That plan in full:

-Claim the anti-war movement as your own.
-Exaggerate the importance of the party in all press releases.
-Sell good capitalism / bad capitalism to the liberal masses.
-Condemn all anarchists and revolutionaries as splitters and elitists.
-Only give approval to DAs where party newspapers are sold.
-Ensure DA activists wear their uniform of silly poster on stick.
-Make sure everyone votes for the party but has no say.
-Rally members to post indymedia with support for their party.
-Avoid all progressive debate.
-Always stick to dogmatic principles.
-Actions must be boring and big. Politics is serious.
-Create large meaningless coalitions to get press coverage.
-Never worry about the policies of potential partners. Numbers are important.
-Blame America for everything.
-Blame Israel for everything else.
-Avoid criticism of capitalism. It only makes potential supporters feel guilty. Conscience cleary scape goat actions and politics sell better.
-Send all those “radicals” who disagree to Siberia for rehab.

There would seem to be a very simple solution to this increasingly heated (and rather unnecessary) debate about present tactics, namely that everybody should do as much, as often and in as varied a way as they possbly can. And stop griping about everybody else!

Thank you

Your welcome

Hi
I am sorry but i am a very real person and think its out of order to say that anyway who dares to stand up to the SWP wrecking tactics (which have, as i have stated elsewhere on IM, included in Brum going round smearing opponents as 'racists' 'scabs' 'fascists'..), what are we suppossed to do in the face of repeated and vicious attacks by the SWP?
In Brimingham all those from across the political spectrum who have got sick to the back teeth of the SWP are involved in a broad based and active antiwar group..i suggest that others do the same..work around the SWP rather than waste time getting bogged down in their sectarian shite!
Victor, the All Seeing, the All Knowing

Hi
How did you know my name? As a sectarian of several years good standing i must protest at your smear that i wish to mobolise the masses! Lord it over a few SWP hackheads yes, mobolise a broad based movement? Sir, that will never happen on my watch!
Jack, from Birmingham

In Florence, after seeing how the SWP/International Socialists operate when they have some position of power, i,m afraid i have no respect for them as a party. (individuals, that's different) whatsoever. They dominated the event: ensuring they had key speakers in the debates/forums and slyly ensuring certain dissenting voices were not heard, with their omniprescent paper selling and constant sloganeering destroying the ambience of what should have been a free thinking event. Turning debates into rallies and making sure thier banners were seen on the media, no matter if they obscured others views/rights...Ultimately, i think they could be a danger to the movement and a distinct threat to anyone who disagrees with them or 'useful idiots' as Lenin called them.

note, i will be posting a more detailed J,accuse SWP on Florence soon

I think you all make the SWP out to be much bigger and influential than they really are-indeed thay have perhaps 6000 members. However, if they could indeed bend the ESF to suit themselves-which means lording it over the whole of the Italian left and the ESF organisers (the IS have about 50 Italisn members!)- then yes they are surprisingly powerful, but I think this is being exaggerated. I was at the ESF and saw lots of left groups other than SWPers selling t-shirts books, papers, its what many on the left have always done the world over....if ya don't want them don't buy them like I refused to.

Q: How many anarchists does it take to change a lightbulb?

A:-none anarchists never change anything

Q:how many SWP'ers does it take to change a lightbulb?

A: None- you don't CHANGE the lightbulb you SMASH the lightbulb

Why not rather than carry on with this endless and pointless debate we stand up from our computers- get some white paint go outside to a public place and draw an outline of a figure on the road (police chalk line style). write the anti war slogan or url of your choice in the figure and repeat thousands of times throughout the country- this would certainly make clear the level of opposition in the county and be an effective recruiting tool for the anti-war movement-

FLUMMOXED IN FLORENCE

The idea of the Social Forum movement is to bring together the disparate campaigns that have sprung up across Europe in recent years – environmentalists, anti-racists, peace activists, trade unionists and anti-globalisation groups to mention just some and there were over 40,000 people in Florence for the European Social Forum.


Sadly for some of the fantasists of the Britleft the ESF is no forlorn attempt to recreate a Comintern or Fifth International guided by some omnipotent Leninist vanguard – rather it has a loose, open structure which reflects the diversity of the new pluralistic radical left that is beginning to shape.


Well that applies to the continental part of the movement at least.


As far as the British delegation was concerned they appeared to believe that ESF stood for English Sect Fest.


