[F]ascism is not a way of organizing capitalism. Instead, it is a radical petty-bourgeois movement in the streets — the most horrible, malignant such movement in history. Banal, mediocre, figures — but ones adept at radical demagogy, nationalism, phrase-mongering, and organization — rise to leadership in these movements. Thugs rise among the cadres. The fascists ape much of the language of currents in the workers movement. “Nazi” was short for National Socialist German Workers Party.These movements never begin with broad ruling-class support. At first, the rulers in their majority alternately scorn and fear this rowdy “rabble”; only handfuls of capitalists back them at the outset. But as the bourgeoisie become convinced they confront an irresolvable social crisis, and as the working class puts up an increasingly serious challenge to capitalist rule itself, growing layers of the exploiters start supporting, or tolerating, the fascists in order to try to smash the workers and their organizations. That is the job the fascists are finally enlisted to do by the bourgeoisie when the threat to capitalist rule reaches a certain threshold.The fascists’ stock of “ideas,” encrusted with historical mystification, are borrowed from the sewers of the bourgeoisie’s own views, values, and attitudes. The things the capitalist rulers say privately among themselves, the subtle and not-so-subtle bigotry they promote, are taken up as the banners of a radical mass movement. The demagogues use these banners to mobilize and channel the energies of radicalized layers of the frightened, resentful, and ruined middle classes in bourgeois society.The fascists initially rail against “high finance” and the bankers, lacing their nationalist demagogy with anticapitalist rhetoric. When they come to power with support from weighty sectors of finance capital, however, the anticapitalist rhetoric slacks off quickly. That is what happened in Italy under Benito Mussolini in the early 1920s after il duce also became premier. That is what happened in Germany under Adolf Hitler a decade later after the fรผhrer also became chancellor. Once these new regimes set about reviving industry, building roads, and preparing for war, radical diatribes against capital went into rapid decline.SWP leader Joseph Hansen wrote quite a bit about the experience of the working class with fascist movements in this century. He pointed out that when a fascist movement conquers, its character rapidly changes. The new government demobilizes many of the most radical sectors on which the movement rose to power, bloodily suppressing some of its own cadres if need be, and begins functioning basically as a military-police dictatorship. In mid-1934, a year after he was appointed chancellor, for example, Hitler disbanded the Storm Troopers — the “Brownshirts” — that he had mobilized for more than a decade as the party’s radical, street-fighting squads against the workers movement. He summarily executed their chief, Ernst Rรถhm, and murdered dozens of other leaders of the Nazis’ longtime cadre.The regimes that come to power on the back of fascist movements are capitalist governments. It is misleading to talk about “a fascist regime” for that reason. It is not something historically different in class terms from a capitalist regime. Once fascist movements come to power, they use the state and forms of capitalist economic planning to bolster the strongest components of the bourgeoisie against smaller rival capitalists and against the toilers. Historically, these governments are short-lived. They become more and more bureaucratized, corrupt, and brittle. But a horrible logic is played out — a drive toward war, a monstrously brutal crushing and atomization of the labor movement, a drastic reduction in the value of labor power, crimes such as the scapegoating and extermination of the Jews in Germany and others that challenge language to describe. This is how a declining capitalism, in an unplanned and pragmatic manner, attempts to restabilize itself. …The workers vanguard must chart a course to mobilize and lead the working class and our allies to take power. Along the way, the labor movement will have to defend our organizations and those of other oppressed layers against fascist thuggery and murderous violence.
