Listen Luuxemburgist!

"It resembles anarchism in its insistence that only relying on the people themselves as opposed to their leaders can avoid an authoritarian society, but differs in that it sees the importance of a revolutionary party, and mainly the centrality of the working class in the revolutionary struggle."

So... In another thread this is how someone described so called Luxemburgism as being different to anarchism, but what do you mean by revolutionary party? I'm an anarchist but I believe that those members of the class who believe in a revolution for real social change led by working class militants should organise together on the basis of theoretical and tactical unity. I would not describe such a formation as a party - what would you call it?

In fact it's a quote from Wikipedia, it's not something written by one of us here.

About the "revolutionary party", this is what William PELZ writes in “Another Luxemburgism is Possible: Reflections on Rosa and the Radical Socialist Project” :

The fourth component of Luxemburgism is her view of the revolutionary party.
As noted previously, Rosa Luxemburg was a committed democrat with a deep faith in the masses of common people. As she wrote in “What Does Spartakus Want?”: we “will never take over governmental power except in response to the clear, unambiguous will of the great majority of the proletarian masses of all of Germany, never except by the proletariat’s conscious affirmation of the views, aims and methods of struggle of the Spartacus League.” These beliefs prevented her from adopting Lenin’s ultra centrist form of the Party. For her, socialism--true socialism--could only be achieved with the full mobilization of the workers as active actors in their own liberation. While uncompromising in her opposition to capitalism and all forms of exploitation, Rosa was creative and far removed from the dogmatic drones who came to dominate European communism in the decades after her death. The Party, for Rosa Luxemburg, was to be neither a substitute for the working masses nor a electoral machine using the common people as passive markers of ballots. Rather, it was a creative, evolving interaction between “leaders” and “followers.”

As for me, I don't think that a party is indispensable (party in the traditional meaning - it's important to remember that Marx used the word in another way : "the party in the broad historical sense", Letter to Freiligrath 29 February 1860).

Interesting. I believe that all militant and progressive examples of working class organisation should federate together in a democratic and fighting association, and that revolutionaries should work within such a formation as an open tendency that agitates for our ideas - that doesn't seem much different to what you're talking about to me.

I do thing the notion of a revolutionary "party" has been discredited by the various Leninist and Trotskyist groups, certainly in Britain over the last 50 years or so, and their undemocratic and disruptive behaviour; maybe it's time to use a different word.

Hi and welcome!

A lot of words are now associated with Leninist principles indeed and not just in the United Kingdom.

I also think that there should be a wide revolutionary organization. Its role is to influence workers' movement in their councils and not lead them. This is the main break from Leninism and Opportunism (right wing tendency of social democratics parties 100 years ago). It is not the Party that develops the movement but the movement that improves the party (or organization).

I believe that such an organization is required in order to have a force countering counter-revolutionary groups. Think of 1968 in France the CP and the main (stalinist-controlled) union managed to deviate the struggle from revolution. The same thing happened in Germany with the SPD...

So we need a democratic party (I don't mind using this word) that empowers proleterians.

It looks like we're on the same page at least. What is Democratic Communiste? Is that an organisation that seeks to build the sort of party you describe?

I think we are really talking about two things. One is the need for some sort of organization or network of like-thinking activists that is an alternative to a vanguard party. The second is the need for mass workers organizations that can exist in a crisis period, but before a real revolutionary period. These have to be entirely different from, on the one hand, trade unions, and on the other, social-democratic parliamentary parties.

In the first problem, the question is how we can achieve some unity in action without having either centralism or endless splits.

It looks like we're on the same page at least. What is Democratic Communiste? Is that an organisation that seeks to build the sort of party you describe?

We don't have that pretention. Démocratie Communiste (http://democom.neuf.fr) is a tiny group based in France. Together with other comrades from Spain, Norway, Portugal and America we are planning to have a bulletin and surely more in the future. But the point is that we are at the present quite small but I think our current should have a voice within revolutionary movements.