In the absence of vibrant new movements in their own country and in a bid to get round the non-recognition of political parties at the Forum, Britain’s sectarians opted for a fancy dress disguise to gatecrash the party.


So officially the Socialist Workers Party were not there. Instead the much more ‘new movement’ sounding Globalise Resistance were present although not surprisingly all the GR members appeared to be selling Socialist Worker and GR’s ‘star’ speaker was SWP Central Committee member Alex Callinicos.


The Alliance for Workers Liberty came dressed up as No Sweat, Workers Power came in their psuedo-anarcho ‘Revo’ outfit and the Socialist Party with their usual lack of flair adopted the highly unimaginative titled ‘International Socialist Resistance’ facade (complete with cliched ‘anarcho youth’ type-set).


Now readers need no reminding our sectarian pals are usually pretty adept at making their voices heard at meetings but they all looked strangely lost in Florence.


After all there were no elections to fight for, no binding resolutions or amendments to scrap over, no formal leadership to denounce, no majority to be in opposition to, not even rival political parties to argue with and split from. What was the point of it all then?


Martin Thomas of the AWL admitted that he and his fellow Brits were more than a bit disorientated by the whole thing.


He described how most of them had simply been: “Overwhelmed by the vast welter of events, spent more time joining the swirl of humanity at the Forum's main sites, dropping in and out of sessions, picking up the atmosphere”.


So in other words without any set-piece sectarian battles Martin and his pals just wondered around wondering what do with themselves.


The same goes for our friends from the Weekly Worker who appear to be rather annoyed that in meetings of several hundred people from all over the world that time was not put aside for an automatic contribution from their tiny, irrelevant London based sect.


“Trying to introduce minority politics in the 30 minutes ‘free time’ that followed the platform speeches - amongst all the others vying to speak - was, quite frankly, a joke,” writes ‘Bob Paul’ in this week’s paper.


So instead of maybe listening and learning something from the meetings, the boys and girls from the ‘cpgb’ decided to sit in a corridor and have a natter with passer-bys.


“It was left to comrades on stalls and the team selling the Weekly Worker to get our politics heard and then on a one-to-one basis,” says ‘Bob’.


Mmm bet that was fun for those lucky enough to get a ‘one-on-one’ session with our ‘Bob’.


Even the hardened activists of the Socialist Party/Committee for a Workers International/International Socialist Resistance, when they weren’t getting involved in fisticuffs in bars with the SWP, also found it all a bit much.


Under the refreshingly honest sub-header ‘Confusion’, Christine Thomas, writes in The Socialist “Although most people felt enthusiastic about the size and international character of the Forum, with so many platform speakers putting forward so many different ideas there was no clear alternative or direction coming out of most of the sessions.”


What to do with all those ideas eh Christine? Far easier when it was just you and the SWP arguing over the constitution of the Socialist Alliance perhaps?


However it appears that unlike the Weekly Worker and the AWL, the CWI did at least manage to work out how to participate in the meetings and they must surely have opened a few eyes among those niave Europeans with this startlingly radical suggestion to the audience of committed left wing activists.


“We explained how war, terror, attacks on workers' rights, racism, environmental destruction and all the others problems discussed at the Forum are rooted in the capitalist system which is based on exploitation, inequality and the pursuit of profit,” say the CWI.


So it wasn't all a waste of time then -- Britain's finest sectarians managed to fly across Europe to explain to a forum full of anti-capitalists that they should be....... against capitalism.


Where would we be without them?

I think this accurately describes how the vulgar left is incapable of distinguishing between a forum, where everyone is allowed a voice, and a rally, where a line of hand-picked leaders trot out the party line.

I find the far left (and not just the SWP) to be a bunch of smug mainly male, mainly white and mainly middle-class people who repeat, apparently verbatim, a stock of text book answers in every debate. If you disagree, you are treated as ignorant, sectarian or insane. I've been shouted in the face and stabbed at with fingers by SWPers and the like for saying things such as "class struggle isn't the only form of struggle", "racism is not necessarily rooted in the capitalist mode of production" and "the jihad is not a socialist revolution".

I've been accused of being sectarian for suggesting that left parties, particularly the SWP, tend to flood single issue groups, dominate their organisation and then leave them high and dry when the single issue has disappeared from the headlines. One day it's third world debt, another it's globalisation, another its war, another it's racism - none of them is explored in any depth or for every long. And each day has a different slogan, which has little meaning and often appears to contradict the party ideology. I know, I've been there and endured SWP membership for three years.

