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Criticism

I think the section on criticisme needs rewording. I think all political organizations are accused by their opponents or rivals of being "undemocratic" . We need a more precise characterization of the accusations if any. Something like :

"The centralized structure of the SWP, despite the existence of an annual delegate conference, is considered by some other Left groups as undemocratic. "

What do you think ? Johncmullen1960 11:14, 9 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This also looks a bit weak to me. We could do with a bit more detail on who has made this criticism and perhaps quote it directly, then look for an SWP response to it. Warofdreams talk 01:27, 10 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Is there any substantiation available for the "largest party of the left" claim? Presumably this is actually Respect? MarkThomas 19:39, 25 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Depends whether or not you consider Respect a.) a party, and b.) of the far left. Personally I would say 'no' on both points, in which case the 'largest party of the far left' claim applied to the SWP is probably true, though difficult to verify - and as such is probably best left out of the article. Guy Hatton 09:53, 28 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Since most SWP members are not in Respect, it's quite possible that Respect is smaller than the SWP. However, it clearly is a party, and on the far left. --Duncan 15:16, 28 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Which simply goes to demonstrate what I suspected already - that there will be many shades of opinion on this. Is Respect a party? It describes itself as a coalition, and as some of its constituent parts are parties in their own right, I think that's where the important distinction lies. As for 'far left', it's clearly not a revolutionary working-class organisation, hence not 'far left' in my book, but that's just my opinion. Guy Hatton 15:46, 28 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

If we review political party then Respect perhaps does qualify: it styles itself as a coalition, but its leaders and members refer to it as a party interchangably. Of course far left is troublesome, in so far as it's perjorative and rarely used to self-describe: perhaps you might not think that most organisations that are or were far left are revolutionary working-class organisations. But Respect's positions do align well with the EACL, in which it participates, and is a coalition of leftists. --Duncan 21:59, 28 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

As far as WP goes, a lot of these things are down to common perception - Respect appears to the public to be a party, even if internally it is considered some kind of coalition or front. I also don't particularly trust statements from most political parties, particularly those of a more doctrinaire disposition, about membership - they nearly always inflate such figures or put a positive gloss on them. There is no objective source on party memberships in the UK and one only needs to look at such figures claimed for Labour and the Tories to see what a quagmire they are. MarkThomas 07:34, 1 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have added a section on practice, because it seems to me that the SWp is not only differentiated by its theories. Open recruitment, no permanent factions, and a central emphasis on publications are important elements of what the SWp actually do. Naturally each of these elements is criticized - in politics if you'r enot being criticized, it's because you're not doing anything ! Johncmullen1960 08:02, 28 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Guy has recently deleted a para saying "The SWP support the contributions of totalitarian Soviet leader Vladimir Lenin to Marxist thought. They maintain that the revolution only became oppressive under the leadership of Joseph Stalin.[1]" I have to say that this appears to be correct - isn't it true that the SWP considers itself Marxist-Leninist but is anti-Stalin and pro-Trotsky in very general terms? Why the removal Guy? MarkThomas 16:48, 26 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I would imagine that there is a far more NPOV way to put this, whether Lenin was 'totalitarian' is part of the accusation the SWP's stance disputes.--JK the unwise 17:08, 26 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

If "totalitarian" means (according to Wikipedia) "the attempt to mobilize entire populations in support of the official state ideology, and the intolerance of activities which are not directed towards the goals of the state, entailing repression or state control of business, labour unions, churches or political parties." This appears to be an extremely accurate depiction of exactly what V.I. Ulyanov set out to do and did in high (self-appointed) office. In fact, it appears that JK yours is the POV, and an extremely minority and sectarian leftist POV at that. I would prefer that Wikipedia articles like this tell the truth about organisations. SWP supports Marxist-Leninism, which is a totalitarian and anti-western liberalism and anti-democratic model. Let's say so. MarkThomas 17:13, 26 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

As JK has already said, the application of the term 'totalitarian' is highly controversial. It is commonly deemed perjorative in regular usage, and hence in this context probably unencyclopedic. Unfortunately, the broader definition you quote is not, I think, how most people would interpret it. Even then, that is most certainly not what Lenin set out to achieve - whether or not it was what actually happened in the latter part of his leadership is another debate. Also, the term 'Marxism-Leninism' has a particular meaning amongst socialist organisations, and would never be applied to any party which claimed to belong to the Trotskyist tradition, as the SWP does. Lastly, I felt very strongly that the source citation was being grossly misused - the article in no way supported the claims being made.