Mu
Saturday, March 14, 2026
You have to learn what fascism is in order to fight it and win – The Militant
Israel fights a defensive war against Tehran rulers – The Militant
Anti-Jewish propaganda machine
....To bolster Tehran’s goal of destroying Israel and eliminating the Jews there, an international propaganda machine — made up of a bloc of Islamist fundamentalists and middle-class leftists — promotes the narrative that Israel is a white supremacist “colonial-settler” state.Its backers claim that Israel began as an imperialist colony whose goal was the “ethnic cleansing” and “genocide” of Palestinians. This, they say, is why Israel’s destruction and a war against the Jews are necessary.This “narrative” leaves out entirely the key reason millions of Jews fought to move to Palestine at the end of the Second World War: (1) The refusal of the Moscow-led Communist Party in Germany to join forces with the Social Democrats to lead a fight by the powerful working-class movement there to stop the Nazis. This allowed Adolf Hitler and his Nazis to take power and murder 40% of the world’s Jews in the Holocaust during the war; (2) The betrayal by the Stalinized Communist parties of revolutionary movements that could have brought the working class to power in Spain, Greece and other countries; and (3) The refusal of the imperialist rulers in the United States, Canada and Britain to let in Jews seeking to flee the Nazis, sending them back to their deaths.Where were the Jews to go?When the war ended, Jews, many who no longer had homes to go back to, were put in “displaced persons” camps in Germany, Austria and Italy, many of which had been concentration camps under Hitler.Slaughtered by the Nazis, betrayed by the Stalinists and turned away by the U.S. and other capitalist powers, where were the Jews to go?They fought to get to what would become Israel, against armed opposition by the British rulers who controlled Palestine.When the newly created United Nations voted to approve the creation of the state of Israel, Jewish leaders agreed to its partition plan, with one section a majority Jewish state and the other majority Arab. But the semifeudal reactionary Arab leadership refused. Five Arab armies, along with irregular bands of the Arab Liberation Army, attacked the new state of Israel.Amid heavy casualties on both sides, thousands of Arabs fled or were expelled from Israel, which emerged victorious. Thousands of Arabs remained within the new country. Today some 20% of the citizens of Israel are Arabs.In the wake of the creation of Israel, Arab regimes across the Middle East brutally expelled their Jewish populations. Roughly half of the Jews in Israel are descendants of Jews from these Arab countries.Rise in Jew-hatredNone of the key questions that gave rise to Jew-hatred leading up to, during, and after World War II have been resolved. In the imperialist epoch, as the crisis of the capitalist rulers and their system deepens, they turn to Jew-hatred. Their aim is to divide and demoralize the working class and to foster fascist gangs.There is a new rise in violent acts of Jew-hatred around the world, tied to today’s deepening capitalist crisis. Until there is a revolutionary-led labor movement in the United States, France, Britain and elsewhere that views fighting Jew-hatred as a life-or-death question for the labor movement, thousands of Jews will continue to move to Israel every year because it is the only government in the world that defends Jews arms in hand.Nearly half of all the Jews in the world live in Israel, a small country that is 260 miles long and 10 miles wide at its narrowest point, and 70 miles at its widest. One nuclear bomb from Iran would cause a new Holocaust.That’s why Israel’s defensive war against Tehran is aimed at ensuring the bourgeois clerical regime there cannot develop nuclear weapons, nor long-range missiles capable of causing mass destruction.
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Friday, March 13, 2026
Tuesday, March 10, 2026
Book review: ๐๐ฆ๐ง๐ต-๐๐ช๐ฏ๐จ ๐๐ฐ๐ฎ๐ฎ๐ถ๐ฏ๐ช๐ด๐ฎ: ๐๐ฏ ๐ช๐ฏ๐ง๐ข๐ฏ๐ต๐ช๐ญ๐ฆ ๐ฅ๐ช๐ด๐ฐ๐ณ๐ฅ๐ฆ๐ณ (1920) by V. I. Lenin
Infantile members of the Comintern did not want to hear about work in bourgeoisified/reactionary labor unions, or electoral openings for propaganda; they assumed that these were chapters in struggle they could dismiss as time-wasters. After all, Moscow looked like the millennium... Or a get rich quick scheme.
Lenin:
[….] Whilst you lack the strength to do away with bourgeois parliaments and every other type of reactionary institution, you must work within them because it is there that you will still find workers who are duped by the priests and stultified by the conditions of rural life; otherwise you risk turning into nothing but windbags.
Lenin:
[….] One must use one’s own brains and be able to find one’s bearings in each particular instance. It is, in fact, one of the functions of a party organisation and of party leaders worthy of the name, to acquire, through the prolonged, persistent, variegated and comprehensive efforts of all thinking representatives of a given class,32 the knowledge, experience and—in addition to knowledge and experience—the political flair necessary for the speedy and correct solution of complex political problems.
Lenin:
[….] for a revolution to take place it is not enough for the exploited and oppressed masses to realise the impossibility of living in the old way, and demand changes; for a revolution to take place it is essential that the exploiters should not be able to live and rule in the old way. It is only when the "lower classes" do not want to live in the old way and the "upper classes" cannot carry on in the old way that the revolution can triumph. This truth can be expressed in other words: revolution is impossible without a nation-wide crisis (affecting both the exploited and the exploiters). It follows that, for a revolution to take place, it is essential, first, that a majority of the workers (or at least a majority of the class-conscious, thinking, and politically active workers) should fully realise that revolution is necessary, and that they should be prepared to die for it; second, that the ruling classes should be going through a governmental crisis, which draws even the most backward masses into politics (symptomatic of any genuine revolution is a rapid, tenfold and even hundredfold increase in the size of the working and oppressed masses—hitherto apathetic—who are capable of waging the political struggle), weakens the government, and makes it possible for the revolutionaries to rapidly overthrow it.
