The League, as we will be showing at length, has a counter-revolutionary political line on Canada, a line which is at once economist and bourgeois nationalist, a line which apologizes for both the Canadian bourgeoisie and American imperialism in its role of oppressing the Canadian proletariat and people. This line comes from the theory of“three worlds” and has everything in common with it. In fact, the League has supported the theory of “three worlds” since its formation.
The brilliant leadership of the Party of Labour of Albania, a Party which has never supported the theory of “three worlds” but which the League has always hypocritically claimed to support, in exposing the theory of “three worlds” has not led the League to review its mistakes and correct them. On the contrary, the League has responded by going on a frantic and desperate campaign to cover for the revisionist nature of the theory of “three worlds” by engaging in the lowest forms of demagogy and deceit.
The League has defended the theory of “three worlds” not principally on the basis of its own imagined merits as a political theory, but principally on the basis of its supposed elaboration by Chairman Mao. By always referring to it as “Chairman Mao’s theory of three worlds”, the League has proceeded to launch vicious slanders against the real or imagined opponents of this theory for “attacking socialist China” and Mao Tse-tung. Even a group such as In Struggle, which has not dared to ally itself with the struggle to defeat the theory of “three worlds” but instead conciliates with revisionism and vacillates between supporting and opposing this theory, has come under such relentless, unsubstantiated and malicious slanders by the League.
But if the League is going to go to all this effort to appeal to the authority of Chairman Mao to defend its theory of “three worlds”, one would think that the League would try to demonstrate concretely that it was indeed Mao who elaborated the theory of“three worlds“. But the League does not undertake this task; the League does not want people to get “bogged down” in “intellectualism” and “right-opportunism”, which are the labels the League uses to slander those who seek to study and master Marxism-Leninism.
Thus the League acts appalled:
IS reprints a text in its supplement, with neither criticism nor comment, that denies that the three world theory is a strategic concept develop by Mao Tse-tung. (The Forge, 2:16, p. 15)
Does the League respond to this article by Comrade Ernst Aust of the KPD(ML) by demonstrating to us that the “theory of three worlds” is indeed a “strategic concept developed by Mao Tse-tung”? Of course not. The League merely castigates In Struggle for publishing the article and allowing it to be read. Then the readers of the Forge are made to wait while the clever editorial staff of The Forge is busily hunting down the source of this “strategic concept developed by Mao Tse-tung”. One issue later, they found it. Says the League: “The theory of three worlds was first put forward by Chairman Mao in 1974 during a conversation with foreign visitors.” {The Forge, 2:17, p. 8)
Thus, in one unwritten conversation, Mao Tse-tung is alleged to have made “a masterful synthesis of the changes which have come about during the last decades”. (Ibid., p. 8) This “masterful synthesis” had never before been published as Mao’s during his lifetime (although it was published as Teng Hsiao-ping’s). This “elaboration” of a “revolutionary strategy” was supposedly mentioned in one conversation which the League dared not even quote directly.
The League has now undertaken a consciously manipulative defense of the discredited theory of “three worlds”. Its revolutionary rhetoric begins to pile high and thick. For example:
The three worlds analysis, which proceeds from a strictly class point of view, gives a precise and concrete picture of the development of the four great contradictions of imperialism today. (The Forge, 2:17, p. 8)
It has been a long time since the League has mentioned the four main contradictions. Although a revisionist version of these appears in its Statement of Political Agreement, they are very rarely discussed in the pages of The Forge. The Forge spends its time talking not about four contradictions but about “three worlds”. But now all of a sudden we learn that the theory of “three worlds” has all along been a “precise and concrete picture of the development of the four great contradictions of imperialism.”
And the League further tells us that the “three worlds analysis... proceeds from a strictly class point of view.” Lenin and Stalin, who proceeded from a strictly class point view, saw that to look at the world from the point of view of classes meant to understand that the world was now divided into two fronts: the socialist front and the imperialist front. The socialist front was formed on the basis of the existence of socialism in one country, Soviet Russia. The material establishment of the socialist system in the world, according to Stalin, tied all the other contradictions into one knot.
I have spoken above about the contradictions of world capitalism. In addition to these, however, there is one other contradiction. I am speaking of the antagonism between the capitalist world and the USSR. True, this antagonism must not be regarded as being of the same order as the internal contradictions of capitalism. It is an antagonism between capitalism as a whole and the country that is building socialism. This, however, does not prevent it from corroding and shaking the very foundations of capitalism. More than that, it is exposing all the contradictions of capitalism to the roots, tying them in one knot and transforming them into a life and death question of the capitalist order itself. (Report to the Sixteenth Congress of the CPSU(B) on the Work of the Central Committee, Calcutta, p. 21)
But the League openly denies that the socialist camp continues to exist. Say these opponents of socialism in the world: “The socialist USSR was transformed into a capitalist country. The socialist camp thus fell apart.” (The Forge, 1:8,p. 10) This position is then reaffirmed when the necessity arose for them to defend the theory of “three worlds”: “The restoration of capitalism in the USSR in 1956... brought about the disintegration of the formidable socialist camp which existed after World War II.” (The Forge, 2:17, p. 9) Even if Albania were the only socialist country in the world, it would remain of extreme strategic importance for the victory of the forces of proletarian revolution in the world, because the existence of socialism in the world would still unite all of the forces of the international proletariat and its allies into a single knot. To ignore or deny the existence of socialism in the world is to deny “the fundamental contradiction of our time, that between socialism and capitalism”. Says the PLA:
The revisionist betrayal... by no means implies that socialism was liquidated as a system and that the criterion of the division of the world into two opposing systems must be changed, that the contradiction between socialism and capitalism no longer exists today. By ignoring socialism as a social system, the so-called “theory of three worlds” ignores the great historic victory of the international proletariat, ignores the fundamental contradiction of the time, that between socialism and capitalism. It is clear that such a “theory”, which ignores socialism, is anti-Leninist; it leads to the weakening of the dictatorship of the proletariat in the countries where socialism is being built, while calling on the world proletariat not to fight, not to rise in socialist revolution (“The Theory and Practice of the Revolution”, Albania Today no. 4 (35), p. 22)
But the “CCL(ML)”, which has spewed out many empty words about groups which “directly attack socialist China”, is openly denying the fundamental contradiction of our time. And not only does the League ignore the existence of the socialist system and the socialist camp in its political line on international strategy; it also denies the existence of the imperialist camp.
...Things have changed since the time that American imperialism could abuse the imperialist countries like France and Canada, as it liked. This is what Chairman Mao’s analysis of the three worlds teaches us. Since the world has been divided in three, we can no longer speak of an “imperialist camp” (The Forge, 1:21,p. 15)
So imperialism, for the League, is supposedly not as dangerous as it once was. The imperialists are supposedly not united into a “camp” to destroy the world proletarian revolution. The imperialists supposedly are too busy entering into diplomatic relations with other imperialists and with comprador bourgeoisies to bother uniting into a world-wide “camp” against revolution. It is the supposed “division of the world into three”, allegedly mentioned by Mao “during a conversation with foreign visitors”, which has supposedly completely transformed the nature of the imperialist enemy such that it is no longer a camp, in other words, no longer an enemy united against the international proletariat and its allies. But the theory of “three worlds” supposedly “proceeds from a strictly class point of view”!
What, then, is left for the international proletariat if there is no socialist camp and if the imperialists are no longer united as the enemy camp? All that is left, for the League and the various other proponents of “three worlds”, is to unite with one’s “own” bourgeoisie, to support the arming of one’s “own” bourgeoisie, in order to fight other imperialisms. Says the PLA:
In trying to divert the attention of the proletariat from the revolution, the authors of the theory of the “three worlds” preach that at the present time, the question of the preservation of national independence from the danger of aggression by the superpowers, especially by Soviet social-imperialism, which they consider to be the main enemy, is the primary issue. (“The Theory and Practice of the Revolution”, Albania Today no. 4 (35), p. 27)
And this is exactly what the League advocates in Canada. The League has in fact plotted a counterrevolutionary strategy for the Canadian proletariat, a strategy which calls upon the Canadian proletariat not to rise up in battle for the socialist revolution but instead to prepare to ally with the Canadian bourgeoisie in the face of the supposedly “inevitable” war against the superpowers.
The League has been able to engineer this strategy by skillfully manoeuvring its analysis of the Canadian bourgeoisie and its relationship to the Canadian proletariat. Within the context of the economic struggle of the Canadian proletariat, the Canadian bourgeoisie becomes its “main enemy”. But as soon as political questions are raised, as soon as the nature of superpower intervention and political interaction with the superpowers comes to the fore, the League magically transforms the Canadian bourgeoisie into a part of the ranks of the people.
In terms of the League’s line on the principal contradiction, the Canadian bourgeoisie is supposedly the “main enemy” of the Canadian proletariat. The Bolshevik Union long ago exposed that the League’s line on the principal contradiction has nothing to do with Canadian reality. Apart from their falsification of statistics, we have shown the infantile and metaphysical reasoning that
Either the Canadian bourgeoisie is an appendage of American imperialism, and Canada is not an independent country, or Canada has a developed bourgeoisie which controls the state. (The Forge, 1:3, p. 12)
The Canadian bourgeoisie does not share its state with American imperialism. Such a relationship is impossible between imperialist classes, and implies not a sharing but a complete capitulation.
The Canadian bourgeoisie is an imperialist bourgeoisie. Canada is neither a colony deprived of its independence and wholly integrated into another country, nor a semi-colony, an underdeveloped land completely controlled economically by another power and enjoying a purely formal independence.
Canada is an independent country, with a bourgeoisie which has its own sources of accumulation of capital – an imperialist bourgeoisie which exploits and oppresses workers in the third world, in Europe and in the US. (The Forge. 1:2, p. 12)
The Bolshevik Union has long exposed this reasoning as anti-Leninist and as a cover for American imperialism. The Bolshevik Union has long ago drawn to the attention of our movement Lenin’s analysis of the “transitional forms of state dependence” which are key to an understanding of the world imperialist chain. The League has long ignored our criticisms. (In Struggle, which rallied to the League’s line on the principal contradiction, has denounced Lenin as a “trotskyite” for having said such things.)
But, as we have shown at length again, it is the line of both Trotskyism and modern revisionism that the Canadian bourgeoisie is in complete control of its own state and that it is this (falsified) relationship of state control which determines the principal enemy of the Canadian proletariat. The Bolshevik Union has demonstrated explicitly that the line of Canadian Trotskyites replicates the League’s analysis of the principal contradiction almost verbatim, and that it is Tim Buck’s revisionist line as well which has explicitly surfaced in this line held by both the League and In Struggle.
What is clear is that for the League, its Hat on the principal contradiction is nothing but a tool for “the economic struggle against the employers and the government”, as the economists in Lenin’s day called the economic struggle when they were trying to justify their activities in it as revolutionary. For the League, the method of waging the struggle against the Canadian bourgeoisie, “our main enemy”, is the trade union struggle, into which the League is trying to implant itself in power. For example, it reported the October 14, 1976 general strike, a spontaneous struggle guided by bourgeois ideology and concretely led by the agents of the labour bureaucracy in Canada:
We must develop our methods of struggle. We must learn from the 14th. We must continue to prepare for an unlimited general strike. Unite our isolated battles together into one powerful movement against our main enemy, the bourgeoisie and its state! (The Forge, 1:20, p. 3)
For the League, the spontaneous struggles of the proletariat in Canada, the “economic struggle against the employers and the government” which tries to wrest concessions from individual employers and to pressure the state to relent on its repressive laws, is the “powerful movement against our main enemy, the bourgeoisie and its state.”
That is the function of the League’s political line on the principal contradiction: to lead the reform struggles “against the state” under the leadership of the League and to label these struggles revolutionary. By gaining certain of these petty concessions, the League considers that it has been vindicated in its political line.
Thus we are told that only the League knows how to “test its political line in practice”.
