A correct determination of tactics must begin with a correct analysis of the state of our movement: existing class forces, struggles, and dynamics, the level of activity and consciousness of the masses, and, most pertinently to this discussion, the level of organization of the vanguard of the class. Thus, in my previous intervention into the ongoing discussions for the CPUSA’s 2024 National Convention, I began with an analysis on “the party question,” and only now on that basis can I begin to draw tactical considerations. Naturally, since the CPUSA has a flawed and sectarian answer to the party question, its tactical alignment is similarly flawed. Two distinct but connected pillars of the CPUSA line stand out in need of dire rectification: the united front and parliamentarism. The errors present on these two fronts are, furthermore, not at all recent. So far as I know, most rank-and-file members blame Sam Webb, former chairman of the CPUSA, for the opportunist trend in CPUSA leadership, and remain split on whether Mr Sims has continued or rectified Webb’s liberalization of the party. Actually, I argue, not only has Sims continued Webb’s legacy, but also, for all the party’s blustering about the aesthetics of Browderism, with its patriotic language and iconography, it has really maintained its liquidationist, revisionist, and reformist legacy from as early as the party’s reconstitution under Foster.
The basic premise of the CPUSA’s tactical outlook is that in order to gain power, to put their program into effect, and, furthermore, to prevent the ascension of fascism, allying with the Democratic party in a so-called “united front against fascism” is of primary necessity, even if it costs suppressing class-struggle. That this rank opportunism epitomizes the CPUSA leadership’s “united-front against fascism” is demonstrated unambiguously by their deeds, though it is still pretty clear in words alone.
The United Front
The Black-Hundred danger cannot be combated by Cadet tactics and a Cadet policy… We are therefore quite undisturbed by the usual Menshevik cries that the Bolsheviks are letting the Black Hundreds in. All liberals have shouted this to all socialists.
(Blocs With the Cadets, 1906)
For all its claptrap about tailoring tactics to concrete material conditions, the CPUSA leadership ironically maintains, based on decades-old recommendations of the decades-defunct Comintern, that it must continue to pursue the tactic of the united front, the content of which it continues to misrepresent. Of course – and it certainly goes without saying – the party should seek to unite with as many working people as possible, regardless of their ideology or party allegiances, and wherever they may be found, in their practical struggles. But this obvious “truism” has nothing in common with what the Party Leadership (PL) means when it advocates for a “united-front” (let alone, an “all people’s front,” whatever that is supposed to mean). The PL’s advocacy of a united-front is certainly wrong for two reasons.
Firstly it is incorrect because it would be, at best, premature. Before trying to reach and elevate the intermediate layers of the class, it is critical to first unite the advanced, vanguard elements. As I argued in my previous intervention, this definite condition has not been met — not even close. Without a consolidated vanguard, the danger of right-wing influence grows ever the more pronounced, since there is less infrastructure in place for consistently combating bourgeois ideology as it infiltrates the minds and ranks of the party. Rather than peeling away social-democratic workers to Communism, the opposite is much more probable; therefore, the united-front can only be carried out by a mass party.
Secondly, the united-front tactic emerged from the split between revolutionary and reformist socialists, and was given particular importance in the (third?) period due to the dominance of the social-democratic leadership in the working class movement. Hence the Comintern proposing the united-front tactic at the same time as it encouraged splits from and purges of reformists. Don’t take my word for it! Here’s what the Comintern said:
For the Comintern the main purpose of the united front tactics consists in the struggle against the leaders of counter-revolutionary social-democracy and in emancipating social-democratic workers from their influence.
RUTHLESS STRUGGLE AGAINST RIGHT-OPPORTUNIST TENDENCIES, 1924
And here,
In a period when the communist parties in a number of the most important countries are still in a minority, when social-democracy for a number of historical reasons is still supported by large proletarian masses, when the capitalist offensive is continuing in various forms and the working class cannot summon up sufficient energy to wage serious defensive struggles, united front tactics were and are correct and necessary. . . . United front tactics are only a method of agitation and of revolutionary mobilization of the masses over a period. . . .
THE UNITED FRONT TACTICS, EXTRACTS FROM THE THESES ON TACTICS ADOPTED BY THE FIFTH COMINTERN CONGRESS, 1924 (emphasis added)
2. Unity from below and at the same time negotiations with leaders. This method must frequently be employed in countries where social-democracy is still a significant force.
Among many other references, but that should suffice to set the stage.