❖ ❖ ❖
๐๐๐ง๐ข๐ง ๐จ๐ง ๐ฎ๐ฅ๐ญ๐ซ๐๐ฅ๐๐๐ญ๐ข๐ฌ๐ฆ ๐ข๐ง ๐ญ๐ก๐ ๐ญ๐ซ๐๐๐ ๐ฎ๐ง๐ข๐จ๐ง๐ฌ
{Book of the Week column}
Printed below is an excerpt from ๐๐ฆ๐ท๐ฐ๐ญ๐ถ๐ต๐ช๐ฐ๐ฏ๐ข๐ณ๐บ ๐๐ฐ๐ฏ๐ต๐ช๐ฏ๐ถ๐ช๐ต๐บ--๐๐ช๐ณ๐ต๐ฉ ๐ฐ๐ง ๐ต๐ฉ๐ฆ ๐๐ฐ๐ฎ๐ฎ๐ถ๐ฏ๐ช๐ด๐ต ๐๐ฐ๐ท๐ฆ๐ฎ๐ฆ๐ฏ๐ต, 1918-1922 by Farrell Dobbs. The author was a leader of the 1934 Teamster strikes, the national secretary of the Socialist Workers Party from 1953 to 1972, and the party's candidate for U.S. president in 1948, 1952, 1956, 1960.
This excerpt, dealing with the political leadership played by V.I. Lenin and the Bolsheviks in the early years of the world communist movement, following the October 1917 Russian Revolution, can be found on pages 172-176 of the book. Copyright © 1983 by Pathfinder Press, reprinted by permission. Subheadings are by the Militant.
BY FARRELL DOBBS
Along with guiding an intransigent fight against opportunism, the Russian leaders also had to cope with problems of ultraleftism inside the communist movement. Whereas the struggle against opportunism necessitated a break with bureaucratic and careerist individuals corrupted by their relatively privileged social position, the Bolsheviks hoped that the disease of ultraleftism could be cured and its proponents saved for the revolutionary workers' movement.
The self-proclaimed "left" advocated policies marked by adaptation to syndicalist practices. Its views reflected several major weaknesses: inadequate knowledge of the historical experiences of the workers' movement; lack of experience in applying a Marxist program; sectarian excesses in trying to counter social reformism; no concept of the transitional method and program, or of necessary alliances; and efforts to bypass the initial stages through which the masses pass on their way to revolutionary consciousness.
Ultraleftism, the Russians patiently explained, could only isolate the vanguard, instead of deepening its integration as a leading component of the working class. The communists had to learn how to function among large numbers of workers just awakening to political life. Their aim should be to lead them forward and help them make a transition to revolutionary perspectives. To accomplish that, however, the workers themselves had to go through political experiences. These experiences would have to be shared by the members of the Communist Party, who would only then be in a position to help the workers analyze the lessons of their ongoing struggles. Only in that way could the treacherous role of reformists and centrists in the labor movement be systematically exposed for all to see and the way opened for development of revolutionary leaderships in the mass organizations of the proletariat.
Lenin took the initiative in spelling out the strategy and tactics required by communists in the revolutionary situation prevailing in Europe. His views were presented in "Left-Wing" Communism--An Infantile Disorder. This small book, published in June 1920, was distributed the following month to the delegates at the Comintern's second world congress. It dealt chiefly with the perspectives of ultraleft Communists in Germany, Great Britain, and Holland.
"It is far more difficult--and far more precious--to be a revolutionary when the conditions for direct, open, really mass and really revolutionary struggle do not yet exist," he wrote in the booklet, "to be able to champion the interests of the revolution (by propaganda, agitation, and organisation) in non-revolutionary bodies, and quite often in downright reactionary bodies, in a non-revolutionary situation, among the masses who are incapable of immediately appreciating the need for revolutionary methods of action.
"To be able to seek, find and correctly determine the specific path or the particular turn of events that will lead the masses to real, decisive and finally revolutionary struggle--that is the main objective of communism in Western Europe and in America today."
The massive postwar influx of radicalizing workers into the trade unions, Lenin said, confirmed "that class-consciousness and the desire for organisation are growing among the proletarian masses, among the rank and file, among the backward elements. Millions of workers in Great Britain, France and Germany are for the first time passing from a complete lack of organisation to the elementary, lowest, simplest and...most easily comprehensible form of organisation, namely, the trade unions."