Communists aren’t afraid to confront their political line with concrete practice, to submit it to the collective experience of the masses and thus prove its correctness. While participating in and providing direction to factory struggles and by defending the daily interests of the masses of workers, communists point the road to total emancipation.... Communist propaganda does not consist only, of giving Marxist-Leninist theory to workers through study circles or other such circles. It also means teaching them how to apply that theory in practice. ... Rooting the party in the workplace, and in particular, in factories of heavy industry, enables communists to initiate and lead struggles of the workers and to demonstrate in practice the correctness of their political line. (The Forge, 1:6, p. 7)
Through the spontaneous struggles, “we aim our principal blows at our main enemy.” (“ We” is the Canadian proletariat. The League, which remains as isolated as ever from the Canadian proletariat, nevertheless does not distinguish between itself and the Canadian proletariat. Hence its slogans: “Forge OUR party”, “Make all OUR struggles successful”, etc.) The successes which Leaguites win in gaining more money for the workers “demonstrate in practice the correctness of their political line”, that is, that the “Canadian bourgeoisie and its state” are the principal agent of keeping wages down. “The Canadian bourgeoisie, an imperialist bourgeoisie of a second world country, remains the principal obstacle to the proletarian revolution.” (The Forge, 1:3, p. 12)
The formulation for the principal contradiction which the League has developed is thus the formulation which best expresses its principal activity, the search for hegemony over the economic struggles of the workers. By maintaining that the principal contradiction is limited to factors internal to Canada, the League is able to eliminate political questions from its principal activity and limit the struggles of the proletariat to its economic struggles.
But let us look at what the League proposes for the Canadian proletariat when broader political questions are raised.
The League spends very little space in its newspaper on the question of the principal contradiction itself, outside of the framework of its economist articles. For the League, its economist articles are the articles which deal with “our main enemy, the Canadian bourgeoisie and its state”. In contrast, the League spends much newspaper space in every issue analyzing the world situation and putting forward political positions on the struggle against the two superpowers and the theory of “three worlds”. This is because for the League, it is the job of the workers to participate in the economic struggle (under the “revolutionary” leadership of the League), but the political struggle against the superpowers is best left to “the main enemy of the Canadian proletariat”, the Canadian bourgeoisie.
Thus to examine the true nature of the League’s political line on Canada we cannot stop at the principal contradiction but must examine its line on “the main secondary contradiction”, which, as we shall see, is not so secondary as it may first appear.
Of the secondary contradictions, the League says:
The most important opposes the Canadian people and the two superpowers, particularly American imperialism. When the bourgeoisie/proletariat contradiction develops to such a point that the proletariat is close to seizing power, this secondary contradiction can be exacerbated to the point of provoking a military, invasion of one or other of the two superpowers. In addition, the proletariat’s growth as a political force will strengthen the core of a united front of the Canadian people to defend the country and oppose the danger of war. (The Forge, 1:2, p. 12)
Here is what the League is saying. The League will valiantly lead the “economic struggle against the employers and the government” on the level of economic demands “and for socialism.” But just as this “socialism” is about to be achieved, something will probably happen. A superpower (probably American imperialism) will most likely invade. And the moment that it invades, “our main enemy” will no longer be our main enemy. In fact, it will become our dearest ally!
If Canada is invaded by one another or both of the superpowers (and at the beginning this is most likely to be US imperialism) our task will be to lead a people’s united front and the people’s army against superpower occupation and after liberation to proceed directly with the socialist revolution. (The Forge, 2:7, p. 16)
That is, “after liberation to proceed directly” to getting back to the economic struggle against “our main enemy”, “the employers and the government”.
For the League, an invasion by US imperialism would liquidate the one-stage revolution in Canada and turn the struggle of the Canadian people into a two-stage revolution of which the first stage is the national liberation struggle in alliance with the Canadian imperialist bourgeoisie.
In the current concrete conditions of the world situation, Canada is an imperialist power which is within the large imperialist bloc headed by the United States. If Canada is dragged into an inter-imperialist world war, it would most likely be on the side of the United States to fight the Soviet Union; hence any invasion of Canada which expressed inter-imperialist rivalry would most likely come from the Soviet Union or the Soviet bloc. An invasion by the US would most likely not express an inter-imperialist rivalry between the Canadian bourgeoisie and American imperialism. War is the continuation of politics by other means; and as the relationship of the Canadian bourgeoisie to American imperialism is and has long been principally one of collusion, such an invasion would be a continuation of this relationship. It is no coincidence that Canada and the United States have never gone to war against each other – even though the League is very sure that “two imperialist bourgeoisies will always, in essence, compete”. (Statement of Political Agreement, p. 52)
An invasion of Canada by the United States would probably have one purpose: to smash proletarian revolution in Canada. It would take place because the Canadian military apparatus had become too weak to protect its rule over the Canadian proletariat and needed the assistance of its closest allies. The League, by adopting its position, is preparing the way for collaborating with the Canadian and American bourgeoisies. It is trying to disarm the proletariat by spreading the illusion that an invasion of Canada is likely to come as the result of a national contradiction and/or inter-imperialist contradictions, rather than precisely as an invasion against the proletarian revolution. What the League is therefore preparing the way for is alliance with the Canadian bourgeoisie (and therefore with American imperialism) in crushing a proletarian revolution. A more social-chauvinist line could not be imagined.
The other situation which could provide an excuse for a US invasion of Canada is the case of a war between the superpowers. In such a case, the United States might invade Canada in order to “protect” Canadian (and US) interests from Soviet social-imperialism. By adhering to the theory of “three worlds” the League would have to support such a move by US imperialism as a positive step in the struggle against the “main danger”, the USSR. This is one more example of the fact that the theoreticians of “three worlds” always have an alliance with US imperialism lurking in the wings of their political line.
The group In Struggle is very proud of itself for having criticized the League in this regard. But In Struggle’s formulation of the main secondary contradiction is exactly the same as the League’s. The line of class collaboration with the Canadian bourgeoisie is inherently related to this revisionist and Trotskyite line on the principal contradiction. It is the theoreticians of “three worlds” who promote the idea that the bourgeoisies of the so-called “second world” are supposedly in complete control of their own respective state apparatuses and are hence fully capable of acting politically independently of the two superpowers. The line of In Struggle and the League on the principal contradiction both come directly from the counter-revolutionary theory of “three worlds”.
For the theoreticians of “three worlds”, the way to oppose superpower hegemonism is to forge a world-wide alliance with imperialist bourgeoisies and comprador bourgeoisies. For Marxism-Leninism, however, it is the socialist countries, the international proletariat and its allies, the oppressed peoples and nations engaged in struggle for national liberation, which form the socialist camp.
When the League says that superpower imperialism will be expelled by the action of “the whole people”, the League means to say that the Canadian imperialist bourgeoisie will act as a part of the forces of “the people”, that it is not collaborating with American imperialism for the oppression of the Canadian proletariat against American imperialism.
Such is exactly the same class-collaborationist, bourgeois nationalist, and social-chauvinist line which the bourgeois nationalists in Canada such as the Bainsites have always called for. Let us compare the two:
Through the action of the entire people, foreign imperialism can be eliminated in a given country. To counter the threat and control of the two superpowers in Canada, we have to get the whole Canadian people to oppose the foreign enemies. It is in the interests of the whole people, except for a handful of agents and traitors, to fight against the two superpowers. (League, Statement of Political Agreement, pp. 53-4)
... Whosoever opposes US imperialism in Canada and in whatever form, and to whatever extent is against the genuine interests of the Canadian compradors and other bureaucrat capitalists and we must encourage them to carry on their own opposition to our common enemy. That is to say that whosoever opposes our principal enemy, US imperialism, is our friend, and whosoever supports US imperialism, under whatever pretext, is our enemy. (Bainsites, People’s Canada Daily News, Sept. 24. 1971, p. 2)
The only difference is that whereas the Bainsites are openly social-chauvinist in “peacetime”, the League’s line allows the Canadian proletariat to wait for the war to break out and US imperialism to invade Canada before it calls for a direct alliance with the Canadian bourgeoisie!
The League has merely dressed up the Bainsites’ bourgeois nationalist line on Canada by adding a formulation which allows it to make economist activity principal during peacetime – economist activity also being, of course, a form of class collaboration with the bourgeoisie. Whereas the Bainsites generally appealed to the petty-bourgeois anti-imperialist movement of the sixties and put forward their class-collaborationist line on that basis, the League emerges as a newer form of revisionism to accommodate the degenerate economism of the early 1970’s among those who emerged from that milieu. Thus the League’s daily activities, rather than focusing principally on the anti-imperialist movement, focus on terrorizing the poor workers unlucky enough to be trapped in the same workplace with the League’s implantees.[1] But in a wartime situation the League’s line will be indistinguishable from the line of the Bainsites: rely upon one’s “own” imperialist bourgeoisie to fight off other imperialist bourgeoisies. Thus the League is not phased by the necessity to trample all over the words of the great proletarian leaders of our time to put foward its counter-revolutionary political line. Therefore we find this priceless gem in the January, 1976 issue of The Forge:
As Enver Hoxha put it: “It is impossible to rely on one imperialism (ed. note: one superpower) to fight the other.” (The Forge, l:2,p. 13)
Maybe the editorial staff of The Forge added its parenthetical comment to help us understand what Comrade Hoxha really meant to say?
So a wartime situation will demand the collaboration of the Canadian proletariat with its “main enemy”. But we must remember that there is another added factor: a third world war, for the League, is supposedly “inevitable”. History has known such charlatan statements before the League showed up. Georgi Dimitrov, the leader of the Communist International during the anti-fascist war, once pointed out:
Aside from the overtly reactionary leaders who sabotage the unity of action of the international proletariat for the defense of peace, We have “left” phrase-mongerers arise who preach fatalistic ideas about the impossibility of avoiding war and the impossibility of keeping peace. Given that the essential cause of war is capitalism, they say, as long as it exists war cannot be avoided, and it is futile and absurd to struggle to keep peace. Such people are crusted doctrinaires, if not pure and simple charlatans. (“Pour l’unite d’action du proletariat dans la lutte contre le fascisme et la guerre” [ler mai, 1935], Oeuvres choisies, editions sociales, p. 143, our translation)
Thus we are not impressed by the League’s charlatanism, which only serves to promote its bourgeois nationalism.
The League talks a great deal about “socialism” in Canada. But the League is also clear that the factors of war in the world are intensifying faster than the factors of revolution.
Why is war inevitable? This is not an academic question – it’s an objective reality which comes from the very nature of imperialism When we talk of the inevitability of war, we have to deal with two questions: 1) the general and fundamental principle that imperialism means war,... 2) the inevitability of war at the present time, when contradictions between the two superpowers are developing. We have to get prepared for a war that’s certain to come – a world war between the US and the USSR.... Soviet social-imperialism is the most dangerous enemy of all the world’s peoples. (The Forge, 1:8, p. 11)
To be sure, the League mentions “socialism in Canada” not infrequently at the very end of its economist tracts. For the League, as we will be showing at length, “socialism” is victory for the League in the economic struggle. But, as we have shown, for the League it is “inevitable” that the struggle for socialist revolution will be interrupted by a world war; and as soon as this question of war is raised, the League drops the question of one-stage revolution and transforms its strategy into a class collaboration with Canadian imperialism in the preparation of the Canadian proletariat for war. Let us return to a previously quoted passage:
We must continue to prepare for an unlimited general strike. Unite our isolated battles together into one powerful movement against our main enemy, the bourgeoisie and its state!
And as we aim our principal blows at our main enemy, the Canadian bourgeoisie, we must not forget the struggle against the two superpowers, particularly against American imperialism in our country and its economic, political and military domination. (The Forge, 1:20, p. 3)
So the League, when lecturing the Canadian proletariat about the value of its economic struggle, reminds it not to “forget” the political struggle against superpower imperialism. But superpower imperialism will supposedly inevitably produce a world war, that is, a war in which the other major powers of the world are involved. It is the Canadian “people” who must prepare for this war – since American imperialism is supposedly in contradiction with the “whole people.” The fight for “socialism”, for the League, is inseparable from this preparation.
What can the people of the world do faced with the increasing danger of war? To fight against imperialist war, we must fight the main causers of wars, the two superpowers and in particular, Soviet social-imperialism which constitutes the principal danger on a world scale. We have to prepare to defend the independence of Canada by combatting the tendencies of the Canadian bourgeoisie to capitulate before the superpowers. These tasks are an integral part of the preparation for the proletarian revolution in Canada. (The Forge 1:4, p. 3)
To “prepare for the proletarian revolution in Canada,” then, it is not for the League a question of overthrowing the Canadian bourgeoisie. If you got the impression that it was, that is because you were just reading the League’s economist sections and not its “political” sections. In the “political” sections you realize that it isn’t for the League a question of defeating the Canadian bourgeoisie in order to safeguard national independence. On the contrary, for the League, what the proletariat is supposed to do is “combat the tendencies of the Canadian bourgeoisie to capitulate before the two superpowers”; in other words, reinforce its tendencies to “independence” and “self-interest”.
