Communist Workers Group (CWG-USA)

CWG NZ view on resolving the split in the HWRS

Dear Comrades of the HWRS,

We don’t claim to have all the documents or correspondence around recent developments in HWRS. We have some of the pre-congress documents forwarded by CR and DJC. And we have a certain amount of email correspondence, including two letters from DW to CWG and to DB personally. We also draw on our common experience in the Liaison Committee since mid 2010 and our experience from our joint work around the LRCI in 1990-91 and the Liaison committee between CEMICOR and Workers Voice in 1997-8. We will however try to keep this letter tight and to the point.

On the basis of what we have read we have come to the conclusion that the factional fight in the HWRS is another instance of an internal fight that leads to an unnecessary split. In our view the two sides to this dispute remain factions of HWRS and recourse to formal rules of majorities and minorities of one, two or three, only makes an unnecessary split appear inevitable. Let’s start with what the two factions have in common and then see how differences blew up to bring about an unnecessary split. Then we can conclude with a proposed solution.

The pre-congress documents circulated during May raised many important questions about how to overcome the problems facing the small group.

DWs contribution “What must be Done?” argued that given the lack of commitment of members, the group needed to put its efforts into contacts, recruitment and educationals. Someone needed to organise this. Without this the group would remain Menshevik rather than Bolshevik. ‘Mass work’ in unions was not possible until the group got bigger. “Personal commitment” was the immediate priority of members. The fact that DW wrote a pre-congress discussion paper indicates that he was planning to return to membership.

SH’s “Balance sheet” also identified lots of problems but also important gains, and it too saw trade union caucus work as beyond the capacity of a small group. Lack of organisation too was the main issue.

CR and DJC in “Tasks and Perspectives” argued that it was necessary to develop theoretical and practical work in tandem, trade union work was part of that necessary practical work, lack of a full time leadership was a problem but the real problem was lack of commitment of individual members.

Up to that point no problems had been identified out of the ordinary for any small struggling propaganda group.

CR and DJC then went on in another document on ‘Alienation’ to try to identify what was causing the failure of particular members to commit to active membership. DW was seriously sick and had resigned. SH although a member had personal reasons for not being active. EB a supporter was more interested in his social life than politics. This left CR and DJC (the two EC members) and the newly recruited CD as the only active members.

The EC then talked of the ‘elephant in the room’ as the problem that was behind the inability of the group to function effectively. This was the tendency of DW, despite being on sick leave for long periods of time since 2009 when the group became active again, and currently not a member, to dominate the group.

They spoke of DW being an expert in alienation who was advanced in theory and method, and yet at the same time expressed alienated behaviour in the form of his ‘egoism’ in dominating members and preventing them from developing as fully functioning members. In particular they said that DW dominated his partner SH and held back her development as a full member.

Although this was a strong criticism, in itself it was within the scope of a frank internal pre-congress discussion when Marxists have to be brutally honest in their criticism of the material bases of deficiencies. Moreover the reference to alienation as an explanation for the groups dysfunction can be seen as not a personal attack on DW but a particular problem all members shared since as they had put up with DWs egoism for years and were therefore alienated co-dependents.

DW, however, saw these criticisms as a personal attack, and because the EC compared his alienated behaviour to Healyite and even Stalinist practices (a clumsy comparison in our view) took it to be personal slander demanding a Control Commission to look at the evidence and come to a decision. In response the EC said that it would not meet with those who accused it of slander unless the charge was withdrawn.

At this point the publication of an article written by the EC for the RWG newspaper Revolutionary Worker on the Greek elections became a new issue. DW opposed the EC article because a late amendment calling for ‘critical support’ tactic for Syriza it had not been discussed with all members.  DW accused the EC of being undemocratic in failing to discuss an amendment to HWRS program.

DW then ‘rejoined’, sympathiser EB was made a member, and the four signatories, DW, SH, CD and EB published an alternative ‘majority’ position on Syriza refusing to give critical support and calling for an unlimited general strike. What was a tactical difference now resulted in two public positions on Syriza signalling a deeper disagreement which led to both CWG and a member of GB (France) to write that this tactical difference was not the basis for a split.