Now, I surely know it won’t be controversial to say that we live in a very different epoch today than the third international. On this score there seems to be agreement. The controversy lies in the identification of the differing features of our era. Among the most poignant of them is this: Social-democracy is not a significant political force in America, and has not been in over a century. Even the vulgar social-democratic trend, i.e. keynesian welfare-capitalism, died with the neoliberal turn at the end of the cold war, when its pacifying influence became obsolete. In a word, the “end of history” period, which was the consolidated victory of imperialism over the revolution, razed all the old conflicts to the ground. It is only now from the ashes that we again emerge, in a world completely monopolized by liberalism, with something of a clean slate. The social-democrats, too, are attempting to re-emerge from the grassroots of this brave new world, but, with few exceptions, they have been utterly and completely snubbed by the bourgeoisie who are quite complacent with the state of affairs as they are. Even the trade unions are only recently repopulating amongst the labor movement, relearning how to stand, like an infant, on its own two legs. Thus, social-democracy remains, at least for the time being, an isolated trend among the more privileged layers of the working class and the more frustrated elements from among the petty bourgeois and professional strata. Admittedly, the DSA, as the foremost representative of this trend, is larger than most grassroots organizations at the present moment; yet, it isn’t even a party, and provides only nominal affiliation with a handful of Democratic candidates who have no obligation to vote in conformity with DSA’s line (if one even exists). All the same, it is obvious to all but the dimmest of dogmatists that the DSA, and social-democracy generally, doesn’t represent the same kind of force that it did in the 20th century, and that, therefore, promoting a policy specifically aimed at tearing the masses from their grasp is rather farcical.
If the united-front were to be applied today, it would only mean sending members of the vanguard to agitate and propagandize the rank and file of the DSA (and the CPUSA, as the unofficial representatives of social-democracy) in order to encourage the more advanced among them to split off and join the Communists. If a well organized vanguard already existed, this, actually, would be a decent tactic worth pursuing. But more to the point, working class leadership in our era is not primarily split between a revolutionary and reformist wing of the movement, but is rather lacking in general. If we can speak of the leadership of the vanguard elements specifically as leadership of the working class movement generally, then it’s clear that the actual separation is in a myriad of more-or-less equally opportunist sects. Hence the united front policy is not the panacea to the disunity we currently face; it is the wrong tactic, for there is not one single revolutionary force to act as a unifying force against the disunifying and counterrevolutionary forces – they are all a disunifying force in deeds whether (like the 20th century social-democrats) they call for unity in words.
If this were all, then this criticism would not be so dire. The grave danger really lies in the CPUSA’s interpretation of how to apply the united-front tactic today. The CPUSA “mistakes” (if we are being generous with intents) the united front (“from below”) as a political alliance with reformist parties. This is precisely the distortion which the Comintern identified as right-opportunism:
It has become unmistakably clear that in some countries… the representatives of the right-wing tendency tried to distort completely the tactics of the united front of the workers’ and peasants’ government, interpreting them as meaning a narrow political alliance, an organic coalition of ‘all workers’ parties’, that is, a political alliance of communists with social-democracy.
RUTHLESS STRUGGLE AGAINST RIGHT-OPPORTUNIST TENDENCIES, 1924
It should really go without saying that the Democrats are not a social-democratic party despite its advocacy for (social) reform; as an avowedly capitalist (and furthermore, neoliberal) party it is unmistakably to the right of social-democracy. Furthermore, the party at large clearly demonstrated its hostility towards even vulgar welfare-capitalism when it conspired — twice! — to undermine Bernard Sanders’ bids for presidency in 2016 and 2020. Yet the CPUSA insists on shoving this square peg into that round hole only to “justify” entering into an alliance with the Democrats against the Republicans in the name of a united-front against fascism. This is all the more confounding when you take into account that the NC, in their Build the Clubs, Build the Party discussion document, ends with the following exception to their general call for unity: “Joining hands with the sectarian left should be avoided like the plague… The CPUSA favors united fronts with trade unions, community groups, places of worship, civil rights organizations – not sectarian parties” (emphasis added). While the sectarian parties in question are never enumerated, I don’t know how else to read this other than a call for unity with the Democrats and a simultaneous call against unity with the more “orthodox” ““Leninist”” “““parties””” such as the PSL and FRSO. Baffling. All the more-so when you further take into account how frequently rank-and-file members of the CPUSA are evidently under the impression that a united front means any alliance between any two parties for any common cause and for any amount of time, so that it is a “united front” when CPUSA and PSL both show up to a rally at Pershing square without squaring off.
