Ibid. 58 CLIFF Tony, “The Labour Party in Perspective” (1962), in The Thick of Workers’ Struggle, Selected Writings Volume 2, London & Sidney: Bookmarks, 2002, p. 19. 59 CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left . . . op. cit., p. 96. 60 SHAW Martin, “The Making of a Party”, The Socialist Register, vol. 15, 1978, p. 109. 61 LUXEMBURG Rosa, Organisational Questions of the Russian Social Democracy [Leninism or Marxism?], 1904. www.marxists.org/archive/luxemburg/1904/questions-rsd/ (last accessed 14.04.2023). 62 CLIFF Tony, “Rosa Luxemburg”, International Socialism, Quarterly for Marxist Theory, n°2/3, 1959. 63 CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left . . . op. cit., p. 98. 64 Ibid., p. 119. 65 ALEXANDER Robert J., International Trotskyism 1929–1985 A Documented Analysis of the Movement, Durham & London: Duke University Press, 1991, p. 492. 66 ALI Tariq, The Coming British Revolution, London: Jonathan Cape, 1972, p. 137. 67 KASSIMERIS George & PRICE Oliver, “‘A New and Disturbing form of Subversion’: Militant Tendency, MI5 and the Threat of Trotskyism in Britain, 1937–1987”, Contemporary British History, vol. 36, n°3, 2022, pp. 355–379. 68 SHAW Eric, Discipline and Discord in the Labour Party, Manchester: Manchester University Press, p. 84. 69 Ibid., p. 88. 70 ALI Tariq, The Coming British . . . op. cit., pp. 138–139. 71 CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left . . . op. cit., p. 121.

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72 For further explanation of the links between the New Left and British Marxists, see BLACKLEDGE Paul, “The New Left: Beyond Stalinism and Social Democracy”, in SMITH Evan & WORLEY Mathew (ed.), Against the Grain, The British Far Left from 1956, Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2017, pp. 47–61. 73 CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left . . . op. cit., p. 121. 74 To understand the difficulty for the left to capture the support of the working class on post-modern themes, see HOUTMAN Dick, ACHTERBERG Peter & DERKS Anton, Farewell to the Leftist Working Class, London: Transaction Publishers, 2012. 75 MANDEL Ernest, “The Changing Role of the Bourgeois University”, speech delivered at Leiden University, June 1970. www.marxists.org/archive/mandel/1970/06/university. htm (last accessed 14.04.2023). 76 CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left . . . op. cit., p. 121. 77 BLAIR John, “Brighton: Labour in Perspective”, International, vol. 2, n°9, October 1969. 78 Ibid. 79 BLACKBURN Robin, “Let It Bleed, Labour and the General Election”, The Red Mole, vol. 1, n°3, April 1970. 80 Socialist Action, What We Stand For, pamphlet, date unknown (probably 1983), p. 15. 81 CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left . . . op. cit., p. 158. 82 GILLIGAN Andrew, “Jeremy Corbyn’s Top Team Encouraged Street Riots”, The Telegraph, September 26, 2015. www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/Jeremy_Corbyn/11893986/Jeremy-Corbyns-top-team-encouraged-street-riots.html (last accessed 14.04.2023).

10 Militant, and the backlash against the successes of long-term entryism

The permanent re-evaluation The group that eventually became the main entryist organisation in Britain had its roots in the debates on the entryist issue within the Revolutionary Communist Party (RCP). Ironically, it was the faction of the party that was initially against entryism in 1947 that eventually developed a sustainable practice of entryism, which proved to be the most successful at the national level. In autumn 1947, the secretariat of the Fourth International allowed the Healyite faction of the RCP to enter the Labour Party, effectively causing a split between the entryists and the independents. The International had planned for Healy’s entryist enterprise to be coordinated with the Independent group, but the reality was different. The entryist group, which formed The Club, did not interact with the independent group until the latter was dissolved. The rest of the RCP soon began to experience militant decay, which could be attributed to two factors. Firstly, the Labour Party had been in power for two years and had implemented social reforms that were favourable to the working class. These reforms, including the nationalisation of many major sectors of the economy, subsidies to businesses to limit post-war price rises, and the establishment of the NHS, were well received by working-class people and the electorate, who overwhelmingly voted for Labour in the next election. However, the British electoral system did not allow Labour to form a government. The success of these reforms also contributed to a re-foundation of the idea that parliamentary socialism was a viable practice, making it difficult for the RCP to defend its revolutionary critique in the eyes of workers, and thus making recruitment very difficult. The second factor that contributed to the RCP’s decline was the blow to the morale of its members inflicted by the betrayal of the Healyite faction. The RCP was the first party to unite the British Trotskyist groups and achieved minor victories, such as coming third in the 1945 Neath by-election. These successes led to strong activist involvement in the organisation. However, the debate over entryism with the Healyite faction lasted for over two years, and the majority of Internal Bulletins were devoted to it until the International intervened in the debate by overturning the internal decisions within the RCP. The length of the event, combined with the perceived injustice of the decision of the international structure, in which many DOI: 10.4324/9781003427551-15

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activists had faith, disgusted many activists, who subsequently deserted the party in the years that followed. According to Ted Grant, Jock Haston proposed returning to the Labour Party on a conservative basis as a result of the disgust and weariness felt by many activists. This return sparked new debates within the RCP, with one faction advocating for an open party and another for entry into the Labour Party. The faction in favour of continuing to work independently argued that returning to the Labour Party would mean denying all the work done by the RCP up to that point and, above all, recognising Healy’s victory and thereby crowning him as the leader of the Trotskyist movement in Britain since reunification would then have to take place on his terms. As previously mentioned, the balance of power was initially around 25% in favour of going back to the Labour Party and 25% in favour of Independence from it, with almost half of the party taking no position and waiting for the leaders to decide. However, the majority of the RCP switched, and entry was agreed in 1949 when Ted Grant and Jimmy Deane decided to return to the Labour Party. The entry into Labour was not secret and was publicly announced in a special issue of the Socialist Appeal in 1949, which turned out to be its last issue. Unlike previous issues of the Socialist Appeal, the cover of this issue displayed a headline rather than an article: “Declaration on the dissolution of the Revolutionary Communist Party and the entry of its members into the Labour Party”. As the title indicated, the entry was named as such and publicly announced, so it was not a secret. The statement also explicitly described the intention of the members of the RCP to maintain their revolutionary principles despite entering the Labour Party: After two-days debate, this fully representative Conference decided, by a substantial majority, to dissolve the organisation and call upon the members of the Party to enter the Labour Party – to which the majority already pay the Trade Union political levy – as individual members. Within the Labour Party they would carry on the fight for the overthrow of the capitalist system and for a Socialist Britain.1 In this passage, the form of entryism described is based on an individual-byindividual basis, without any organisation of its own. However, in reality, RCP members initially became active in The Club, the secret Healyite structure. The document is informative, and while it recites Leninist platitudes about the nature of the Labour Party, it openly describes the basis of the form entryism that would later be practiced by Militant starting in 1964. The statement refers to the Labour Party as the party of the working class, and directly addresses the impossibility of the RCP coexisting alongside the Labour Party: There is dissatisfaction among wide sections of the working class with the policy of the Labour Government. They reflect this, however, not by seeking for a new or more revolutionary organisation, but by striving to exert pressure through their established mass political organisation – the Labour Party. They see no alternative in small Left-Wing groupings outside that Party. The

The permanent re-evaluation 187 perspective for Socialists must therefore be to join the ranks of the politically conscious workers inside the Labour Party and try to orientate its policy along truly Socialist lines.2 Apart from the RCP’s admission of failure by referring to itself as a grouping, the document postulated that the workers within the Labour Party were dissatisfied with the proposed reforms by their own party. This analysis, although it remained an unquestioned axiom, already indicated a notable deviation from the classical Leninist analysis, namely that the Labour Party is an end in itself. All the other Trotskyist entryist tendencies in Britain based their entryist theory on the long-term objective of establishing a revolutionary party independent of the Labour Party. By 1949, the Grantites were already showing signs of a new attempt at a total reorientation of the Labour Party. This analysis differed from Lenin’s in 1920, who recognised the Labour Party as the party of the working class but proposed that communists support it in the same way as “a rope supports a hanged man”, with the prospect of bringing the masses into their own revolutionary party: the Communist Party. The statement suggested that entering the Labour Party as an affiliated society, similar to the Fabian Society or the Socialist Fellowship, would have been a preferable option. In order to legally operate within the Labour Party, the RCP was dissolved. Indeed, in early 1946, the Labour Party implemented a new rule prohibiting groups with their own political programme, independent propaganda, independent candidates for election, and political affiliation with a foreign political organisation from affiliating with the party. This legislation was specifically designed to prevent Communists from operating within the Labour Party and the CPGB in particular, which had been attempting to join the Labour Party since the 1930s.3 The statement described the impasse in the following terms: We would prefer to have the right to enter the Labour Party as an organised body, affiliated in the same manner as the Fabian Society and other organisations. But this is not possible owing to the 1946 decision of the Labour Party regarding organisations seeking affiliation. We have therefore dissolved our organisation and will fight as individual members, within the framework of the Constitution of the Labour Party, for the policy outlined above. By dissolving the Revolutionary Communist Party and entering the Labour Party as individual members we consider we will best play our part in aiding the British workers to reach their Socialist goal.4 The admission in the statement shows that the form of entry into the Labour Party was more influenced by the context surrounding the RCP than by any clear-cut desire of its members. This admission also reveals that the RCP’s original intention to enter the Labour Party was not much different from previous pre-war attempts. Ironically, the decision taken by the Labour Party in 1946, specifically to bar all kinds of communists, conditioned the form of entryism practised by the Trotskyists and created a democratic crisis within it in the 1980s.

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The early years of ex-RCP members within the Labour Party, particularly in The Club, were marked by the Healyite tendency’s harsh treatment. This included targeted harassment, such as that experienced by Jock Haston, and arbitrary expulsions. Some members were expelled for testifying against the expulsion of other members or simply showing support for Haston. Members quickly left The Club, forming their own organisations (as was the case with Cliff’s Socialist Review Group), walking away from activist life (as was the case with Haston), or stepping back to reorganise.5 Ted Grant, who suffered under Healyite tyranny, broke away from the group and founded the International Socialist Group (ISG) with Sam Bornstein and Jimmy Deane. In 1955, the ISG re-established contact with the International Secretariat, which was at odds with Gerry Healy for having taken over the leadership of the rival faction in the international split. The International Secretariat no longer had an official section in Britain, apart from a small core of sympathisers who had broken away from The Club after the international split. This core had organised itself and joined forces with the ISG. This collaboration gave rise to the new Revolutionary Socialist League (RSL) in June 1957, which began publishing Socialist Fight early in the following year.6 “The problems of entrism” The main theoretical and practical foundations of the new RSL were developed in an internal pamphlet called “The Problems of Entrism”, which was written and published in March 1959 by Ted Grant. This pamphlet contained a brief historical analysis of the entryist experiences of various Trotskyist groups in Britain, starting with the Marxist Group in the Independent Labour Party (ILP), followed by the Militant Group and the Workers’ International League in the Labour Party. The pamphlet then re-examined the relevance of entryist tactics in 1959 and was structured around a simple question: “How to overcome the weakness and isolation of the revolutionary movement, whilst maintaining its principles intact, is the basic task of this epoch”.7 In this pamphlet, Ted Grant made a deliberate effort to surpass the Healyites’ short-term analyses. He believed that the creation of new groups or tactics in response to seemingly advantageous opportunities (such as a strike), as the Socialist Labour League (SLL) did with the Liverpool dockers, was counter-productive. Instead, entryism had to be viewed as a long-term operation, which, however, did not involve a complete practical and ideological dissolution of the revolutionary organisation within the Labour Party. Grant’s theory challenged the four prerequisites for entryism laid out by Trotsky himself, which were (1) a revolutionary or pre-revolutionary situation, (2) the presence of Marxist ideas within the social-democratic party, (3) the existence or formation of a left-wing faction within the party, and (4) the possibility of rapid progress for the revolutionary movement within the party. According to Ted Grant, these four conditions were not fulfilled and had never been. He argued that when the Healyite faction of the RCP decided to split, the conditions for entryism were not really there. He demonstrated this by explaining that in 1950, the Healyites had based their thinking on the expectation of the advent of socialism or of a new form of fascism by the end of the following year.