Thus the trickery and deceit of die theoreticians of “three worlds” becomes ever more evident. The theoreticians of “three worlds” in their respective countries are required to assume a certain pseudo-revolutionary cover in order to try to win some credibility amongst the masses. Thus they speak loudly about their “own” bourgeoisie’s being “the main enemy”. But their real political line can be seen when they lay their preparations for the supposedly “inevitable” world war and they no longer hide their class collaborationism.
To maintain its revolutionary cover in Canada, then, the League is forced to constantly seesaw back and forth between seeing the Canadian bourgeoisie as “our main enemy” and seeing the Canadian bourgeoisie as part of “the whole people”. Thus the League brags that the theory of’ ’three worlds“
... is in no way in contradiction with the revolution in our country nor with the fact that in Canada our principal enemy remains the Canadian bourgeoisie.... On the contrary, by combining this strategic path for world revolution with the path of the Canadian revolution, we will be able to win great victories. (The Forge, 2:18, p. 9)
The League has no problem in representing its call for an alliance with the Canadian bourgeoisie (“the people”) as completely compatible with the line that the Canadian bourgeoisie is “the main enemy”. “The main enemy” one day, “the people” the next day. “The main enemy” in the economic struggle, “the people” in the political struggle. “The main enemy” when “struggling for socialism” in Canada, “the people” when mapping “a strategic plan for world revolution”. These contradictions pose no problem for the League because the League is interested in neither the Canadian revolution nor the world revolution. The League’s “great victories” consist in the counter-revolutionary betrayal of the Canadian and the world proletariat.
The Joint Declaration of five European Parties has correctly noted:
The “theory of three worlds” claims that inter-imperialist contradictions, which are contradictions between the enemies of the revolution and socialism, the contradictions between the imperialists of the so-called “second world” and the two superpowers are contradictions between the enemies and friends of the people, and this is how it presents them. In this way it tries to present all the imperialist and capitalist states of the so-called “second world” as allies of the international proletariat and the oppressed peoples. In reality, these imperialist and capitalist states are integrated into the systems of the alliances and blocs of the two superpowers and the monopoly bourgeoisie of those countries has betrayed the national interests. (Joint Declaration, Tirana 1977, p. 28)
The League does precisely this, trying to represent the contradiction between the Canadian bourgeoisie and the two superpowers as contradictions between enemies and friends, as contradictions between the invaders and “the whole people”. But now that the League is being forced to defend the counter-revolutionary theory of “three worlds” from the exposures of authentic Marxist-Leninists, it has performed an act of magic. The League has now instantaneously transformed the contradiction between the Canadian proletariat and the Canadian bourgeoisie back into a contradiction between enemies.
The three worlds theory shows us that such rifts exist among our enemies (as described by Lenin), and that they are the contradictions between the first and second world countries.
Refusing to take advantage of this potential under the pretext that imperialist countries as such cannot contribute to the destruction of imperialism is to understand neither Marxism nor dialectics. This is not seeing the difference between the intentions of imperialists and the objective result of their actions.[2]
Refusing to consider that these countries can be part of the united front because they are our enemies and they are imperialists is to deny all principles of the united front.
Refusing to exploit the contradictions among our enemies to the advantage of the revolutionary struggle, not distinguishing the principal enemy from the secondary: this was always the attitude of Trotsky, firmly opposed by Lenin. (The Forge 2:17, p. 9)
So now the opponents of the counter-revolutionary theory of “three worlds” become “Trotskyites” because we, unlike the League, supposedly “refuse to exploit the contradictions among our enemies”. Let us consider how the PLA clarified this point:
The contradictions in the enemy camp should be exploited, but in what way and for what aim? The principle is that they should always be exploited in favour of the revolution, in favour of the peoples and their freedom, in favour of the cause of socialism. The principle is that the exploitation of the contradictions in the ranks of the enemies must lead to the intensification and strengthening of the revolutionary and liberation movement, and not to its weakening and dying out (“The Theory and Practice of the Revolution”, Albania Today, no. 4 (35), p. 25)
The League is frantically trying to cover its tracks. The League knows full well that it has always put the contradiction with the Canadian bourgeoisie forward as a contradiction with “the people” in the context of the struggle against the superpowers. But for the League, this alliance of ”the whole people” to defend Canadian independence now becomes “exploiting the contradictions among our enemies”. Those of us who are too slow to follow the game of hide-and-seek between the Canadian bourgeoisie as “the people” and the Canadian bourgeoisie as “the main enemy” have now supposedly become Trotskyites. Those of us who maintain that the struggle against superpower invasion in Canada would still involve the proletarian revolution, with the proletariat as the main and leading force, have now supposedly become Trotskyites. (The Bainsites, incidentally, make precisely the same accusation against those who advocate the one-stage revolution in Canada: “This is why the proletariat must lead the revolution through stages, firmly completing one stage as a prelude to the next. The theory of the one-stage revolution is merely Trostkyite sophistry and windbaggery. There is nothing of substance in it.“ – page 20 of the Political Resolutions of the 3rd Congress) Those of us who would use superpower invasion in Canada to further “the intensification and strengthening of the revolutionary and liberation movement“, rather than as an excuse to further the intensification and strengthening of the Canadian bourgeoisie and its army, have now supposedly become Trotskyites. Those of us who would turn the war into a civil war against the bourgeoisie rather than a “national liberation war” in collaboration with the bourgeoisie, have now supposedly become Trostkyites.
The League is not calling for certain temporary tactical alliances in order to take advantage of contradictions among the enemy; the League has mapped out a “unity” between oppressor and oppressed as its principal strategy for world revolution. The oppressor imperialist bourgeoisies become “the people”; the oppressor comprador bourgeoisies become a part of “the motive force propelling history forward”. The League is merely throwing its slander of “Trotskyite” against authentic Marxist-Leninists in order to cover up for its plot to arrange for the Canadian proletariat to collaborate in the strengthening of the role of the Canadian bourgeoisie in the world. That is what the League means when it calls on the Canadian proletariat to “prepare for war”: to defend and assist the Canadian bourgeoisie in arming itself to the teeth in order to further its reactionary and aggressive aims in oppressing the peoples and squelching the struggles for liberation and for socialism.
So, according to the League, the principal international tasks of the Canadian proletariat are to prepare for an alliance with the Canadian bourgeoisie in order to supposedly defeat the two superpowers. According to the League, “our main enemy” does not stand up for itself sufficiently on a world scale. According to the League, the Canadian bourgeoisie is still too weak; it still capitulates too much; the task of the Canadian proletariat – when it starts to undertake political tasks – is to combat these certain “tendencies” which the Canadian bourgeoisie has to be too spineless. According to the League, the task of the Canadian proletariat is to criticize and correct the diplomatic policies of the Canadian bourgeoisie, which we remember is supposedly in complete “independent control“ of its own state.
... When the bourgeoisie capitulates or reveals its wavering nature in the fight against the two superpowers, we have to denounce it. An integral part of the socialist revolution in Canada today is the preparation of the Canadian people for the building of a united front against the war preparations of the two superpowers and for the defence of national independence.
This united front is a component part of the world united front against the two superpowers composed of all the countries and peoples pushed around by the two superpowers (The Forge 1:2, p. 13)
The Canadian proletariat should supposedly “denounce” the Canadian bourgeoisie for its incorrect “tendencies”. Such “denunciations” should supposedly form part of the “criticisms” the Canadian proletariat must make of the imperialist Canadian bourgeosie for not preparing properly for the “inevitable” war with the superpowers.
Says the League of the two superpowers:
Their rivalry will necessarily lead to war; it is inevitable. .. Here in Canada, THE PEOPLE must strengthen and defend the country’s independence – starting right now.... For example, US imperialism has a strong economic hold over Canada.... That’s not to mention OUR heavy dependence on the US for defense.
So, safeguarding Canada’s independence means, in this case, denouncing and fighting the American presence wherever it is felt. It also means CRITICIZING the capitulationist ATTITUDES of the Canadian bourgeoisie towards American imperialism.
... As for the Canadian bourgeoisie, it is not able to defend the independence of Canada except in a vacillating and hesitant way Therefore, we have to commit ourselves to DENOUNCING any capitulationist ATTITUDES and to ENCOURAGING any move by which the Canadian bourgeoisie demarcates itself from the two superpowers.
... In the case of armed intervention in Canada by either of the superpowers it would be necessary to fight, arms in hand, to resolutely defend the independence of our country. (The Forge 1:12, p. 3)
Yes, League, and whose arms?
For if the Canadian imperialist bourgeoisie is indeed an ally of the Canadian proletariat and the world united front in the struggle against the superpowers, how could the League logically argue that it is not a positive thing for the Canadian bourgeoisie to arm itself to the teeth? And, as we shall see, it does not. Hence the League “accidentally” fell into the most blatantly reactionary positions imaginable with regard to the strengthening of the Canadian army, positions that are inherent in the theory of “three worlds”. As for the Canadian bourgeoisie, it is not able to defend the independence of Canada except in a vacillating and hesitant way It reinforces the military defence potential... although only against one superpower. (ibid)
The bourgeoisie also uses its army to defend Canada’s territory. In the context of the world situation, when the US and the USSR are rushing towards world war and threaten the independence of second world countries like Canada, this defensive role has positive aspects for the Canadian people.... Under these conditions, can we say that the purchase of defence materials for Canada is positive? It is if – and only if – this material is not used to participate on the side of the United States in a war between the superpowers, or to intimidate the countries of the third world (as in Jamaica a few years ago) and if they are not used to repress the Canadian people; but only if they are used for territorial defence against the voracious appetites of the superpowers. (The Forge 1:12, p. 8)
(The Canadian bourgeoisie)... can make some correct decisions which we must support – like increasing the defence potential of the country (The Forge 1:10, p. 5)
And, in an article “criticizing” the Canadian bourgeoisie for using its arms industry to collaborate with US imperialism rather than build its own military independence:
... These agreements also make Canada more dependent on the US economically. Hurts OUR Economic Independence... To reduce this economic dependency on the United States the Canadian state has taken some measures to expand the international market for Canadian-made military equipment. The result has been a great increase in overseas sales in the past years. HOWEVER, Canada still sends most of its military production to the United States
But It Stops Very Short.
The Canadian arms industry, which the government is so anxious to make profitable, serves American imperialism in advancing its aims overseas and in Canada as well. OUR arms industry hurts the Canadian people and the people of the world in their struggle against the two superpowers.
And it shows once again the tendency of the Canadian bourgeosie to capitulate before the two superpowers. We absolutely cannot count on it to defend the integral independence of our country. (The Forge 1:6, p. 6)
So the Canadian bourgeoisie cannot be “counted on”. The Canadian proletariat will therefore have to “prepare for war” by mobilizing its “criticisms” of the Canadian bourgeoisie’s “capitulationist attitudes”.
The League, which has gone out of its way to hail the “positive aspects” of Canada’s growing links with the so-called “third world”, has even gone so far as to imply that the trade of Canadian nuclear armaments with the “third world” would be a positive step in the direction of the struggle against the two superpowers.
Canada sells more CANDU reactors to Third World
... So far the two superpowers, particularly the US, have done all they could to undercut this growing trend toward Canada-third world trade in nuclear technology. Further, the US has tried to bribe Canada to stay in its camp by offering to buy CANDU’s for its South Korean puppet state.
The Canadian bourgeoisie has vacillated in the face of US opposition. (The Forge 1:5, p. 4)
So the League, without actually saying so directly, sees the danger in the sale of CANDU reactors to US imperialism principally in the fact that it should be selling them instead to certain comprador bourgeoisies in order to build the “united front against the superpowers”.
In an article cheerfully subheadlined “Let’s Correct Our Errors”, the League realizes that it has said too much regarding the reinforcement of Canada’s defense capacity to fight the superpowers. This article, appearing in the January 20. 1977, issue of The Forge (2:2, p. 10), is an outstanding example of a phony self-criticism. It deserves to be treated at length because it illustrates perfectly the bind into which the “theory of three worlds” traps its proponents.