But perhaps the NC will maintain that an alliance with a liberal, bourgeois party is a perfectly reasonable application of the united-front. Indeed, this very argument was made in a public statement by the Louisiana branch:
I include this as a screenshot only because the original post was deleted; nevertheless, the sentiment seems to be ubiquitous among CPUSA leadership. To address the second claim first: yes, indeed, the Chinese Communists entered into a united-front with the bourgeois-nationalist KMT during the Sino-Japanese war. Unless the CPUSA considers the US a colonized and semi-feudal country, however, this fact is irrelevant; otherwise, perhaps, they think it was “ultra-left” of the Bolsheviks to fight against their government during WWI? How absurd.
The first claim is even more ridiculous; not only is it not true, but it is precisely the opposite of the truth. Lenin repeatedly lampooned the liberals of his day for accusing the socialists of “splitting the vote” and thereby “enabling the black hundreds.” Did the Bolsheviks ever enter into “blocs” with liberals? Indeed they did, though under very particular circumstances:
The central issue is: on what lines should the socialist proletariat enter into agreements, with the bourgeoisie, which, generally speaking, are inevitable in the course of a bourgeois revolution… the Bolsheviks permit agreements only with parties which are fighting for a republic and which recognise the necessity of an armed uprising.
Blocs With the Cadets, 1906
As Lenin explained here, partial and temporary alliances with the revolutionary bourgeoisie were occasionally necessary in building the general-democratic revolution against semi-feudal, autocratic Czarism. Under these circumstances, where the liberals were, in fact, revolutionary compared to the existing political system, and therefore prepared to fight and pick up arms, it is ridiculous to superficially transpose the cadets, vis a vis liberalism, onto the modern Democratic party. The closer analogy would, in fact, be backing the monarchists to oppose the Black Hundreds, which is precisely what Lenin accused the Mensheviks of advocating:
The Mensheviks permit agreements with “democratic opposition parties” generally… Opposition is a purely parliamentary term. This term is so vague that it can include the Octobrists, and the Party of Peaceful Renovation, and, in fact, all who are dissatisfied with the government. True, the addition of the word “democratic” introduces a political element, but it is indefinite. It is supposed to refer to the Cadets but this is exactly where it is wrong. To apply the term “democratic” to a monarchist party … means deceiving the people.
Ibid
Here Lenin explicitly criticized the Mensheviks for permitting agreements with the cadets, who, as constitutional monarchists, only “opposed” the Czarist regime from a very narrow, technical standpoint. So, to be clear, let us not equivocate between a united-front with (revolutionary) liberals, a united-front with the cadets, and a united-front with the Democrats. He then continued to criticize the Menshevik policy from the perspective of countering the Black Hundred danger:
The Mensheviks’ main argument is the Black-Hundred danger. The first and fundamental flaw in this argument is that the Black-Hundred danger cannot be combated by Cadet tactics and a Cadet policy. The essence of this policy lies in reconciliation with tsarism, that is, with the Black-Hundred danger. The first Duma sufficiently demonstrated that the Cadets do not combat the Black-Hundred danger, but make incredibly despicable speeches about the innocence and blamelessness of the monarch, the known leader of the Black Hundreds.
Ibid
Here, I think the analogy between the Black Hundreds and modern fascism becomes a bit fraught. If we generously attempt to reframe this passage to better fit our current conditions, we could, perhaps, understand the passage like this:
The fascist danger cannot be combated by liberal tactics and a liberal policy. The essence of this policy lies in reconciliation with finance-capital, that is, with the fascist danger. The Democrats have sufficiently demonstrated that the liberals do not combat the fascist danger, but make incredibly despicable speeches about the innocence and blamelessness of big capital, the known seedbed of fascism.
To get any further into the subject of fascism will, I fear, bring us too far out of scope (perhaps that will have to be the subject for another intervention). Suffice to say, I think this reformulated paragraph rightly reflects that the Democratic party is not a fighting force against fascism and that the fascist germ in our society is not isolated within the Republican party the way that CPUSA leadership is content to argue. The Democrats, furthermore, are not like the SDP in Weimar Germany (which is implied whenever the CPUSA refers to the Comintern’s “social fascism” thesis despite this parallel being just as fraught), but, rather, more like Paul von Hindenburg. Which is to say — even from the perspective of an anti-fascist united-front, the Democrats remain completely irrelevant to such a tactic.
