The May First Collective does not have a fully developed position of the path of the revolution in Canada, and we are not today putting forward our view in any detail on the questions to be debated within the general framework. We look for leadership from others in our movement who have taken up aspects of the question and in preparation for this conference we have studied in depth the positions of three groups in particular: CCL(M-L), IN STRUGGLE!, and the Red Star Collective. These contributions do not, of course, sum up the total knowledge of our movement. However, we feel that the main ideological lines within our movement are reflected in the political lines of these three groups on the question of the path of the revolution.
We would like to contribute three points to the debate: firstly, our understanding of political line as the application of ideological line to the concrete conditions of our country; secondly, what kind of approach Marxist-Leninists should take to the question of the path of the revolution; and thirdly, our analysis of the method and approach taken by the three groups.
What does it mean to say that political line is the application of ideological line to concrete conditions? At this time in Canada it means to understand that party building is not one part of, or aspect of our line – it is our central task. This struggle takes place throughout the period of building the party and is taken up on many fronts. We want to demarcate from those who refuse to wholeheartedly take up the task of building the party; those who do not grasp the essence of ideological struggle – that is class struggle, two-line struggle, and must be carried to the end throughout our movement and in the midst, and with the participation of the working class.
The League is always saying that “ideological and political line decides everything”, yet they refuse to take part in the struggle over line in a full and open manner. Tine and again they have characterized the two-line struggle in our movement as a contest between the various positions of two large groups. The rest of the Marxist-Leninist movement would he allowed the privilege of being passive spectators at these events, but the rest of the working class would not even be allowed to know about it. Instead, they can read the one and only correct line in the newspaper and documents of CCL(M-L), which does not clutter un the pages of the Forge with other, “opportunist”, points of view. It is clear they do not grasp the essential nature of ideological struggle, and the relationship of ideological and political line.
The Red Star Collective has correctly put forward that the two-line struggle in our movement is not restricted to the positions of the CCL(M-L) and IN STRUGGLE!, but in essence their position is to deny that there are two lines at all – only many points of view on many questions – and thus they contribute to the liquidation of our central task. In the introduction of their position, “Canada: Imperialist Power or Economic Colony?”, they criticize the “left” error of some comrades who elevate the importance of the “narrow” question of party building, and fail to understand that the principal contradiction is of equal importance in the struggle to achieve the unity of Marxist-Leninists. This turns everything on its head. The question of uniting Marxist-Leninists, the question of the principal contradiction and all other questions on which we are not yet united, need to be resolved in order to achieve OUR CENTRAL TASK, not the other way around. The danger of this complete misconception is that it is leading Red Star Collective towards the promotion and consolidation of a third centre in our movement. Their line is a cover for the continuation of their own backwardness and has a detrimental effect on our whole movement because of the important influence which their general line has on many Marxist-Leninists, especially in English Canada. The Red Star Collective, though small, is part of a historical continuum in Canada of anti-revisionism dating bark to the days of Progressive Workers’ Movement. Individual members of their group have on occasion warned us not to orient ourselves to the two-line struggle coming out of Quebec, but instead to chart some other course to determine our tasks and how to take them up. We feel that one root of this refusal to take leadership from Quebec, when clearly in recent years this is where leadership has arisen, is national chauvinism arising out of economic and bourgeois nationalism in their historical development.
We have put forward many times that we feel IN STRUGGLE! has given the most leadership in our country to the development of till proletarian line. This has been true since the publication of “For the Proletarian Party” and “Against Economism”, and it is true today. To quote from the last issue of Proletarian Unity:
“some have shown, generally because of their experience, but mostly because of their capacity to draw lessons from their experience, that they are better able to apply Marxism-Leninism correctly to the revolutionary struggle in our country”. The publication of IN STRUGGLE!’s position on the Path of the Revolution is once more an example of how they are able to put forward their positions in such a way as to expose the struggle within their own group to the scrutiny of the rest of the movement and the masses. The changes and developments of IN STRUGGLE!’s political line have based them more strongly on proletarian ideology, and their leadership contributes to the advancement of us all.
What is the Marxist-Leninist approach to the questions before us? A scientific approach must combine dialectical, materialist and historical perspective in an analysis. These of course cannot be separated but are elements of a proletarian approach which should lead us to ask and answer the right questions in order to determine our tasks. If we study the development of Canadian society, in relation to the whole world, in relation to history, in terms of class struggle, by analyzing contradictions and determining what is principal and secondary, by making a concrete analysis, and we develop our line in opposition to opportunism, then we can be confident that the proletarian viewpoint will emerge stronger and stronger as a guide to action.