The permanent re-evaluation 189 The thinking of the new RSL differed from its predecessors in that it recognised that entryism was not an advantageous tactic or a real end in itself for achieving any specific short-term goal. Instead, it was seen as the least disadvantageous tactic possible in the situation that the league found itself in. This explanation was based on a basic Leninist premise, which Grant considered to be a fact: All history demonstrates that, at the first stages of revolutionary upsurge, the masses turn to the mass organisations to try and find a solution for their problems, especially the young generation, entering politics for the time.8 Grant viewed the fact that the Labour Party was the mass party of the working class in Britain as central to his thinking. This fact was combined with two other arguments, which formed the backbone of his re-examination of Trotsky’s theory: (1) the numerical weakness of Trotskyist forces in Britain and (2) the resurgence of workers’ faith in social democracy after the balance sheet of the 1945–1950 Labour experience. Unlike other Trotskyist groups, particularly the two Fourth Internationals (Secretariat and Committee), the Grantite tradition recognised that Stalinism and social democracy would experience a revival of interest on the part of the masses immediately after the war. Considering these three points, abandoning the Labour Party, where the rest of the RCP had gone to hibernate after recognising its impotence, would have been equivalent to condemning the final victory of socialism in Britain. To provide clarity, these arguments are summed up in Table 10.1. Thus, Problems of Entrism argued that returning to the Labour Party was ultimately inevitable. At the time of Ted Grant’s writing, leaving the party had more disadvantages than staying. It is therefore accurate to say that the entryism proposed by the new RSL was conservative and non-offensive. This observation is somewhat ironic considering that Militant, the successor to the RSL, became not only the most well-known entryist group but also the most successful. The question that arises is: what solutions did Grant propose in his pamphlet to address the problem and maintain the RSL militant activity within the Labour Party? With a long-term perspective of shattering the illusions of reformism, the aim was to prepare a base that the masses could fall back on when the revolutionary moment arrived. In a strategy that is not very original in the history of the Trotskyist movement, Ted Grant proposed recruiting the most advanced elements of the working class to provide the future revolutionary party with trained cadres ready to lead the masses. However, some original premises for the future Militant’s strategy also appeared: At the same time, on the basis of our work and our political positions, gaining positions in the local Labour Parties, Wards, General Management Committees, etc. This is all preparatory work for the major job in the future. Our job in the preparatory period, which still exists, is the patient winning of ones and twos, perhaps of small groups, but certainly not the creation of a mass revolutionary current, which is not possible at the present time. To attempt to shout louder than one’s voice merely results in hoarseness and ultimately the loss of voice altogether. We have to establish ourselves as a tendency in the Labour Movement.9

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Table 10.1 Theses and antitheses developed in Problems of Entrism Classical argument for independence

Counter-argument for entryism

The revolutionaries must abandon the Labour Party and offer a real alternative for the working class.

The period from 1945 to 1950, during which Labour was in power, gave workers a reason to place their trust in social democracy. Leaving the Labour Party in 1959 would mean abandoning ten years of work within it. Moreover, the number of militants is too small to undertake the construction of a workers’ party which would be different from the Marxist sects. The constant cycle of entering and leaving the Labour Party results in the group’s identity becoming unclear and its policies appearing inconsistent to workers. The time is not ripe yet. Firstly, the movement of the working class towards the Labour Party needs to be harnessed to create movement cadres within it. Working openly is even riskier because, if Trotsky’s fourth condition were to be met and re-entry into the Labour Party becomes necessary, it would be impossible due to the fact that the executive would already have a list of the revolutionary movement’s cadres, given their public existence.

Working outside the Labour Party is more effective.

Working outside the Labour Party provides a clearer and more readable socialist position to address workers The revolutionaries must build a mass party of the working class. Working within the Labour Party is risky, and past experiences of entryism by both Stalinists and Trotskyists have strengthened the Labour Party’s machinery of control and repression against Communists.

The entryism undertaken by the RSL thus differed from other entryist experiments not only by its long-termism, announced as early as the 1950s, but also by its desire to exist as an established and visible tendency. Leaving the Fourth International The collaboration between the former RCP members and members of the Committee for the Regroupment of the British Section of the Fourth International within the RSL was counterproductive due to their opposing views on some issues. They worked very little together, with former ISG members more concerned with entryist issues and local politics in the Liverpool and Glasgow Labour parties while the committee focused on relaying the rhetoric of the International Secretariat and working to recreate a new unified Trotskyist section

The permanent re-evaluation 191 in Britain. The RSL split in two in 1961, with one group led by Pat Jordan soon to form the IMG and the other faction led by Ted Grant publishing, among other things, the Young Guard newspaper within the Labour Youth in collaboration with the Socialist Review Group. Both groups were recognised by the International Secretariat as sympathetic sections in Britain and were urged to join forces to counter the Healyites. The academic literature on the subject is not very clear about the precise reasons why the two groups could not work together effectively. However, some broad outlines are visible in the literature produced by the actors themselves: there were numerous political, historical, and personal disagreements between the RSL and the United Secretariat of the Fourth International (USFI), which was formed after the merger of the US SWP and the International Secretariat in 1963. It is likely that the leaders of the USFI, such as Frank and Mandel, harboured animosity towards the former majority members of the RCP, namely Grant, Bornstein, and Deane. This animosity probably led the former to attempt to oust the latter, while the latter saw the manoeuvre as a plot against them. Therefore, it seems clear that the conflicts dating back to 1938 between the members of the WIL and the leadership of the Fourth International were only resolved by Grant’s RSL ultimately leaving the International in 1965. It also seems that the responsibility for the RSL’s departure from the Unified Secretariat is disputed from different perspectives. For Rob Sewell, a Grantite, the two organisations would have made the decision, but in an antagonistic way, accusing each other. In fact, a letter dated January 19, 1966, signed by Pierre Frank, announced to the British group that it had been relegated from the status of an official section to that of a sympathising section, which would have led the British group to cut its links with the world party completely.10 Therefore, like the Socialist Review Group, the RSL also faced a paradoxical situation where it advocated global cooperation among workers for the purpose of world revolution, yet it did not immediately participate in a global structure. Interestingly, these are the only two major British Trotskyist traditions that have managed to have a lasting existence and continue to exist into the early 21st century. The RSL later evolved into Militant in 1964 and then into the Socialist Party in 1997. On the other hand, the Socialist Review Group transformed into the International Socialists in 1962 and then the Socialist Workers Party in 1977. These two organisations separated themselves early from the groups that originated in the original International Secretariat and managed to remain independent at first. In a second phase, they constituted a more confidential but more ideologically united wave of international structures. The SWP is now part of the International Socialist Tendency,11 while the Socialist Party is part of the Committee for a Workers’ International.12 Militant: the entryist publication “par excellence”? Contrary to what was long claimed by its members,13 the RSL seems to never have really officially dissolved.14 Instead, from 1964 onwards, the organisation operated

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under the name of its publication, Militant, as a working name.15 The name of the publication was decided by a select committee in June, with the choice made by a young activist from Birkenhead, Peter Taaffe. Ted Grant’s opposition to the name was in the minority during the decision process.16 As is written in its masthead, Militant was aimed at the youth of the Labour Party. It was designed to replace Young Guard, which the RSL had abandoned due to the publication being controlled by the International Socialists and leaving no room for their tendency. The year 1964 marked a turning point in two ways. Firstly, the Healyite Keep Left group left the Labour Party and established itself as the youth section of the SLL. Secondly, the return to power of a Labour government presented an opportunity for the emergence of a major critical voice within the party. Peter Taaffe was chosen as the chief editor, and he became one of the main architects of the paper’s success in the years that followed.17 The newspaper’s editorial provides valuable insights into the group’s strategy: About ourselves

The Militant is being published at the present time because of the need to provide a conscious socialist lead for the labour movement, particularly the Young Socialists, in the face of the problems that loom before us.18 Although the editorial of the newspaper is formulated in a way that conforms to Labour Party rules, the use of Leninist vocabulary and the related strategy are evident. This includes the emphasis on providing leadership to the masses and prioritising the youth. It is important to note that the members of Militant in 1964 were initially activists who joined the Labour Party before joining a socialist organisation (with the exception of a few RCP cadres who remained). Therefore, defining Militant as purely an entryist-level enterprise is problematic. In 1965, after the split between the RSL and the USFI, there was no external political pressure for the creation of the newspaper. The only perspective that could support the classification of Militant as an entryist group would be the long-term perspective of a revolutionary moment in the future. However, even then, it would be appropriate to speak of “exit-ism”, since the expression “entryism” implies the opposite approach in this case. The editorial goes on to describe its strategy as follows: For conscious socialists the problem is to make the mighty labour movement aware of the impossibility of solving the national and international problems of our time such as peace and security, prosperity, and abundance, without taking decisive measures against capitalism. Only through the most meticulous, scrupulous, and patient arguing to convince the mass of the labour movement of the need for international socialism can a way be found to the broader masses of “ordinary” “non-political” people who are not consciously devoted to politics. On all the important issue we will endeavour to mobilise the left-wing workers in the Young Socialists,

The permanent re-evaluation 193 the trade-unions, the wards and GMCs of the Labour Party, and the Cooperative bodies.19 The last sentence is noteworthy because it expressed an intention rather than a method. Militant’s strategy aimed to gain control or influence over the Labour Party through a “bottom-up” approach, starting with the Labour youth, followed by local parties, and ultimately the national party. This approach was innovative in two ways. Firstly, it echoed the strategy outlined by Ted Grant in the pamphlet Problems of Entrism, which emphasised a long-term effort to capture activists individually rather than through a global propaganda and recruitment strategy. Secondly, there was no intention of taking a constituent element of the Labour Party and splitting it off from it. Instead, the goal was to convert one sector (such as the youth) and then influence the next (local parties) in order to mobilise rather than break apart. The editorial concludes as follows: Our aim is to be the Marxist voice of the Young Socialists and the militants in the labour movement. The sacrifice and collection of money among militant workers and Young Socialists has made possible the production of the paper. It is your paper. Write for it, sell it, criticise it to make it a better paper, send reports to it, collect money for it. Make it the mass journal of militant labour and socialist youth.20 The reference to youth was again predominant in this excerpt, with three mentions in nine lines of the column. The extract put forward an idea of openness towards the paper, stating that even if you wanted to criticise it, it was still “your” paper and you had the right to publish in it. While this approach was not entirely original in the context of the 1950s and 1960s, with Socialist Outlook and International Socialism having also adopted this method, what set it apart was the emphasis on the notion that the newspaper was not a platform for expression but rather a tool owned by the masses, disavowing any desire for outright leadership. In other words, revolutionaries were encouraged to read Militant because it was their newspaper and one they were invited to participate in. Militant’s style was similar to that of previous Trotskyist papers that originated from within the Labour Party. The paper maintained an unyielding stance against the leadership, advocating for the abolition of capitalism while emphasising that the Labour Party was the solution. In this regard, Militant’s position was comparable to that of The Club’s Socialist Outlook, which held that only a Labour Party with a socialist programme could fulfil the aspirations of the working class. The hegemony of Militant among the Labour Party Young Socialists Following the departure of Keep Left from the Labour Youth and the gradual withdrawal of the Cliffites from the Labour Party, Militant found an opportunity to make headway with the Labour Party Young Socialists (LPYS). Within the two