Even if we supposed that the fascist danger truly lies solely with the GOP, it is folly to think Lenin would approve supporting the Democrats. As he said,
The second flaw in this stock argument is that it means that the Social-Democrats tacitly surrender hegemony in the democratic struggle to the Cadets. In the event of a split vote that secures the victory of a Black Hundred, why should we be blamed for not having voted for the Cadet, and not the Cadets for not having voted for us?
“We are in a minority,” answer the Mensheviks, in a spirit of Christian humility. “The Cadets are more numerous. You cannot expect the Cadets to declare themselves revolutionaries.”
Yes! But that is no reason why Social-Democrats should declare themselves Cadets.
Ibid
And later,
The real Black-Hundred danger, we repeat, lies not in the Black Hundreds obtaining seats in the Duma, but in pogroms and military courts; and you are making it more difficult for the people to fight this real danger by putting Cadet blinkers on their eyes.
Ibid
And again,
We think it is childish to imagine that the elimination of the Black Hundreds from the Duma means the elimination of the Black-Hundred danger.
Ibid
Finally, and quite succinctly: “No blocs with the Cadets!” (Ibid).
I could go on, further breaking down the myth that the Democrats wield the influence of the majority of the intermediately conscious masses (at most its 25%), and that, therefore, it is within the Democratic party we must go to “reach the people,” but if the preceding paragraphs haven’t sufficed for the reader so far, then there’s no further point in belaboring this argument.
Playing at Parliamentarism
The reformists take every opportunity to put forward partial demands as a substitute for genuine revolutionary struggle. Bolsheviks utilise every partial demand in order to enlighten the masses on the necessity for revolution.
(Theses on the Bolshevization of the Parties of the Comintern, 1925)
Two essentially separate but overlapping problems must be addressed: the Democratic-Socialist strategy advocated by the PL, and the flawed parliamentary tactics employed by all of our modern socialist sects. By Democratic-Socialist strategy I mean the reformist tendency, first systematically expounded by Bernstein, that advocates for a purely electoral, gradual, and peaceful (evolutionary) transition to socialism, as conveyed in the slogan “revolution through reform.” In principle, the goal is the same, but the broad plan of action substitutes building a revolutionary mass movement to overthrow the state for gaining power within bourgeois institutions. This very strategy, I argue, is completely at odds with the tactics of parliamentary participation as famously advocated for by Lenin.
Naturally, various strata of the CPUSA will deny these allegations of reformism. I suppose a bit of evidence is in order then, yes? To begin, this is spelled out in the party’s Road to Socialism USA document:
We see revolution as a profoundly democratic process, one that involves the actions and decisions of the vast majority. The more unified the majority, the more likely it is that a transition can be accomplished without the capitalists using violence to block the building of socialism. We reject all approaches that welcome and seek violent action. We fight for and commit ourselves to building enough unity to win socialism peacefully… The Communist Party aims for a peaceful transition to socialism.
CPUSA, 2020
The idea that a unified majority would ever prevent the ruling class from trying to violently repress the social revolution is not just utter folly, but the vague and dubious statements of increased “likelihood” offer little confidence that the authors even believe their own words. Even if our “own” national bourgeoisie (national strictly in the sense of residing within our borders) decided to give up — which only a fool can imagine they would — there’s still an entire international imperial system that would, without a doubt, seek to restore capitalism in America by force. Incidentally, the Comintern characterized this very view as “right-wing”:
The fifth world congress of the Comintern confirms in full the formulations of the third and fourth congresses. It decisively rejects as incorrect those right-wing tendencies which insist on the winning of a statistical majority of the working masses as a preliminary, and believe that there can be no serious revolutionary struggles unless the communists have already won if possible 99 per cent of all the workers.
Extracts From The Theses On Tactics Adopted By The Fifth Comintern Congress, III. The Building Of Mass Communist Parties As The Cardinal Task Of The Comintern, 1924
If the CPUSA leadership believes, as here, that it is only by winning over the “vast majority,” with influence among the masses so decisively complete that the bourgeoisie have no one left on their side to fight for them, that revolution in America can succeed, then this amounts to nothing more than a grotesque deception. A deception of both vanguard elements who are under the impression they are working towards revolution, and a deception of the broader masses who will be completely disarmed by these peaceful illusions.
