ELEMENTS OF RESPONSE TO THE INTERNATIONALIST COMMUNISTS CIRCLE
(INTERNAL FRACTION OF THE ICC)

The change of orientation of the comrade of the Círculo is first and foremost a change with the method of regroupment, of discussion, of debate, of political clarification led by the liquidationist ICC. It's first and foremost a break with the policy of secret and of the discussion "apart" with the present ICC. It expresses their willingness to open debate with and in front of the whole proletarian camp. Particularly with the IBRP and our fraction. It marks the renewed affirmation of the dynamic towards the confrontation and the clarification of different, and sometimes even contradictory, positions circulating within this camp. This dynamic of political confrontation and of political clarification within the proletarian camp, already engaged since some times now, can and must broaden, deepen and take roots.

Our task in this process is simple and clear : to defend the true ICC positions which are today distorted and politically liquidated and, still worse, threatened of disappearance. Their dramatical caricature and the disgusting that the present ICC provokes, risk to lead to the rejection and, worst, to the ignorance of the classical positions of the ICC which would be amalgamated with their present revision and with their present political liquidation.

Whether they are right or wrong, whether they're going to be verified and to become an active and essential factor in the proletariat struggle or refuted and invalidated, they have to be really discussed, debated, confronted. The ICC positions must be seriously examined and criticized. This debate, this political struggle, would inescapably lack if it was not to develop. Is not there one of the goals, if not The goal, the main and constant one of liquidationism, to make disappear this political confrontation ? Is not there what have begun to respond the IBRP, and too the ICP-Le Prolétaire, through the publication of articles on the classical positions of the ICC ? Thus "somebody", it means a political organization what ever is its form - party, group, fraction -, must embody and defend these positions. There isn't but our fraction which can do it today. It's precisely what we begun to do in our bulletin 22 with the comrades of the former NCI when we published their statement on the demonstrations in Bolivia (the end of 2003) and our letter which aimed at presenting to the comrades the real position of the ICC on the struggles of the proletariat in the peripheral countries. It's also through this that our fraction is the ICC.

For its part, the liquidationism carries on its destructive policy and plunges the present ICC in the depths of political failure and powerlessness. Since the holding of the public meeting of the ICC in Buenos Aires, August 27th 2004, and the discussions between its delegation and the NCI during which the Argentinian comrades expressed their increasing disagreements with the liquidationist policy and orientation, the ICC has multiplied in its press articles of the Núcleo defending positions that today it rejects without even mentionning this political break. Can we doubt here of the knowledge by the delegation and the secretariat of the central organ of the ICC, the IS, it means the liquidationist faction core, of these disagreements ? Or should we believe in omissions and lies towards the... very militants of the ICC ? In any case, here is a scandalous and disgusting omission whose aim is to sow doubts on the comrades and to try to "confine" them through blackmail, since it's exactly what it is, on their former positions. Here is an other example of the obtruction policy, not to say destruction, to the clarity of the debate and to the political clarification.

As by chance, the last International Review 119, October 2004, publishes a text of the NCI which is today in complete opposition to what we've reproduced above. The text of the ex-NCI defends "the correctness of the ICC's position, which we defend, when its classifies the events of the 19th and 20th December [2001 in Argentina] as an inter-classist revolt" and that "to say that there was not a workers’ struggle in Argentina on 19th December 2001 in no way implies being a deserter of the class struggle, as the IFICC pretends". It even goes up to classify all the "piquetero experience", the unemployed, at the bourgeois State service : "The positions adopted by these assemblies and those that followed clearly demonstrated the nature of the different piquetero groups, as an apparatus in the service of the bourgeois state. This nature did not change later after the split between the Polo Obrero and the other two currents, leading to the formation of the Bloque Piquetero" (International Review 119, underlined by us).