In that volatile situation, the main aim of the reformist hacks who dominated the trade union officialdom in the capitalist countries was to preserve their bureaucratic control over the workers in order to perpetuate class-collaborationist policies. Their central objectives were to confine union demands to limited economic and social improvements within the capitalist system; to maintain a formally "neutral" attitude on political questions that amounted to support for ruling-class policy; and to ensure that trade-union action did not move toward challenging bourgeois political power.
The "leftists" were impervious to the growing opportunities for communists to take on these class-collaborationist perspectives in the unions and win workers to their views. They repudiated the established trade unions unconditionally, calling for new, revolutionary unions.
๐๐จ๐ซ๐ค๐ข๐ง๐ ๐ข๐ง ๐ญ๐ก๐ ๐๐ฑ๐ข๐ฌ๐ญ๐ข๐ง๐ ๐ฎ๐ง๐ข๐จ๐ง๐ฌ
Lenin quoted a pamphlet of the German "left-wing communists" on this question. "A Workers' Union, based on factory organizations, should be the rallying point for all revolutionary elements," the pamphlet said. "This should unite all workers who follow the slogan: 'Get out of the trade unions!' It is here that the militant proletariat musters its ranks for battle. Recognition of the class struggle, of the Soviet system and of the dictatorship should be sufficient for enrollment."
Such a course, which puts an ultimatum to the masses of workers, could only lead to disaster, Lenin said.
"This is so unpardonable a blunder," he wrote, "that it is tantamount to the greatest service Communists could render the bourgeoisie....
"To refuse to work in the reactionary trade unions means leaving the insufficiently developed or backward masses of workers under the influence of the reactionary leaders, the agents of the bourgeoisie, the labour aristocrats."
"There can be no doubt," Lenin continued, that the union bureaucrats of all nations "are very grateful to those 'Left' revolutionaries who, like the German opposition 'on principle' (heaven preserve us from such 'principles'!), or like some of the revolutionaries in the American Industrial Workers of the World advocate quitting the reactionary trade unions and refusing to work in them."
To the contrary, Lenin explained, "The task devolving on Communists is to convince the backward elements, to work among them, and not to fence themselves off from them with artificial and childishly 'Left' slogans."
To be effective, communist policy required that party cadres participate in the unions as they currently existed. Only in that way could they cooperate directly with the workers in their struggles and experiences, using that close relationship to guide them toward adoption of revolutionary perspectives.
Source:
https://www.themilitant.com/2000/6433/643349.html
Saturday, March 7, 2026
Book Review: Not by Politics Alone ... – The Other Lenin (Verso 2024) edited and introduced by Tamara Deutscher
Not by Politics Alone beautifully captures the motivations and emotions of the most significant communist leader the working class movement has produced.
The book’s subtitle “The Other Lenin” strikes me as a publishing ploy, and a misnomer. Aside from Fidel Castro, I know of no other communist leader more forthright and militant in openly stating in print and in public exactly what his motives and his program were at every turning point of the class struggle. There was no secret or sub rosa Lenin.
Below are my synopses of the last three chapters of the collection, where the focus is on political questions concerning culture, party-building, women's rights, and the contradictions of the young Soviet republic.
IV. Revolution, Literature, and Art
This section illustrates Lenin’s pragmatism and his belief that culture should serve the revolutionary cause, while maintaining a deep respect for classical Russian literature.
“Literary Foundations and Tolstoy”: Lenin viewed literature as a mirror of social conditions. He analyzed Leo Tolstoy not just as a writer, but as a reflection of the "epoch of preparation for the revolution," noting the contradictions between Tolstoy’s "protest against social falsehood" and his "non-resistance to evil".
“What is to be Done?”: This text is a tribute to Nikolay Chernyshevsky’s 1863 novel of the same name, and its impact on an earlier generation seeking the revolutionary road.
“The Struggle with Futurism and Modernism”: Lenin was deeply skeptical of "Futurism" and experimental art, which he found incomprehensible to the average worker. He humbly and with patience criticized figures like Mayakovsky for their complexity, preferring art that was accessible and educational for the masses. But he still saw in Mayakovsky occasional real insights. For instance:
“Public Education and Illiteracy”:
Lenin argues that a modern socialist state could not be built among an illiterate population, leading to his focus on public libraries and mass literacy campaigns.
“Cinema and Propaganda”: Lenin identifies cinema as "the most important of all the arts" for the Soviet state because of its ability to reach and educate the vast, often illiterate, peasantry. He expresses real frustration that useful films take too long to gestate
“Monuments and Style”: He advocates for "monumental propaganda"—replacing Tsarist statues with monuments to revolutionary heroes to provide constant visual education to the public. These embitious plans, however, fell short due to scarce resources. Many collapsed in harsh weather, or were removed before they collapsed.
V. Women’s Rights
This section focuses on the emancipation of women as a prerequisite for a true socialist revolution.
“Letters to Inessa Armand”: These reveal a more personal side of Lenin, discussing matters of revolutionary theory and personal discipline. Lenin points out that the social roots of prostitution, the whole system of compulsion, must be eliminated, and prostitutes returned to useful work. He vehemently opposes organizing prostitutes like other types of labor.
“A Great Beginning”: Lenin emphasizes that real freedom for women requires more than just legal equality; it requires the socialization of domestic labor (communal kitchens, nurseries) to "liberate" women from "household bondage".
“Soviet Power and Status”: Lenin highlights that Soviet power was the first to grant women full legal equality, but stresses that the "working women’s movement" must continue to fight the "petty-bourgeois" remnants of male chauvinism.
VI. Bureaucracy
In his final years, Lenin became increasingly preoccupied with the "distortions" of the Soviet state and the rise of a self-serving bureaucracy.
“The Party Crisis and New Members”: Lenin grew concerned about the "dilution" of the party. He proposed stricter conditions for admitting new members to ensure the party remained a vanguard of dedicated revolutionaries rather than careerists.
“Struggle Against Great Russian Chauvinism”: In his final notes, Lenin expressed deep alarm over the mistreatment of non-Russian nationalities by Soviet officials (notably Stalin and Dzerzhinsky), arguing for "autonomisation" and respect for national identities to prevent "Great Russian" bullying.
* Eleventh Congress of the R.C.P.(b): Lenin’s speeches here focused on the need for the party to learn how to manage the economy under the New Economic Policy (NEP) and to combat "bureaucratic routine".
10 Insights into Lenin as Leader and Party Builder
* Lenin believed the party must be a disciplined, professional core of revolutionaries, rather than a loose organization, to effectively lead the masses.
* For Lenin, art and literature were never "neutral." Their value was measured by how effectively they educated the proletariat and consolidated the revolution. At the same time, he opposed censorship of artists not collaborating with White forces.
* Toward the end of his life, Lenin identified internal bureaucracy and "red tape" as a primary threat to the revolution, often more dangerous than external enemies.
* Education as Power: He viewed literacy and cultural development not as luxuries, but as essential infrastructure for building a socialist state.
* Rejection of Spontaneity: He maintained that left to their own devices, workers would only develop "trade union consciousness"; true revolutionary theory must be taught.
* Subordination of the Personal: His letters and lifestyle reflect a leader who demanded the same total discipline from himself—regarding health, reading, and expenses—that he expected from the party.
* Flexibility (The NEP): Lenin demonstrated an ability to retreat from strict "War Communism" to the market-oriented NEP when he realized the state was not yet ready for total socialization.
* Internal Party Control: He advocated for strict "purges" of the party to remove careerists and "scoundrels" who joined only after the Bolsheviks took power.
* The Nationality Question: He recognized that the success of the Soviet Union depended on the voluntary union of nations, requiring a constant fight— “to the death” —against Russian chauvinism.
The Jeffrey Epstein files and the pornographication of US politics – The Militant
....Conspiracy theories are based on rejecting any idea that the workings of society can be explained by unfolding the class interests involved, let alone that workers are capable of organizing to fight to change our conditions. The files’ dump also sets a dangerous precedent for document releases in criminal frame-ups in the years ahead, targeting trade unionists, communists and opponents of Washington’s wars.The dangers of bourgeois scandalmongering for the working class are explained clearly in the article “Imperialism’s March Toward Fascism and War” by Jack Barnes, Socialist Workers Party national secretary, in New International no. 10.“The greater vulnerability to scandals today,” Barnes writes, “is a reflection of the instability of the world imperialist order and the growing lack of confidence in this system and its leading personnel expressed both by its beneficiaries and by millions of others.”“Scandalmongering is an effort,” he writes, “to exacerbate and profit from middle-class panic and to drag workers … into the pit of resentment and salacious envy.” Barnes aptly describes this as the “pornographication of politics.”“What the working class needs is not exposรฉs of bourgeois politicians,” Barnes says. “We need to be able to explain politically why the working class has no common interests with the class these bourgeois politicians speak for.”Along this road, workers can take steps to build a party of our own. This course, not infatuation with allegations about the dissolute and corrupt behavior of capitalists and their politicians, is the road to workers developing confidence in our own capacities and advancing the struggle for our class’s emancipation.
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