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years of its formation, the RSL, through Militant, succeeded in getting one of its members elected to the National Labour Youth Committee,21 which was more a matter of conversion than election as the LPYS national committee members were appointed by the Labour Party, and this procedure was put in place to ensure a degree of control over its youth section after the Keep Left split. However, from 1968 onwards, the LPYS leadership was re-elected, and the procedure was changed.22 In the early years of Militant, two supporters of the paper, John Ewers (delegate for the Southwest) and Davy Dick (delegate for Scotland), were already present on the youth executive. Ewers apparently converted during his tenure, while Dick was a Marxist before his appointment.23 In 1965, Militant featured numerous debates regarding the nature of its work within the youth section of the Labour Party. In the April issue, there was a notable critique of the actions of the Young Socialists of the SLL, the group that had split from the Labour Party in 1964: At the start of this vital period, Keep Left takes outside the Labour Party many comrades who can play an important role in the struggles ahead. The history of the British Labour movement is rich in examples of costly hysterical walk-outs and childish “left turns” by sects with claims to divine leadership.24 In this excerpt, Peter Taaffe characterises the SLL as a sect. While the term may be chosen for its punning quality around Gerry Healy’s dominant and self-centred personality, it is also selected for its primary meaning in the far-left milieu. The term is used in the Leninist sense associated with the idea of “sectarianism”, which refers to isolation. A sect is an irrelevant party or group consisting of only a few activists and not able to play any role except passing resolutions that do not impact politics. Peter Taaffe then elaborates that revolutionaries’ place is within the Labour Party, and any external venture is useless: But the Labour Party is not only the political expression of the organised workers, but also of the unorganised and politically backward sections. At times of crisis they will turn first to the Labour Party for solutions to their problems.25 Before concluding: The enthusiasm of the comrades who make up the ranks of the new movement will be dissipated in fruitless campaigns unless they dissolve the organisation and turn towards the real struggle inside the Labour Party. A refusal to do this and to join forces with other left tendencies in the struggle for a Socialist programme will doom them to isolation and gradual demoralisation.26 These two extracts represent the essence of Militant’s public approach to the Labour Party, emphasising that the real struggle was within the party rather than

The permanent re-evaluation 195 outside of it. The article aimed to demonstrate Militant’s commitment to providing non-sectarian leadership for Labour youth. This is further conveniently supported by the inclusion of a letter from a reader to the right of the same article, not so subtly entitled “programme” as if it were the readers who would define Militant’s programme: Young Socialists should not only be a squad of young people who canvass for the Labour Party, as Transport House would wish them to be, or a body of armchair Marxists sitting back waiting for a revolution, or a group of rowdy agitators trying to create a revolution in a non-revolutionary situation. Young people need a body with political influence to which they can turn. Lewes young Socialists are trying to become such a body.27 This letter was likely not randomly selected or placed on the page. It is the only reader’s letter featured on page 8, whereas the others are on page 7. The first paragraph, while cloaked in general language and a dig at the Labour Party leadership, clearly references the Young Socialists of Keep Left. This attack is a textbook example of an implicit reference to Ted Grant’s theory of entryism and was probably included for educational purposes: the situation is not revolutionary, and the oppressed (in this case, young people) need a structure to provide them with political expression, which is, of course, the Labour Party. This letter also served to legitimise Militant as the forum for young radicals and socialists within the Labour Party. The letter was signed by Mary Fitch, and her position as secretary of the Lewes branch of the LPYS in Sussex was noted under her signature. This served two purposes and was addressed to two different audiences. Firstly, it reminded communist activists of all traditions of the need to remain in the Labour Party and form a common front against the leadership to effectively educate from a revolutionary perspective. Secondly, the message was directed at young non-communists to show that the people behind Militant were committed to their interests and that Marxism was the way forward for them. Militant’s strategy was to follow the Labour Party’s rules and act as a wellbehaved, loyalist part of the movement. They never openly criticised the Labour Party, as they did not intend to break away from it. This approach ensured that Transport House did not initially pay much attention to Militant’s activities in the LPYS or the National Association of Labour Students (NALS). In the late 1960s, the Labour Party was more concerned with the SLL and their split, the International Socialists, and the International Marxist Group and their involvement in the New Left movements, as well as their support for the Vietnam Solidarity Campaign.28 The Labour Party’s indifference to Militant’s activities in their youth section was such that the official Labour youth magazine, Left, was rapidly transformed into another of Militant’s propaganda tools through its infiltration.29 This combination of advantageous circumstances for Militant enabled the organisation to make further progress within the Labour Youth, and by 1970, the majority of the Labour Youth National Executive Committee was composed of Militant members.

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The consecration: the presence of Militant members on the Labour Party Executive Committee and the first Trotskyist MPs Starting in 1972, Militant’s control of the youth section reached an extent to the point where one of its members, Peter Doyle, was elected to the National Executive Committee of the Labour Party in the seat designated for the LPYS. Of the nine young people who have held this position throughout the LPYS’ history, eight have been members of Militant.30 This presence on the NEC allowed Militant to propose motions and contribute to their adoption. For instance, in 1973, a decision was passed calling for the nationalisation of the 25 largest British companies. An article on this topic in Militant on July 27, 1973, did not mention the role played by its representative on the party’s executive committee, perhaps to avoid triggering any backlash. The paper argued that this was “one of the best agendas for decades” and cited Clause IV of the party constitution to legitimise its position.31 During the 1980s, Militant made significant progress. Besides their achievements in the youth section, the highly politicised atmosphere of the 1970s and the strong trade union movement in those years pushed the Labour Party to the left. The party’s activist base became more radical due to the consecutive failures of the Callaghan and Wilson governments, which Militant was able to exploit. By the early 1980s, the group’s membership was estimated to be around 2,000, which, along with the 3,500 members of the LPYS they could mobilise, made them an actual political force.32 For instance, during the LPYS executive committee elections, Militant received 200 votes, while the other two tendencies, Workers’ Action and Clause 4, received only 20 votes each. Additionally, Militant had 63 staff members at this time. Other figures cited by John Callaghan indicate the group’s success in the 1980s, including their ability to control 36% of delegates at Labour Party Conventions, while the Tribune group, also classified as radical, could only get 24%.33 Militant’s success enabled them to apply Ted Grant’s gradual theory of entryism, which involved starting at the base level and working their way up to higher positions. Their strategy of being good, loyal members of the Labour Party also allowed them to avoid alienating the Party itself. During the February 1974 general election, Militant and the LPYS campaigned vigorously for Labour candidates. One noteworthy example was when 400 young Labour members, supported by Militant, rallied to campaign for Tony Benn, the leader of the left in the party, in his Bristol Southeast constituency. This effort led the young Labour members and Militant to be thanked for their implication in the election.34 In June 1982, Militant achieved its aim of legitimisation itself within the rank and file and local sections by selecting seven of its members as future candidates for the parliamentary elections in the following year. Two of them, Dave Nellist for Coventry Southeast and Terry Fields for Liverpool Broadgreen, were elected, marking the entry of the first Trotskyist activists into the British parliament. They were re-elected in the June 1987 election and were joined by Pat Wall, a new Militant MP for the Bradford North constituency. The campaign material used by Militant candidates is interesting to study. Their leaflets and flyers did not mention

The permanent re-evaluation 197 their affiliation with Militant. Instead, they emphasised their membership in the Labour Party, even exaggerating this link to convey the message that Militant and the Labour Party were inseparable entities. Figures 10.1 and 10.2 are two examples of such campaign material: None of these documents mention Militant, not even Pat Wall’s campaign leaflet, which was text-heavy but made no mention of the candidate’s affiliation. However, the leaflets did mention the Labour Party alongside the candidates’ names. At the bottom of Pat Wall’s leaflet, it even emphasised his affiliation as “Pat Wall, the Labour Party candidate”. Liverpool and the fight against poll tax Militant’s success was not only limited to the parliamentary arena but also extended to its actions on Liverpool City Council, which garnered more attention. In the local elections of May 5, 1983, the Labour Party regained control of Liverpool’s City Council. Although the numerical significance of Militant there was sometimes overstated, as the Labour group of councillors comprised 51 individuals, only 16 of whom were Militant members, the group’s hyper-activism and strong discipline allowed it to exert a considerable influence on the council’s decisions.35

Figure 10.1 Campaign poster for Dave Nellist, with no mention of Militant but an emphasis on the word “Labour”. Modern Record Centre, University of Warwick (601/C/3/14/2).

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Figure 10.2 Campaign poster for Pat Wall, with no mention of Militant but an emphasis on “Vote Labour”. Modern Record Centre, University of Warwick (601/C/3/14/2).

The permanent re-evaluation 199 Liverpool’s financial situation was complicated, and according to Militant, the city was being underfunded. When Labour gained control of the city, they had to deal with the budget set by the previous council. On the basis of figures reported by Militant, the planned expenditure was £218 million while the budget was only £212 million, forcing them to make £6 million in cuts to stay within the budget. Additionally, the Labour Party had been elected on a working-class agenda, which included proposals for 1,000 new jobs, a £2 reduction in rent per week, a 35-hour working week for council employees, and a minimum wage for council workers.36 Implementing this programme would have required further budget cuts. Until then, Militant had focused its strategy on local action, moving its activists from one local Labour Party branch to another and using a localised battle strategy to influence the Labour Party at a national level through its tight and disciplined activist network. Liverpool marked a turning point in the organisation’s ascension, as Militant used the situation in Liverpool City Council to shift the conflict from the local to the national level through the media. Militant’s main argument was that the city’s funding had been reduced due to the actions of Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative government, with estimates of the loss since 1979 at £270 million. The council then set its plan in motion and created 600 additional jobs in order to increase the deficit and create a conflict with the national government, with the aim of obtaining more local funding from the State. It seems that the Labour councillors were uncertain of the success of their actions: But, to paraphrase Napoleon, “First engage in struggle – and then see what happens”. Regrettably the right-wing labour leadership consider that a guarantee of victory must be obtained before the working class can engage in struggle. Their arid concept of the history of the working class is that only ‘practical’ goals can be achieved. But who decides what is practical? Historically, the proletariat, including the British working class, has advanced only by carving out from marble the steps of its advance.37 John Callaghan suggests that we should nuance the importance of Militant’s role in Liverpool City Council’s strategy. He argues that regardless of party affiliation, all members of the Labour Party in Liverpool agreed with the housing and job creation policy that was adopted in 1982 under the slogan “No cuts, no rent or rate rises”. Thus, the conflict with the Conservative government was inevitable due to the Labour majority’s reluctance to make cuts in a budget that had already been planned for them.38 There is no doubt that the Labour Party had shifted significantly to the left by the 1980s, and non-Militant councillors were eager to implement the proposed agenda. However, Callaghan acknowledges that “No cuts, no rent or rate rises” was a Militant slogan and that their strong activism aimed to change the politics of the local council. One of their strategies was to coordinate and impose their policies at local Labour Party meetings. Callaghan’s model assumes that the Labour Party was already very left wing, leaving the field open for Militant. However, this cannot lead to the conclusion that Militant did not dictate the policy to