Today, in the text we publish, the comrades clearly present an other position than the ICC one and, above all, an other orientation for the revolutionaries' intervention : " We must draw lessons of the first piqueteros assemblies that developped in Argentina, their strengths and their weaknesses in order to bring out the necessary teachings. But such assemblies, let's be clear, aren't the party. Their existence is independant from the revolutionary party even though this one must actively participate in those ones. It's true that these workers assemblies have a limit which is the demand limit ["reivindicativo límite"]. That's why the party must act within it in order they can overcome this barrier without it means participating in the unions" (underlined by us).

We let the comrades of the Círculo to come back and to explain both the reasons of their change of position and the conditions in which they had then adopted the new thesis of the ICC.

Nevertheless, on this question of the unemployed assemblies, on their quality, their nature, their different natures, and when they are true expressions of struggle, on their role and on the intervention that the communists must lead, it remains that we have a first political question to debate and to precise to the light of the particular experience of the proletariat in Argentina. And we see two levels of discussion and of political clarification : the principles which must guide the understanding and the intervention of communist groups in this kind of movement ; and the real analysis, not schematical, not dogmatical, of the immediate reality, in this case the concrete situation which prevailed at that time in Argentina, certainly very diverse and sometimes even contradictory, in particular in these piqueteros' and barrios assemblies.

On the content of the Círculo text

The text of the Círculo deals more particularly with describing the situation which prevailed in the peripheral countries of capitalism, especially in South America and in Argentina, all along the years 1990. The worth of the text is to situate the concrete evolution of capitalism in theses countries and of the classes struggle in the framework of the international situation opened up after the fall of the Berlin Wall.

Then, it deals with the evolution of the classes struggle during that period. There would be much points, even formulations or concepts to precise with the comrades, because in themselves they come to express confused positions, even false ones.

An example : "The industrial working class carries on being crushed non only for the defeat it has suffered in a recent past but also for the organization method of the production which replaced fordism and which meant an attack to the organization and to the proletarian solidarity since the extreme enlistment of the companies avoids the working class self-organization" (we underline the point that we think we should clarify).

As such, in itself, this affirmation seems false to us. We can quite well, on the contrary, consider that the discipline and the extreme isolation of the workers today in relation with the old organizations of work, on their work places, impose - we don't say favour - even more the immediate, quick one, extension and organization of the workers themselves in the struggle in order to precisely overcome this increased dispersal. The examples of the British postmen "wildcat" strike in October 2003, of the Italian tramways in December 2003-January 2004, and now the one, still "wildcat", of the 9000 workers of the car factory of OPEL in Bochum in Germany, come to illustrate our general statement. General we say, since of course it doesn't take into account, nor does the comrades' one, the concrete situation. In the last, it's the "political" relation of forces, in this case the willingness and the decision for coming into struggle and the "political" forces in presence on the ground, which determine the need and the ability to organize - even though the organization of work, as well as the concentration, as the... geography, also participate to the concrete realization of this organization of the struggle.

Is it necessary here to recall that we have, it means our organization the ICC, always defended that revolutionaries had too, in relation to their militant forces, a primary, determining, role at that level of class struggle ? Particularly for putting forward the slogans which go in that direction regarding the real possibilities, it means the general relation of forces, the local relation of forces (which can "differ" with the first one, for instance because the presence or the missing of strong and active unions, or indeed the presence of revolutionary militants or of a... "struggle committee"), and the concrete local conditions, the work conditions, the geographical situation, etc...

Finally, the comrades' text raise questions and divergences which aren't new within the proletarian camp. They affect the union question ; the question of the particular conditions and potentialities of the proletariat's struggle within the countries at the periphery of capitalism. They also affect the question of the factory workers groups according to the IBRP (we hope we don't distort its definition) or what we called, and carry on calling, the struggle committees. These disagreements are old. Nevertheless, the new situation of the proletarian camp and, above all, the new dynamic of the international situation, in particular the revival of the workers struggles, present the conditions for a renewal, indeed a new start, of the debate and the confrontation of the positions. At the least, we quite say at the least, we must be able to precise and to clarify the different concepts, the different positions and the different methods of analysis and of understanding which found them. This is this militant and fraternal approach which already allowed to precise, at the right level in our opinion, the disagreements on the question of decadence between the IBRP and the ICC, for instance. It's in the same spirit we want to raise the following points.

