The Party

In the Inaugural Address and Provisional Statutes of the First International, Marx sets out, in a formidable synthesis, or rather re-proposes, what the Communist Left has defined as the social pyramid: statistical class, organised class, political party.

“The working class possesses one element of success: numbers; but numbers carry weight only if united by organization and led by knowledge”. Furthermore: ‘In its struggle against the collective power of the propertied classes, the working class cannot act as a class except by constituting itself into a political party, distinct from and opposed to the parties of the propertied classes. This constitution of the working class into a political party is indispensable in order to ensure the triumph of the social revolution, and of its ultimate end – the abolition of classes‘. Finally: ’The combination of forces which the working class has already effected by its economical struggles must also serve as a lever for its struggles against the political power of landlords and capitalists”.

Marx then reiterates the historical goal of the class and the path necessary to achieve it: “…The conquest of political power has therefore become the great duty of the working class”; “To ensure the victory of the social revolution and the achievement of its ultimate goal – the abolition of classes”.

Not content with reiterating the programmatic foundations, Marx also characterises the organisation of the class political party and the relationship between the militant and the Party: “Anyone who accepts and defends the principles of the IWA (International Workingmen’s Association, or First International) can be admitted as a member”.

How is the Party organised? “Continuous struggle by the General Council against sects and amateurish experiments”. It is authoritarian, anti-democratic centralism, opposed to the libertarian and democratic federalism of Bakunin and similar groups.

We find these same principles in Lenin and the Communist Left, with explicit reference to Marx, in an unbroken line of continuity.

On the part of spurious tendencies in doctrine and practice, some of which call themselves Marxist and Communist, there has been a desire to contrast Marx with Lenin and the Left. These tendencies have based this alleged contrast on an unspecified absence of “proletarian democracy” and a consequent “party democracy”.

The ruthless state and ideological terror of Stalinism, which strangled October and the International, gave rise to these distortions, whether represented by small groups or professed by individuals. Ultimately, both Stalinists and democratic anti-Stalinists have claimed and continue to claim to escape the dictatorship of principles and the discipline of the Programme, the former by establishing a caporalesque dictatorship and the latter by establishing a confused anarchism, both of which destroying the Party.

This convergence of apparently opposing factions has only one outcome: opportunism that denies the Party, its Programme and its organisation. The Stalinist party is all about organisation and action. The anarchist movement is all about action. The fascist movement is also all about organisation and action.

In the Communist Party, principles take precedence over organisation and action. But the political party ceases to be such if it renounces even one of these three elements. It is a mistake to say: principles exist, therefore the political party exists. It is also a serious mistake to say: organisation and action exist, therefore the political party exists. It follows that the distortion of even one of these three elements simultaneously distorts all the others: the exclusion of even one prevents the existence of the class-based political party.

From this follows the Marxist theorem: the indissolubility of programme, organisation and method of action in the Party. It is superfluous for us to add that denying the Party is denying the class.

Another assertion, confirmed by the heroic behaviour of the Left in one of the darkest phases of defeat: the Party is not attacked; the Party is not abandoned. Not a single act was ever carried out by the Communist Left against the Party, except when it fell prey to the most deadly counter-revolution in history and thus ceased to be the revolutionary Marxist Party.

The enemies of the Left – and who is more hostile than official historians? – persist in repeating, concealing the truth, that the old Communist faction of the PSI did indeed have a programme, but no organisation or method of action. It is well known, however, that the faction made use of the widespread organisational network of the abstentionist Communist faction of the Soviet. It is well known that the communists of the PSI left no stone unturned in their efforts to place themselves at the forefront of the workers’ struggles. And the action of the Communist Party of Italy, led by the Left, in the working class and its mass organisations was so continuous and persistent that the International had to praise its initiative and abilities.

Have these characteristics, which are in principle p
articular and distinctive to the Party, changed today in 1971? Do they need to be rectified, updated, enriched? We answer categorically no!

When we refer to the unbroken line from Marx to Lenin to the Communist Left, we want to emphasise that, throughout this long historical arc, the fundamental characteristics of the Marxist Communist Party have never changed.

The manifold and multifaceted events of history have only made it possible to highlight them with ever greater precision. Events, the course of history, not the “fact”, the occasional accident that are indecipherable to everyone if taken out of the concatenation of events.

Is not the main argument of opportunism, the constant anxiety of the middle classes, that of discovering every day a “new fact” that justifies, deviation after deviation, the abandonment of principles, open betrayal, and defection to the enemy? Opportunism crept into the Third International under the guise of changing times. Under this pretext, “new” tasks were entrusted to the Party and “different” functions to the proletarian dictatorship. The result was the destruction of the proletarian Party and state.