First of all, the League typically omits page references in order to make it difficult to go back to the original issues where the statements appeared that are now being “self-criticised”. We are told: “certain articles have implied... in one early issue we commented... in another we implied” So the reader is encouraged once again to trust the supposedly wise and benevolent leadership clique of the League when it assures us that these articles “advanced a generally correct line... these views contradict the general line of the League... the articles where they appeared contained mainly correct positions”
The League now holds:
Today Canada has no independent defensive capacity. The policy of the Canadian bourgeoisie to ally with US imperialism, totally subordinates the defence of the country to this superpower. The problem is not that Canada opposes “only one” of the two superpowers but that it is engaged in an imperialist military alliance with one against the other.
Any strengthening of the Canadian army will simply put more weapons into the hands of our oppressors. Any strengthening at this time of the Canadian army will in fact help the US imperialists in their war preparations. But even if Canada pulls out of NATO and NORAD, supporting the building up of the bourgeois army must still be condemned.
... The Canadian bourgeoisie will certainly capitulate before a superpower – if it doesn’t simply invite them in to crush a growing revolutionary movement – and these weapons will be used against the people to preserve the bourgeois dictatorship.
... The bourgeoisie will never defend the independence of our country. Only the armed people led by their Marxist-Leninist communist party can accomplish this.
These errors are clearly right-opportunist errors of conciliation and tailing behind the bourgeoisie. They clearly contradicted the general line of the League. But the articles where they appeared contained mainly correct positions. (The Forge 2:2, p. 10)
But the League’s self-criticism is meaningless, because the League still holds to the theory of “three worlds”. The League still sees Canada as a part of the “second world”, and hence a part of the “united front against the two superpowers”. The League still sees the Canadian bourgeoisie as forming a part of the “whole people”. So what does the League mean when it says that “the bourgeoisie will never defend the independence of our country”? Does the League mean that the Canadian bourgeoisie does not act independently of US imperialism, a point which the Bolshevik Union has been making to the League for many months? Does the League mean that the Canadian bourgeoisie will never act as part of the so-called “second world” to supposedly oppose the superpowers? Does the League mean that the entire strategy of the theory of “three worlds” makes certain assumptions about so-called “second world” bourgeoisies which are fundamentally wrong? Of course not. All the League means is that it has been caught with its pants down and is now searching for a fig leaf to cover itself from complete exposure as the agents of the Canadian bourgeoisie and US imperialism that it is. That is why the League still clings frantically to the theory of “three worlds” and to its line on the Canadian bourgeoisie, maintaining of course that “these errors... clearly contradicted the general line of the League”.
The authentic Marxist-Leninists in the world today have consistently been exposing the theory of “three worlds” for precisely the political line which the League holds; they have consistently demonstrated that the imperialist bourgeoisies in the worlds, such as the Canadian bourgeoisie, do not act independently of the superpowers but in fact are part of the two major imperialist blocs which today form the world imperialist camp.
The present day facts speak not of disintegration of the imperialist world, but of a single world imperialist system, which is characterized today by the existence of two big imperialist blocs: on the one hand, by the Western imperialist bloc, headed by US imperialism, the instruments of which are such inter-imperialist organisms such as NATO, the European Common Market, etc., and on the other hand, by the bloc of the East, dominated by Soviet social imperialism, which has as the instruments of its expansionist, hegemonistic and warmongering policy the Warsaw Treaty and COMECON.
... It can never happen that the so-called countries of the “second world”, in other words the big monopoly bourgeoisie ruling there, become allies of the oppresssed peoples and nations in the struggle against the two superpowers and world imperialism. History since the Second World War shows clearly that these countries have supported and still support the aggresssive policy and acts of US imperialism such as in Korea and Vietnam, the Middle East, Africa, etc. They are ardent defenders of neocolonialism and of the old order of inequality in international economic relations. The allies of Soviet social imperialism in the “second world” took part jointly in the occupation of Czechoslovakia and are zcaious supporters of its predatory expansionist policy in various zones of the world. The countries of the so-called “second world” are the main economic and military support of the aggressive and expansionist allies of the two superpowers. (“The Theory and Practice of the Revolution”, Albania Today, no. 4 (35), p. 25)
The “theory of three worlds” ... tries to give to all the imperialist and capitalist states of the socalled “second world” the appearance of being the allies of the international proletariat and the oppressed peoples. In fact, these imperialist and capitalist states are integrated in the systems of alliances and the military blocs of the two superpowers and the monopoly bourgeoisies of these countries have completely betrayed the interests of the nation. (Joint Declaration, Tirana 1977, p. 27-28)
Has the League’s so-called “self-criticism” included a re-evaluation of its line of the principal contradiction, which desperately denies the possibility that American imperialism can exercise a degree of control in Canadian state power? Of course not. Has the League’s so-called “self-criticism” included an admission that to strengthen the Canadian bourgeoisie is to strengthen American imperialism precisely because these two bourgeoisies fundamentally collude? Of course not. The League still argues that “two imperialist bourgeoisies will always, in essence, compete.” (Statement of Political Agreement, p. 52) The League still argues that the Canadian bourgeoisie is fully in control of the ship of state and is capable of acting independently on a world scale. Nothing has changed; the League is has only been caught, and not for the last time, in the bind of the theory of “three worlds.”
The “self-criticism” itself reveals how caught the League is by the theory of “three worlds” and how manipulative and dishonest the League is forced to be in order to defend its counter-revolutionary class collaboration. Thus the League lists three functions of the Canadian armed forces:
(a) They are used against the proletariat and against the Quebec nation and the oppressed national groups by the bourgeoisie to maintain its class dictatorship.
(b) Against the peoples of the third world and for the imperialist re-division of the world (for example the war in Korea and Canadian participation in the First World War).
(c) And finally the armed forces are used to protect the interests of the bourgeoisie against foreign aggression.
Of these three roles played by the Canadian army, the first is principal – its repressive role against the proletariat. The principal contradiction in our country opposes the bourgeoisie to the Canadian proletariat. This means that the bourgeoisie sees, above all, to maintaining its power base within the country itself.
... Its most important secondary role is in serving imperialist aggression. (The Forge, 2:2, p. 10)
There are, then, indeed three functions of the Canadian armed forces. But let us go back to the “self-criticism.” Does the League deal with functions no. 2 and 3 in its “self-criticism”? Not a whisper. All the League dares to do is to dwell on Function no. 1, which for the League is only the role of the Canadian state in keeping wages down, in order to divert its readers from the fact that the League still supports the role of the Canadian armed forces in Functions no. 2 and 3: in defending the ability of the Canadian bourgeoisie to prey on the peoples of the so-called “third world”, and to “protect the interests of the bourgeoisie against foreign aggression.” The facts are that the League, a continuing fanatical proponent of the theory of “three worlds” in Canada, continues to propagate a counter-revolutionary class collaborationist political line on these two questions. Let us examine what the political line of the League has always been, and continues to be, on these two points.
The League in its “self-criticism” acknowledges that the Canadian army is used to enforce the imperialist role of the Canadian bourgeoisie in the world. But for the League this is a good thing. For the League this constitutes “tightening links” between the “third world” and the “second world” in order to build a “new international economic order” and “isolate the two superpowers.” The League has never objected to strengthening the repressive apparatus of the Canadian state for this purpose.
It’s not that the Canadian bourgeoisie has “good intentions” concerning the third world: the third world is twisting its arm. These new developments in the foreign relations of our country are positive. They are the result of a militant struggle by the third world.
They contribute to reinforcing the ties between the second world and the developing countries. Thus they contribute to isolating the two hegemonic superpowers. (The Forge 1:4, p. 1)
The Canadian bourgeoisie finds itself obliged to come closer to the countries of the third world (the visits of Trudeau and MacEachen to the Middle East and Latin America) and the second world (developing links with the countries of the Common Market). These are positive moves that contribute to the isolation of the superpowers and the reinforcement of the world united front against hegemonism.
En Lutte negates the positive character of certain attitudes of the Canadian bourgeoisie. En Lutte denounces Canadian imperialism (which, in itself, is not wrong) and presents the rapprochement between Canada and the third world as a basically negative thing. (The Forge 1:8, p. 1)
Denouncing Canadian imperialism for the League “in itself is not wrong” – provided that this does not carry with it any real meaning in terms of a political line on the world situation. For the League, if denunciations of Canadian imperialism remain empty phrases, they are not wrong. But for the League, as soon as these denunciations begin to be applied to a consistent analysis of the world situation, then they become wrong! For the League, as soon as opposition to Canadian imperialism implies that its relationship to the so-called “third world” is basically one of plunder and exploitation, it becomes wrong!
The League is telling us that denouncing the Canadian bourgeoisie “in itself is not wrong.” What we must make sure of at all times, it seems, is that our denunciations are leveled in the “spirit of unity-criticism-unity”! With the goal of uniting and not splitting! Within the context of comradely “criticisms”! As long as our “criticisms” are offered with a view toward strengthening the Canadian bourgeoisie in “reinforcing its ties” with the so-called “third world’’, and not with weakening it in the face of the superpowers, especially not with overthrowing it and turning the inter-imperialist war into a civil war, a proletarian revolution! So long as we keep to all that, our denunciations will not be wrong!
In fact, the League’s opposition to Canadian imperialism is just a pseudo-revolutionary cover for its support of the counter-revolutionary theory of “three worlds.” The League can publish some glittery and descriptive phrases about the evils of Canadian imperialism. But the League’s political position on Canadian imperialism is to support its “ties” with the oppressed nations and peoples of the world, and to support the strengthening of Canadian imperialism in the world in order to bring about a “new international economic order” hand in hand with the comprador bourgeoisies of the world.
When the Canadian bourgeoisie makes agreements with third world countries and when it is forced by the powerful rise of these countries which are playing an increasingly important role in the international situation to establish a relationship based on a more equal partnership, this has a positive side to it. Of course it will see this as an opportunity to enrich itself. And for sure it will try to intensify its exploitation and pillage. And we must fight this resolutely. But objectively, these activities weaken the superpowers’ hold, undermine the basis of their hegemony and help to isolate them. (The Forge 1:21, p. 15)
Of course the Canadian bourgeoisie will use its various agreements with the “third world” to plunder the lands of, and suck the lifeblood from, the oppressed peoples of the world. Of course imperialism is a savage and barbarous thievery which is moribund and reactionary and which the oppressed nations and peoples are struggling to overthrow in a bitter, protracted, life-and-death struggle throughout the world. But for the League, these facts merely constitute subjective concerns. These problems are merely in our heads. As communists, we must be objective. We must look at the wonderful glories which Canadian imperialism can bring to the world objectively] Objectively, Canadian imperialist plunder of the world “undermines the superpowers”! Objectively, Canadian imperialist rape of the natural resources rightfully belonging to oppressed peoples “undermines the basis of superpower hegemony”! It is only supposedly on the subjective level that “we must fight this resolutely”! And what could this “subjective” level be? Only this: the League’s fig leaf, its cover for its objective class collaborationism, its glittery revolutionary phrases in the pages of The Forge, where the League can paint itself with a pseudo-revolutionary cover, but where its words will have no fundamental meaning whatsoever in changing its strategy for the Canadian proletariat.
The League’s strategy for counter-revolution rests fundamentally on its revisionist conception of the bourgeois state: that it is the state which supposedly determines developments at the economic level, that it is the state which supposedly controls the activities of those who own the means of production. These revisionists do not think that it is what occurs at the economic level that determines the activities of the state. The Bolshevik Union has developed this point at length in our articles on the principal contradiction in Canada.
The theory of “three worlds” is a theory which places principal emphasis on state-to-state relations on a world scale and sees the world as being fundamentally transformed by means of state-to-state agreements and negotiations. Thus the Canadian state is supposedly capable “by definition”, regardless of concrete conditions on the level of the economic base, of making a free and independent choice between capitulating to superpower hegemonism and tightening its links with the so-called “third world.” But Lenin is clear that imperialists are not free to choose their “policies” in the world: that the exigencies of their economic survival as imperialists force certain actions upon them.