The EC members rejected the charge of lack of democracy over the article. They said they had applied the HWRS method on critical support in the case of Syriza. And in any case it was a tactical question which as the EC they were authorised to take. DW then accused the EC of Stalinism, cowardice, etc in refusing to debate the political question of critical support. The EC said it would not discuss politics with those who accused them of slander.  DW offered to withdraw his accusation of slander but reserve the right to take it to a CC after the congress. The EC said withdraw it in total and we will discuss Syriza even with someone who is still a non–member.

The EC declared that SH and CD who were members, and DW who had resigned for health reasons in February, and EB who was a supporter now constituted an “inside/outside’ faction as they had broken Leninist norms to create a ‘majority’ of the HWRS. The EC did not recognise any meetings between these individuals and asked that members SH and CD dissociate themselves from the charge of slander and meet with the EC which they failed to do.

The new ‘majority’ of HWRS then expelled the ‘former’ EC for a breach in democratic centralism. The internal discussion on alienation had now become an public dispute over democratic centralism. There were now two public factions of HWRS, the ‘majority’ and the ‘EC’. There were more exchanges on email lists and in some public meetings over method of work in trade unions, gangs, community groups, etc where the two factions had, apparently, different ideas. These ‘differences’ like that of critical support for Syriza however, were no more than would have been normal in any functional let alone dysfunctional group except now they were infused with public factional content in two rival HWRS groups.

In our view, the two factions are still adhering to the program and method of HWRS even if that common approach is now poisoned by strong feelings of personal insult and slander. We can see no programmatic reason why the HWRS shouldn’t make a big effort in the interests of the international proletariat and try to resolve these differences. They stem from a dysfunctional group where most if not all the active work was loaded onto two comrades in the EC. Even with DW on leave or out of membership the EC came under criticism for ‘mass work’ when that mass work was necessary to keep in touch with potential contacts and recruits. As a result those comrades felt they were still under the domination of the physically disabled historic leader in absentia. When they honestly ventured to get to what they saw as the root of the problem and confront the leader in the terms of the theory of alienation that he had himself developed, DW ‘saw red’ and turned the pre-congress discussion into a personal attack on himself and his political reputation and pursued a split to remove his critics.

DW needs to recognise the effects that his long-term disability on his role and functioning in the HWRS, and that this has disqualified him from acting as the main leader.  Like anyone isolated from the active struggle, DW’s isolation from events has led him to take sectarian, abstract positions on most questions, Syriza being the latest. It is not the activism or ‘opportunism’ of the EC that is the problem. As the EC argues, activity in the class struggle is the only course to overcome elements of alienation short of socialism. Inactivity compounds the alienating pressures of capitalist society.  For sure having written strongly about alienation would be hard for DW to have this very good theoretical work reflected back as a weakness. It would be difficult to take a critical look at one’s self and role in HWRS. Yet this has been a big point in DW’s theory of leadership – the need to show responsibility and maturity as an example to others.

Further, DW’s response to the question of alienation is surely evidence of his alienated condition. He responds to an internal criticism of his domination of the group with a political offensive. He makes a charge of slander that shuts down political discussion with the EC. He refuses to withdraw it unconditionally which surely would have allowed the question to be resolved inside the HWRS. Then along comes Syriza. DW accuses the EC of a breach of democratic centralism for refusing to have a political discussion on Syriza.  Then he creates a public inside/outside faction. Then he dredges up minor political differences to prove that this breach of democratic centralism is rooted in the past wrong methods of the EC members. Minor differences are blown out of proportion to create a smoke screen rather than confront the real cause of a dysfunctional group.

So far the CWG has viewed the two factions of the HWRS as potentially capable of resolving their differences. However, we agree with the comrades of the EC that DW has created an unprincipled faction and is now claiming that the faction fight is over. We appeal to DW and his faction to withdraw the charge of slander directed at the EC and return to a pre-congress discussion with a view to overcoming the root causes of the group’s dysfunction. DWs work on alienation essentially described the ideal comrade as a “compassionate loving person”: the HWRS factions need to get back around a table with at least comradely respect. Failure to take this step will mean CWG ending its relations in the Liaison Committee with the ‘majority’ faction.  

Fraternally,

DB

AS