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be implemented by the Liverpool group. While this may not have been the case, it would be unwise to assert otherwise in a context where the Labour Party was experiencing much internal conflict between its right wing and its left wing, which was about to face multiple failures. Therefore, with the distance we now have from the events, it is important to examine the subject even more carefully, especially since the activity of Liverpool’s city council broke with the constant legalism of the British Labour Party. Thus, Liverpool City Council launched their ambitious plan. The Labour Youth were mobilised to organise demonstrations and campaigns to secure more funding from the national government. On March 29, 1984, a citywide strike was organised, and many meetings were held to explain and garner support for the Liverpool City Council’s approach,39 which was summed up in the slogan “Better break the law than break the poor”. Without delving into the specifics of the Labour majority’s actions, it is worth noting the significant short-term political gains for Militant. Despite the controversy surrounding its tactics, the extended media exposure during this period has significantly boosted its membership both locally and nationally. For instance, Callaghan’s research shows that membership in Merseyside doubled from 180 in 1983 to 354 in the summer of 1984 after a new council election, which saw the illegal budget pass and another victory for Labour. Additionally, John Callaghan reports that Militant’s national membership grew by over 30%.40 In terms of party sources, Peter Taaffe notes that after the day of demonstrations on March 29, 1984, over 40 people applied to join Militant at their post-demonstration rally. At the group’s major annual rally at Wembley that same year, over 3,000 people were in attendance – an impressive number for a Trotskyist group in Britain.41 However, it is important to consider the covert-entryist nature of Militant. While many people may have been drawn to the group’s politics, they likely still considered themselves primarily members of the Labour Party. Therefore, with Militant, support offered by people to the “tendency” might have been more important than its actual membership numbers. The power struggle between national authorities and Liverpool’s Council came to a head in the latter half of 1984. Despite an earlier pledge to refrain from raising council tax rates, minor increases were introduced but kept below inflation levels. Additionally, a major urban renewal initiative was launched, involving the construction of over 6,000 homes, which further stretched the city’s budget.42 These policies not only resulted in job creation but also garnered significant support for the Labour Council from its constituents. Furthermore, they provoked the Conservative government by accusing it of bankrupting the city through underfunding, and demonstrated through local successes that the issue was a matter of funding rather than economics. In conclusion, the experience of Militant in Liverpool City Council enabled the group to gain national attention by transforming a local issue (Liverpool’s finances) into a global issue (Thatcherite liberal reforms). The Liverpool experiment also demonstrated the potential of the total entryist strategy for a minority group. The hyper-involvement of Militant members, combined with a radicalised and favourable political environment within the Liverpool Labour Party, enabled

The permanent re-evaluation 201 them to overcome their numerical inferiority by shaping the decisions of the local party. These decisions, in turn, served to demonstrate the superiority of the Marxist policies of Militant in winning the favour of their beneficiaries and turning their support into membership, thus creating a virtuous circle of recruitment. The various gains made by Militant in the early 1980s attracted the attention of the national press, the Labour Party leadership, and the Conservative government, which combined their efforts to put an end to the Trotskyists’ progress. The premises of the struggle between the Labour Party and Militant The conflict between Militant and the Labour leadership can be traced back to the mid-1970s, when a sub-committee of the Labour Party NEC discussed a 9-page report drafted by Reg Underhill. The report recommended taking action to eliminate the influence of the Trotskyist group within the party. However, the sub-committee rejected these recommendations, citing reasons such as the small size of Militant, their lack of a sufficiently important membership to exert a decisive influence, and the quality of their paper being too poor to warrant a witch hunt, which had the potential to harm the party’s integrity.43 There were also conflicts within the National Organisation of Labour Students (NOLS), as the Clause Four group, which was dominant in the organisation and had close ties with Tribune and the leadership, attempted to prevent Militant from voting at the 1975 end-of-year convention by excluding several present delegates. Paul Copin, a student member from Cardiff, made the following accusation in the January 9, 1976, issue: It can be no accident, in our opinion, that of the 21 delegates so disenfranchised at a stroke every single one were likely to support the political ideas of the MILITANT. The leadership of the “Clause 4” group orchestrated deliberate removals of “Militant” supporting delegates. At a “Clause 4” caucus that first night it was admitted that the removal of Cardiff, at least, was a “tactical” device.44 The leader of Clause Four and NOLS at the time, Mike Gapes, was given a chance to respond in Militant, but he did not offer any substantial arguments to counter the points raised by Paul Copin. Instead, he accused the Trotskyists of not being loyal to the Labour Party by not reporting the decisions taken at the NOLS congress. Although this episode was minor in the overall witch hunt against Militant, it demonstrated the localised nature of the conflicts between the party’s right and the Marxists. Mike Gapes eventually became a permanent member of the Labour Party and later one of the MPs who opposed Militant. The Hayward-Hughes report The first major attempt to get rid of Militant occurred in early 1982, when the Labour Party’s General Secretary Ron Hayward and national officer David Hughes

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published a report on the group’s activities. This report contained much of the criticism that would be used against Militant for the rest of the decade, and it had the particularity of shifting the criticism from the ideological to the statutory dimension. Rather than attacking Militant’s Marxist ideology, the report accused the group of being undemocratic, secretive, and a party within a party, and argued that they did not abide by the Labour Party’s rules. This critique was effective because, while the ideological DNA of the Labour Party is difficult to define, the rules are well-defined and difficult to contest. Moreover, Militant had always played the “exemplary members” card within the Labour Party to legitimise their presence, so finding a flaw in their application of the rules undermined their strategy. The Hayward-Hughes Report contained a set of observations and recommendations for action to contain the infiltration of the Labour Party by outside forces. Appendix A, Enquiry into Militant Tendency, contains a wealth of information: (v) We believe that the Militant Tendency is not a group formed solely to support a newspaper. It has a hard core of supporters (including its full-time employees) who form an organisation with its own programme and policy for distinctive and separate propaganda which is determined outside the structure of the Labour Party and its Annual Conference. It is therefore under its present arrangements in conflict with Clause II Section (3) of the Party Constitution. Supporters of the Militant Tendency consist of a group of indeterminate number who are aware of the nature and objectives of the Militant organisation and another larger group who are not fully aware of that nature and those objectives and believe themselves to be working for socialist objectives and for the party. We are concerned to distinguish between these two groups.45 The issues raised by the Hayward-Hughes Report bear resemblance to the problems the Labour leadership had with the CPGB in the first half of the 1920s, particularly regarding the question of Militant’s independent programme. However, the report does not specify which programme it refers to, and it remains unclear whether Ron Hayward and David Hughes were referring to Militant’s public socialist programme, which primarily aimed at the nationalisation of Britain’s 200 largest companies. It appears that the authors of the report were well-informed and had access to confidential documents circulating within Militant’s inner circle that discussed the possibility of a split in the very long term. The strategy of “breaking up” in the indefinite future, formulated by Ted Grant in 1959, remained relevant and was debated until the early 1970s. This is evident from an extract of a set of perspectives submitted to the group’s national convention in 1969: We must be careful that entrism remains for us a tactic, which can and must be discarded when it no longer serves a revolutionary purpose. We must remember that we are not ordinary, rank and file L.P. members and that our objective is not a “Socialist” Labour movement. . . . Although it is true that

The permanent re-evaluation 203 we have to keep the positions we have won in the Labour Movement, by participating in the day-to-day work of the L.P., it is not our duty to run the L.P. and spend all our time running it.46 While there is no record of whether these perspectives were adopted, they clearly reference the tactic of breaking away from and leaving the Labour Party. Additionally, the positions that Militant obtained were explicitly referred to as instrumental and not embodying any real end, and the objective of winning the full party was also rejected. One of the strongest criticisms levelled against Militant in the report was the allegation of the existence of a secret core among the group’s supporters. The report accused the group of being undemocratic and having an inner circle that was privy to the group’s true intentions, with some Labour members allegedly joining Militant without ever being made aware of it. It is difficult to ascertain the veracity of this claim. While Peter Taaffe has denied it, neither side has presented concrete evidence, with the debate remaining open to interpretation between members and readers. When questioned by Ron Hayward about whether Militant conventions were open to Labour Party activists,47 Taaffe responded as such: For a number of years, Militant Editorial Board has held not an “Annual Conference” but a Militant supporters’ rally. . . . The Editorial Board invites to the Rally regular sellers of the Militant who are in general agreement with Militant’s policies and who make regular financial contributions to the paper; it is therefore not open to all Labour Party members.48 To understand this extract, it is important to contrast the use of the expression “supporters’ rallies” with “readers’ meetings”: Militant Readers’ meetings, which are public meetings, are organised either by our sales organisers or by supporters who call them from time to time on their own initiatives. Militant Reader’s Meetings are public meetings and are therefore open to anyone.49 The defence put forward by Peter Taaffe is actually a line of defence that plays on the journalistic nature of Militant. Readers are considered just readers and not members, and those invited to “rallies” are invited on an individual basis by the editorial board. This provision was intended to keep things vague and thus ward off accusations of being a party within a party. However, it appears that these arguments did not impress Hayward and Hughes, who made the following recommendation to the Labour Party leadership: A(1) That the National Executive Committee establish a Register of non-affiliated groups of members to be recognised and allowed to operate with the party. B If the National Executive committee accepts the above recommendations, it is our opinion that the Militant Tendency as presently constituted

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would not be eligible to be included on the proposed Register in the light our findings in paragraphs 2(v), (vi) and (vii) of this Report.50 The Hayward-Hughes Report’s recommendations were a step backward in Labour Party practice, as a register of organisations eligible to join had already been established to contain the infiltration of Stalinist communists within the party but had been abandoned in 1973.51 Despite this, the recommendations were eventually adopted by the National Executive Committee of the Labour Party on January 13, 1982, and endorsed by the party’s annual conference at the end of that year. As a result, Peter Taaffe, Ted Grant, Clare Doyle, Keith Dickinson, and Lynn Walsh, the members of Militant’s editorial board, were expelled from the Labour Party on February 23, 1983. However, this did not have a significant impact on their editorial activity. As Michael Crick reports, some of the expelled members continued to receive their Labour Party membership cards from their local branches. From summer 1983 on, Militant was also prohibited from selling its publications at Labour Party events and using party facilities for its activities.52 What defined a member of “the Militant tendency”? In his investigation of Militant’s activities within the Labour Party, Michael Crick estimates that around 40 Militant members were expelled by 1986.53 These expulsions were based on the definition of Militant membership as an expression of financial or organisational support for the group or its activities. On February 3, 1983, Jim Mortimer proposed the following to the Labour Party NEC in order to legitimise the expulsions of Militant supporters: The National Executive Committee resolves that, when considering an allegation against an Individual Member of the Labour Party, that he/she is a member of the Militant Tendency, it will afford him/her an opportunity to undertake that he/she is not now, or shall immediately cease to be and further shall not hereafter become, involved in financial support for, or in the organisation of, or in the activities of, the Militant Tendency and shall regard his/ her readiness to give such undertaking as an important factor in determining whether he/she is a member of the Militant Tendency, and thereafter liable to expulsion from the Labour Party.54 The Labour Party’s National Executive Committee passed the resolution in the same month, but instead of resolving issues, it only worsened the democratic crisis within the party. This put the party’s leadership in a difficult position, especially since the party’s rank and file did not fundamentally oppose the left-wing positions held by Militant. The fact that Militant resolutions such as the call for the nationalisation of the country’s major companies were passed at the party’s annual conference indicated this. If opposing the rise of the Militant’s ideas during a time of reaction to Thatcherism was difficult, engaging in a legal battle with the Trotskyists was less complicated. However, even if one takes into account the RSL’s

