First Published: Canadian Revolution No. 1, May 1975
Transcription, Editing and Markup: Malcolm, and Paul Saba
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In July, 1974, the Ontario Waffle began an internal struggle that ended in the organization’s disintegration five months later. Three main tendencies took part in this struggle, which started over criticism of the federal election campaign. The bourgeois nationalist social-democratic faction, including the major public spokesmen and policy formulators, argued that the Waffle must become more nationalist. This group split in October 1974 and now publishes Ontario Report.
A second faction who considered themselves revolutionary centred around the Waffle student group at York University. This group (which one author was in), initially argued that the Waffle’s leaders were undemocratic, and that they had revised the programme to run an opportunistic election campaign. As the struggle progressed, the majority of this faction began to adopt the line of International Socialists, a British and American Trotskyist group. After the nationalists left in October, the Trotskyists were the only ones left with an even partially worked out line. As a result, they were able to take control of what remained of the Ontario Waffle organization at its annual Convention in December 1974.
Finally, a small and extremely loose Marxist-Leninist tendency existed in the Ontario Waffle (which another author was in). These Marxist-Leninists played no independent role throughout their participation in the organization. In the struggle described here, some limited themselves to criticizing lack of democracy in the Waffle. Another associated with the York student faction until it began to adopt a Trotskyist line. None presented an independent, proletarian line as the Trotskyist line came out more clearly, after the October split and at the December convention itself. All resigned from the Ontario Waffle afterwards, including both authors.
What is the importance of summing up the history of the Ontario Waffle (OW) and the work of Marxist-Leninists in it? In the first place, it is necessary to correct illusions about the revolutionary potential of the OW. Many confused but honest individuals and groups were either influenced by the Waffle or members of it.
Some of these people hold the wrong idea that the OW was either revolutionary or potentially revolutionary, but later degenerated. This idea is based on confusion about the difference between Marxism-Leninism and social democracy; it obscures the need to work to create a new Marxist-Leninist party, and must be struggled against. We have tried to show the social democratic character of the OW in Part II of this paper. We put forward the following theses in relation to Waffle’s ideology, analysis, programme and mass work:
1) the strategic line of “Canadian independence” leads to collaboration with the ruling class;
2) the OW used Marxist-sounding phrases, but really identified socialism with “public” ownership and opposed socialist revolution;
3) the OW criticism of the NDP strengthened social democracy;
4) the OW called for a new socialist party, but really sought to build a parliamentary machine;
5) the OW followed the opportunist slogan “economic struggle on the trade union front, political struggle on the parliamentary front” in its mass work.
There are further reasons to study the experience of the Waffle. The history of the OW and the mistakes of the Marxist-Leninists who worked in it contain important negative lessons for the whole independent Marxist-Leninist movement. These lessons concern the danger of right opportunism, currently the main error made by Canadian Marxist-Leninists. The most important manifestations of this right opportunism at present are bourgeois nationalism, economism, and passivity (“liquidation”) in building Marxist-Leninist organization.
The result of these errors is that some Marxist-Leninists are practically indistinguishable from social democracy of the OW brand. In the case of the Toronto Marxist-Leninists described here, this practical similarity was carried to its conclusion by fusing with the OW. A summary and criticism of the political line and practice of these Marxist-Leninists forms Part III of this paper. Our object in publishing this analysis and criticism is to contribute to the struggle against right opportunism in the movement as a whole.
A final note: readers will notice that we have omitted any discussion of the Saskatchewan Waffle. We are not familiar with the recent struggles in the Saskatchewan Waffle, or where Saskatchewan comrades stand on the issues discussed here. We look forward to their response.