We can find the same view expressed in manifold publications and by various authors, but a particularly representative example comes from Chairman Sims himself: “It is only by means of winning elections backed by powerful working-class grassroots movements that real change can be effected” (Is community self-defense the answer to fighting racist terror?, 2019 – emphasis added). This single sentence clearly explains the entire outlook of the PL: The proletariat’s power is found in combined mass action only so far as that action means voting in elections; the majority of the masses don’t need to be won to the influence of the party for the sake of an unstoppable insurrection, but, really, to build an electorally successful third party; participation in parliament is not a means of discrediting bourgeois institutions, but rather a real means through which the proletariat will capture power and realize its program.
Here’s another example of this same view from Mr. Carl Wood, who has conducted virtual, educational presentations for the party: “We have no choice but to work for a peaceful transition to socialism despite the difficulties” (Is a peaceful path to socialism possible?, 2021). Despite the difficulties? What an understatement!
It bears further reiterating: these views are far from exceptional in the CPUSA. Here is a screenshot of an onboarding presentation to the party (regrettably, I do not know which branch, or if this was provided by the NC) which attests to this fact:
Here again CPUSA’s reformist, social-democratic character is spelled out explicitly in the disavowal of overthrowing the bourgeois republic.
On a handful of occasions I’ve borne witness to party members shamelessly claiming that this outward-facing spinelessness, this explicit patriotism and pacifism, is some kind of a “ruse,” that it is “merely” disingenuous and, therefore, shouldn’t be regarded as genuinely reflecting the political orientation of the party. Such a defense is so plainly preposterous – for a variety of reasons – that I won’t bother to dignify it with a rebuttal. If you like, you can simply imagine me blowing a raspberry.
Of course, I don’t mean that Communists should, “on principle,” refuse to participate in electoral politics. I certainly stand by the analysis Lenin provided in “Left-Wing” Communism: An Infantile Disorder. Rather, it is my opponents who blindly, haphazardly, and dogmatically recite formulas from it without actually understanding the content of Lenin’s tactical genius. If our comrades had, indeed, read the work in question, and furthermore understood what they had read, then there would be absolutely no question about using the bourgeois state apparatus for a peaceful transition to socialism:
The conclusion which follows from this is absolutely incontrovertible: it has been proved that … participation in a bourgeois-democratic parliament … actually helps that proletariat to prove to the backward masses why such parliaments deserve to be done away with; it facilitates their successful dissolution, and helps to make bourgeois parliamentarianism “politically obsolete”.
In other words: it is a method of approaching the masses where they are in order to convince them of the insufficiency of the bourgeois-republic and of the necessity of revolution and soviet power. To advocate for parliamentarism as a means of gaining power has the effect, not of anti-parliamentary agitation, but of supporting the bourgeois regime and of blinding and disarming the budding revolutionary movement. Particularly today when there is justified and wide-spread frustration and disenchantment with our existing political system, it is beyond reproachable to tail behind the least conscious strata of the masses, and, furthermore, to imply that this is what Lenin had in mind.
Other sects, like the Party for Socialism and Liberation (PSL), at least recognize – in the abstract – the correct purpose of participating in parliamentarism. The problem there, made here by the CPUSA as well, is the utterly mystifying equivocation between “participating in parliament” and “participating in elections.” That participation in an election for the mere sake of participation is likened to “reaching people where they are” is a clear absurdity if only one took even a moment to consider it. How, exactly, is this reaching people? Only by means of direct contact with those on the street you’d beg for a signature to get on the ballot. In some rare cases, maybe even by achieving a spot on the ballot, in which case, I suppose, you could “reach people” who look at the ballot and wonder who Gloria LaRiva and what the Freedom Socialist Party (which isn’t even her own party!) are. In the main, reaching people where they are – in other words, where you wouldn’t be able to reach them by other, normal means of public agitation – would mean getting on stage to debate Joe Biden on live TV, getting in front of congress to criticize the bourgeois regime, proposing and voting on legislation where it enters into public record; it would mean, in other words, actually having a seat in the parliament (or other public office) and having ones words and deeds publicized and amplified outside the party’s existing sphere of influence. In lieu of this, can we really justify the time, labor, and energy spent on elections we are unambiguously doomed to fail? Of course, I answer in the negative.