The union question

The unions "don't try but to sale the work force in best conditions. But it's impossible because the reformist period when it was possible that the bourgeoisie made concessions to the proletariat, is over. Actions of such counter-revolutionary tools aren't but mediations in favor of capital". This position, already present in the proletarian camp, isn't shared by the ICC.

For our part, the ICC, we defend that the counter-revolutionary function at the service of the bourgeois State of the unions and unionism, included the radical, the rank and file, the "revolutionary" ones, is first and foremost political. Consequently, as direct emanation of the bourgeois State in the present historical period, the unions has no "mediation" role, it means in the sense there would be a "mediation" between two opposed classes by a third element above or outside the two antagonistic classes. We think the concept of "mediation" - as we undestand it - opens the door to this error. On the contrary, the primary role of the unions, political and ideological, is to surround the working class and to oppose to the development of its historical struggle as well as its immediate ones. We can't develop more in this text. Nevertheless, these two visions can drive to different interventions in the workers struggles even though, lately, we could rather notice a "convergence'" between the IBRP one, even of certain bordiguist groups, and the ICC's such as our fraction has realized it. The line of "fracture" within the proletarian camp on this question rather divide today all these groups on one side with the liquidationists' ICC with its defeatist positions on the other side.

Without developing, let's precise at once, and above all let's recall what has always defended our organization, that this position about the primary "political" role of the unions doesn't mean that the revolutionaries give them up the ground of the economicial struggles, of the demands, nor they keep a "purist" attitude, of "indifferentism", in front of any union "initiative" such as theirs calls for assemblies or demonstrations. Here it's as for the unemployed assemblies we mention previously. It's up to the communists to be able to acknowledge the immediate potentialities of the struggle and the aim, the goal, the quality, of such or such union "initiative" : in particular, does it respond to a real workers pressure in order to derail it and to sabotage it or is a trap ? And according to the answer, to intervene towards that or that direction, and through that or that form in relation to the cases. Indeed, in the case of workers assemblies called by the unions, the ICC has always defended that its militants had to participate in it. Nor had our organization hesitated to call the workers to participate to demonstrations called by the unions in the years 1980 in order they would "transform" them in real workers demonstrations. As well, our fraction supported and greeted the processions regrouping thousands of workers of different sectors around the teachers who attempted to take the lead of the street demonstrations - called and organized by the unions against the strike and its spreading - and to impose the slogan of "public-private sector, general strike" during the struggle against the pensions 2003 reform in France. So they intended to "transform" these demonstrations and "day of action" called by the unions and whose aim was to avoid the existing renewal and extension of the strike, into a moment of generalization to all the sectors.

The insistence on the anti-workers political role, at the service of the bourgeois State, of the unions doesn't signify indifferentism and a desertion of the struggle against these unions and against their influence within the class. All the contrary, this understanding of the political character of the unions does reinforce the imperious need to fight them the "leadership" and the orientation of the struggles, even the immediate ones.

The workers struggle in the peripheral countries

This question is also a question which separates the ICC from the whole other communist organizations. We already dealt it with the NCI in our bulletin 22. We'll just recall here in its great lines the true position of our organization. The ICC has elaborated a criticism of Lenin's theory of the weak links ["Théorie des maillons faibles"] according to which the revolutionary process would be started easier in the weaker countries of the capitalist world. Contrary, our organization developped that it was in the historically, politically, and even "geographically" central countries that the revolutionary process and its outcome would be determined.