The fact that the old PSI was linked to Freemasonry and that its politics were further to the right than imaginable was never enough to justify the anarchist “reaction” in the eyes of the Left. Thus, revolutionary unionism was not justifiable as a response to the reformism of the CGdL. Not even the birth of the KAPD found the Left’s approval, although it recognised the erroneous policy of the KPD as the occasional cause of this split. The Party explains these “experiences”, but does not justify them, much less approve of them.

A “pure” and guaranteed party?

The Party would be asked, in order to join it, not to degenerate, to progress and to win. In short, a sort of insurance policy against defeat, opportunism and counter-revolution is demanded.

This was demanded by the “right wing” of the CI when, among other things, in the wake of declining social subversion, they insisted that every communist party protect itself with the shield of “Bolshevization” to exorcise itself from all “sin”. This was not the case, however, when the CI itself established that all sections be
subordinated to the decisions of the Central Committee based in Moscow: a measure that was neither exorcising nor decisive, but aligned with the direction and the will to overcome the false and mystifying democratic method in the life of the world party.

The Communist Party of Italy was formed by the convergence of the Marxists of the Communist Left and the neo-idealists of the Ordine Nuovo. An aberrant bloc, the “purists” would say; it was “inevitable” that sooner or later the party would fall apart. Was the Left “wrong” to bring together ideologically dissimilar allies? In that historical moment, the stakes were the birth of a militant and combative party, also desired by the International, at a precise turning point in the revolutionary resurrection of the class. Those who sided unreservedly with Moscow were among the ranks in Livorno. The process of forming a class-based political party does not respond to any logical or pragmatic canon, but to the historical maturation of the class struggle.

Engels wrote, after the dissolution of the First International, that a new “purely communist” International would arise “after Marx’s books have exerted their influence for a few years”, and that it would “directly propagate our principles”. The balance of power between the classes was not yet ripe for a completely Marxist International, but it was ripe for an International that was inclined towards Marxist communism, for an organisation in which it was possible to “propagate” Marx’s “principles”. The Left also excelled in these issues of the maturing of the historical process, working to direct even non-Marxist revolutionary forces, aware that it could succeed on condition that it did not stray from revolutionary Marxism.

One of the many lessons provided by the Stalinist counter-revolution is this: the defeat of the proletariat was based on the Third International’s inability to fully assimilate revolutionary Marxism.

The new World Communist Party can only be Marxist, or it will not be. It will not be the product of political alchemy. It will not issue insurance policies against error.

Will such “Marxist” purity ensure victory of the proletarian struggle? There is no answer to this question. The history of class struggles and political party teaches us that there is a historical need for incessant selection in the organs of the working class. The Marxist communist party is the historical product corresponding to the final phase of the revolutionary class struggle. Without this specific type of party, the class cannot proceed towards communism. This is the fundamental historical outcome, the essential premise for the revival of the class and victory.

Programmatic battles

The Party develops and strengthens itself on the basis of the Programme. Even today, the life of our small organisation is a continuous struggle in defence of the Programme, in every field, on every occasion, at every moment. Defending the Programme means enabling the Party to carry out the most complex tasks of tomorrow. This defence is action and, as such, involves the Party and its members in the class struggle. If it is true that class struggle and communist consciousness (Marx, Engels, Lenin, Left) are parallel and that the latter does not descend from the former, it is also true that communist consciousness must penetrate the class struggle, raising it to the level of the Party. The Party therefore engages in the heat of this struggle, and it would be foolish to expect that consciousness and militancy would automatically exclude error in assessment and action.

The historic confrontation between the abstentionist theses of the Left and those of the revolutionary parliamentarianism of Lenin and Bukharin at the Second
Congress of the Comintern was based on a single and identical programmatic body, and resulted in a single, identical conclusion. The arguments of the Left and Lenin were drawn from common doctrine.

However, at that time, the Left, obeying the priority of the demands of centralism, behaved accordingly, accepting the solution imposed by the world leadership of the movement. Today, history, with a plethora of practical confirmations, has validated the tactical positions of the Left. Was Lenin’s decision a “mistake”? Was the Left “wrong” to follow Moscow? Not even in our wildest dreams. The CI and the revolution did not fall because they practiced the tactic of revolutionary parliamentarism, but because of a series of deviations that ultimately strengthened the enemy’s defensive capacity, aided by the revolutionary ebb.

How many times did Lenin declare that he had been wrong on this or that issue, and that it was necessary to “rectify” the direction and move on!

The Party is not a static organ. As an organ of the class, it is influenced to a certain extent by its vicissitudes. It must therefore test its strength, its ability to influence the proletarian struggle, and the class’s capacity for reception and reaction. In this complex, arduous and difficult activity, the Party tests, even in its mistakes, the maturity or weakness of its organisation and the suitability of the tools it uses. Principles serve this purpose, not a foolish adoration of “ideals” reduced to the role of “harmless icons”. The programme is embodied in the organisation to the extent that the organisation handles it and matures in this activity. If this were not the case, communism would be a little school for learning a sort of Marxist catechism, and every militant would have to be awarded a degree in Marxology after passing a special exam before being admitted to the organisation.