And it is precisely that “unambiguity” that our socialist sects have failed to cope with. In a conventional parliamentary system, representation is divvied out by proportion of votes, so that even a minority party can gain seats, even if only a minority of seats. In our winner-takes-all system, participating in an election, without at least a 50% preference among the voting population (more or less, anyway, due to gerrymandering), will net you zero seats in parliament – hence the two party system. Third parties have come and gone trying to break through for the last 150 years and all of them failed; what is being done differently, which conditions have so fundamentally changed, that this completely routine consequence should be in doubt? No, this is not reaching people where they are, it’s merely playing at politics the same way a child playing in a sandbox might “participate” in digging to China.
To the credit of the CPUSA, they’re one of the few parties to consistently recognize (again, only abstractly) this contradiction. The only other political organization to recognize this is the DSA. And both, it turns out, agree on how to overcome it: by having candidates run as Democrats. This much was recently conveyed, in so many words, by one Juan Lopez, chairman of the Communist Party in northern California and (former?) National Vice Chair, in another discussion document for the CPUSA’s 2024 National Convention:
Sections of our country’s left mechanically try to superimpose the multiparty system on our country’s reality where third parties tend to act as spoilers… [and] see the Democratic and Republican parties as one-and-the-same tool of the ruling capitalist class… [whereas, we] see the Democratic Party as the vehicle progressive peoples’ movements must utilize at the state and federal level… Many on the left fail to see the symbiotic relationship whereby the people’s movements operate alongside, with, and through the Democratic Party.
Is the Democratic Party “the other” capitalist party or a progressive people’s party?, 2024
The “strategy” is crystal clear: the Democratic party can be co-opted by revolutionaries through a cross-class alliance within the party, which is how the CPUSA intends to fulfill its program, and which is necessitated by the two-party system that prevents an independent Communist party from parliamentary access, which we must pursue as a matter of primary importance because obviously that’s what Lenin would’ve wanted (trust me, I browse /r/GenZedong). Lopez, to his credit, defends the necessity of independent organizational representation outside the Democratic party in this article. That is to say, at least he presents the issue here with greater deft than he had four years prior: “The principal preoccupation needs to be to aim and work for building the most massive voter turnout to elect Democrats up and down the ticket” (Let’s beat Trump first, 2019 – emphasis added). Note from the future: I must add that, since beginning to write this intervention, this same Mr. Lopez then returned to his earlier statement: “Absolutely everything depends on winning a super-majority for the Biden-Harris ticket in battleground states. Similarly for Senate and House races” (At the crossroads: Trump’s fascism vs. Biden’s New Deal, 2024), so I must retract that he learned to wield greater deft.
The sum total of these two pillars of capitulationism-reconciliationism can only lead to one conclusion. The final trajectory of the CPUSA’s opportunist line must eventually end in liquidation – and this is what I meant when I accused the CPUSA of being “Browderist.”
Browderism Without Browder
By “Browderist,” I firstly mean that the CPUSA’s strategy subordinates itself and the class struggle to the Democrats in the name of “all people’s unity,” which is “justified” post-hoc by the Democrats’ alleged “progressive-popular” character. Of course, the CPUSA routinely denies that it supports the Democratic party. Now if this is really so, then explain to me why, then, I have a copy of internal communications from one of the local clubs in which the author defends canvassing for the Democratic nominee Mike Levin to the House of Representatives? (VINE BOOM)
In what fantastic world is this not “supporting” the Democrats, not only in words, but very clearly in deeds? And of course it would be Carl – at least I’m pretty sure this letter refers to the same Carl Wood from earlier – who would defend such an unequivocally opportunist tactic.