The permanent re-evaluation 205 entryist intentions, the majority of Militant members, including its cadres, were primarily Labour Party members. This was the line of defence used by Peter Taaffe at his hearing before the party’s National Executive Committee in December 1982. He argued that “In relation to the term ‘entryists’ this is also a fiction. Four of the members of Militant’s Editorial Board joined the Labour Party and were won to the ideas of Marxism through their own experience”.55 In The Rise of Militant, Peter Taaffe highlighted that the five members of Militant’s editorial board had a combined 121 years of membership in the Labour Party. Another argument presented by Militant during the same hearing was that the group was not a distinct organisation and had no plans to split up, contrary to what the Social Democratic Party had done a few years prior. This reference to the SDP split was an argument Militant invoked regularly to highlight their own loyalty to the party by contrast: To talk about entryism is ridiculous. I’ve been in the party for over 30 years. Trotsky spoke about entryism as a short-term measure. How can that apply for over 30 years? We/Militant is not applying for affiliation. Militant is not an organisation, like Victory for Labour which was a prelude to the setting up of the SDP. How can we be separate when we stand for Clause 4?56 This statement of intent is, in fact, highly questionable historically. In fact, at its foundation, the RSL theorised its entryism around a departure from the Labour Party when the revolutionary situation manifested itself. But this departure was hypothetical and not topical in the 1980s. It was then only “half a lie”. Militant launched a significant campaign, rallying local Labour parties to support their cause against what they claimed to be a witch hunt against socialists within the party. This effectively shifted the debate from Militant’s adherence to the party’s constitution to a larger discussion on the party’s ideology, specifically its relationship to Clause IV, as encouraged by Ted Grant’s argument. This presented a challenging situation for the Labour Party’s leadership, and the matter was fiercely debated between 1983 and 1991 through various means, including statements, speeches, meetings, and the production of propaganda materials. Both sides pushed the confrontation to the extreme; Militant even went as far as launching the periodical Witch Hunt News in 1986, while the leadership created a file for every Labour Party member who supported Militant. The publication of Witch Hunt News coincided with the events in Liverpool in 1986 and was not solely produced by Militant but rather by the left-wing faction of the Labour Party. The first issue, published in January, included a paragraph that read, “Published by the Labour Left Co-ordination and the Campaign for Labour Party Democracy in co-operation with the Campaign Group of Labour MPs as a service to the labour movement”.57 Several influential figures within the Labour Party backed the campaign, including Trotskyist MPs Dave Nellist, Pat Wall, and Terry Fields, along with non-Trotskyists such as Tony Benn, Jeremy Corbyn, and Joan Maynard. Ken Livingstone and Diane Abbott also contributed to the cause by delivering speeches at public gatherings.58

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In response, the Labour Party leadership reacted with greater inflexibility and increased intelligence operations aimed at monitoring Trotskyists and supporters of Militant. A striking example of this was the creation of a list of party members who had contributed to the publication, even while it was still circulating within the Labour Party, dating back to 1991. The list consists of four pages, beginning with the following paragraph: The following is a list of people, prominent in the Labour movement who have at some time donated to the Militant, produced articles and interviews, or spoken on Militant platforms, as recorded in the pages of the Militant, itself.59 This list is interesting in many ways. Firstly, because it shows the intensity of the struggle that was being waged by Labour’s leadership, and secondly, because even Labour veterans like Tony Benn, Dennis Skinner, and Eric Heffer were mentioned and monitored. Ironically enough, the list mentioned Neil Kinnock himself as having been close to Militant in 1978. Neil Kinnock, who took over the leadership of the Labour Party in 1983, aimed to fight against Militant and regain control of the party. His goal was to steer the party towards a more centrist ideology and further assimilate the market economy into Labour doctrine in response to Conservative victories. Michael Crick noted that Neil Kinnock initially only considered expulsion from the editorial board as the main course of action against Militant. However, the Bournemouth Congress in 1985 spurred the acceleration of efforts to combat the group. Kinnock delivered a speech denouncing Militant and specifically criticising Derek Hatton’s actions in Liverpool. This speech boosted Kinnock’s popularity and encouraged him to maintain momentum. Additionally, many local Labour Party branches had already begun purging Militant members, resulting in an overall realignment of the Labour Party. This realignment was evident in traditionally left-wing branches such as Blackburn, which also embarked on purges.60 The Labour Party’s struggle against Militant was not without consequences, but ultimately, it emerged victorious with the group’s departure from the party in 1992. This led to a realignment towards the right with the adoption of Third Way theories. The “constitutionalising” of the abandonment of the party’s statutory collectivist objectives was evident after the election of Tony Blair and the rewriting of Clause IV, which provided a justification for revolutionary socialists to remain in the party. This move can be interpreted as a strategy of partisan control through statutory means rather than a mere indication of an ideological shift. Walton, Dublin, and the Scottish Militant split from Labour The end of Militant was brought about by a pivotal event in the confrontation between the Labour Party’s left and its leadership. Eric Heffer, one of the socialist left leaders in the National Executive Committee, passed away in May 1991, which triggered a parliamentary by-election in Liverpool, Walton. Heffer had been a key supporter of Militant within the Labour leadership and had thwarted purges in the 1980s. In 1985, he had opposed Neil Kinnock’s efforts to shift the Labour Party to

The permanent re-evaluation 207 the right. Heffer’s death provided an opportunity for Kinnock to make advances in the very left-wing Liverpool constituency by nominating Peter Kilfoyle as a candidate. This move was not well received by the left wing of the party, which viewed it as an attempt to diminish their influence in the PLP. As a result, on June 9, 1991, the “Broad Left” coalition within the Labour Party announced its support for Lesley Mahmood’s candidature, a coalition councillor on Liverpool City Council and a member of Militant. Mahmood ran on the “True Labour” ticket in the July 4 election and came in third with 6% of the vote. Although she was not elected, her campaign was significant as it showed that Militant still had some support. In the same year, a member of Militant who had been expelled from the Labour Party in 1989 was selected as a socialist candidate for the Mulhuddart seat in Dublin’s ward elections. The two aforementioned events triggered a heated discussion within Militant. It was the first time that independent candidates who were also members of the group had been nominated for election and had achieved relatively decent scores for Marxists in Britain. These successes prompted Militant to reconsider the usefulness of entryism within the Labour Party. The pace of events quickened with the decision of the Scottish branch of Militant to establish an independent Marxist organisation. This decision was largely driven by the success of the campaign against the Poll Tax imposed by Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative government, in which Militant played a leading role. Tommy Sheridan, himself a member of Militant, was one of the key figures in the campaign in Scotland and a vocal proponent of the independent turn. In July 1991, the majority of the Scottish group proposed a resolution to pursue independence, which was supported by the majority of Militant’s executive committee. The proposal was grounded in a number of factors, including the decline of the Scottish economy, the rise of the right and “reactionary” elements within the Labour Party, the success of the Poll Tax campaign, and the surge of Scottish nationalism on populist grounds. The resolution put forth the following proposals: 106. However, a political programme alone is insufficient. Flexible tactics and bold organisational methods will be required if we are to maximise the impact of Marxism in Scotland. 107. While the image of the tendency among some of the most advanced layers could be that of only a loose pressure group inside the Labour Party we are forced to fight with one hand tied behind our back. Only with an open, public organisation can we attract towards us the best fighting elements of the working class and youth in Scotland who are already looking for an alternative to Kinnock’s Labour Party. On an all-British scale too it is to these sections that we must look to prepare the forces to conquer the ranks of the organised working class and to build on the scale necessary to conquer the leadership of the labour movement in the next decade.61 There are several notable elements in this proposal. Firstly, the emphasis on flexibility directly reflects Leninist principles and may be reminiscent of the culture of

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change that was prevalent in the Workers’ International League in the late 1930s and early 1940s. Secondly, the Labour Party is described as a liability that the group would be better off if emancipated from it. However, it is important to note that this resolution was preliminary and did not yet involve the formation of a fullfledged independent party: 127. From the outset it must be made clear there is no question of announcing the public formation of a new “party”. That would suggest some permanent breach with Labour. We will be recognised as an independent force but our appreciation of the long-term importance of the traditional organisation and our need to reorient back to it remains unchanged. We will stand for a majority, socialist Labour government and the transformation of the party. We can say that we are organising openly in Scotland around this programme because the Labour Party right wing have made it impossible to work in any other way for the foreseeable future.62 In the tradition of texts heralding the mutations of British Trotskyism, this passage is quite cryptic. However, several key facts can be gleaned from it. Firstly, the proposed organisation’s form was ambiguous, with the reference to a party being placed in inverted commas, suggesting that the group intended to create an organisation with all the characteristics of a party except for the name. The deliberate ambiguity in the proposal was related to the Trotskyist group’s relationship with the working class, as there was no clear break with the Labour Party but rather a gap because working within the party was deemed impossible. The independent turn The proposal suggested by the Scottish section and supported by the majority of the Militant Executive resulted in a significant split within the organisation. On one side, a majority group led by Peter Taaffe began considering a complete exit from the Labour Party, which meant abandoning the entryist tactic. On the other hand, a minority group led by Ted Grant and Rob Sewell wanted to maintain the organisation’s original tactics. At the same congress where the Scottish motion was presented, the minority presented its own motion opposing the so-called Scottish turn. The minority document was entitled A Threat to Forty Years Work and was highly critical of the events in Walton, Dublin, and the Scottish debate: After decades of successful work in the mass organisations, which have permitted us to make unprecedented gains, an attempt is being made to launch the tendency on an adventure which threatens to undermine the entire basis of the tendency.63 Before any strategic arguments were presented, the old ghosts of British Trotskyism resurfaced, and the majority’s proposal was immediately labelled as adventurist. In this respect, Grant’s motion displayed certain conservatism on his part. Since

The permanent re-evaluation 209 1938 and the WIL, Grant has always been sceptical of major strategic shifts made by British Trotskyist groups. When the International proposed a mixed structure, he preferred to retain the WIL structure. Similarly, when the RCP debated returning to the Labour Party, he opposed it and defended the retention of the previous tactic. Although Grant did not always advocate entryism, as the example of the RCP shows, it is clear that he was imbued with a form of strategic conservatism. The events at Walton were criticised as the beginning of a shift towards leftism that could have negative effects on both the education of the movement’s youth (leading to ultra-leftism and sentimentality) and the leadership (resulting in adventurism and sectarianism). Grant believed that supporting a dissident Labour candidate instead of the official right-wing candidate was akin to playing into the hands of the Labour leadership. Supporting the dissident candidate provided concrete proof to Kinnock that Militant was a separate organisation disloyal to the Labour Party. In Grant’s view, denouncing the Labour Party as a hostile party whose nature had changed during the 1980s was also a mistake. According to the entryist theorist, despite the witch hunt of the previous decade, the nature of the Labour Party remained unchanged: 105. It is impressionism to argue that because of Kinnock and the witch-hunt there has been a “fundamental change” in the Labour Party – so significant as to warrant the de facto liquidation of the entry tactic -because that is the inevitable result of what is being proposed. 106. It is no accident that the advocates of the “turn” compare the Labour Party to the US Democrats. This has always been the argument of the sects – that the Labour Party was not a workers’ party at all.64 According to Grant, there was no need to question the dual nature of the Labour Party in the purest Leninist tradition: not only a party of workers but also a bourgeois party. The working-class nature of the Labour Party was not defined by the existence of a left-wing within its leadership, which was no longer the case according to the proposal of the majority, but by its privileged link with working-class organisations, specifically the unions. The relationship between the party and the working class occurred at the base level, not at the leadership or political level, and it was there that the work of revolutionaries had to be focused. For Grant, to exist independently would amount to a form of substitutionalism by the Communist Party for the working class, leading to isolation, which, in the orthodox Trotskyist logic he defended, was both anathema and a danger. Grant’s position was countered by the majority with economic arguments, demonstrating that the situation in the 1990s was significantly different from that of the 1950s and 1970s. The crisis of the 1970s was said to have had a unique impact on the new generation, resulting in a disconnection between them and the traditional organisations of the labour movement and culminating in a new form of class consciousness: 17. Conditions determine consciousness, and these changes have inevitably had a big effect on the working class. The older layer of workers, with