... Kautsky detaches the politics of imperialism from its economics, speaks of annexations as being a policy “preferred” by finance capital, and opposes to it another bourgeois policy which, he alleges, is possible on this very same basis of finance capital. It follows, then, that monopolies in the economy are compatible with non-monopolistic, non-violent, non-annexationist methods in politics. It follows, then, that the territorial division of the world, which was completed during this very epoch of finance capital, and which constitutes the basis of the present peculiar forms of rivalry between the biggest capitalist states, is compatible with a non-imperialist policy. The result is a slurring-over and blunting of the most profound contradictions of the latest stage of capitalism, instead of an exposure of their depth; the result is bourgeois reformism instead of Marxism.
...A “fight” against the policy of the trusts and the banks that does not affect the economic basis of the trusts and banks is mere bourgeois reformism and pacifism, the benevolent and innocent expression of pious wishes. Evasion of existing contradictions, forgetting the most important of them, instead of revealing their full depth – such is Kautsky’s theory, which has nothing in common with Marxism. (“Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism”, LCW 22:270-1)
But the theoreticians of “three worlds” in fact treat imperialism as if it were a “policy” of the so-called “second world” countries: they treat these imperialist bourgeoisies as if they were capable of in fact engaging in “a non-imperialist policy” all while they are engaging in the territorial re-division of the world.
The role of the Canadian bourgeoisie vis-a-vis the so-called “third world“ is inevitably imperialist. This comes from the basic facts about the laws of imperialism, the objective laws of the economic base which operate during the epoch of imperialism and proletarian revolution. The Canadian state is not free to act entirely at will, choosing to act more or less independently of the superpowers or selecting a policy which will involve dealings with the so-called “third world” while not acting to oppress the peoples and nations or tightening its imperialist grip over them.
But for the proponents of “three worlds” in Canada, it is merely a matter of talking the Canadian state into choosing a certain kind of diplomatic relationship with the countries of the “third world.” True to its reformism, the League has a deep and abiding faith in the readiness of the Canadian state to be influenced in its policies by the Canadian proletariat through persuasion, criticism, and the other techniques appropriate to handling contradictions among the people. Thus, for the League, the task of the Canadian proletariat is to advance comradely “criticisms” to the Canadian state so that it is “persuaded” to tighten its links with the so-called “third world” rather than with the superpowers. The task of the Canadian proletariat for the League is also to “persuade” the Canadian state to abandon its wage controls and other policies which keep wages down. Revisionists have no recognition of the actual role of the economic base in shaping world history; thus the revisionist world view is the world view of political science academics, that the fundamental division of the world is nation-states whose interactions, i.e. diplomacy and policy, are the basis of the movement of history. In other words, for the revisionists, fundamentally world history is shaped on the basis of diplomatic relations, and, in the case of the theoreticians of “three worlds”, the view is that it is the states of the most backward countries – whether these states are in the hands of comprador bourgeoisies, progressive national bourgeoisies, or the proletariat – which will have the most success in their diplomatic encounters vis-a-vis the superpowers. That is why, for the theoreticians of “three worlds”, the “third world is the motive, force propelling history forward.”
Thus the national liberation struggles of the oppressed peoples in the colonies, neo-colonies and dependent countries are not too important in the League’s world strategic plan. What the comprador bourgeoisies accomplish in the world of diplomacy, for the League, is far more important on a world scale.
The fifth summit conference of non-aligned countries which was held in Colombo, Sri Lanka, has once more confirmed the third world’s desire to tighten its unity against imperialism and particularly against the two superpowers’ hegemonism....
The countries and people of the third world have by their fierce struggles to defend their territorial integrity and national independence, dealt hard blows to colonialism and imperialism.
These countries share basic common interests the satisfaction of which will only be obtained by the united struggle to safeguard their political and economic independence particularly against the two biggest exploiters of the peoples of the world, the USSR and the US. (The Forge 1:16, p. 1)
The so-called “third world“ – here shamelessly defined by the Titoite conception of “non-alignment“ – is “tightening its unity against imperialism.” Comrade Enver Hoxha, of course, had very definite denunciations to make of the Colombo conference.
... Without formally participating in these two military blocs (NATO and the Warsaw Treaty), many of these countries are so completely aligned with the superpowers and the big capitalist countries through a series of treaties and agreements, that the word “non-aligned” has a very hollow meaning.
This situation of the “non-aligned” movement was borne out by the Colombo Conference. With difficulty it managed to cover up divergences and the opposing political aims which individual countries and groups of participating states are pursuing. This time nobody spoke out against or openly attacked the United States of America and the Soviet Union by name and opposed their aggressive and warmongering policy and activity. However, they did find it opportune and advantageous to attack France! (Report Submitted to the 7th Congress of the Party of Labour of Albania, Tirana 1976, p. 174)
But more importantly for the League, this “non-aligned world” is fighting “particularly against the two superpowers’ hegemonism.” By making the struggle against hegemonism principal, the struggle against imperialism reduces itself to the struggle against formal political annexations. The actual oppression of the masses who are struggling against the manoeuvres of both foreign imperialism and their own comprador bourgeoisie, is relegated to the secondary role. In practice, of course, it is abandoned. Just as in the case of Canada the League recognizes Canada’s formal political independence as the sign of complete freedom from superpower control over the Canadian state, so the League reassures the oppressed masses of the so-called “third world” that the “valiant” struggles of their comprador bourgeoisies to strengthen their ties with imperialism are an indication of the struggle “particularly against the two superpowers’ hegemonism.”
For the League, increased Canadian activity in the so-called “third world“ is a positive development for the world’s peoples, even as the League openly admits that the Canadian bourgeoisie is using the opportunity for plunder and privilege. What the League wants is to strengthen the stranglehold of its “own” bourgeoisie over the oppressed nations and peoples of the world. As this is often best achieved by certain diplomatic manoeuvres between the imperialist bourgeoisie and the comprador bourgeoisies, the Canadian bourgeoisie is said to be “tightening its links with the third world.” The reality is that the Canadian bourgeoisie is only tightening its exploitation of the oppressed peoples of the world as the imperialist crisis forces it to intensify its search for plunder and superprofits.
The League, like other proponents of “three worlds” throughout the imperialist countries, is standing in line waiting for crumbs from the table of the superprofits. That is why the League so desperately leads the “economic struggle against the employers and the government” during “peacetime.” That is why the League favours the “positive aspects” of Canadian imperialist plunder of South Africa, Latin America and the Middle East. That is why the League draws the attention of the masses to the state-to-state relations between imperialists and compradors who are struggling for a share of the profits, and draws the attention of the masses away from the harsh economic realities of the oppression of the peoples throughout the world fighting internal as well as external enemies. That is why the League covers for the oppression which American imperialism visits on the Canadian proletariat and paints the Canadian bourgeoisie, “our main enemy”, as a wartime ally of the Canadian proletariat against superpower imperialism.
So far we have shown that the League’s so-called “self-criticism” has been devoid of meaning with respect to the function of the Canadian armed forces in the so-called “third world.” The Canadian army in fact defends the Canadian imperialist bourgeoisie in the pillage and plunder of the so-called “third world,” and the League has never changed its line in defending the building of unity between the so-called “second world” and the so-called “third world” in order to supposedly oppose the two superpowers. The League still considers that the rape by Canadian imperialism of these areas of the world is positive because it “objectively undermines the superpowers.” War is a continuation of politics by other means. Since the League defends these politics by the Canadian bourgeoisie, it inevitably defends the role of the Canadian armed forces in enforcing these politics in the world.
As for the third function of the Canadian army, to “protect the interests of the bourgeoisie against foreign aggression,” what is the position of the League? Not surprisingly, the “self-criticism” is totally mum on this question.
It could not be otherwise. The League’s position has not changed one bit on the role of the Canadian army in fighting off foreign aggression. Obviously, it is superpower aggression which would be the most likely form of foreign aggression against Canada and it is the question of superpower aggression which is the League’s sore point in its so-called “self-criticism.”
Did the so-called “self-criticism” change the League’s line on the main secondary contradiction in Canadian society? Of course not. Says the League in June, 1977, long after its supposed “self-criticism”:
American imperialism also has military interests in the Canadian Arctic where, for example, it controls the radar system. As the superpowers step up provocations against our country, it is clear that it is up to the proletariat AND THE PEOPLE ALONE to assume the task of defending Canada’s sovereignty. (The Forge 2:13, p. 4)
We have seen clearly that “the people” includes the Canadian imperialist bourgeoisie: all but “a handful of agents and traitors.” The Canadian bourgeoisie is still called upon to participate in the defense of Canada in the case of superpower invasion. The League still stands by its Agreement wherein it is stated:
When foreign imperialism oppresses a country, it enters into an antagonistic contradiction not only with the proletariat, but also with all the classes, strata and social groups of people (except for a handful of agents and traitors to the nation). (Statement of Political Agreement, p.53)
In other words, for the League, when American imperialism invades Canada – and such is supposedly “inevitable” – it enters into an antagonistic contradiction not only with the Canadian proletariat and its natural allies but also with the Canadian imperialist bourgeoisie. Now it is obvious that war is a continuation of politics by other means. If “all the classes, strata and social groups of people” are to fight to save “the nation” (which nation? English Canada? French Canada? Native Canada?), are they not to use all the weapons at their disposal in order to fend off the invaders and defend their common interests on behalf of their “nation”? And is not world war “inevitable”? Then why is it not time to start encouraging the arming of the Canadian bourgeoisie?
It is not as if the League has much power to determine the question, in any case. The Canadian bourgeoisie is getting armed to the teeth, independent of the will of the League. The Canadian bourgeoisie is arming itself because inter-imperialist contradictions are intensifying. Only the correct political line on the principal contradiction can prepare the proletariat for its strategic role as the main and leading force against superpower imperialist invasion in Canada. Only the correct political line on the principal contradiction can guide the proletariat to seek alliance with its friends and not with its foes, the Canadian imperialist bourgeoisie.
The principal contradiction in Canada opposes the Canadian proletariat to the Canadian bourgeoisie and American imperialism, taken together. Both imperialist bourgeoisies collude in the exploitation of the Canadian proletariat. Both imperialist bourgeoisies, through bribery and other methods, share in the control of the Canadian state. Canadian imperialism forms a part of a huge bloc headed by US imperialism and acts in the world as a part of this bloc. As an imperialist power. Canada is relatively weak and strongly dominated by American imperialism.
The PLA says:
The bourgeoisie of the various countries is linked in one way or another with this or that superpower. This makes it absolutely essential that the proletariat, which is moving towards the revolution, while fighting its own bourgeoisie, must not forget the danger that threatens it from the superpowers, and while fighting against the threat posed by the superpowers, it must not forget its own bourgeoisie that oppresses and exploits it. The struggle against its own bourgeoisie and the struggle against the threat from the superpowers do not constitute two different problems, but two aspects of the same problem, which only the revolution of the proletariat and its state power can solve once and for all. (Zija Xholi, “Socialist Revolution – The Only Road of Social Progress,” Albania Today no. 5 (36), 1977, p. 19)
As for the League, it is an all-round apologist for the role of the Canadian imperialist bourgeoisie in Canada and in the world. With the theory of “three worlds” as its baseline, its counter-revolutionary betrayal of the Canadian proletariat and of the world proletarian revolution is clear.
The League, as Canada’s franchise of the “theory of three worlds”, is ardently working for the collaboration of the Canadian proletariat with Canadian and American imperialism and is actively working for the extinction of the revolution.
What Comrade Mehmet Shehu recently stated on the “theory of three worlds” exposes its Canadian proponents as well.
The theory of “three worlds” constitutes a very great danger for the international communist and workers’ movement: it is the theory of the extinction of the revolution, the theory of unconditional capitulation before the bourgeoisie and the all-round alliance with US imperialism, it is the theory of the suppression of the liberation struggle of the peoples.
In fact this notorious theory has replaced the slogan of Marx, “Proletarians of all countries, unite!” and Lenin’s slogan, “Proletarians of all countries and oppressed peoples, unite!” with the counter-revolutionary slogan, “Proletarians and peoples of all countries, bourgeois, reactionaries and fascists, wherever you are, unite under the leadership of US imperialism, against Soviet social-imperialism!”, as it has appealed and is appealing openly to the third world and the second one to unite with half of the first world, with US imperialism, to fight against Soviet social-imperialism! Today, one cannot find any slogan which is more reactionary.