Once it left the NDP in 1972, the OW was extremely hostile toward the New Democrats. This superficial hostility led some comrades to think there was a fundamental conflict between the politics of the OW and the NDP. This analysis overlooks the fact that social democracy is a political current, a class trend which is not restricted to a particular organization. In fact, the split between Waffle and the NDP was a split over tactics within social democracy, over how to react to American imperialism.[1]
The fundamental line of the OW throughout its history was that “the most important issue for Canadians is the very survival of Canada”.[2] This question, the tactics for creating an economically independent Canadian capitalism, was the basis of disagreement between the leadership of the NDP and the Waffle caucus in 1969. Likewise, this same issue was at the root of the creation of the Ontario Waffle. In the OW’s own words: “...Waffle members believed that the threat to Canada from U.S. control was so great that it was necessary to continue the Waffle as an independent group... In 1972 the Waffle began as an organization outside the NDP. Its main concern has been to build a movement to gain indepencence from U.S. control.”[3] This line was continued to the OW’s end. During the 1974 Federal election campaign, its last mass work, the OW stated in its programme that “the last year has proven that there is no basic difference in strategy between the three different parties on the need and strategy for solving Canada’s central problem – the U.S. domination of our country.”[4]
This strategic line of the OW amounted to saying that at the present stage the principal struggle is for national independence. This line, held implicitly by the OW throughout its history, was clearly summarized in an internal document circulated in September 1974:
The essence of the political struggle taking shape in Canada is that it is a working class nationalist struggle against American corporate and state power in Canada and against the Canadian capitalist junior partners of the Americans.[5]
A nationalist economic programme of resource and major manufacturing industries and the use of Canadian resources for Canadian manufacturing can only be implemented when a working class (parliamentary –Ed.) regime comes to power in Canada. And such a regime can only assure the success of such a nationalist economic programme by moving forward to socialism.[6]
This wrong strategic line was based on a wrong class analysis of Canadian society, summarized in another internal document:
The first contradiction is between U.S. imperialism as the exploiting metropolis and Canada as the exploited hinterland. This is the dominant contradiction. The second contradiction, which although not the dominant one is also very important, is between the exploiting Canadian financiers and the Canadian people, primarily the working class. A third important contradiction is between the people of Quebec (primarily the working class) and the American corporations which dominate the Quebec economy and the Anglo-Canadian financiers who act as their junior partners in exploiting Quebec.[7]
The essence of this position is that the principal contradiction is “the irreconcilable conflict between American imperialism and the interests of the Canadian people”.[8] This is a fundamental distortion of Marxism. Canada is a monopoly capitalist country, with thoroughly capitalist relations of production and a monopoly capitalist state. Under these conditions the principal contradiction is between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie, whose resolution requires socialist revolution.
Further, the Canadian state is not a “puppet regime of U.S. imperialism”. Speaking generally, the state represents all capitalists by maintaining conditions favourable for the exploitation of labour power. More concretely, the state is the instrument of the dominant faction of the Canadian bourgeoisie, whose interests lie primarily in commerce, banking, and utilities. Economically strong in its own right, this dominant faction has an interest in political independence; that is, they need a state machinery separate from the U.S. as a vociferous guardian of their own particular spheres of profit-making.
On the other hand, the interests of this dominant faction lie in promoting economic dependence on American imperialism. As merchant-banking capitalists, they depend on the growth of American productive (manufacturing) capital to expand the magnitude of surplus-value available for it to share in. Clearly, it is not the case that “foreign ownership of our resource industries has been the key to our dependency”.[9] American economic domination is not strictly a foreign-imposed phenomena. It is an integral part of Canadian monopoly capitalism and cannot be overcome without overthrowing the political rule of the Canadian merchant-banking bourgeoisie and simultaneously expropriating the American monopolies.