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experience of activity within the Labour Party and trade unions, retain a loyalty to those organisations, although many are bitterly disappointed and disgusted by the current leadership and have dropped out of activity. 18. At the same time, there is a new generation of younger workers, who have grown up during the Thatcher era and whose view of the labour movement is conditioned by Kinnock and the right-wing trade union leaders. In industrial struggles, workers have not only come into conflict with the bosses but in many cases with their own trade union leaders, especially since the leadership embraced “new realism” and after the defeat of the miners’ strike.65 The majority’s conclusion drawn from this demonstration was that independence was not a substitution of the party for the class but rather a means of reaching a new working class whose consciousness was shaped by a new context. The example of the fight against the poll tax was given as a contrast between the present situation and that of the 1950s, when Ted Grant recommended entryism into the Labour Party. In that period, entryism was advocated conservatively, to recruit activists one by one and build up cadres to lead the revolutionary struggle. In the struggle against Thatcher government’s tax, the struggle was certainly structured on the left of the Labour Party, but mainly outside it. Militant had thus been able to fulfil the Grantite prophecy of the 1950s: to organise the working class on a national level in an autonomous and massive way. Although its membership was still not large, its link to the class was established, and its status as a mere propaganda group was over. The foundation of an independent group was therefore decided by a national vote, with 97% of the votes supporting the Taaffe majority. Only 3% supported the position of the Grant-Woods-Sewell minority.66 A final entryist group: Socialist Appeal The minority consisting of Grant, Woods, and Sewell refused to participate in the creation of an independent group even after it had been established, resulting in a split between the two factions. It remains unclear whether this was a voluntary separation or a forced purge. Each side blamed the other for the split, with the majority denouncing the minority’s stance as the foundation of a rival group, thus making them a de facto political competitor. The separation was accused of being dogmatic and rejecting democratic centralism: Despite the overwhelming support for this initiative, Ted Grant and a small group of supporters, including Alan Woods, were not prepared to accept this step. Other opponents of the Scottish turn will remain loyal supporters of Militant and the discussion on perspectives, strategy and tactics will, of course, continue. However it has now become clear that immediately after our conference Ted Grant and his group abandoned any idea of acting as a loyal opposition. Instead of continuing the debate within our ranks, as they had claimed they would, they took steps to set up their own, rival publication. They have

The permanent re-evaluation 211 plans to launch a monthly magazine, moving, as soon as possible, to a fortnightly and weekly. They now have their own small premises and their own staff and are raising their own funds. This is a clear split from Militant. Those supporting a rival publication cannot be regarded as Militant supporters.67 In this excerpt, the focus is on the minority’s refusal to debate, with no mention of an expulsion. The title of the article is The Parting of the Ways, but it appears that this romantic title was done more for the publication’s sake. Internally, it was clear that the split was a result of the expulsion of Ted Grant and Alan Woods, which the majority never hid. However, later documents from the minority suggest that the split was less organic and more brutal. It seems that the harsh treatment by the majority after the vote on the founding of Militant Labour was a significant factor in the separation of the two groups, rather than any dogmatism on the part of the minority: One of the things that always set us apart from the pseudo-Trotskyist sects was the extremely democratic and tolerant internal life within the tendency. Expulsions were extremely rare and dissenting views were always given a fair hearing. . . . But these clean traditions were trampled underfoot. Taaffe and his supporters did not possess the necessary political armoury to take on the Opposition in a fair fight. Instead they used the weight of the apparatus, the full timers, the weapon of slander, gossip and character assassination, to attempt to wear down and crush us. In the heated faction fight, Ted and the Opposition were treated abysmally. We were presented not as comrades with arguments to be answered, but as enemies to be crushed. They resorted to the pettiest methods of harassment to undermine our morale. When we went to the centre, nobody spoke to us, not even good morning. Later, our bags were searched before we were allowed to leave the building, and so on.68 In 1992, the minority group continued their work within the Labour Party by publishing Socialist Appeal, making it the last major entryist group within Labour. Despite the removal of Clause IV from the party’s constitution by Tony Blair in 1994, the group continued its activities within the Labour Party. Socialist Appeal transformed into a theoretical magazine that still exists today, adopting the subtitle of Militant and describing itself as “A Marxist Voice for Labour and Youth”. The publication advocates for transitional demands within the Labour Party, such as nationalising various industries, lowering the retirement age, and revaluing wages and transfer incomes. It also provides tools for Marxist analysis and calls for the restoration of Labour’s Clause IV through the Labour4Clause4 campaign that began in 2018. The publication had an estimated membership of 250 in 2000,69 a significant decrease from the over 8,000 members claimed by Militant at its peak in 1986.70 The organisation was banned from the Labour Party in 2021 after a vote of the party’s NEC in an effort to make the party more electable and as a backlash against the left after the Corbyn leadership years.

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Conclusion The Grantite tradition achieved something that no other Trotskyist group had been able to accomplish in 20th-century Britain: establishing a sustained and relatively successful entryist strategy within the Labour Party. Militant’s influence was so great at the 1983 Labour Congress that analysts such as John Callaghan and Michael Crick described it as the most influential political group within the party at that time. Despite being banned from the party, Militant’s successes in effectively taking control of Liverpool City Council and getting three MPs elected to the House of Commons during a witch hunt within the Labour Party showed a certain resilience on the part of this Trotskyist tradition. The extent of Militant’s success can also be measured by the reaction of the Labour leadership. It marked an end to the liberalisation era that began in the early 1970s and a turn to the right, culminating in the rewriting of the party’s Clause IV in 1994, which symbolised the party’s commitment to market logics. However, the relatively successful experience of Militant showed that the entryist strategy within the British Labour Party was only viable in the short term, as the party leadership was deeply hostile to revolutionary ideology and too attached to social democratic logic. The Labour Party’s description as a “broadchurch”, already much questioned by Eric Shaw,71 is difficult to defend from the last quarter of the 20th century onwards, given the leadership’s lenient attitude towards the formation of the Council for Social Democracy (the forerunner of the consequent Social Democratic Party) within the party, while it was rigid towards Militant, which had no pretence of leaving the party yet. Neil Kinnock summarises this concept of the “broadchurch” as follows: Yes we have a broad church, we should be proud of it and of the liberal and tolerant spirit that motivates us as democratic socialists. But churches have walls and rules and the reason they continue to be churches is not because they let anybody and everybody in.72 Militant managed to survive the witch hunt, however, continuing to grow and capitalising on the publicity offered by the management’s reaction to it. In the end, it was Militant’s hubris that defeated the group’s entryist strategy, and it failed to repeat its past exploits with its independent form, Militant Labour, despite the subsistence of its descendant, the Socialist Party, at the time of publication of this book. Notes 1 HASTON Jock, “Declaration on the Dissolution of the Revolutionary Communist Party and the Entry of Its Members Into the Labour Party”, Socialist Appeal, Special Issue, July 1949. 2 Ibid. 3 THORPE Andrew, “Locking Out the Communists: The Labour Party and the Communist Party, 1939–46”, Twentieth Century British History, vol. 25, n°2, June 2014, pp. 221–250. 4 HASTON Jock, “Declaration on the Dissolution . . . op. cit.

The permanent re-evaluation 213 5 GRANT Ted, History of British Trotskyism, London: Wellred publications, 2002, pp. 188–191. 6 CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left in British Politics, Oxford: Blackwell, 1987, p. 192. 7 GRANT Ted, Problems of Entrism, 1959, MRC: 601/C/2/2/6. 8 Ibid. 9 Ibid. 10 GRANT Ted, History of British . . . op. cit., p. 210. 11 International Socialist Tendency. http://internationalsocialists.org/wordpress/groups/ (last accessed 14.04.2023). 12 Committee for a Workers International. www.socialistworld.net/ (last accessed 14.04.2023). 13 In a debate organised by the Socialist Party between Peter Taaffe and Michael Crick, Taaffe explains that “[he] never joined an RSL . . . if it existed, it existed in the 1950s”. See at 25min20: www.youtube.com/watch?v=UEUwEOrf74c (last accessed 14.04.2023). 14 In his book on Militant, journalist Michael Crick cites a copy of the RSL constitution from 1962 as evidence. During my own research I found a 1969 exemplary in the Socialist Party archives at the MRC. MRC: 601/C/1/1. 15 This practice is not an exception in the world of Trotskyism; a well-known example in France is Lutte Ouvrière, whose name is actually Union Communiste (Trotskyste). 16 CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left . . . op. cit., p. 196. 17 GRANT Ted, History of British . . . op. cit., p. 210. 18 TAAFFE Peter, “About Ourselves”, Militant for Youth and labour, n°1, October 1964, p. 3. 19 Ibid. 20 Ibid. 21 CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left . . . op. cit., p. 196. 22 Workers’ Liberty, Labour’s Misspent Youth, 1959–87. Seedbed of the Left: The Origins of Today’s far Left Groups, Pamphlet, 1993, p. 27. www.workersliberty.org/files/seedbed.pdf (last accessed 14.04.2023). 23 TAAFFE Peter, The rise of Militant, Croydon: Socialist Publications, 2013, p. 22. 24 TAAFFE Peter, “‘Independent’ Young Socialists March into the Wilderness”, Militant: For Youth and Labour, n°5, April 1965, p. 8. 25 Ibid. 26 Ibid. 27 FITCH Mary, “Programme”, Militant: For Youth and Labour, n°5, April 1965, p. 8. 28 ALEXANDER Robert J., International Trotskyism 1929–1985 A Documented Analysis of the Movement, Durham & London: Duke University Press, p. 488. 29 CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left . . . op. cit., p. 197. 30 TAAFFE Peter, The Rise of . . . op. cit., p. 75. 31 REEVES Bob, “Labour Party Conference Resolutions Say Nationalise All Monopolies”, Militant: The Marxist Paper for Labour and Youth, n°166, July 27, 1973, p. 1. 32 CALLAGHAN John, British Trotskyism: Theory and Practice, Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1984, pp. 180–191. 33 Ibid., p. 181. 34 TAAFFE Peter, The Rise of . . . op. cit., p. 82. 35 CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left . . . op. cit., pp. 208–209. 36 Among other measures, for a more precise account of the demands, see Militant’s official account of this event: MULHEARN Tony & TAAFFE Peter, Liverpool: A City that Dared to Fight, London: Fortress Books, 1988. 37 Ibid. 38 CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left . . . op. cit., p. 209. 39 MULHEARN Tony & TAAFFE Peter, Liverpool . . . op. cit. 40 CALLAGHAN John, The Far Left . . . op. cit., p. 209. 41 TAAFFE Peter, The Rise of . . . op. cit., p. 264.