The genuine communists, the proletarians and peoples are against the imperialist war. The historic task of the peoples, of the proletarians and communists is, as Lenin teaches us, to do the utmost to avoid the war between the imperialist powers, not by compromising with the local bourgeoisie, but by rising against it, to impose on it the will of the people so as to prevent it from launching an imperialist war, and if a war between the imperialist powers becomes inevitable and breaks out, then the duty of the communists, proletarians and peoples is not to fight for the “defence of the Homeland”, as the leaders of the Second International claimed and as the standard-bearers of the theory of “three worlds” are preaching today, but to turn an imperialist war into a civil war, into revolution, with the final aim to overthrow the local bourgeoisie and establish the dictatorship of the proletariat. If you do not bear in mind and do not apply these instructions and teachings of Lenin, you are against Leninism, a warmonger, and at the same time a fire extinguisher of the revolution, a servant of the international bourgeoisie.
The advocates of the theory of “three worlds” are rapidly exposing themselves with their pro-imperialist activity. All the peoples are understanding the real content of this theory. The peoples are seeing that the preachers of the theory of “three worlds” have become the most zealous advocates and the most ardent defenders of the interests of US imperialism and the Western reactionary bourgeoisie, of all the world reaction. No people can accept the alliance with the local reactionary bourgeoisie, as the supporters of the theory of “three worlds” claim, submit themselves voluntarily to financial capital; no people of the so-called “third world” can accept the persistent demand of the supporters of this theory and strike an enslaving alliance with the colonialist bourgeoisie, which has suppressed and enslaved them to this day and which in one thousand and one ways tries to introduce its claws deeper and deeper into the flesh of the peoples, to suck their blood through new methods.
The theoreticians of “three worlds” proclaim that US imperialism is in decline, in retreat and on the defensive, while Soviet social-imperialism is thirsty for expansion and on the offensive, therefore, Soviet social-imperialism is more dangerous, while US imperialism is less dangerous to the peoples. This is the same as to say that the red wolf is more dangerous than the black wolf! But the peoples are not so much ignorant as the theoreticians of “three worlds” think. (Mehtnet Shehu, Socialist Albania Will Never Budge from its Revolutionary Positions, Tirana 1977, pp. 18-20)
Because the theory of “three worlds” is a theory of all-round social-chauvinism and reactionary nationalism, it is a safe prediction that its proponents will take up nationalist and chauvinist positions on the questions of the nations oppressed within its own borders. Canada is a country which contains two oppressed nations: the Quebecois nation and the emerging Native nation in the colonial north. Thus it comes as no surprise that the League takes extremely social-chauvinist positions on both of these questions.
Let us begin with the Native national question.
The Bolshevik Union has written a great deal on the Native national question. Our position is that Northern Canada is a colony which has been annexed to serve the imperialist interests of Canadian and American imperialism. As a colony, its native inhabitants have the right to self-determination, up to and including political secession. In taking this position the Bolshevik Union is consistent with the positions of Lenin and the Comintern on this question.
The League is still sticking to its story that it does not have a line on the Native question. But the League has stated flatly that Canada does not have any colonies (The Forge 1:8, p. 12) and has never had any colonies (The Forge 1:2, p. 13). The League is well aware that the position of the Bolshevik Union is that the North is a colony of Canada and that this is principal in the recognition of the right of Native people to self-determination. That is why, in its one article about our group which was an out-of-hand, cowardly dismissal of our political existence, the League quoted us as saying, “We do not consider it essential to use (Stalin’s) definition at all in our discussion of the Native national question ...” without daring to finish the sentence: “... as it was not written to apply to tribal, colonized peoples.” (The Forge 2:9, p. 15; see Canadian Revolution no. 4, p. 42)
The League completely rules out the possibility that Native people in the North could wage a national liberation struggle. The League denies that it is Canadian imperialism which oppresses Native Canada. The League does not permit the right of Native people to secession.
The Native peoples are victims of capitalism. In their just resistance they must combat this rotten system. That’s why they MUST unite with the Canadian working class in the fight to the finish against the parasitic bourgeoisie. (The Forge 2:12, p. 14)
So for the League, the Native people in Canada have no right to a separate struggle from that of the Canadian working class in the south; they have no right to a two-stage revolution; they have no right to wage the struggle first on an anti-imperialist level.
To breathe the idea that Canadian imperialism extends its vicious and rapacious tentacles into the Canadian north is, for the League, counter-revolutionary. During a conference on anti-imperialist struggles one year ago, the League sponsored a workshop entitled “Canadian imperialism.” The workshop focused principally on Canadian imperialist plunder in the Caribbean. A cadre of the Bolshevik Union rose and added that the Canadian imperialism also oppresses the North. She was promptly denounced for engaging in a “counter-revolutionary disruption of the workshop” and for “diverting the questions of the Canadian revolution.” Photographers poised throughout the audience instantly began to take her picture. The Forge later praised these actions, characterizing the Bolshevik Union as having “denounced the League and tried to break up the proceedings.... The League comrades harshly exposed this counter-revolutionary act and the discussion proceeded.” (The Forge 2:9, p. 14) The workshop, of course, was instantly transformed into a workshop on the Caribbean. The entire act was one of splitting the unity of the peoples of the world oppressed by Canadian imperialism.
The inability of the League to admit the role of Canadian imperialism in the North is principally, as the Bolshevik Union has shown many times, a function of the superprofits derived from the North which bribe the social strata that are the main prop of the League. But coming from this is another factor, and that is that Native Canada does not at this point in time have its own sovereign state. Native Canada is a colony in the fullest sense: it lacks any formal home rule. Therefore, for the League, the role of Native people in the world is inconsequential. The League deals only in questions of state-to-state relations. Since the Native people have no state, for the League, in their struggle they “MUST unite with the Canadian working class in the fight to the finish against the parasitic bourgeoisie.”
Stalin exposed this kind of social-chauvinist thinking years ago:
According to your scheme, only such nations could be recognized as nations as have their own state, separate from others, and all oppressed nations which have no independent statehood would have to be deleted from the category of nations; furthermore, the struggle of oppressed nations against national oppression, and the struggle of colonial peoples against imperialism would have to be excluded from the concept “national movement” and “national liberation movement.” (The National Question and Leninism, Moscow, p. 9)
That is why the category of the so-called “third world” is so perfectly designed for the social-chauvinist and imperialist designs of the League. Only those oppressed peoples which have their own sovereign territory can qualify for the so-called “third world.” If a people is so politically oppressed and that they have not even yet achieved a modicum of formal political independence, they can be ignored. The traditional revisionist position that their struggle should be under the “leadership” of “the workers movement” (i.e. under their leadership) in the capitalist world comes to the fore.
Is the northern part of Canada in the third world? No. Canada is a developed capitalist country of the second world. Canada is an imperialist country. Not some hybrid 2 and 3 world country. BU hopelessly deforms the communist analysis of the international situation and the nature of Canada. (The Forge 2:9, p. 14)
Deliberately ignoring the colonial question, which in the era of imperialism has become a national question, the League dismisses the Native question with a single blow by leaning on the revisionist theory of “three worlds.” For the League, the Native people live inside of the formal territory of Canada. Therefore, for the League, that is where they belong. For the League, southern Canada is developed, and that makes northern Canada rightfully annexed to it. For the League, it is in the very “nature of Canada” that the Native people must be annexed to Canadian and American imperialist plunder. Lenin says:
Marx advocated the separation of Ireland from England, “although after the separation there may come federation.”...It serves as a warning against that “servile haste” with which the philistines of all countries, colours and languages hurry to label as “Utopian” the idea of altering the frontiers of states that were established by the violence and privileges of the landlords and the bourgeoisie. (“The Right of Nations to Self-Determination”, LCW 20: 440-42)
The League’s insistence that the proletariat in the Canadian metropolises (i.e., the aristocracy of labour struggling for a share of the superprofits) seize hegemony over the Native struggle, is only one reflection of its political line that Canadian imperialism should strengthen its stranglehold over the oppressed nations and peoples of the so-called “third world.” What the League has actually plotted for the Native people of the Canadian north is that they capitulate one more time to the Canadian imperialist bourgeoisie in order to achieve unity with their “own” emerging comprador bourgeoisie, the other comprador bourgeoisies of the so-called “second world” in order to fight Soviet social-imperialism. Since objectively – whether the League admits it or not – Canadian imperialist plunder of the North is inseparable from that of American imperialism, the League is also objectively calling for the Native people to join hand in hand with American imperialism and many more of the world’s traitors and butchers in order to be cannon fodder for this “new international economic order.”
The Bolshevik Union has only the beginnings of an analysis of the Quebecois national question. We are deeply aware of the urgency of taking a correct position on this question, and our group is studying it intensively so that we may be able to put forward a true concrete analysis of the Quebecois national question, something that has not yet been done in the movement of those who claim to be anti-revisionist and Marxist-Leninist.
It is clear, however, that the concrete conditions of the Quebecois nation are very different from those of Native Canada. The Quebecois nation is not a colony but it has a developed capitalist economy which is fully linked with the economy of English Canada. We recognize, and have always recognized, the right of the Quebecois nation to self-determination, up to and including political secession and the formation of an independent state. However, at this time separation would serve no positive purpose for the proletarian struggle and would be harmful to the Quebecois working class and for the Canadian working class as a whole.
We also take the position that the Quebecois nation is not identical to the province of Quebec. The boundaries of the province of Quebec have been established by the violence of the bourgeoisie and include a part of Native Canada, which itself as a colony has the right to political secession and the formation of an independent state. The Quebecois nation has no rightful claim to the northern part of this province, inhabited principally by Native people and held for the interests of the imperialist bourgeoisie. The boundaries of a nation are rightfully determined by the masses who live there and not by the thirst of the bourgeoisie for resources and profit. Although the Quebecois nation is an oppressed nation, great-nation chauvinism towards the Native population in Quebec is an ever-present danger which must be guarded against and defeated.
Great-nation chauvinism in Quebec, like social-chauvinism throughout the imperialist countries, is rooted in the social-economic base of the petty-bourgeoisie and the labour aristocracy corrupted by imperialism. The masses of workers in Quebec will have no difficulty whatsoever recognizing the rightful claim of the Native people to northern Quebec, such as in the case of the struggle by Native people to retain their land from rape by the James Bay project. In fact, in our experience doing propaganda within the Quebec working class, our position on the Native question has won rapid and enthusiastic acceptance from workers. It is the social stratum of opportunists who defend their rabid social-chauvinism against the Native peoples and play on the contradiction between English Canada and Quebec by saying that to recognize the right of self-determination of Native Canada is an attack on the oppressed Quebecois nation. For example, an In Struggle spokesman stated at In Struggle’s second conference: “How could the Native people possibly have the right to separate the North in Quebec? This would mean that the Native people and the Quebecois would be fighting over the same territory!” One could not imagine a clearer statement of great-nation chauvinism by In Struggle, manipulating the fact of the oppression of the Quebecois masses to defend the violence of the American bourgeoisie and the Canadian bourgeoisie (including the Quebecois bourgeoisie) against the Native people of the North.
The masses of Quebecois workers desire no violence against the Native peoples of the North and they will not defend the violence of the imperialist bourgeoisie against the Native peoples of the North. The masses of Quebecois workers have nothing to gain from the annexation of Northern Quebec to the Quebecois nation. But the situation is different for the bribed agents of imperialism in Quebec.