The Anti-Nazi League, which is an SWP front, is a case in point. The ANL sweeps into Bradford every election time to "smash the BNP", thereby side-lining other local working-class concerns and making local anti-racist activists appear stupid. The ANL rhetoric is inane and their tactics are counter-productive. Then they vanish, leaving the BNP to continue its long-term strategy of building up support. When I have raised this point, I've been shouted down as if I was a BNP sympathiser. There is not "if" or "but", just "us" and "them". And if you are not "us" then you are "them" and you are treated like shit.

As for the ESF not giving the British left enough time to push their party, have they ever found the time for debate on party tactics or the party line? Go to any Marxism "conference" (read: "rally") and make a point that strays from the party line and you will be laughed or shouted at.

After years in the SWP, I decided that I should become an independent Marxist, belonging to no party. I am not a Leninist; I don't believe parties are good "vanguards" for revolution or that party leaders have people's best interests at heart. I am a libertarian who enjoys being with people who are free-thinking and may not agree with everything I say. I devote my time to causes which I have an interest in and can devote my efforts in the long-term. One of my interests is the cause of the 260 million Indian "untouchables" who are being persecuted by the Hindu fundamentalist government. It's more satisfying than being in a party and it achieves far more than selling papers and shouting at marches. Moreover, I am more able to influence others with Marxist arguments by talking one-to-one in a non-hierarchical manner rather than yelling from a podium. I think this is what the ESF was all about.

I believe every genuine Marxist should adopt this kind of attitude. Take a cause close to your heart and pursue it from a Marxist stand-point and in co-operation with non-Marxists. Political activism does not begin and end with a party, nor is it always about mass demonstrations. It is about people coming together to solve humanity's problems and that requires something other than party organisations.

Ignore the SWP and others and get on with your own work.

blimey Tony's reply and Dan's were spot on, stole my thunder as they articulated so many of my concerns about Florence and the unreconstructed left. Still, i think my article will be of some use in the debate, particularly evidence of physical threats from the Greek comrades... .

The IMC obsession with the SWP shows how central we are to the anti-war and anti-capitalist movements, and the resentment some folk hold for us reflects our growing influence. For more info, why not visit our website:

Hi
The SWP may as well put on the coppers uniform..the strong responses they get here are a sign that they have been exposed as the assimilating State assests they are

I
Have to speak out about the SWP..ive just left the Socialist Alliance in disgust at what is 'alleged' to have gone on there...its a bloody dosgrace that SWPers have even the nerve to post on IMC given the cheque book fraud they perpetrated in the Socialist Alliance and driving decent socialists like Liz Davies out (along with the sexist whispering campaign many of you will have heard of...)..dont let them do to the real antiwar movement what they have done to the Socialist Alliance (RIP)
andy

As members of the Socialist Alliance executive are aware, I have resigned as national chair of the Socialist Alliance and from the executive. I have done so with deep sadness.

I feel strongly that minimum standards of accountability and probity have not been upheld by some leading officers and members of the executive. Under the circumstances, it is clear to me that I will not be able to discharge effectively my duties to the members.

The premise of the Socialist Alliance was that individuals and groups from differing political backgrounds and perspectives could work together on a common political project. It was always clear that trust among the elements of the Socialist Alliance, and in particular trust among members of the executive and national officers, was essential to this endeavour. As a result of recent events, I feel that trust no longer exists.

I remain committed to contributing towards the development of a viable socialist alternative to New Labour.

>> In other words, the SWP have trashed the Socialist Alliance, bleeding it of support, money and ambition. What a fucking joke!

Liz Davies never accused the SWP (or anyone) of nicking money from the Socialist Alliance.

In fact any SA member will admit the SWP have subsidised the SA, not the other way round.

Whatever else you/we feel about the SWP, it's hardly fair to call people thieves when they ain't.

So Duppy Conqueror - pleased with your contribution to reducing pro/anti-SWP divisions then?

SWP guy said: "The IMC obsession with the SWP shows how central we are to the anti-war and anti-capitalist movements, and the resentment some folk hold for us reflects our growing influence."

I believe IMC is an open publishing forum, not a political party. Therefore, it has no agenda in this debate.

