{"id":8781,"date":"2023-01-05T02:03:13","date_gmt":"2023-01-05T07:03:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.tempestmag.org\/v01_2020\/staging\/?p=8781"},"modified":"2023-01-15T22:35:40","modified_gmt":"2023-01-16T03:35:40","slug":"class-independence-and-the-broad-parties","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tempestmag.org\/test02\/2023\/01\/class-independence-and-the-broad-parties\/","title":{"rendered":"Class independence and the broad parties"},"content":{"rendered":"

I<\/span>n an essay published<\/a> at Left Voice<\/em> recently, Nathaniel Flakin takes up the broad left party concept, ultimately arguing (as the title suggests) that they \u201care a dead end.\u201d It\u2019s hardly the first<\/a> time<\/a> this argument<\/a> has come up in Left Voice<\/em>, but what\u2019s different about this piece is that it\u2019s branded as \u201ca debate with Tempest<\/em>.\u201d The piece is constructed, first and foremost, as a polemic against Tempest<\/em>. This would be perfectly fine, but it is customary to at least inform the other party if you wish to have a genuine debate. All the same, this does provide an opportunity to take up substantial questions about theory, strategy, and tactics, and discuss where we disagree and where that may be exaggerated for effect.<\/p>\n

Where is the smoking gun?<\/h4>\n

Flakin\u2019s article begins with its view of the problem: There\u2019s a large audience for socialism in the United States right now, but there is no independent socialist party and \u201c[t]he largest socialist organization in the United States, the DSA [Democratic Socialists of America], campaigns for and runs candidates as part of a capitalist and imperialist party.\u201d The piece does not elaborate on this set-up, these three points (audience, absence, DSA being bad) are given off the cuff with no references or footnotes.<\/p>\n

It moves from there onto the broad Left party question, and more specifically Tempest\u2019s approach to these broad party experiences. Flakin quotes one sentence from Tempest comrade Natalia Tylim: \u201cWe think it\u2019s a mistake to reject with a single stroke the broad party experiences.\u201d It then focuses on the transcript of a talk <\/a>given by another Tempest member, \u201cFor [Aaron] Amaral, a \u2018wholesale rejection\u2019 of \u2018broad-party experiments over the last couple of decades\u2019 can only lead to \u2018sterile propagandism.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

As a tactic, Flakin selectively quotes less than one full sentence to \u201cgotcha!\u201d Amaral\u2019s position, whereas the quote in full reads,<\/p>\n

There is often a wholesale rejection of the varied socialist attempts to build broader formations, without taking account of the specific dynamics in different countries, the different approaches which marked these experiments, and the different stakes that came into play at different moments. While I agree that one clear lesson from these experiments is that revolutionaries need to maintain their own organized current in such Left formations, the idea that broader organized formations are per se, everywhere and always, out of bounds is a mistake and often held in common by this third trend.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Neither Tylim nor Amaral make categorical arguments demanding support for broad Left parties, as Flakin suggests. So, he attributes a position to Tempest<\/em> with no evidence. He writes, \u201cA \u2018broad left party\u2019 is ultimately a euphemism: It means a party uniting reformists and revolutionaries.” Except that this isn\u2019t our position, and Flakin must know that. This is evident by the fact that members of Tempest say almost nothing in the article that is ostensibly a debate with us. If there were a smoking gun, you’d think that Flakin would have found it.<\/p>\n

And while there is a substantial portion of Flakin\u2019s article devoted to SYRIZA and Podemos as evidence of why we should categorically reject broad formations, the immediate aim is the relationship of revolutionaries to the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA).
\nThe impression one would get reading this article with no other knowledge is that Tempest<\/em> cheerleads the DSA, and this is because of our mistaken fidelity to broad Left parties. Flakin lays out what the purported difference between Tempest<\/em> and Left Voice<\/em> when he writes:<\/p>\n

If a neoreformist party is able to politicize and enthuse many thousands of young people, we \u2014 of course \u2014 agree that revolutionaries need to engage with them. This means fighting together for the rights of working-class and oppressed people, alongside members and even leaders of neoreformist parties. But this kind of unity in action does not require us to sign up for parties whose stated goal is to administer the capitalist state \u2026 We can say that the balance sheet of broad Left parties has been dismal. Socialists should break with this failed strategy. We should not advocate unity with reformists in the form of broad Left parties.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

What I find particularly odd about this characterization is first, Tempest<\/em>\u2019s criticism of DSA is widely known, so much so that the \u201cboss caucus\u201d majority of DSA\u2019s National Political Committee (NPC) believed<\/a> that we were somehow behind every act of opposition<\/a> the leadership faced (if only!). I do not see where Flakin could get the impression from our numerous articles<\/a> on DSA (many of which have been cited<\/a> by Left Voice<\/em> writers in their pieces on DSA) that we are uncritical proponents of the organization.<\/p>\n

But more to the point, members of Left Voice<\/em> were also members of DSA\u2014they just left the organization much sooner. Tatianna Cozzarelli, for instance, toured some DSA-adjacent<\/a> podcasts<\/a> circa 2018 and frequently introduced herself<\/a> as being a member of the DSA. It would appear to contradict Flakin\u2019s argument that revolutionaries should never become members of these formations. If anything, it seems that Left Voice<\/em> made a similar calculation as Tempest comrades that it could be potentially useful to be part of DSA to win this new layer of socialists to revolutionary politics. Left Voice<\/em> may have had a different set of criteria for when membership in DSA no longer served that aim. It would be useful to hear Left Voice<\/em>\u2019s account of when and why they made a change in policy.<\/p>\n

Terms of a debate: independence<\/h4>\n

If Flakin\u2019s article is mostly shadowboxing an imaginary opponent, and in practice the Tempest<\/em> and Left Voice <\/em> approaches to the DSA have been fairly similar, then what are we really debating? This comes down to class independence and its relationship to the development of a mass, revolutionary socialist Left. The question of broad parties is related but subsidiary to that understanding.<\/p>\n

Flakin represents the Left Voice<\/em> position as one that draws a stark line: \u201cWe should not advocate unity with reformists in the form of broad left parties.\u201d The conclusion Flakin draws categorically rejecting \u201cbroad parties\u201d appears to be based on a particular conception of class independence and its relationship to reformism. It’s admittedly a little hard to pin down because Flakin never defines \u201creformism.\u201d<\/p>\n