For the time being, the leadership in the CPUSA are content existing as an independent party, merely using the Democratic party as a “vehicle” to promote the “progressive people’s movement” (in Mr. Lopez’s words), which is to say, towards the party’s own ends. Whether or not such a proposal is earnest (or has any merit to begin with), the party’s repeated insistence on prioritizing this “people’s movement” over the working class movement goes to show that the party will go to any lengths, i.e. including liquidating the party, to prop up the Democrats. This in fact is the complete and full essence of Browderism, who I will cite at length for those comrades who are not yet fully aware of what he stood for:
It is my considered judgement that the American people are so ill-prepared, subjectively, for any deep-going change in the direction of socialism that postwar plans with such an aim would not unite the nation but would further divide it. And they would divide and weaken precisely the democratic and progressive camp, at the same time uniting and strengthening the most reactionary forces in the country… Adherents of socialism, therefore, in order to function actively as bearers of unity within the broad democratic camp, must make it clear that they will not raise the issue of socialism in such a form and manner as to endanger or weaken that national unity. They must subordinate their socialist convictions, in all practical issues, to the common program of the majority… American Communists are relinquishing for an extended period the struggle for partisan advancement for themselves as a separate group, which is the main characteristic of a political party… The existence of a separate political party of Communists, therefore, no longer serves a practical purpose but can be, on the contrary, an obstacle to the larger unity… In my book Victory – And After, published in 1942, I gave an extended analysis of the two-party system and its workings. I showed how the Democratic and Republican Parties had become semi-official institutions, buttressed in laws and customs which rendered difficult if not impossible the rise of new major parties… The result is that today’s political issues are fought out, not between the two parties, but within both of them… a growing portion of the population, now more than a third, identify themselves as independent of both parties… The Communists are not joining any existing political party as a group or organization. They are joining the body of independent voters who choose the best candidates from among those put forward by all parties.
Teheran: Our Path in War and Peace, Earl Browder, 1944
Having heard it directly from the horse’s mouth, isn’t it clear that this remains the exact same policy that the likes of Sims and Lopez advocate? Isn’t it completely obvious that, instead of weakening parliamentarism they are subjugating themselves to it? That, instead of entering into a united-front with reformists in order to awaken their supporters to revolutionary class consciousness, they really intend to liquidate themselves among the closest analog of a social-democratic party to suckle at the teet of the bourgeoisie? Browder’s line and the modern CPUSA’s line differ in only one regard: Browder considered the GOP and DNC as indistinguishably bourgeois and didn’t care which of them a Communist formally ran under. In that sense, that actually places the modern CPUSA a step to the right of Browder, where they find themselves in the good company of the DSA, and only one small step to the left of the so-called “MAGA-COMMUNIST” cult, which advocates – more or less – the same tactic but for the GOP.
At the risk of wandering out of scope, I should mention that the foreign policy of the CPUSA, though it isn’t directly related to their tactics per se, also shares qualities with Browderism. More precisely, the CPUSA retains Browder’s revisionist-capitulationist line, albeit turned inside-out: where Browder had advocated for a class truce with American big capitalists in the fight against foreign empires, and where he had characterized American capitalism as non-imperialist and having retained the qualities of “a young capitalism” (Browder’s italics), the CPUSA, as with various other revisionist sects, applies the inverse thesis today. Now, instead, it is the rivals of American imperialism — Russia, for example — that purportedly maintains the qualities of a young capitalism despite its advanced state of monopolization in industry and finance, and with whose big capitalists we must find common cause (this argument, in fact, was once made to me verbatim by a PSL member who openly identified himself as a proud “Marcyite”). Once again, is it any wonder that the social-patriotic trend represented in the “infrared” internet subculture shares this same “line,” only differing in degrees of bare-faced opportunism? The right-opportunist trend is so ubiquitous in our movement that it even has its own right-wing demanding ever greater fealty to foreign capitalists!
Modern Problems Call For Modern Solutions
I have so far expressed purely negative criticisms of the CPUSA’s tactics. While it is not my interest to “fix” the CPUSA, I’d be remiss not to offer a more positive vision, if only to show that there’s a concrete alternative.
So far as electoral politics are concerned, it is absolutely correct to keep running candidates for positions you have a legitimate shot at winning. Perhaps something in your municipal government, city council, etc – though obviously not the presidential election. Ranked choice voting, as a way of overturning the existing two party system, should be added to the program for defending democratic rights, and fought for through non-parliamentary means. Only if this succeeds can a more expansive tactic of parliamentary participation become viable.
Second, the party needs to hop off Joe Biden’s dick and recognize that the parliament is a dead end for opposing fascism (whether of the “maga” variety or not). Party members should under no pretext advocate for voting for a rival, bourgeois party (least of all without even getting some kind of concession out of it, say a seat in congress, for example). Accusations of splitting the vote, which never made sense in the first place, make even less sense in our two party system, where Communists, except in exceptionally rare circumstances, stand to win precisely zero seats, and pose no credible threat to the liberals within the Democratic Party.
Third, the current leadership, at both national and regional levels, must be recalled and strictly reeducated and disciplined, if not outright purged. If you really want to make me happy, treating Mr. Sims to Red-Guard-style public hazing would be a good place to start (in my humble opinion). Regular re-registrations should be carried out to purge extreme-right opportunist elements (like a certain Noah Khrachvik, for example). And finally, a brief candidacy (probation) period should be introduced for new members to distinguish between “paper membership” from actual, organisable prospects.