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42 Ibid. 43 Ibid., p. 113. 44 COPIN Paul, “Why Were We Barred”, Militant, the Marxist Paper for Labour and Youth, n°286, January 9, 1976. 45 HAYWARD Ron & HUGHES David, “Appendix A: Inquiry Into Militant Tendency, 2. Conclusions”, Labour Party: Report of the National Executive Committee 1981–1982, January 13, 1982, MRC: 601/C/3/4. 46 Anonymous (RB, PG, NE, GT, PH), Perspectives for the Organisation Submitted for Discussion at the National Conference, Conference Document, January 1969, MRC: 601/B/1/8. 47 Letter from Ron Hayward to Peter Taaffe, December 23, 1981. MRC: 601/C/3/4/2. 48 Letter from Peter Taaffe to Ron Hayward, February 8, 1982. MRC: 601/C/3/4/2. 49 Ibid. 50 HAYWARD Ron & HUGHES David, “Appendix A: Inquiry Into Militant Tendency, 3. Recommendations”, Labour Party: Report of the National Executive Committee 1981– 1982, January 13, 1982, MRC: 601/C/3/4. 51 SHAW Eric, Discipline and Discord in the Labour Party, Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1988, p. 172. 52 CRICK Michael, The March of Militant, London: Faber and Faber, 1986, p. 266. 53 Ibid. 54 Minutes of the Meeting of the National Executive Committee of the Labour Party, January 26, 1983, PHM: LP/HART/12/29. The resolutions are also available in the Militant archive in a letter from Jim Mortimer to Militant, dated February 3, 1983, MRC: 601/C/3/4/2. 55 Peter TAAFFE, quoted from Notes on Meeting with NEC, December 15, 1982, MRC: 601/C/3/4. 56 Ted GRANT, quoted from Notes on meeting with NEC, December 15, 1982, MRC: 601/C/3/4. 57 Witch Hunt News, n°1, January 1986. PHM: LP/ESH/09/07. 58 Joan Maynard, Ken Livingstone, and Diane Abbott, for example, appeared at a large meeting on January 21, 1986, alongside Amir Khan and Kevin Scally, who had recently been expelled from the Birmingham Labour Party for being close to Militant. 59 Labour Party, Contributors to the Militant, 1964–1991, 1991, MRC: 601/C/3/13/1. 60 CRICK Michael, The March of . . . op. cit., p. 268. 61 Militant, “Marxists and the British Labour Party: The Open Turn Debate”, Scotland, Perspectives and Tasks, Majority Document, July 1991. www.marxist.net/openturn/ main/index.html (last accessed 14.04.2023). 62 Ibid. 63 Militant, “Marxists and the British Labour Party: The Open Turn Debate”, The New Turn – A Threat to Forty Years Work, Minority Document, August 1991. www.marxist. net/openturn/main/f3-1.html (last accessed 14.04.2023). 64 Ibid. 65 Militant, “Marxists and the British Labour Party: The Open Turn Debate”, For the Scottish Turn: Against Dogmatic Methods and Thought and Action, Majority Document, September 1991. www.marxist.net/openturn/main/f3-2.html (last accessed 14.04.2023). 66 Unknown Author, “A Parting of the Ways”, Militant, the Marxist Paper for Labour and Youth, January 24, 1992. 67 Ibid. 68 SEWEL Rob, “Postscript”, in GRANT Ted, History of British . . . op. cit., p. 224. 69 BARBERIS Peter, MCHUGH John & TYDESLEY Mike, Encyclopedia of British and Irish Political Organisations, London: Pinter, 2000, p. 161. 70 CRICK Michael, The March of . . . op. cit., p. 315. 71 SHAW Eric, Discipline and Discord . . . op. cit. 72 Interview with Neil Kinnock, November 18, 2020.

Conclusion A typology of entryism

This book aimed to investigate the history of political parties and groups on the periphery of British political life that have received little attention from both the general public and academia, resulting in a gap in academic research. Approaching the Marxist Revolutionary Left as a whole would have been too broad a subject to cover in a single book. Therefore, this book chose to focus on entryism as a relevant angle to study the subject. This angle is also neglected in academic research, despite entryism being an integral part of the revolutionary Marxist left’s mythos in Britain. The literature devoted to entryism is almost non-existent, limited to a few articles or chapters. On the CPGB In the first part, it has been demonstrated that although the practice of entryism is generally associated with Trotskyist communists, it was actually first practised by the official Communist Party of Great Britain in its earliest days. This entryism, which was first open and then secret, was part of a two-stage strategy recommended by Lenin himself. It involved communist activists infiltrating the Labour Party (many of whom were already members) to enable the party as a whole to join the federation of parties and societies that was already the Labour Party. The second step, once membership was achieved, would have been the exposure of the Labour leadership as an objective ally of capital, so that the Communist Party would then appear as the natural party of the working class, allowing it to take over the leadership and move towards the path of proletarian revolution. This plan was not unanimously accepted within the newly formed CP in 1920, and the question of participating in any kind of militant work with the Labour Party was a contentious issue from the early days of the CPGB. This section outlined three distinct phases in the relationship between the CPGB and Labour. The first phase, which spanned from 1920 to 1927, is known as the united front phase. During this period, the Communist Party openly penetrated the Labour Party and used an argument based on the legitimacy of its place within the Labour movement. The CPGB created a set of front organisations, all aimed at promoting communism and the CP’s affiliation with the Labour Party. In response, the Labour Party formally refused Communist applications for membership and DOI: 10.4324/9781003427551-16

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extended a range of disciplinary and legal measures to prevent communists from gaining influential positions at Labour’s annual congresses through the back door, such as obtaining delegate positions in particular unions. The second phase of the CPGB’s relationship with the Labour Party was the so-called class against class phase, which lasted from 1928 to 1934. During this phase, the CPGB rapidly extracted itself from the Labour Party in the name of denouncing it and seeking direct confrontation with it on all possible grounds. This rapid shift from a relationship of willingness to participate in one of the confrontations was again modified from 1934 onwards, leading to the entry into the so-called popular front phase. During this phase, the Communist Party proposed a formal alliance with the Labour Party in order to confront the rise of fascism in Europe and within the United Kingdom itself. The CPGB aimed to build the socalled popular front, which was systematically opposed by the Labour Party. The CPGB’s practice of entryism and its diminishing virulence towards the Labour Party nevertheless allowed it to form a pseudo-front with the ILP (outside Labour) and the Socialist League (inside Labour), which enabled it to support its demands on Labour. CPGB entryism ended in 1939 due to legal reasons and was not reattempted on a significant scale thereafter. On the Trotskyist movement before the Second World War The second part of the book examined early British Trotskyism, from its establishment with the Balham group in 1932 to its incorporation into the RCP and subsequent fragmentation in 1949. This period is divided into three distinct phases. The first phase, spanning from 1932 to 1937, illustrates how British Trotskyist dissident communists were unable to find a political foothold, leading them to adopt different forms of entryism, first within the ILP, then within Labour, and later in a coalition comprising both the ILP (via the Marxist Group) and Labour (via the Marxist League and the Militant Group) while maintaining an independent organisation (the RSL). These strategic shifts created significant factionalism among British Trotskyists due to their inability to emerge as a political force, even a minor one. The Fourth International’s lack of clear leadership further compounded these issues, as it was deeply divided after Trotsky’s death. The WIL, a group outside the International Secretariat, survived by initially focusing on fractional work within Labour, before transitioning away from it to gain a strong militant base. The second phase, from 1938 to 1944, highlights the competition between the RSL, with its hybrid entryist approach, and the WIL, which gradually abandoned entryist tactics. The WIL eventually became the dominant force in British Trotskyism and led the majority of its followers outside the Labour Party to form a single Trotskyist group, which became a political party for the first time: the RCP. The third phase, from 1944 to 1949, witnessed a resurgence in the debate on entryism between the RCP minority, who favoured entryism, and the RCP majority, who advocated for independence. The disagreement stemmed from divergent economic prognoses and remained unresolved. The International Secretariat, which favoured entryism as a quasi-doctrine, intervened in the British section by granting

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the minority the status of the main and official section of British Trotskyism. Consequently, the RCP majority was isolated and unable to establish itself as a significant political force, and it disbanded in 1949. Its remaining members resumed total and secret entryism into the Labour Party. On the Trotskyist movement after the Second World War In the final section, the relationship between entryism and the Labour Party within the four main Trotskyist traditions in the latter half of the 20th century was examined. The Healyite tradition transitioned from a secretive practice of entryism to an ambiguous confrontation with the Labour Party, resulting in the creation of the SLL and a successful coup d’éclat that led to the departure of the youth section of the Labour Party. Meanwhile, the IMG and the Cliffite tradition utilised the Labour Party as a temporary vehicle for survival before departing during the radical decade of the 1960s. The Cliffites transformed their organisation (the IS) into a real party, the SWP, by establishing their independence from the Labour Party, while the IMG struggled with mutation and ultimately returned to the Labour Party without significant impact. The Grantite tradition, represented by Militant from 1964 to 1992, was the most successful in establishing itself as an influential political force, getting MPs in Westminster, influencing the positions of the Labour Party, and contributing to the resignation of Margaret Thatcher. However, the success of Militant’s entryism led the Labour Party to tighten its disciplinary grip on the party and to conduct a witch hunt against Militant. Although the myth of entryism as an insidious and invasive tactic contains some truth, it is clear that there were multiple forms, objectives, and extents of entryism that were set up in Britain. While The Club’s entryism in the 1950s embodies this popular image of an ultra-secret tactic, it is difficult to speak of entryism in the singular. Not only are the forms multiple, but the objectives and scope of the latter in relation to the organisation practising them are also varied in several modalities. Proposed typology After a thorough examination of the different main attempts at entryism in the political history of British communism, we can establish in Table 11.1 defining the characteristics of entryism: Table 11.1 Criteria and modalities of entryism Stealth

Length

Scale

Objective

End trigger

Total secret

Short term

Individual

Survival

Secrecy of intentions With one’s banner unfurled

Indefinite Fractional – expectative Sui-generis Total

No more possibilities/ reorientation Removal (ban/ expulsion) Contagion/liquidation

Recruitment Propaganda Containment

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All five criteria are combinatorial and allow us to exhaustively describe any form of entryism. Here is a definition of each modality: Stealth

Total secret: the entryist group attempts to conceal its presence within the party it has infiltrated, as exemplified by The Club, which operated covertly within the Labour Party without an identifiable organisational structure. The group’s operations were carried out ad hoc by its members, including the invitation process, membership procedures, and meeting organisation. The majority of the group’s activities took place during meetings and through press organs that were not formally linked to the group, such as Socialist Outlook. Secrecy of Intentions: the entryist group does not operate secretly but rather hides its intentions from the party it enters. It presents itself as a tendency or pressure group, as was the case with Militant, the IMG, the International Socialists, and, to some extent, the Socialist Labour League. In the second half of the 20th century, secrecy of intentions was the most common entry strategy. The main advantage of this strategy is that the group is identifiable to the public it is addressing, but it does not openly state its revolutionary intentions or desire for the infiltrated party to collapse in favour of a revolutionary party. With one’s banner unfurled: the entryist group is not necessarily secretive and may reveal part of its intentions to the entered party. In the British context, several cases are observable, such as the Marxist Group, the Socialist Labour League, and the CPGB. However, the logic of the entry “With one’s banner unfurled” is debatable in the case of the SLL, as it only shows up in some of its documents, with tactical developments sometimes changing. This tactic allows for approaching the whole group and sending a signal to its members. In the case of the Marxist Group, the idea was to address the Independent Labour Party (ILP) during its so-called centrist phase to make it drift left and escape the influence of the Third International, as recommended by Trotsky himself. The SLL used this modality to trigger its own expulsion from the Labour Party, garnering massive publicity and leaving with some of its militants. Length