Because of its petty bourgeois outlook, the OW was unable to grasp the fundamental and antagonistic character of the contradiction between labour and capital in Canada. The OW tried to use attitudes toward “Canadian independence” as the litnus test to determine the friends and enemies of the working class. Canadian independence, without specifying “for whom, for what class” is a mere empty phrase. In addition to the dominant faction of merchants and bankers, there is also a national bourgeoisie in Canada, small and weak though it is. Theoretically, the OW denied that such a class existed. It claimed that “there is not now an independent Canadian capitalism and any lingering pretentions on the part of Canadian businessmen lack credibility”.[10] Practically, however, the OW allied itself with the Committee for an Independent Canada on several occasions. It also included an endorsement from former CIC president and book publisher, Mel Hurtig, in Jim Laxer’s federal election campaign literature.
As we have said, even the dominant merchant-banking section of the ruling class wants to maintain its formal political independence while supporting American economic penetration. Recently, some of the members of this class have begun to question how it might improve its revenues, within the basic framework of the current relations with American imperialism. These “extreme” representatives of the dominant faction of the ruling class – men like Eric Kierens – were heralded by the OW as allies of the workers.
Such class collaboration is the inevitable outcome of any line which makes Canadian independence the central struggle. Such a policy tries to reconcile the irreconcilable, the antagonistic conflict of interests between the working class and the various capitalists favouring their own brand of independence.
NOTE: The attitude of the OW to internationalism is further proof of what has been said above: the OW opposed imperialism from a petty bourgeois nationalist point of view, and not a proletarian one. Imperialism is not an American policy which infringes on Canadian sovereignty. It is an international system of exploitation and oppression. From a working class standpoint, one must support the international struggle against imperialism and social-imperialism: the struggle of the working class of all countries countries, the struggle of oppressed nations, and efforts to build socialist societies.
The OW did not follow these basic principles of proletarian internationalism. To the OW, the concern of the ’New Left’ with internationalism (one of its positive features) was a bad thing. For its part, the closest the OW ever came to internationalism was in the NDP, where the Waffle Caucus criticized the American war in Vietnam and the national oppression of Quebec.
After leaving the NDP the OW effectively dropped its support for Quebec’s right to self-determination. It did not publicly support struggles in any foreign countries either. The OW did not recognize or even discuss the existence of any socialist countries. Nor did it recognize the existence of social imperialism. All these examples show that the OW had a “narrow” bourgeois nationalist outlook. Certainly, American imperialism is an important enemy of the Canadian people. The point is that we have allies throughout the world. A blow to imperialism in another country advances our struggle for independence and socialism. That is why international solidarity is important.
Some comrades may object to calling the OW social democratic, and think it is better described as right opportunist or revisionist. Under no conditions can the OW be considered a right opportunist trend within the Marxist-Leninist movement. As a closer examination of its programme will show below, the OW repudiated the basic principles of Marxism-Leninism in both theory and practice.
The distinction between modern revisionism and social democracy is harder to make. The political outlook of some individual OW members was undoubtedly revisionist. The policies of the OW and the revisionist Communist Party of Canada were similar on many issues. (This did not go unnoticed by the revisionists, who complained that “the Waffle took the Communist Party’s position on independence and advanced it as its own”.)[11] Unlike the “official” European and North American social democratic parties, the OW did not openly repudiate Marxism, and even began to use Marxist-sounding phrases as its unofficial, internal ideology after leaving the NDP.[12] This “Marxism” was mere window-dressing, since the OW continued to put across its programme with the traditional social democratic arguments in its mass work. For this reason the OW was social democratic, as opposed to revisionist. The distinction is not terribly important here, however, since both are petty bourgeois in social origin and counter-revolutionary in content.
Although the OW paid lip service to the idea of the class struggle, its stand on socialist revolution showed its real class character. As Lenin pointed out, in the era of imperialism, when proletarian revolution has become a practical question in the capitalist countries, it is no longer enough to recognize merely the class struggle:
Those who recognize only the class struggle are not yet Marxists; they may be found to be still within the boundaries of bourgeois thinking and bourgeois politics. To confine Marxism to the doctrine of the class struggle means curtailing Marxism, distorting it, reducing it to something which is acceptable to the bourgeoisie. Only he is a Marxist who extends the recognition of the class struggle to the recognition of the dictatorship of the proletariat. This is what constitutes the most profound difference between the Marxist and the ordinary petty (as well as big) bourgeoisie. This is the touchstone on which the real understanding and recognition of Marxism is to be tested.[13]
Far from propagating the need for socialist revolution and a workers’ state, the OW actively opposed it. Throughout its lifetime the OW promoted the idea that “public” ownership is socialism, without reference to the fact that the state is an instrument of the ruling class.
The Waffle Manifesto stated:
Capitalism must be replaced by socialism, by national planning of investment and by the public ownership of the means of production in the interests of the Canadian people as a whole, (emphasis added).
Relevant instruments for bringing the Canadian economy under Canadian ownership and control and altering the priorities established by corporate capitalism are at hand. They included extensive public control over investment and nationalization of the commanding heights of the economy. Five years later, in its election campaign literature, the OW still followed this line: “Canadian independence is impossible without socialism, without large-scale public ownership and control by working people”.[14] “Only public ownership will ensure the pursuit of a strategy in the interest of the majority of Canadians”.[15] “The only answer here, as with the American-owned oil industry, is to nationalize the aero-space industry so that it is owned by the people of Canada”.[16]
In essence, the OW promoted the idea that the state is neutral and can be made to serve the interests of workers a well as bosses. Hence, socialist revolution appears an unnecessary adventure. In reality, nationalization by the bourgeois state is not a step towards socialism. To demand ’nationalization in the interests of the people’ under the rule of the bourgeoisie amounts to asking the capitalists to repudiate their fundamental nature and run their industries in the ’interests of the whole people’. It is a Utopian and reactionary illusion.
It should be noted that the OW did say that “broader”, “extra-parliamentary” struggle was needed to achieve socialism, but this was just an empty phrase to please left critics. Practically, the OW ran in elections without criticizing bourgeois democracy as a class tool, or promoting the need for revolution.
The OW attacked the NDP as social democratic and posed itself as a “socialist” alternative. The OW’s phoney criticism confused the difference between socialism and social democracy, and served to strengthen social democratic ideas among the workers.
The NDP is now and always has been a party of capitalism. This is the conclusion of an objective analysis aimed at discovering what class in society its policies serve, regardless of the subjective intentions of its leaders or members. Social democracy serves the ruling class because it fights to protect the foundation of capitalism, the “right” of the capitalist to exploit the labour power of the working class. It does this under the guise of striving to use the bosses’ state to guarantee the “equality” of labour and capital. In reality, however, there can be no “equality” between labour and capital: whoever tries to reconcile the exploited to their condition, objectively serves the interests of the exploiter.
Three main sorts of criticism were directed against the NDP during the OW’s lifetime. The first boiled down to claiming that the NDP had degenerated and no longer served the workers’ interests. This was the justification for forming the Waffle Caucus, which “was born when progressive members of the NDP realized the party’s politics were moving away from the issues of independence and socialism”.[17] Why? According to the OW, because “it does not demand public ownership of the key sections of the economy, such as the resource industries”.[18] The second criticism was that the NDP proved that it did not represent the workers because it failed in elections. The final criticism was that the NDP showed by its actions that it was not serious about aiding the workers, and that its leaders were opportunistic individuals out for personal gain.
This analysis constituted a social democratic critique of the NDP. It implied that the NDP had once served the workers’ interest, but later degenerated. Further, it implied that if the NDP demanded extensive public ownership, it would be a real workers’ party again. As stated above, the NDP was never a workers’ party; furthermore, the programme of “public” ownership under the capitalist state is not socialism, but a more thorough brand of social democracy. Finally, criticism which implies that the NDP’s actions are due to careerism, incompetence or poor intentions on the part of its leaders is wrong, and strengthens social democratic ideas. It does not explain the NDP’s actions by showing what class it serves. Instead, this sort of criticism says the counter-revolutionary policies of social democracy are sound, but its leaders are rotten. In point of fact, the Waffle caucus actually translated this line into practice, running Jim Laxer for the leadership of the NDP.
In its analysis of the NDP, the OW erroneously identified the top bureaucracy of the American trade unions as the exclusive basis of social democracy. Accordingly, the OW thought the struggle to create Canadian unions would automatically destroy any social democratic ideas. This is wrong in two respects. First, the social basis for nationalist social democracy does exist in English Canada, some parts of which formed the base of support for the Waffle itself. The OW virtually denied the existence of any such groups including the labour aristocracy, the Canadian labour bureaucracy, or the petty bourgeoisie. In its rudimentary class analysis, the OW recognized only American corporations and their Canadian junior partners, on the one hand, and the working class on the other, “all those who work for private capitalists or the state in non-managerial positions”.[19] Secondly, social democracy will not be destroyed automatically by changes in the trade union structure. Protectionist or reform labour politics is a spontaneous outgrowth of the economic struggle of the workers. It will be overcome only through conscious political struggle for revolutionary ideas.
Based on its assessment that “the NDP has failed us”, OW called for the formation of a new political party. In spite of the “window-dressing” contained in convention resolutions, etc, what was really meant was a loose, parliamentary bourgeois-type party exactly like the NDP in organization.
OW leaders were not naive; they consciously repudiated democratic centralism. Their excuse was that “it had caused Stalinism in the Soviet Union”. This was not the real reason for rejecting a communist-type organization. Because the OW rejected the end of socialist revolution, it rejected the means necessary to attain it: a democratic centralist Marxist-Leninist party.
The political unity needed for the most minimal level of democratic centralism would have excluded many, if not most OW members.[20] This conflicted with the essential aim of the OW, which was to change the parliamentary regime. To accomplish this it was necessary to build the largest possible membership, no matter what the class or political differences, in order to make a large, and therefore effective election machine. Also, democratic centralism would have forced leaders to follow the majority decision. The leading group did not want such a democratic organization. They strove to follow the example of the parliamentary fractions of bourgeois parties. Unbounded by collective discipline they looked forward to using the efforts of their mass membership to provide themselves with a platform to promote their petty bourgeois line.
Generally speaking, the mass work of the OW was summed up in the slogan above. The political work of the OW consisted of promoting its sham Marxist line in public meetings, lectures and books, as well as the election campaigns (where the pretense of Marxism was dropped). Economic struggle was conducted in the trade unions under the slogan, “an independent and militant Canadian union movement”.
The essence of this split between economic and political struggle is that it restricts the class struggle to limits acceptable to capitalism. It amounts to saying that workers should struggle on the economic front, but limit themselves politically to pressuring the bourgeoisie through the institutions of capitalism. In the case of the OW, this view of politics was a consequence of its petty bourgeois class outlook, which in essence accepted the permanence of capitalism.
Because of this outlook, the OW could never raise the political consciousness of the working class beyond the limits of trade union politics, the reformist consciousness naturally generated by the economic struggle. In the course of the struggle with specific employers for better terms in the sale of labour power, workers recognize the necessity of “striving to secure satisfaction of (these) trade union demands, the improvement of working conditions in each separate trade by means of ’legislative and administrative measures’.”[21] This consciousness is not revolutionary, but bourgeois; its end objective is the general improvement of conditions of sale of labour power not abolition of the wages system. Lenin gave the example of the British trade unions as typical of the political demands reflecting such trade union consciousness:
The British trade unions long ago recognized and have long been carrying out, the task of ’lending the economic struggle itself a political character’: they have long been fighting for the right to strike, for the removal of all legal hindrances to the cooperative and trade union movements, for laws to protect women and children, for the improvement of labour conditions by means of health and factory legislation, etc.[22]
In its trade union programme the OW put forward only demands of precisely this sort: higher real incomes, new economic strategy for jobs, outlaw strike breaking, real equality of women, genuine political action by labour, independent union movement.[23] It did not, in any way, build the revolutionary consciousness of the working class.
In its practical methods, OW unconsciously accepted the “capitalist way of doing things”. It essentially organized people to be passive, in the same way the workers are persuaded to let the bourgeoisie look after their welfare, rather than rely on their own resources.
In its election campaign the OW called on workers to simply “vote Waffle”, to put their faith in a Waffle candidate. In fighting “business unionist” labour leaders, OW told workers to simply support its candidates and refused to organize a rank and file fight. In its call for Canadian unions, OW insisted that workers follow official Convention channels and opposed the cases where workers had taken things into their own hands to form a Canadian union. The OW generally opposed mass demonstrations as a tactic. When it did participate in such actions, it tried to restrain them as much as possible, as in the case of the Dare strike demonstration, (the OW organized this demonstration, which attracted nearly 4,000 workers. The OW leaders fought against suggestions to hold mass pickets at the factory, and held the demonstration at a park several miles away).
The OW’s fundamental fear of the working class was the root of their method of organizing. They refused to push issues to the point of confrontation, and refused to call on workers to take direct action because they were afraid workers might take things into their own hands.
The Ontario Waffle was social democratic and opposed to socialist revolution, from its founding in the NDP, to its disintegration last December. As it has been shown, social democracy is not merely a “non-proletarian” political trend, but an anti-proletarian one. As Enver Hoxha correctly summed up its role: “Traitorous social democracy has been for a long time and continues to be an agent of the bourgeoisie and imperialism in the labour movement, to curb revolution and to preserve and strengthen the capitalist order”.[24] The anti-proletarian character of social democracy has serious implications for those who would like to have transformed the OW into a revolutionary organization. It means that the OW could not have become a revolutionary organization without completely repudiating its class ideology, programme and form of organization.
A small group of Marxist-Leninists who saw themselves as non-revisionist and non-trotskyist joined the OW a year before its disintegration, (one author was a member of this group). We were quickly integrated into leadership positions within the Waffle Labour Committee, the Waffle Magazine, North Country, and local Executives. We become members because we saw the OW as a progressive organization born out of the mass anti-imperialist, sentiment created by Canada’s dependence on American imperialism. Two years earlier we had defined our central task to be the building of a powerful broad-based anti-imperialist movement whose long-term goal is an independent socialist Canada. There did not appear to be any contradiction, therefore, between our goals and those of the OW. We did not recognize the OW as a fundamentally nationalist social democratic organization. In fact, after a relatively short period of time we were defending the position that OW was the only potential “mass party of the working class”.
As an “opposition force” within the OW, we had no fundamental effect, because we accepted its political framework. We restricted ourselves to: 1) democratizing the organization; 2) increasing OW’s mass practice and links with workers. We were not known as Marxist-Leninists within OW and nor did we. operate as such. We had no formal, independent organization of our own.
Why did our “Marxist-Leninist” politics blend so comfortably into social democracy? Basically, because our politics historically suffered from three errors: 1) Economism and trade-unionist ideology; 2) Opportunism around the national question; 3) Passivity in relation to building a proletarian Marxist-Leninist party.
Lenin defines economism as:
The lagging of the conscious leaders behind the spontaneous awakening of the masses. The characteristic features of this trend express themselves in the following: with respect to principles, in a vulgarization of Marxism...with respect to politics, in the striving to restrict political agitation and political struggle or to reduce them to petty activities, in the failure to understand that unless Social-Democrats take the leadership of the general democratic movement into their own hands, they will never be able to overthrow the autocracy: with respect to tactics, in utter instability...and with respect to organization, in the failure to understand that the mass character of the movement does not diminish, but increases, our obligation to establish a strong and centralized organization of revolutionaries capable of leading the preparatory struggle, every unexpected outbreak, and finally, the decisive assault.[25]
Economism took root among independent Marxist-Leninists in the Toronto area over two years ago. As a reaction to ultra-left errors, building links with the masses was defined as an essential task in order to heighten the class consciousness and unit of the working class. But what does class consciousness mean and how do you heighten it?