This position has been criticized then as europeocentrist. To tell the truth, Lenin's position as well as the ICC one can't be taken in an absolute, dogmatic, way unless one doesn't understand anything and doesn't "respond" to the point. No serious people would deny that the struggle outset of the 9000 German Opel workers in Bochum hasn't the same significance in terms of potentialities for itself as well as for the whole working class than the entry into struggle, for instance, of 200 workers of the steel plant of the small town of Wheeling isolated in the deep end of West Virginia despite it's located in the United-States ; or even still than the Maracay steel workers of Venezuela, or than the teachers and masters of Oaxaca State in Mexico. Acknowledging this doesn't mean that the Wheeling workers, the Oaxaca masters, can't struggle, nor that they should not struggle and just wait for the proletarian struggle in West Europe to develop. All the contrary, for one part they are constrained to struggle, and for the other part they have a particular role and particular responsabilities towards the international proletariat as well as towards their class brothers around them and towards the other empoverished and no exploiting masses and classes which surround them. We particularly think of the peasantry and of unemployed masses which populate the great metropolis of the peripheral countries. But they also can, in certain circunstances and in very precise moments, have a determining role in the development of the international classes struggle. The historical example is given by the 1917 Rusian Revolution in a relatively peripheral country but whose proletariat was very concentrated and had a great experience of struggle (1905). The other example is the August 1980 mass strike in Poland, other relatively peripheral country. But even the movement of workers struggles, as confused it was, of Winter 2001 in Argentina has played a role in announcing the international revival of the struggles... if it wasn't so, why do we discuss and do we try to clarify what are the Piqueteros assemblies ?

One of the difficulties of our position is the risk of its mechanical and dogmatic understanding. This difficulty has been expressed within the very ICC itself in various occasions all along its history in this subject as on others. Here there is nothing abnormal. It is part of the normal life of an organization. And internal debates, generally quite quickly concluded, rejected this false method and vision. Today, this dogmatic vision has been definitively imposed by liquidationism. The reader could notice it, the analysis of the ICC on the particularities of the workers struggles in the peripheral countries that we summarily recalled above, has nothing to do with the position developped today by the liquidationist faction of this organization. On the basis of the dogma of decomposition and on an idealist and abstract vision of the workers struggle, the today ICC rejects the Argentinian experience by amalgamating it with the "hunger riots" whose character was "interclassist", or even with the street demonstrations supporting President Chavez in Venezuela, under the pretext that the Argentinian Winter 2001 demonstrations and assemblies weren't... "pure", it means purely worker.

In a first time, the comrades of the NCI have adopted this position as doesn't miss to recall the International Review 119. Now, in the text published above, the comrades reject this position which tends to deny any role and any responsability to the proletariat of the peripheral countries. "That's why the proletariat's response must be global and international. There is no difference between the proletariat of the imperialist nations and the peripheral one. There is no nation lost for the revolution". The last sentence is a clear and explicit rejection of the new position of the ICC according to which countries of the capitalist periphery, like Haiti, are lost for the revolution : "Capitalist decomposition has terribly advanced in Haiti making this region as certainly lost for the revolutionary cause" (Revolución Mundial 79, Mexican publication of the ICC, translated by us).

We find again the "fracture" line within the proletarian camp we already mentionned also on this question between on one side the whole communist groups and on the other side the ICC of the liquidationists with its indifferentist and defeatist positions on this question. Obviously, we greet the evolution of the Argentinian comrades' position. Now remains the true question to discuss, to debate and to clarify : are there differences of situation and potentialities of struggle between the different fractions of the world proletariat ? And if so, what are the tasks and the particular responsabilities of every one of this fractions vis-à-vis the world proletariat and its revolutionary struggle ?

Organization and organisms of the proletariat's struggle

The IBRP and the ICC, just to mention only these two currents, have the same position, if not the same vision and the same understanding, on the unitarian organization the class in struggle gives itself such as the general assemblies, strike committees, workers councils, etc... The comrades of the ex-NCI take back and defend the need for "self-organization". They too deal with the question of setting up minoritarian organisms of struggle of the working class. They deal there with an important question to which the revolutionaries already intented to give answers. For instance, for the IBRP, it's necessary for the revolutionaries to create factory groups linked to the political organization, linked and directed by the party, who have a political function of agitation in the work places and in the struggles. We hope we don't betray the comrades' position and we let them the presentation and the defence of their position. For its part, the ICC defends the possibility and the need for the building up of struggle committees by the working class, when it is realizable and concretely raised, in particular around some mobilizations, in which the communist organizations and militants must intervene. What is today the degree of difference between the two positions and two visions ? We think too it's a point to clarify and the comrades of the Círculo offer us this opportunity.