I don't think the SWP is central to the anti-war or the anti-capitalist movements. This is a gross exagerration of the SWP's strength and ability and negates the activities of other important groups in political resistance. Moreover, it is a display of arrogance that many have come to expect from the SWP.

To interpret criticism as rooted in resentment of "our growing influence" shows how ignorant and blinkered you are. The inability to listen to what people are saying to you indicates that you have no interest in democratic debate, but only a fixation with maintaining that you are right. It is the mentality of Stalinism.

There are clearly people here who are determined to hate the SWP. They don't need facts, because they can make up as much as they want. I don't understand this hatred. All I can do is appeal to people who are not knee-jerk anti-swp and have open minds not to believe slurs which have no basis in fact - for example the lie that the SWP is stealing from the SA.

The SWP wreck every protest movement they ever come into contact with. There are a number of ways they do this

One: They distribute their placards on demonstrations, which creates the false impression that the demo is an SWP front. This puts off people who distrust the SWP, or who see them as the political equivalent of the Jehovah's Witnesses etc etc.

Two: Cynically, they sell their papers on demos and use this as a springboard to recruiting.

Three: the 'Globalise Resistance' front group (but also the ANL) are examples of the way they cynically manipulate the political climate by trying to capitalise on the media profile of particular issues. Eg with the anti globalisation movement, the fact that groups quite sensibly avoid the media leaves an image vaccuum which the GR front has filled.

Particularly bad is the sticker on a pillar at the university saying 'Save the Planet - Buy Socialist Worker'. It is cynical and manipulative, just like they always are.

The only thing we can do with the SWP is avoid them. They are like the bubonic plague. There is no place whatsover for them anywhere in the real movement.

Er
sorry Ben but you talk BULL! I was in and around the SA and we all know that Rob Hoveman (SA exec & SWP hack) was forging the signature of Liz Davies on cheque books as well as other more serious incidents...unless you want me to spill the beans i suggest you cease playing the little Hitler...
Andy

Then there's one particular guy (won't spill the beans, because it's not my business), who has managed the defraud both the benefits agency and Globalise Resistance in order to boost his income - with the acquiescence of the SWP. Think about it - many SWPers have standing orders for £10 per month or more. With 6,000 members, they are turning over three quarters of a million pounds a year. Then there's merchandise, the book shop, paper sales, party donation appeals and the annual Marxism conference on top of that. Where's all the money going? Who's enriching themselves off the genuine if misguided convictions of party activists?

‘LIZGATE’ CONTINUES

Astute observers will know that we have followed closely the affair surrounding the resignation of Liz Davies from the SA leadership over financial abuses, in particular the misuse of the SA chequebook.


We have had more than a few emails from readers about what has become known as Lizgate – most of them containing scurrilous and unfounded accusations which we have, of course, no intention of publishing in a reputable paper such as this.


So when we heard that Liz had made a new statement on the issue this week, we hoped she might finally give us the full details of this sordid affair and put an end to the damaging gossip that is undermining the SA leadership.


Interestingly she does respond to the claims from the executive that she threw a tiff about a minor misdemeanor.


“It is claimed that "Liz's concerns related to problems with a breach of agreedprocedures relating to authorising expenditure and use of the Socialist Alliance chequebook." No: I'm afraid the malpractise involved was much more serious and sustained than that, and that its impropriety had been severely compounded by the response to it of a
number of national officers and Executive members, “ writes Liz.


So it was much more serious than the chequebook liberalism - far from closing this chapter Liz is half-opening a new one here.


But she is a bit of a tease is our Liz:


“There is much more that could be said, and I appreciate that many members continue to feel frustrated by the opacity of the accounts they've been given,” she says. Too right we do Liz!


But it seems that is as far as Comrade Davies is going to go on the issue for now. The ball it seems is in the rather murky court of the SA National Executive.


“I have submitted detailed evidence to the sub-committee conducting the investigation,and like everyone else in the SA, I await its report”.


So do we Liz, so do we.



STOP PRESS: According to the ‘cpgb’s Phil ‘Hamilton’ and Dave Parks anyone who asks any questions about the Lizgate affair is “guilty of crossing class lines” (UK Left Network, Nov 18)


Apparently this duo are not attempting to join us in the world of sectarian satire and genuinely believe that asking for transparency in the Socialist Alliance is an act of outright scabbery and class treachery.