Says the League:
... Quebec is not just another province but the national territory of the oppressed Quebecois nation, which has the right to self-determination up to and including the right to secede. (The Forge 1:24, p. 1)
And:
Trudeau and the monopolist bourgeois... have always refused to admit that Quebec is not just a Canadian province but that it constitutes the territory of the Quebecois nation. (The Forge 2:20, p. 15)
The League’s criteria for defining the boundaries of an oppressed nation have nothing to do with Marxism-Leninism but are instead copied from the violence of bourgeois legality. The League has thus spat upon the fundamental Marxist criterion for defining the right to self-determination. Lenin says of the opportunists:
... They do not defend the necessity for revolutionary tactics on the part of the socialists of the oppressor nations in particular but, on the contrary, obscure their revolutionary obligations, justify their opportunism, make easy for them their deception of the people, and avoid the very question of the frontiers of a state forcefully retaining underprivileged nations within its bounds, etc. (“The Socialist Revolution and the Right of Nations to Self-Determination”. LCW 22:152)
The principal question, the one the imperialist bourgeoisie will not permit discussion of, namely, the question of the boundaries of a state that is built upon the oppression of nations, is evaded by Kautsky, who, to please that bourgeoisie, has thrown out of the programme what is most essential. The bourgeoisie are ready to promise all the “national equality” and “national autonomy” you please, so long as the proletariat remain within the framework of legality and “peacefully” submit to them on the question of the state boundaries. (“The Revolutionary Proletariat and the Right of Nations to Self-Determination”, LCW 21:412)
Thus, in the name of many crocodile tears about the oppression of the Quebecois in Canada and about the great-nation chauvinism of English Canada against Quebec, the League is pleased to turn around and support the oppression of another nation by the Quebec bourgeoisie. But since the League lacks any concrete analysis whatsoever either of the Native question or the Quebec question, it is entirely predictable that the League should fall into bourgeois ideology when it opens its mouth about the Quebecois national question. The League has formulated its “correct political line” on these questions on the basis of its own imperialist and chauvinist sentiments rather than by basing itself on concrete reality or Marxism-Leninism.
Because the Bolshevik Union has not yet completed a concrete analysis of the oppression of the Quebecois nation and of the revolutionary strategy which would come from this analysis, we are not yet prepared to comment on the League’s many gratuitous statements about the nature of the Quebec bourgeoisie or the tasks which it sets forward for agitation and propaganda in Quebec. There is one set of questions, however, which must be commented on, and on which the League’s arrogant racism and social-chauvinism must be rapidly exposed. These questions relate to the position of immigrants and national minorities within the Quebecois nation. For even without a true concrete analysis of the Quebecois national question, we can state categorically that the Quebecois masses have no right to – and have no desire to – participate in the oppression of immigrants and other national minorities. No matter how oppressed a nation, it has no right to oppress other national groupings. No matter what nation we speak of, our position on national minorities within that nation must remain a question of Marxist-Leninist principle.
The League’s position on national minorities went through two phases. The second phase was marked by a “self-criticism” which was as phony and useless as its “self-criticism” on the defense capacity of the Canadian army.
In the first phase the League argued for the establishment of French as the official language of the entire province of Quebec, and in fact went further than the PQ ever dared to go in promoting its great-nation chauvinism and imperialist ideology.
... Maintaining an English public school system (having proportionally more human and material resources at its disposition than the French system!) in Quebec is an attack on the Quebec nation. It constitutes a privilege granted the English Canadian minority in Quebec which enables it to keep the highest ranking jobs and the best salaries in the very territory of the oppressed nation.
... The existence of an English school system in Quebec presents a threat of assimilation for the Quebec nation because it attracts to it the large majority of immigrants living in Quebec. The immense majority of immigrants come in to Canada because unemployment and difficult living conditions have driven them from their countries.
... It is easier to find a job, a better job, when you speak English.
... To begin with we are for one single school system across Canada.... In Quebec this curriculum should be given in French in one secular school system. No divisions based on language or religion. It is a question of protecting the rights of the oppressed nation. The single secular French school system is a necessary measure to do away with the privileges of English in Quebec and to assure the full development of the French language. It is important to understand that the Quebec language and culture are threatened, and that is an essential factor in the national question. On the other hand, the language and culture of the English-Canadian minority will not be endangered by losing the privilege of having English schools. And finally this will be a victory over division along national lines of which school are the best instruments. In other words, a victory for working class unity.
The English-speaking minority in Quebec should, for its part, be able to preserve its culture and the right to speak its language. So it should be able to have English language and English-Canadian culture courses within the single French school program. It is a question in this case, of abolishing national privileges and respecting national rights. (The Forge 1:21, p. 10)
What the League does is to represent all non-Francophones as the agents of the oppression of the Francophone population in Quebec. This of course is not only the particular line of the bourgeoisie in Quebec, that fraction represented politically by the PQ, but also the general line of the entire imperialist camp wherever it is confronted with the wrath of the working class. “It’s the fault of the immigrants,” explain the racist imperialist bourgeoisies. “If only we could keep the dirty foreigners away from our pure nation and maintain the purity of our race, your suffering would disappear.” In its most developed form this is of course the basis for fascist demagogy the world over: nationalism towards the majority nation and chauvinism against all those who do not descend from the majority ancestry. As we will be showing, the League is not immune from its own fascist demagogy, complete with a racist and nationalist political line.
Thus the League argues: “The existence of an English school system in Quebec presents a threat of assimilation for the Quebec nation because it attracts to it the large majority of immigrants living in Quebec... It is a question of protecting the rights of the oppressed nation.” (Ibid.) So for the League, oppressing minorities is one part of the “rights of the oppressed nation.” To force the entire educational system to be conducted in French is, for the League, “a question of abolishing national privileges and respecting national rights.” So for the League, studying in one’s native language is a “national privilege” which threatens the domination of the Quebecois imperialists over non-Francophone minorities. It thus becomes the “national rights” of the Francophones to abolish this “privilege.” The League is trying to make the working Quebecois masses the agents of the smashing of national minorities in Quebec. This is only one more case of the work of the League in forcing the influence of the imperialist bourgeoisie upon the Canadian working masses.
Lenin of course is clear that there should be no separate school systems for separate national minorities. But Lenin bitterly opposed those who thought that the solution of this problem lay in the establishment of one official language, in the establishment of official coercion. “The national program of working-class democracy is: absolutely no privilege for any one nation or any one language.” (“Liberals and Democrats on the Language Question”, LCW 19:356)
Says Lenin:
The liberals differ from the reactionaries in that they recognize the right to have instruction conducted in the native language, at least in the elementary schools. But they are completely at one with the reactionaries on the point that a compulsory official language is necessary.
What does a compulsory official language mean? In practice, it means that the language of the Great Russians, who are a minority of the population of Russia, is imposed upon all the rest of the population of Russia. In every school the teaching of the official language must be obligatory. All official correspondence must be conducted in the official language, not in the language of the local population.
On what grounds to the parties who advocate a compulsory official language justify its necessity?
The “arguments” of the Black Hundreds are curt, of course. They say: All non-Russians should be ruled with a rod of iron to keep them from “getting out of hand.” Russia must be indivisible, and all the peoples must submit to Great-Russian rule, for it was the Great Russians who built up and united the land of Russia. Hence, the language of the ruling class must be the compulsory official language. The Purishkeviches would not mind having the “local lingoes” banned altogether, although they are spoken by about 60 per cent of Russia’s total population.
The attitude of the liberals is much more “cultured” and “refined.” They are for permitting the use of the native languages within certain limits (for example, in the elementary schools). At the same time they advocate an obligatory official language, which, they say, is necessary in the interests of “culture,” in the interests of a “united” and “indivisible” Russia, and so forth.
... Russian is a great and might language, the liberals tell us. Don’t you want everybody who lives in the border regions of Russia to know this great and mighty language? Don’t you see that the Russian language will enrich the literature of the non-Russians, put great treasures of culture within their reach, and so forth?
That is all true, gentlemen, we say in reply to the liberals. We know better than you do that the language of Turgenev, Tolstoy, Dubrolyubov and Chernyshevsky is great and mighty one. What we do not want is the element of coercion. We do not want to have people driven into paradise with a cudgel; for no matter how many fine phrases about “culture” you may utter, a compulsory official language involves coercion, the use of the cudgel.
... Who wants that sort of thing? Not the Russian people, not the Russian democrats. They do not recognize national oppression in any form, even in “the interests of Russian culture and statehood.”
That is why Russian Marxists say that there must be no compulsory official language, that the population must be provided with schools where teaching will be carried on in all the local languages, that a fundamental law must be introduced in the constitution declaring invalid all privileges of any one nation and all violation of the rights of national minorities. (“Is a Compulsory Official Language Needed?”, LCW 20:71-73)
The League, in its first phase, was not even a “liberal” on this question; it was tightly allied with the worst “reactionaries” of which Lenin was speaking. Like the Purishkeviches, the League “would not mind having the ’local lingoes’ banned altogether”, no matter what their percentage of the Quebecois population. In taking this position the League did not even bother to throw up a pretext for its chauvinism by glancing at the Marxist-Leninist position on language rights of minorities. It merely spewed out its deepest instinctive labour-aristocrat counter-revolutionary social-chauvinist inclinations on this question.
In reviewing its position in November 1977, the League apparently decided that its veneer was not sufficiently well designed to hide its racist and social-chauvinist nature. Thus the League entered “phase two” and produced! “self-criticism.” To expose the true nature of this “self-criticism” we will be quoting both from no. 2:21 of The Forge and its very revealing internal document which formed the basis of it change in position. The full text of this internal document is available upon request from the Bolshevik Union and will be published in future issue of Lines of Demarcation.
Says the League:
In vol. 2 no. 8 of The Forge we said that the English-Canadian minority should have the right to certain courses in their language but not to all courses. This position comes down to denying the principle of the equality of languages in practice, a principle which recognizes that all national minorities have the right to an education in their own language. This was a narrow nationalist error. (The Forge 2:21, p. 9)
The League made merely a “narrow nationalist error”; however, the PQ, for making the same “error”, is qualified as having taken positions which are a bit more serious:
Bill 101 is nothing more than a demagogic, nationalist and anti-democratic project. The PQ... is... negating the equality of languages and the right of minorities to an education in their own language.
First of all Bill 101 establishes French as the official language of Quebec. We are against the establishment of any official language. (The Forge 2:21,p.9)
And the League’s previous position was not only just an “error”, it was not even a fundamental “error” in its political line. It was merely “an error in the application of our line to the question of the right of minorities to an education in their own language.” (Ibid.) The League has of course always had the “correct political line.” Certain details merely change. “Since the creation of the League, in the Statement of Political Agreement, we have always had a correct line on the national question.” (“Rectification dans la question nationale,” internal document – our translation)
And why was this error made? The League leadership of course had nothing to do with it. It was the fault of the workers with whom they came in contact, who of course are so narrowly nationalist whereas the League leadership clique is so broadly internationalist! It was the fault of narrow nationalism at the base of the organisation. It was the fault of In Struggle. It was everybody’s fault except that of the League leadership clique which concocts its political line in secret and demands everybody’s total capitulation to it.
We must see the link between the manifestations of narrow nationalism which have multiplied at the base in Quebec and right-opportunism. It is easy to establish that a large number of intermediate workers are largely influenced by bourgeois nationalism in Quebec. It is therefore easier for comrades to defend narrow nationalist positions among the workers. Certainly this is only a way of capitulating in the face of the ideological struggle.
Another factor which may have reinforced narrow nationalism is the reaction to the great nation chauvinism which In Struggle has recently shown. This may have pushed certain comrades to exaggerate and distort our positions formerly in the defense of errors.
... Many comrades have not really grasped and mastered the national qestion and the reasons behind our position. We all agree that the “independent and socialist Quebec” line is wrong, but we have not all understood why, and this becomes apparent when it comes time to taking a position on tactical questions. (“Rectification dans la question nationale’’, our translation)
As for the Native peoples, we learn from the League:
Indians, Inuit and English Canadians must have the right to an education in their own language. Inuit and Indians must have the right to choose their second language without restriction, although we can encourage them to adopt French as a second language in Quebec. (The Forge 2:21, p. 8)
Those familiar with the League’s practice amongst the masses – and we will be exposing this shortly – will have a fairly good idea of what the League has in mind when it suggest that “we can ENCOURAGE them to adopt French as a second language in Quebec.” The League’s “encouragements” are carried off by terror, force and reactionary arrogance. The League’s turnabout on this question is pure tokenism.
But the fundamental feature of the League’s turn-about is that the League has decided to back off on its open chauvinism attacks against the English Canadian minority in Quebec – and against the Native peoples, insofar as the League is capable of pretending to limit its chauvinism towards the Native peoples – in order to focus the full force of its nationalist and racist hatred directly against the immigrant and other minority communities in Quebec. Thus the first step for the League in liquidating the most basic democratic rights of immigrants and other minorities in Quebec is to deny that they have any scientific status whatsoever in the social structure of Quebec. They are made completely invisible.