Short-term: “a few years with a precise objective”. It emulates the logic of a raid, with rapid entry and exit. The Socialist Labour League’s case is a perfect example of this approach: once The Club was transformed into the SLL, the group aimed to be expelled as quickly as possible while taking as many Labour activists as possible with them. This tactic allows for a high degree of control over the exit. The SLL was broadly successful in taking more than a thousand Young Socialist members out of the Labour Party and turning several hundred of them into permanent members. Indefinite-expectative: the most common modality in the British context was the one that aligned with survival entryism, with a specific objective that could be

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achieved within a few years. It meets several needs, including maintaining activity and integrity for a group that cannot exist independently. It is also used as a last resort when no better idea is available. For instance, when the International Socialism Group or the Socialist Review Group left The Club, they lacked the strength to establish themselves as independent groups, so they had to wait for a more favourable situation before extricating themselves from the Labour Party or determining a new strategy. This modality is not necessarily synonymous with hibernation, although it can also cover this reality. It corresponds to an entry with no immediate prospect of exit. Militant used this modality by becoming the RSL and then waiting for a favourable situation to exit. Sui-generis: “indefinite entry until a major event” (in the communist case: a revolutionary crisis). This modality was prescribed by the Secretariat of the Fourth International in the aftermath of the Second World War and was adopted by four British groups: The Club, Militant, Socialist Action, and Socialist Appeal. Indefinite entryism is aimed at long-term work, with the idea of efficient propaganda rather than strict conversion of the entered group’s members. Militant and the Lambertist current in France are the most prominent adopters of this tactic. Practically, this modality can be achieved by existing as a pressure group within the organisation in an uncovered way, as was the case with Militant. They pushed the logic to its paroxysm by not proposing any status or cards of “Militant members” but rather of “Militant Supporters”. Scale

Individual: involves only a few individuals working on their own behalf within the entering party. This modality often takes the form of free dual membership. The Workers’ International League employed this form of entryism. Some of its members had been recruited from the Labour Party membership due to the group’s origins as a split from the Militant Group. Others were recruited through propaganda work within the ILP, and they retained their dual membership. The league, not being a party in the true sense, was able to operate under this modality, which allowed for limited-scale propaganda work and militant information gathering within the penetrated party. Fractional: an entryist fraction is a group that collaborates with the original group and operates within the entered party to achieve specific objectives without committing the group as a whole, at least for the time being. In the British context, this modality was set up by the Communist Party of Great Britain and the first Revolutionary Socialist League. It is worth noting that it was not widely replicated in the second half of the 20th century. The CPGB adopted this modality to lobby for its affiliation with the Labour Party from the inside. The fractions were composed of groups of activists who operated either within the CLPs or within front organisations such as the Minority Movement. Maintaining the presence of organised groups within the penetrated organisation allows for effective coordination and the deployment of different strategies in an organised manner, ranging from minimal, such as getting a delegate elected to the host party’s

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congress, to maximal, such as reorienting the organisation’s policy and forming pressure groups. The choice between full-scale entryism and fractional entryism can be justified in several ways. Firstly, the entryist group may not be welcomed in the host party, either because of a legal mechanism, as was the case with the British Communist Party, or because of too much distrust of the host organisation, which then reduces the entryist group’s room for manoeuvre. The second reason may be the lack of willingness to really join the penetrated party. Theoretically, the first RSL did not aim to take place within the Labour Party as a whole; the entryist fraction was meant to execute a support role for the organisation, such as propaganda and recruitment. Total: the modality of total entryism involves moving the entire organisation into the entered party and is generally considered the most common form of entryism. This tactic allows the entryist group to take a position as close as possible to the members of the entered party. It also enables the group to dissolve or camouflage its own identity more easily, making it easier to approach and convert members to the entryist group’s ideology. However, while total entryism offers greater ease of contact, it also exposes the entryist group to greater disciplinary action by the entering party. For example, the Socialist Labour League and Militant were expelled from the Labour Party for their disruptive and subversive activity within the party. In 2021, Socialist Appeal, the minority faction of Militant that refused to abandon entryism, was also expelled from the Labour Party. Expulsion is not necessarily a problem, but it can be an issue when it undermines the plans of an entryist organisation that has based its entire strategy on the modality of total entryism. Objective

Survival: this modality of entryism is used when a group joins the entered party in order to avoid disappearing due to unfavourable circumstances. The majority of the RCP in 1949, which could no longer sustain an independent organisation, and the Socialist League/Socialist Action in 1982, which returned inside the Labour Party due to a lack of public support, are examples of this constrained modality. In the British context, the success of this modality was uncertain, with the majority of the RCP failing to survive and Socialist Action not achieving significant success until 2015, when Jeremy Corbyn became the leader of the Labour Party. Successful survival entryism examples are the entryism set up by the Socialist Review Group and the International Socialism Group, with both groups consolidating and adapting their strategy over the years to become the Socialist Workers Party and Militant/the Socialist Party, the two major groups on the British far left today. Recruitment: the aim of this modality is to recruit new members, especially from the youth section of the entered party, who are perceived as lacking training, loyalty, or apparent radicalism compared to the party as a whole. In the British context, this method was often combined with front organisations, such as the Militant Labour League for the Militant Group in the second half of the 1930s,

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or the multiple organisations and social movements established by groups using a peripheral strategy, such as the Communist Party in the 1920s–1930s and the IMG and IS in the 1960s–1970s. The “exit-ist” strategy of the SLL in 1959 can also be considered part of this recruitment modality. Propaganda: the purpose of entryism is to disseminate revolutionary socialist ideas within the context of building a powerful and broad-based revolutionary movement. In the British example, joining the Labour Party provided a platform to address the masses more effectively, particularly those who were otherwise indifferent to revolutionary groups. Propaganda is the primary militant activity for a Leninist vanguard party, and therefore, all Leninist groups utilise this modality. In fact, this is the lowest common denominator in terms of the objectives of entryism. Containment: the purpose of entry is to prevent the organisation from being contaminated by a competing ideology. In the case of British Trotskyism, this was done in the 1930s to protect the ILP, or the Labour Youth, from being converted to Stalinist ideas. The activity of the Marxist Group within the ILP is a good example of this practice. End trigger

No more possibilities/reorientation: the objective initially pursued by the entryist group becomes unattainable, and the group decides that independent work would be more profitable. This was the case with the IMG and the IS, which terminated their entry into the Labour Party as they felt that it no longer offered sufficient prospects for revolutionaries and that social movements provided better opportunities. The CPGB also had to abandon its entryist activity in 1939 for legal reasons, as the potential risk involved in declaring the Communist Party an illegal organisation was deemed too great. The Open Turn of Militant arose from a similar situation where the group’s efforts to remain active within the Labour Party failed to meet its expectations following the victory against Margaret Thatcher’s poll tax. This constitutes a controlled end to entryism. Removal: the entryist group becomes exposed and may face disciplinary action from the party they have joined, or the environment may become too hostile for them to continue, and they are forced to retreat to independence. The Communist Party of Great Britain and Militant faced expulsions and disciplinary measures that compelled them to modify their approach towards the Labour Party, even if their expulsion did not technically end their entryism. The SLL and, more recently, Socialist Appeal were expelled from the Labour Party, marking an end to their entryism. Contagion/liquidation: The entryist group completely dissolves into the entered group, and its members lose their revolutionary ideas or abandon them due to discouragement, adopting the ideas of the entered party instead. The Marxist League is an example of partially responding to this idea, as most of its members stopped revolutionary activism once the first RSL was formed, and its main cadre, Reginald Groves, became a strong supporter of Labour. From

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our observations, this modality is more likely to be observed among individuals and cadres of the revolutionary movement than among the organisations themselves. It is interesting, however, that the social democratic cadres that emerged from this process remain the target of accusations of Trotskyism ad vitam aeternam. This was the case for former French Prime Minister Lionel Jospin, who spent his youth as an infiltrated Trotskyist within the French Socialist Party and was accused by the right of still being a Trotskyist for a long time even during his term. Once these 16 modalities have been established and divided into five criteria, we can try to apply them to the groups we have observed to check how well they work in describing the entryist phenomenon. Table 11.2 synthesizes significant forms of entryism in Britain. It is apparent that the absence of subordination to a particular political theory has contributed to the diverse range of entryist strategies. Additionally, there appears to be no association between the aims of entryism and its extent, duration, or secrecy. As such, it appears that the methods of entryism utilised by communist organisations are heavily influenced by their respective contexts. This is especially evident in the early examples of entryism, where strategies were often dictated by the guidance of influential figures within the international communist movement, such as Lenin for the CPGB and Trotsky for both the Marxist Group and later the Militant Group. It appears that the Labour Party itself, rather than the leading forces of international communism, had a greater influence on the forms of entryism adopted by British communists. Communist Party entryism became secretive when the Labour Party began to create legislation to prevent Communists from infiltrating the party. Trotskyist entryism into the ILP aimed to gain access to the Labour Party and, as a more radical group, hoped to influence the party towards more progressive policies. However, when this strategy failed, Trotsky assessed that the masses of the Labour Party had not left the party, leading to his decision to return to the Labour Party in 1936. The post-war period provides a clear example of how context shapes the modalities of entryism. The RCP’s major divisions from 1945 onwards were centred around a debate about the changing economic landscape and the Labour Party’s response to it. The minority believed that due to the instability of the international political context, a crisis was imminent and that it was essential to be with the masses within the Labour Party rather than remaining independent of it. On the other hand, the majority of the RCP believed that the impending crisis necessitated staying outside the Labour Party to attract the crowds that would come from it. In both cases, the Labour Party was viewed as incapable of leading the masses to liberation, and it was up to the revolutionary group to provide an alternative. The analysis made of the Labour Party thus conditioned entryism rather than the adoption of a general tactic that could be applied to all situations.

Table 11.2 Synthesis of the most significant forms of entryism in Britain throughout the communist left in Britain Organisation

Stealth

Length intended Duration (in years)

Cumulative duration (in years)

Scale

Secondary objective

End trigger

Fate of the organisation

Communist Party Multiple of Great Britain

Indefiniteexpectative

19

19

Individual

Recruitment

Fragmentation

Marxist League

No

Not defined

2

2

Total

Contagion

Marxist Group

No

Indefiniteexpectative

3

3

Total

Containment

Removal No more possibilities Liquidation Contagion Removal

Militant Group

Multiple

Indefiniteexpectative Not defined

2

3

Total

Propaganda

Liquidation

7

9

Fractional

Recruitment

Liquidation

Workers No International League Revolutionary Total Communist secret Party (minorité) The Club Total

Short term

6

6

Individual

Recruitment

Reorientation

Sui-generis

3

3

Fractional

Propaganda

–

Continuation as The Club

Sui-generis

19

22

Total

Propaganda

–

Socialist Labour No League International No Socialism Group

Short term