This does not mean that the Party, being Marxist and communist, can afford the luxury of devising the most unthinkable tactics in a sort of Machiavellian kaleidoscope. The programme is the scope but also the limit of the Party’s operational possibilities, outside of which the Party ceases to be the organ of the communist revolution.

From a contingent point of view (history is normally measured in centuries, except in critical conditions where centuries can pass in a few years or even a few months), the class struggle is at a lower stage than it was 60-70 years ago. This state of affairs has led to the most absurd judgments being made about the class, the class struggle and the Party, such as “the class no longer exists”, “the working class is integrated into bourgeois society”, and so on.

The revolutionary class struggle is confused with class struggle. The revolutionary class struggle is an exceptional condition, just as the state of crisis of the regime is exceptional. If this were not the case, we would already be in a phase of transition from capitalism to lower communism.

But it is not at all necessary for the class to always carry out a revolutionary struggle. As a result of defeat, the class, reduced to an objective existence, is forced into a pure defensive struggle against the economic, social, and political blows of capitalism. In this negative phase, the activity of the class contracts, almost dies out. Even the Party is reduced in numbers and activity. However, the critical and theoretical functions develop more, an indispensable prerequisite for the resumption of the large-scale struggle of tomorrow. This means learning the “lessons of the counter-revolution” and strengthening the party by drawing them.

In this now centuries-old process, the Party has moved from a “naive” identity to a “scientific” one, to that of a Marxist Party. The Party form has also developed, taking on increasingly marked connotations of ideological suitability for the revolutionary class struggle, for the conquest of power, the management of the proletarian dictatorship, and the direction of society towards communism. Similarly, the capitalist regime has taken on more appropriate forms of class dictatorship, having itself learned the lessons of victories and defeats.

Despite this, there has never been a return to the past under the pretext that defeat had nullified the revolutionary action of the class and the Party.

To draw a parallel with economics, it can be said that today’s political party sets off in its practical action from the highest level reached by the previous political party formation, in the same way that countries that are latecomers to the sphere of industrial production make use of the latest technological advances and do not have to go through the whole process of technical appropriation of production.

The Party has achieved maximum theoretical development through the “lessons” that the Left itself has learned over the last fifty years, which are condensed in the “texts” and “theses” of the Communist Left, which constitute the programmatic basis of our Party.

This does not mean that ‘everything is now accomplished’ and that all that remains to be done is to wait for ‘the corpse of our enemy’ to pass. It is the function of the Party to continuously process the data of experience in order to better sculpt the distinctive features of our doctrine, in tactics and organisation, in the work of preparing for the revolutionary assault.

If others are “free” to formulate the most absurd theories and propose the most convoluted political organisations, claiming to act for communism, we cling to revolutionary Marxism in order to propose to the proletarian class the only true path to revolution.

A single, unitary party

The enormous work accomplished by the Communist Left in the International and in the CPI can be summarised in this sentence: to make the Party a single, unitary body. A single worldwide organisation united by a single programme, that is, by the consistency and interdependence of principles, aims and tactics.

It is therefore categorically out of the question that the Party should be the result of the unification of heterogeneous groups in a federalist form. These are facts acquired by the Left and deduced from history. The process of Party formation is irreversible. We will not be deterred by any numerical “weakness”. Numbers are subordinate to the uniqueness and unity of the Party. A “large” party with a thousand “programmes” and a thousand “ideas” is a large, weak party, doomed to shatter at the first impact like a vase into a hundred pieces. Our Party can only be “closed” to the endless external pressures on its Programme, especially in the current counter-revolutionary phase, “not plethoric” compared to opportunist “mass” parties. The more conservative it is in its principles, the more revolutionary it will be in its actions. The more “closed” it is in its Programme, the more open it will be to class action. Just think of the trade union “united front” tactic, admirably applied by the Left, which worked to bring together huge masses of proletarians, professing the most diverse ideologies, organised in different parties and trade unions, on a platform of struggle susceptible to being influenced by the slogans of the class-based Party.

These are the conditions for the Party’s existence and functionality. The swarm of small groups, produced by the miasma of counter-revolution, is there, historically concrete proof confirming our assumptions. To depart from these dictates means to enter the realm of confusion and impotence.

Maintaining these conditions is the permanent task of the party organisation. This function, which is as difficult, hard and demanding, cannot be abandoned to circumstances or convenience, but must be carried out in all conditions by the entire organisation. To the extent that each militant subordinates himself to these tasks, he succeeds in assimilating the Party’s line, eliminating the uncertainties and doubts that the contradiction between our powerful doctrine and the immaturity of the class’s behaviour can arouse.

In individual militants, consciousness is fortified by merging with revolutionary mysticism, scientific rationality with passion, intellect with heart.