Hope this clarifies my reasons for removing that paragraph. Guy Hatton 08:19, 27 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Maybe then you should "fix" the totalitarian article. We will await that with bated breath. :-) I think I see small piglets flying over. Totalitarianism isn't any more pejorative than saying "Leninist" and if we're being accurate we should say it. If the SWP suddenly took power in the UK, as is their dream, would we have democracy, or would we have Supreme Leader Rees (presumably in a job-share with Supreme Leader German!) and a Stasi-style "Industrial Brigade" to keep order, beat up the Tories, etc? The latter I suspect. But of course it's not totalitarian because it's Bronsteinism! Puh-leeze. MarkThomas 10:22, 27 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Yawn. Guy Hatton 11:09, 27 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

If you don't want to discuss, don't revert things that don't happen to fit in with your extreme-left POV then. MarkThomas 11:11, 27 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion I do - hence the explanation above. Inane sarcasm, on the other hand, gets short shrift. End of story. Guy Hatton 12:00, 27 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Not sarcasm, just genuine joy that you understand a different sense of "totalitarianism" to (most) of the rest of us. MarkThomas 12:17, 27 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The original statement made the assumption that Lenin's leadership can be correctly categorised as totalitarian. The SWP doesn't accept this, and the article on totalitarianism marks the categorisation of the Soviet Union at any time as authoritarian as being controversial. It doesn't even mention Lenin's period. So the discussion about the term would be best held at talk:totalitarianism - where I see there is already a lively discussion on various applications. Warofdreams talk 16:19, 27 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Don't try to limit discussion about the SWP's policies on this article. Just because the totalitarian article doesn't specifically mention Lenin is irrelevant. I have clarified the SWP's beliefs in the lead section. MarkThomas 16:25, 27 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Eh? Where has anyone tried to limit discussion about the SWP's policies? This clearly isn't the place to decide whether Lenin was a totalitarian leader; that has very little to do with the SWP's policies. The introduction to an article should strive to be based on uncontroversial factual statements; controversial statements should be in the body, where they need to be sourced and attributed. The statement you are proposing is clearly controversial, given the objections to it on this discussion page. Warofdreams talk 16:42, 27 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

II think Mark has misread the SWP article he linked to in the section we are discussing. The section we are discussing says of the SWP: "They maintain that the revolution only became oppressive under the leadership of Joseph Stalin.[2]". In fact, the article stresses the degeneration of the revolution in 1920, and Lenin's opposition. Incidentally, the SWP would not call itself marxist-leninist, in so far as this means anti-Trotskyist. --Duncan 22:44, 28 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Just to note, in case anyone reading this talk page has just skimmed the article, that there is already a discussion of the SWP's relation to the Marxist tradition in the section named "Theory". It notes that they see themselves as standing in the tradition of Trotsky and Lenin and that they seek to distinguish themselves from what they see as the separate tradition of Stalin. Has anyone got anything constructive to say about how this section could be improved, if improvement is necessary?--JK the unwise 07:53, 29 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

There appears to be some confusion. Some say the SWP is in the Leninist tradition and others not. If it is, then the question arises as to Lenin's totalitarian methods. I suspect the latter is in fact the case. Only one question remains - which of the SWP leadership will head up the secret police? :-) MarkThomas 08:22, 29 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The SWP is a Leninist party, but does not call itself Marxist-Leninist. Here's its leading theorist Alex Callinicos: "I wouldn’t call myself a ‘Marxist-Leninist’ because this implies adhesion to some version of the Stalinist orthodoxy that became institutionalized from the mid-1920s onwards. But I have no qualms about calling myself a Leninist when it comes to revolutionary organization."[3]. Although it is into Lenin big time (see its founder, Tony Cliff's, three part hagiography of Lenin), it does not see Lenin's period of rule as an "ideal society" (again, see the final installment of Cliff's trilogy, which highlights the problems with the period after the 1917 revolution). So it is rather unfair to make these sort of designations. I think that the section on Theory already more or less adequately captures the SWP's position. It might be worth augmenting the State Captalism subsection with something that makes clear that the SWP sees the USSR as becoming state capitalist only after Lenin's death - which differentiates the SWP from other proponents of the state capitalism theory, such as left communists.

As for totalitarianism, it is utterly un-wikipedian to describe things as totalitarian as if this can be stated as a matter of fact. If it is worth saying - under the Criticisms section - that some people see it is totalitarian, then this needs to be done by citing solid examples, such as Nick Cohen or Oliver Kamm [4] BobFromBrockley 11:31, 29 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]