The appearance of the pamphlet Contre l’economisme (Against Economism) four days before the Congress of the Comite de Solidarite avec les Luttes Ouvrires (C.S.L.O.), in September, 1975, marked a significant step forward in the struggle against economism (right opportunism) in the Quebec Marxist-Leninist movement. Because of the importance of this struggle and its implications throughout the whole of Canada at this particular time, EN LUTTE! is republishing this pamphlet in the form of an English edition. Included as well as two appendices, first, the article concerning the C.S.L.O. which appeared in the journal EN LUTTE! before the Congress, and second, the article which appeared in the same journal after the Congress.
EN LUTTE! was one of the founders of the C.S.L.O. in September, 1973. In the beginning, it took the form of an ad hoc coalition of various Marxist-Leninist and popular groups, brought together to lend “support” to the striking workers of Firestone, in Joliette, a city 40 miles outside of Montreal. This support aimed to point out the workers real enemies, develop the workers class consciousness, and develop the unity of the broad masses around the workers and their struggle.
After the successful conclusion of the Firestone strike and the early involvement in the struggle at Shellcast, the C.S.L.O. decided to become a permanent body, thereby firmly setting out on the road to opportunism. Along this road, directed by a “minimal” and non-communist line, were economist interventions in workers struggles at Canadien Gypsum, Renault, Carter White Lead, Notre Dame Hospital, Great Lakes Carbon, St. Lawrence Fertilizers, United Aircraft, Penman’s, Thetford Mines, and others, interrupted only momentarily by the Congress of October, 1974. Out of this congress came principally the concept of reorganizing the C.S.L.O. into a “structured” series of local solidarity committees (“mass” organizations), with each sending representatives to the central body. Left unaltered, however were the organization’s “minimal” line and economist nature. The intensification of the struggle between the two opposing lines (Marxism-Leninism vs. economism and right opportunism) led up to the September, 1975 Congress and the publishing of this pamphlet.
The Congress opened with all groups presenting their self-criticisms and entering into a debate on the tasks of Marxist-Leninist movement (a more complete analysis of this congress can be found in the second appendix of this pamphlet).
But the dissolution of the C.S.L.O. is just the beginning of the struggle. Economism and right-wing opportunism still flourishes in the form of defenders of “implantation”, and those of “intermediate organizations”, the former would have Marxist-Leninists “joining” the working-class instead of having Marxism-Leninism merging with the working-class in winning over the vanguard of that class to communism. The latter would establish “intermediate organizations” to carry out a lower level of propaganda and agitation among the ”less advanced elements of the working-class and the masses instead of carrying out communist propaganda and agitation reflecting clear ideas in the context of systematic strategy and tactics. These deviations have been present until now in Quebec in the form of the Rassemblement des Comites de Travailleurs (R.C.T.), defending implantation, and the Cellule Militante Ouvriere (C.M.O.), defending enternediate organizations and, ultimately, implantation. (The situation in Quebec has been changed somewhat, since the initial publication of this pamphlet, by the recent (November, 1975) dissolution of the R.C.T., and the merging of the Mouvement Revolutionnaire des Etudiants du Quebec (M.R.E.Q.), the Cellule Ouvriere Revolutionnaire (C.O.R.), and the C.M.O., into the Ligue Communiste (Marxiste-Leniniste) du Canada (L.C. ml C.). Many other groups as well have polarized around one form or the other of this trend. In the rest of Canada, economism is found dominating many of the “study groups” and ”collectives” forming a scattered and divided Marxist-Leninist movement.
But the struggle has to be carried on in a determined and continuing way; “the defeat of the economist deviation (of right-opportunism) in our ranks is the essential condition for elaborating a correct political line and thereby building a strong ideological unity among Canadian Marxist-Leninists”. (EN LUTTE!, no.46, p. 5).
EN LUTTE!
NOVEMBER, 1975.