Perhaps before these two particularly humourless sectarians start lecturing people about class they ought to ask themselves what it is that makes ordinary working people sick of politicians who really are on the other side of that class line?


Could it be that they have no respect for liars and cheats who try to cover-up their botched sleazy operations and attempt to silence their critics?


And please, when your organisation’s most high-profile political personality is an aristocratic former paid-staff man of Robert Maxwell, please don’t lecture others about class or morality.

Ygael Gluckstein, Christopher Bambi, Chris Harm-man

Well, what a constructive debate this has been!

As far as I can see, the only substantive new accusation against The Party Of Evil is that they're embezzling from the Socialist Alliance. I've already pointed out that neither Liz Davies nor anyone else involved in the SA has claimed this, and that in fact the SWP has subsidised the SA to a considerable extent. But hey, I do realise it's much more fun to believe scandal than not! ;-)

Other than that it's the same old litany; bandwagon-jumping, lack of long-term commitment, obsession with paper-selling and recruiting, insistence on limiting slogans and action so as to maintain 'maximum unity + diversity', lack of internal democracy, etc etc. Maybe true, maybe unfair; either way, hardly news! Surely we've had these arguments many many times before? Surely we could keep em off a news service?

Hey ho. I really do sympathise with Duppy who seemed to me to have the best of intentions. Perhaps I may repeat a couple of wise lines from their original posting:

'Those who want to weaken the antiwar movement are desperate to open up cleavages between the SWP and the rest of us. There are going to be fake pro- and anti- SWP postings used on the web to manipulate a response.'

'Their real target is the Stop the War Coalition, which they are desperate to weaken. Just keep on organizing.'

Well said dude.

point in fact, that most of the people in this 'stop war' thing are total blairites ( of the junior kind), but anxious that their own little feather-nests shouldnt be ruffled by a war. many of them were full- square behind blair in 1999 when he seized the lead of NATO (now organising in Prague to almost no comment here) and all told, this 'coalition' is sure to fall apart once the war begins for real. why ? because good intentions are not enough; its a sad indictment that i should have to point out to the SWP that its only the proletariat which can ultimately stop wars; only workers have a genuine international class interest, but the SWP tagging along with any old Labour- lefties will cause more harm than good.

I am as yet undecided on whether or not to support the SWP, or at least not to attack it with the same ferocity as the majority of posters have here, but can I just answer to those who say we don't need any parties that we evidently do. Perhaps we don't need some of the parties we have at the moment, but the proletariat CANNOT organise without a democratic mass party. It's impossible. So drop the high-minded rhetoric and help to get something done.

Ah, the usual SWP-bashing. First, I have not in any way been "instructed" to post on this site, despite your strange and ill-informed opinions about the "top-down" structure of our party.Maybe should (re?)read Lenin on Democratic Centralism. Second, and this is a fact whether you probable anarchists like it or not, without the SWP there would have been NO STWC. I know you'll dispute this, but as someone who sat on many organising meetings in my area I am sad to report that despite the best efforts of myself and my comrades in our party, we, as per usual, ended up having to organise everything. If we had not been there, there would have been no STWC in our area, full stop, except possibly a few hippies lighting some candles. We would absolutely LOVE it if someone else took some responsibility but it seldom happens, or they are enthusiastic for a couple of months and then disappear.Third, I know the details of the SA fiasco and none of you, i'm afraid, know what you're talking about.Fourth, you think we have an annual turnover of three-quarters of a million pounds???? If only. We have bankrolled a large part of the STWC, The ANL/UAF, Respect, etc. Leaflets, papers, placards etc. aren't free, and anyway (and you probably think i'll go to Siberia or somesuch rubbish for telling you this) our collection of subs isn't entirely efficient.And fifth- middle class? really? I have, among other things, dug up roads, put up marquees and worked in minimum-wage shop jobs for a living. In my SWP branch there are a couple of teachers, two nurses, two factory workers, a youth worker, a canteen worker... hardly the bourgeiosie, is it? Sixth- Sectarian? really? We are CONSTANTLY trying to break down barriers- RESPECT, anyone? I won't go any further with that argument- the charge is too absurd to bother with.In conclusion,why don't you just sit at your PCs and rant at the SWP while we get on with actually BUILDING the movement, as a party, which is the only way possible. Loose networks, or whatever you want to call them, have no history of success- the Zapatistas have been in retreat for years.