These, as well as my recommendations in the previous intervention, would certainly be a good start.
The Tasks Ahead
The purpose of these interventions is not to demoralize my comrades in the struggle. Quite the opposite! I only want to bring them to awareness of the primary task of our movement in the current stage of struggle: We must unite the truly revolutionary Marxists from all the disparate Communist parties and organizations together and, at the same time, to purge the opportunists from within our ranks (obviously easier said than done). Unity is impossible without struggle, so we must recognize today that just as it took the Bolsheviks and Mensheviks separating into factions, and just as the third international split from the second, so too are we in such a period where we must heighten unity through struggle. Recall that the united front tactic was called for by the Comintern concomitant to calls for purges of opportunists. We are, furthermore, in such a period that we must do for Lenin what he did for Marx: contest the revisionist distortions of him and reclaim the revolutionary content of his theories.
So far as the opportunists ultimately retain power in each of their respective parties, it will fall upon the revolutionaries in each sect to determine whether to wage a struggle against their leadership, or simply to split off and then unite around a new banner, perhaps the New Bolshevik Party USA, or the Unified Communist Party USA, etc. If the modern CPUSA had already succeeded in becoming a mass party and merely “detoured” into opportunism, as in previous centuries, this would certainly call for more a determined struggle for control over the party; nevertheless I have no firm or absolute recommendations to make to my comrades – use your best judgment. In this unified party, however it comes about, all disagreements on particular tactics and forms of struggle must be subordinated as a reconcilable conflict in the interest of the unity of revolutionary Marxists. I would propose only the following minimum requirements for the new party:
- It must maintain the revolutionary overthrow of the bourgeoisie as its goal and resolutely stamp out philistine delusions of a peaceful transition or of “revolution through reform.”
- It must advocate Soviet power as the ideal form of proletarian democracy even if it determines that participation in bourgeois parliaments remains a viable tactic of agitation.
- It must vocally maintain the development of communism as its ultimate goal.
- In order to unite the myriad nations in this prison house of nations, it must have an absolutely correct line on the national question, the decisive significance of which must be understood by all.
- It must have the interests of the entire, international proletariat in mind, opposing the imperialist policy of “its own” bourgeoisie both in word and in deed.
- It must be based on the Leninist theory of the vanguard party, raising educated cadre and professional revolutionaries, and being organized on the principle of democratic centralism (and not merely professing to do so).
- Cadre must be sent to the trade unions and factories to perform agitation and to develop Communist cells. In this era of advanced globalization, automation, and deindustrialization, the logistics industry (ports, railways, trucks, warehouses, data servers) will likely be among the most critical battlegrounds in the national economy.
- It must be willing under all circumstances to enter into conflict with the ruling class and its state forces rather than indefinitely biding its time. (Note: to be willing does not mean to try and force a confrontation before the masses are ready to engage in one).
- It must make combined use of legal, semi-legal, and illegal methods as appropriate, and not, as a general rule, regarding illegal methods as adventuristic or as too dangerous to consider, nor legal methods as inherently opportunistic.
In any case, the unification of our party will only be possible once the revolutionary vanguard has become keenly aware of this pressing task. Therefore our immediate tactics must be the construction of independent Communist educational orgs for raising new cadre (like a book club, for example), propaganda aimed at the Communists of existing organizations for unification, and exposures of the opportunism in our movement.
To my comrades in the CPUSA – and elsewhere, for that matter – you must stand tall and weather the storm of opportunism surrounding you. In the beginning, I’m sure it will feel isolating, but if the organizations to which you belong are worth even an iota of your energy, you will naturally find true comrades with a clear vision among your ranks willing to fight alongside you. That fight naturally will begin with efforts to change the party line through “proper channels” and with the resignation of opportunists from leadership. If (when) that fails, it will fall on you, as a revolutionary duty, to organize a revolutionary faction, just as the Bolsheviks once did from within the RSDLP. Naturally, you will be accused of “wrecking.” On the contrary, if the party leadership expels your faction, despite all efforts to continue unifying in practice with your fellow party members, it is they who will be the clear “wreckers” and liquidationists, and it is their opportunism that will be made clear to all but the most sycophantic cretins.
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