As for Anarchism and what we think is authentic Marxism, there is not much difference on the relation between workers and organization. Remember that the ultimate goal is stateless society. However, we don't agree on all the means. In the future workers should get passed these theoretical differences and unite.

I think we are really talking about two things. One is the need for some sort of organization or network of like-thinking activists that is an alternative to a vanguard party. The second is the need for mass workers organizations that can exist in a crisis period, but before a real revolutionary period. These have to be entirely different from, on the one hand, trade unions, and on the other, social-democratic parliamentary parties.

Indeed. For me, there should be an international network or group of like-minded activists so that they can make a current within the workers' movement but on the local level there should be broad mass groups. In both cases, there can't be substitution of the class by a party. That is the key.

Concretely, I think a revolutionary international journal is a good way to develop such a tendency. Then, people can become active as they think is the best way locally, depending on their social realities.

I think we are really talking about two things. One is the need for some sort of organization or network of like-thinking activists that is an alternative to a vanguard party. The second is the need for mass workers organizations that can exist in a crisis period, but before a real revolutionary period. These have to be entirely different from, on the one hand, trade unions, and on the other, social-democratic parliamentary parties.

Yes, we definately need both those things

In the first problem, the question is how we can achieve some unity in action without having either centralism or endless splits.

In brief I would say an organisation of revolutionaries who are committed to working together on the basis of theoretical and tactical unity, should adopt positions based on their real experience in class struggle, and after full and open debate with members - and those they work with.

I would suggest it should work along federalist lines with a delegate council that is empowered within a limited remit to make snap decisions on the organisation's behalf, and respond to rapidly unfolding situations without having to consult every member, but these delegates are regularly replaced, and can of course be recalled at any time. With the governing body of the org being an annual delegate conference.

You need a healthy internal culture, with lots of room for discussion, education, and openess with those who are not members but you are working with on a regular basis.

ElIndio wrote:
We don't have that pretention. Démocratie Communiste (http://democom.neuf.fr) is a tiny group based in France. Together with other comrades from Spain, Norway, Portugal and America we are planning to have a bulletin and surely more in the future. But the point is that we are at the present quite small but I think our current should have a voice within revolutionary movements.

Interesting stuff, do you have any members in London?

I posted the initial invitation to the bulletin project in the following link : https://luxemburgism.forumotion.com/general-f1/project-multilingual-bulletin-t61.htm

So far there is nobody in England, unfortunately. But anyone who feels should be part of this can join.
We set up a discussion list for this and we are preparing the website of the future journal.

I would suggest it should work along federalist lines with a delegate council that is empowered within a limited remit to make snap decisions on the organisation's behalf, and respond to rapidly unfolding situations without having to consult every member, but these delegates are regularly replaced, and can of course be recalled at any time. With the governing body of the org being an annual delegate conference.

How we have worked in the past (Democracia Comunista in Spain and Démocratie Communiste in France) was to take all decisions relating to the overall group together (simple majority) and whatever involved the local surrounding, we decided locally.

We came to the conclusion that we should reach some kind of minimum platform on which we all agree (as of today we got two texts on this : For Democratic Communism and What is Communist Democracy (Luxemburgist). These texts can be changed and discussed any time even by new members.
This is even more so if the bulletin project is completely set up.

Based on this "plateform" all views can be held, discussed... We know that we don't have final anwsers, we hafve a heritage (Marxism and LuxemburgisM) that needs to be looked at critically by analysing History and complete this with other currents (autonomism, anarchism, left communism...) and our studies, researches...

Every member is free to work in other organizations : unions, parties or whatever s/he thinks is the best option as long as we agree on the basis.

So there is a mix of centralism (we vote all together and apply decisions, even though anyone can publicly say s/he disagrees with the majority) and federalism (members can organize/act outside of the groups as s/he thinks is best).

But this works fine for a tiny group. For a larger one, I agree there should be delegates, committees, etc. The point is to have a constant control on mandated people and ensure democracy and make sure no "leader" appears. Because it would be the end of the group.