But why, then, are immigrants not a national minority? The Greek immigrants, the Italian immigrants, etc. have not been constituted in historically established communities in Canada for years. Although they stay apart for a certain amount of time, this cannot last for more than one generation at which time they are assimilated into one or the other nation. This is because they do not have an historical basis in the country. It is stupid to say that we should have Greek schools, Italian schools, etc. (“Rectification dans la question nationale,’’ our translation)
Here we have another masterpiece of chauvinism.
First of all, what does this sentence mean about the “stupidity” of having Greek or Italian schools? From the moment that a single school system is proposed, without an official language, why write this? It is simply yet another opportunity that the League does not miss to exhibit its own stupidity and its own chauvinism. If there is a locality where Italian is spoken almost exclusively, the school there could be “Italian” in the sense – and uniquely in the sense – that this would perhaps be the most utilised language.
But the League has decided that this is “stupid,” under the pretext that the “foreign” communities do not have any continuing existence in Canada. We can give the League a list of associations where it would be greeted by boos when it would go there to support this position. In the meanwhile, it would profit by consulting L’immigration et le desequilibre linguistique (Jacques Henripin, Information Canada, 1974) on page 6. There we find a diagram showing, for certain languages, the percentage of those who speak them as the mother tongue, in comparison with the total population of Canada, from 1921 to 1971. In the majority of the cases given, this percentage has decreased, but not disappeared by contrast. For Ukrainian, after having risen appreciably, the percentage fell back down in 1971 to about the same level as in 1921, although of course the Canadian population increased. As for Italian, the percentage quadrupled between 1921 and 1971. In other words, the League has no concrete analysis and it puts forward that it is impossible for Italian speakers to maintain themselves in Canada after “one generation.” which is false.
But let us turn to the heart of the matter.
Immigrants arriving in Quebec from outside Canada must integrate into French schools. This is only natural since they have chosen to live in a francophone nation. The bourgeoisie’s immigration policies attempt to assimilate and liquidate the Quebecois nation by artificially building up the English-Canadian minority. Immigrant workers have nothing to gain from being used as pawns in the bourgeoisie’s chauvinist strategy. On the contrary it is in their interest to integrate themselves with the working people of their new country.
As for immigrants already living in Quebec who have adopted the English language, the most just policy at the present time is to permit them to remain in English schools if they so wish. (The Forge 2:21. p. 8)
To the counter-revolutionary League, a policy of language coercion is only “natural.” Social-chauvinism come entirely “naturally” to the League. And let us examine this imperialist deception that these immigrants have “chosen to live in a francophone nation.” Says the Joint Declaration of five European Parties:
Millions of working people of our countries are unemployed. Millions of workers have abandoned their countries in search of jobs and minimum living conditions, have emigrated to foreign soil, where as emigrant workers they are subject to special exploitation and oppression by the capitalists. On the other hand, hundreds of thousands of them have now been forced to return to their own countries, where they fill the ranks of the unemployed, (“Joint Statement,” Albania Today no. 6 (37), 1977, pp. 45-46)
But for the League, the immigration of the working class has nothing to do with the oppression of the international working class by the world imperialist camp. For the League, there is no such thing as a world imperialist camp and for the League the international proletariat is fundamentally divided by state boundaries and has as its task to ally with its “own” bourgeoisies “against the superpowers.” Thus, for the League, which denies the international character of capitalist oppression and thus the nature of the world imperialist crisis, immigrants leave their home country and immigrate because they have “chosen” to immigrate. Quebec, love it or leave it. If you don’t like the laws here you can go back to Italy where you came from. Once you’re here, you have to put up with whatever we in the majority dish out. And for the League, this is all quite “natural.”
What comes “naturally” to the League, of course, is “clerical or bourgeois deception“[3] – known politely as “national culture.” Lenin says:
And so it boils down to this – the Ukrainian Bishop Nikon and others of his school of thought are begging the Great-Russian landowners to grant privileges to the Ukrainians on the grounds that they are their brothers, while the Jews are people of foreign extraction! To put it simply and forthrightly – because the Jews and others are of foreign extraction we agree to oppress them, if you make concessions to us.
... What Bishop Nikon refuses to understand is that the Ukrainians cannot be protected from oppression unless all peoples, without exception, are protected from all oppression, UNLESS THE CONCEPT “PEOPLE OF FOREIGN EXTRACTION” IS COMPLETELY EXPUNGED FROM THE LIFE OF THE STATE, unless the complete equality of rights of all nationalities is upheld. No one can be protected from national oppression unless the most extensive local and regional autonomy and the principle of settling all state questions in accordance with the will of the majority of the population (that is, the principle of consistent democracy) are consistently put into practice.
Bishop Nikon’s slogan of “national culture” for the Ukrainians means nothing more than the propagation of Black-Hundred ideas in the Ukrainian language; it is the slogan of Ukrainian-clerical culture.
Politically conscious workers have understood that the slogan of “national culture” is clerical or bourgeois deception – no matter whether it concerns Great-Russian, Ukrainian, Jewish, Polish, Georgian or any other culture. A hundred and twenty-five years ago, when the nation had not been split into bourgeoisie and proletariat, the slogan of national culture could have been a single and integral call to struggle against feudalism and clericalism. Since that time, however, the class struggle between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat has gained momentum everywhere. The division of the “single” nation into exploiters and exploited has become an accomplished fact.
Only the clericals and the bourgeoisie can speak of national culture in general. The working people can speak only of the international culture of the world working-class movement. (“How does Bishop Nikon defend the Ukrainians?”, LCW 19:380-1)
What the League does, of course, is to make all the oppressed “foreigners” the true and principal agents of the oppression of the Quebecois nation. In the name of “down with the bourgeoisie,” of course. “The bourgeoisies’s immigration policies attempt to assimilate and liquidate the Quebecois nation by artificially building up the English Canadian minority.” Thus for the League it is not capitalist oppression which threatens the right of the Quebecois nation, it is not the imperialist system itself which must be overthrown in order to liberate oppressed nations; it is “the bourgeoisie’s immigration policies“ of permitting immigrants the right to an English education. More plainly put, for the League it is the fact that immigrants are receiving an English education which is the principal threat to the existence of the Quebecois nation as a nation. Thus the League’s solution is to “artificially build up“ the French-Canadian majority! For the League, it is by forcibly assimilating the oppressed immigrants into the official language of French in Quebec that the Francophones in Quebec will realize their “rights as an oppressed nation.“ For the League, there can be no liberation of the Quebecois nation until it has the right to coerce non-Francophones into submitting to the hegemony an official language and official culture.
“At the present time“, of course, “immigrants already living in Quebec who have adopted the English language“ do not have to be transferred forcibly into French schools. “At the present time” – awaiting the day when the League is in power in Quebec and has more to say about these “foreigners.”
“The rights of the English-Canadian minority in Quebec to an education in its own language,” the League has suddenly realized, “in no way oppresses the Quebec people.” (The Forge 2:21, p. 9) By contrast, the rights of the Portuguese, the Greeks and the Italians to an education in their own language oppresses the Quebecois people, in the Quebec of the League. “French is neither superior nor inferior to English.“ (Ibid.) Chinese, Polish and Spanish, by contrast, are of course inferior to both French and English, in the Quebec of the League, which would be a prison. Lenin says:
The workers of all nations have but one educational policy: freedom for the native language, and democratic and secular education. (“On the question of national policy“, LCW 20:224)
Social-Democrats demand the promulgation of a law, operative throughout the state, protecting the rights of every national minority in no matter what part of the state. This law should declare inoperative any measure by means of which the national majority might attempt to establish privileges for itself or restrict the rights of a national minority (in the sphere of education, in the use of any specific language, in budget affairs, etc.), and forbid the implementation of any such measure by making it a punishable offence. (“Theses on the national question“, LCW 19:246)
Under socialism, what the League advocates will be a “punishable offence.“ But then again, under socialism the League itself will be a “punishable offence.“
An analogous turn-about was made by the League on the question of the referendum on Quebec separation. In its first phase the League said: “... A referendum concerning separation must consult the members of the dominated nation exclusively; in other words Quebec francophones only.“ (The Forge 1:24. p. 5) And:
... We already know from statements made by PQ leaders that the referendum will be open to the entire population of the province.
Here once again is how the PQ denies in practice the Quebec nation’s right to self-determination. Our position on this question is clear: every nation has the right to choose its own destiny, and the referendum must consult only the members of the dominated nation. In Quebec, this means the Francophone Quebecois (The Forge 2:5. p. 12)
Needless to say. a more anti-Leninist position on this question could not be imagined. Determining the right to vote based on race and national origin! The Marxist-Leninist position on this question is quite straight forward:
Social-Democrats . . . should . . . demand the settlement of the question of such secession only on the basis of an universal, direct and equal vote of the population of the given territory by secret ballot. (“Theses on the national question”, LCW 19:244)
Once again, during its reactionary first phase the League went farther in its nationalism than the PQ ever dared to go. But in the League’s “self-criticism,” we learn that its regret for having taken this position has nothing whatsoever to do with the fact that its former position was racist and anti-Leninist. On the contrary: “However, this does not mean that we should refuse minorities the right to participate in the referendum. That would be a tactical error that even the PQ is not committing.” (“Rectification dans la question nationale,” our translation)
The League made a tactical boo-boo. It is trying to establish its counter-revolutionary hegemony over all workers in Canada and not just the Francophone population. Thus it tipped its hand in a way that was none too wise. Just as the League is quite careful to deny vigorously that its support for the theory of “three worlds” is a support for an alliance with US imperialism, so the League should have been much more careful on the immigrant question as well.
The PQ itself does not raise the question (of who could vote at the referendum – editor’s note) because it knows that this would not make any difference for itself in the referendum and that this would serve more to give it an anti-democratic image. But as for us, we do not have any interest in alienating the nationalities in Quebec, be they Inuits and Indians or English Canadians.
The League’s boo-boo was bad for its image. That is why it changed its position. Its communist image was suffering. It was alienating the national minorities, making it more difficult to establish its influence and control over them.
But with all of the League’s arrogance and chauvinism against the immigrant population in the questions of schools and other official questions, we find that the League is very deeply concerned over one question in particular: language rights in unions.
As concerns the language of work and the unions: we demand the right of the Quebecois to work in their own language. We demand as well that they be able to express themselves, to be informed and to participate in union affairs in French. Translation must be furnished for all minorities in unions in Canada.
Unions in Quebec should function generally in French and at the same time provide translation for workers who speak other languages to ensure their full participation in the union. All documents and meetings as well as the higher bodies of Canadian unions must ensure translation for participating nationalities. (The Forge 2:21, p. 8)
Although only English, French, and the language of Native peoples would be permitted in schools, wc notice that the workers within the trade-unions will be entitled to full translator into whatever language. Language rights at last! Because within the trade-unions, the League’s most important territory of operation, the League wants no misunderstanding whatsoever of the duties and obligations of every worker in following the League’s orders. The League can best establish its absolute authority in the trade-union movement if its dicta are communicated as clearly as possible to every worker so that there will be no excuses for workers who are trying to escape the League’s reign of terror therein. ”... It is clear that we should do what we can to reach the immigrant workers in their language if necessary”. (“Rectification dans la question nationale”, our translation) When working with immigrants, the League is willing to relent on its national chauvinism and condescend to speak in the various foreign languages. This is the price Leaguites must pay to establish their rule over as broad a portion of the Quebecois working class as possible. “If necessary”.[4]
But this brings us to the question of the League’s tactics in the working class.
[1] This is not to imply of course, that the Bainsites have not come through with flying colours in terms of an economist adaption to the necessities of the time. Hardial Bains is just as capable of demanding, “make the rich pay” as the League is of screaming, “class against class” in order to conceal a genuine class analysis and avoid putting forward a genuinely revolutionary alternative.
[2] The objective results of imperialism are supposedly good for the world! It’s just that the imperialists didn’t mean it that way.
[3] Making the link between “clerical culture” and “bourgeois culture” in the Quebec national question is very logical and very important. In our concrete analysis of the Quebec national question we will be demonstrating that the Catholic Church has a long history of influence and power in the Quebecois nationalist and separatist currents.
[4] In our concrete practice with the League we have found its cadre refusing to speak English to comrades who are unilingually English. “In Quebec, we speak French.”