We must demarcate against subjectivism in the form of dogmatism (which passes off a “grocery list” of positions as a substitute for investigation and struggle) and in the form of empiricism which mistakenly thinks that a certain number of facts add up to the truth, rather than the objective relationship of those facts.
If we critically examine the positions put forward today, we can see that many comrades do not vet grasp the principles of Marxism-Leninism sufficiently, or do not apply them rigourously to the concrete conditions we face. We want to make it clear that we do not hold the view that every group making a contribution must have a fully developed line on every question within the general topic of the path to revolution in our country. It is a natural consequence of the youth and uneven development of our movement that many of us can put forward our view on only a specific question (such as the principal contradiction, or the various national questions, etc.). However, nothing exists in isolation and correct ideas cannot emerge without being situated in a general understanding of the contradictions we face, and a general understanding of the historical development of those contradictions in Canadian society. Our concern is with the method of approach firstly, because a scientific method will likely reveal the correct path through the course of struggle, where an incorrect method cannot, even if the “positions” you arrive at seem correct on the surface.
Thus the principal contradiction cannot be determined separate from a general class analysis. Yet this is what is attempted by both CCL(M-L) and the Red Star Collective. CCL states that “We can trace the history of Canada in order to extract what is essential, determine the character of the Canadian revolution and define the major contradictions in our society. Such an analysis will show that today, these contradictions are, in order of importance ...” However, a reading of the rest of their founding documents fails to reveal the analysis. One is left to conclude that they did not bother to do such a study since they had already come to the correct conclusions. No document since, nor any of the mostly polemical articles in the Forge, has revealed to us on what basis CCL’s confidence in their correct political lines are founded. Since they do insist that the founding document is a “full and complete” view, we insist on judging it as rigorously as any other and we find it to be ahistorical, undialectical and based on idealism, not materialism. The method used is to insist, not why, but that Canada is an imperialist country; not why, but that, the principal contradiction is between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat; not why, but that, there exists an advanced financial oligarchy and on and on. We hope to be illuminated on these questions here at the conference, if not by the League’s open defence of their position, at least by the more responsible actions of others in the debate.
We welcome the contribution of Red Star Collective to this question and think it an important one. Their position has many strengths: they attempt to trace the history of the Canadian bourgeoisie to explain its present relationship to American imperialism; they attempt a concrete analysis of the Canadian situation; they present empirical evidence to substantiate their arguments; they sum up at many points where they differ from other views and try to demarcate themselves. However, their approach is considerably weakened by an overriding failure to understand class struggle as the motive force of history. It would be fine to make a contribution which only traces the development of one class if this was done against a background of the historical development of all classes and the dynamic contradictions. The RSC fails to do this, and also states in the introduction that this history of one class constitutes a “history of the development of capitalism”, which it certainly does not. The logic of the arguments put forward by RSC, and the contradictions in what they have to say (for instance that there is alliance brought about by the conscious manouvering of the Canadian bourgeoisie, while at the time it is ”dominated” by the U.S.) leads us to believe that, stripped of attempts to mask it, they still hold the position that the Canadian bourgeoisie is a comprador bourgeoisie, and if that is so that is the position they should defend.
The approach of IN STRUGGLE! in our view has been a basically sound one. Although many of their positions are open to question and are not totally substantiated by the arguments so far put forward, the method used is to understand current contradictions in Canadian society in the context of the historical developments out of which they arose, to start from a general analysis of classes and contradictions, and to identify from that which is principal and which are important secondary ones. The weaknesses in the position put forward are not in approach which is sound enough to allow for further development and rectification through the course of struggle.
We look forward to clarifying our views, and the specific points out of which they arise, in the debate and struggle this weekend and afterwards, in a continuation of the process through which the proletarian ideological line will emerge and be embraced by our whole movement sufficiently to bring us to the point where our movement can unite in one national organization of struggle for the party. We cannot say that this or that position put forward today embodies THE proletarian line, and these others bourgeois ideology.
It is by centralizing the correct ideas of our whole movement, and in the process isolating out and demarcating opportunist views, that we will raise the level of our unity. We do not debate to prove we are right, but to arm the working class with a weapon to carry out its historical task.