"The constitution of workers and territorial groups is fundamental for the communists in order to attract the workers vanguard - in activity or unemployed - without this implies a political adhesion to a determined political group since it's the revolutionary minority that will guide the working class to revolution and to full class consciousness". In their text, the comrades use the Argentinian experience of unemployed and district assemblies. The dramatic situation of the working class and of the population in general in the country has provoked a period relatively long of mobilization with characteristics of "permanent struggle". We must take into account this reality and the questions it raises. The liquidationists within the ICC have resolved the problem by declaring that this movement was interclassist and that the revolutionaries had nothing to defend in it, except just to denounce it. Thus, once reality denied and ignored, there is no more problem to resolve in regards with the minoritarian and struggle organisms that the working class can give itself.

But the problem remains for the workers, the proletarians, in Argentina as else where, and for the revolutionaries in front of this kind of situation. During the period of struggle relatively long of Spring 2003 in France against the pensions "reform", mobilization which lasted several months for some sectors, "inter-corporation" struggle committees have been built up and have mobilized for the "Private-public general strike". The fact these committees were for their most part invested by the leftists and the base unionists doesn't change anything to the fact there was a political fight to lead in them. For the real ICC, for our fraction, thus it matters to come back to the practical experience, and to previous ones, in order we can raise, discuss, precise and clarify this question which, the Argentinian proletariat shows us, will come back, soon or later, under a form or another, in a situation or another, to be posed with acuteness for the whole international proletariat. Just let's notice here that, in the quotation, the comrades allocate the setting up of these "workers and territorial groups" to the communists. Whereas, very often, these groups are direct creation of the workers and the direct product of a mobilization and of a growing combativeness. Nevertheless, we agree that the communists must not wait passively until these groups or committees constitute for actively intervening within - it should go without saying - and too that they have to be at the initiative for their constitution when it is necessary and possible.

Here are some points of the comrades' contribution we wanted to underline and to "put on discussion". For the comrades of the Círculo, their new approach and new orientation must be the start of a true process of clarification and of political regroupment. A new "start".

Until now, they had only known the "new" policy of the ICC regarding the "regroupment". And this one was almost up to succeed with the risk of condemning them to sectarianism and to blindness towards the workers struggles which, independantly of the individual manipulations the militants have suffered from the liquidationists, wouldn't have led them but to demoralization, to despair, to the break up and the division of the group and its militants (1). This policy of regroupment isn't based on the confrontation of the positions and to their clarification, but on the adhesion to the condemnations of our fraction, to the rejection of the IBRP, to the dirty tricks and the little maneuvers such as the Call they've "issued" for an international conference or as the May 22nd  2004 Declaration of the NCI which denounced us as cops and bourgeois State agents (2). That they could escape all this is an encouragement and a hope in regards to the seriouness and the worth of their militant compromise on which the serious group of the proletarian camp, firstly the IBRP, must bet and build. Now the most important remains to be done.

The proletariat of the "peripheral" country of Argentina, whose struggle capacity is historicaly determined, "producted", by the international relation of forces between capital and the international proletariat, contributes at its turn, as active factor, to the development of the international classes struggle and to its historical experience. It's the same for the Argentinian comrades of the Círculo de Comunistas Internacionalistas. They contribute to relaunch and to deepen the confrontation of the political positions of the main currents claiming themselves to be the continuity of the Communist Left, more particularly the Italian one, of the currents coming from the review Bilan in the years 1930. Welcome comrades ! Welcome to this historical struggle for the building up of the world communist party !

The internal fraction of the ICC, October 24th 2004.

Notes: