First Published: In Struggle! No. 288, June 22, 1982
Transcription, Editing and Markup: Malcolm and Paul Saba
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The programme says that “the party is at all times and in all respects the headquarters of the revolution, its supreme and sole leadership” (Article 7, p. 30). If you want to have a vanguard minority exercise leadership in all mass organizations you have to have monolithic unity and top-down decision-making to be effective.
BE IT THEREFORE RESOLVED THAT:
We hereby set aside the kinds of structures and methods of operation that IN STRUGGLE! had:
– because the way we were organized made only a limited amount of democracy possible;
– because it restricted the degree and quality of the participation of women, workers and gays and lesbians in making political decisions and carrying out leadership functions;
– because the structures and methods of functioning we had were bureaucratic;
– because they restricted and stifled political initiative on the part of the base units and individuals;
– because they forced everyone to have a uniform practice and to maintain the same level of involvement as everyone else; this excluded a lot of people from active political life;
– because the rules of secrecy and clandestine methods isolated the organization from the masses.
In fact, all of the criticisms listed above flow from the way we defined the role of the party and analyzed the concrete conditions in the programme.