Our collective made a distinction between a) revolutionary consciousness – consciousness of the need to replace the dictatorship of the monopoly capitalists by the dictatorship of the proletariat and by socialism, and b) class consciousness – consciousness of the need for the proletariat to take leadership in political struggle against monopoly capitalists and the state apparatus. Our assessment was that revolutionary consciousness did not exist on any kind of mass scale in the Canadian working class, whereas class consciousness did to a fairly limited degree. Therefore, Marxist-Leninists would begin with agitation and organization around immediate issues of concern to the workers and only gradually develop into consolidation around broader anti-imperialist consciousness and discussion of socialism among advanced workers. In other words, we saw workers’ consciousness developing in stages. This is one of the roots of economism. The programme for the dictatorship of the proletariat, a Marxist-Leninist party, etc., becomes an internal, private line, and the anti-imperialist programme becomes the public, mass line, the line which “heightens class consciousness”.
This anti-imperialist programme contained six points: (Note: The Waffle’s programme included all of the below except No. 1 and No. 5).
1) Opposition to imperialist aggression and war; support for the colonial liberation struggles;
2) Support for the national liberation struggle of the people of Quebec and defense of the democratic rights of all national minorities;
3) Opposition to U.S. imperialist exploitation and oppression of Canada, in support of Canadian independence;
4) Support for the liberation of women from oppression and exploitation by monopoly capitalism;
5) Opposition to the menace of fascism;
6) Support for the defense of the living standards of the working people.
These six points, however, do not raise class consciousness in and of themselves. Communists must work around such issues in away that exposes the essence of our capitalist society. Why are colonies, women, national minorities exploited and by whom? What is the political line that links all these struggles into a coherent view of society as a whole? And what does “political struggle against monopoly capitalists” concretely mean: Canadian unionism, Waffle, building mass organizations, etc? It does not specify the class character of political struggle.
At root behind the concept of the anti-imperialist programme is the belief that there is an “intermediate” line one can take to the working class, a line that is neither explicitly proletarian nor bourgeois. The anti-imperialist programme appears necessary to help the masses in the process of the daily struggle to find the bridge between present demands and the socialist programme of the revolution. This position in itself is bourgeois. There is no such thing as a political line that is above class or neutral. It is not good enough to go half-way in explaining the world to workers – the result is a bourgeois explanation.
Since there can be no talk of an independent ideology formulated by the working classes themselves in the process of their movement the only choice is – either bourgeois or socialist ideology. There is no middle course (for mankind has not created a ’third’ ideology, and, moreover, in a society torn by class antagonisms there can never be a non-class or above-class ideology.) Hence, to belittle the socialist ideology in any way, to turn aside from it in the slightest degree, means to strengthen bourgeois ideology. [26]
Economism, as we have seen, restricts political analysis and struggle to the immediate “economic” issues facing workers; it stops short of explaining why there are contradictions in the economic sphere, how they are related to political contradictions under monopoly capitalism, and what the only resolution can be to these contradictions. This ideology is not neutral – it objectively aids the bourgeoisie in maintaining workers’ political confusion and disunity.
If you do not put forward a clear class perspective on all struggles and do not warn people that these issues cannot be resolved under the present capitalist system, then you have adopted practically social democratic politics: i.e. the capitalist system is basically O.K. but in need of serious reform and new management (in the case of Canada, national management). Since we did not do this, there was no serious difference of opinion between ourselves and the OW.
Our mass work, particularly in the trade unions, was strongly influenced by trade-unionist ideology. We interpreted “defense of the living standards of the working people” solely to mean building independent, militant and democratic trade unions. We were in total agreement with the OW on this point except that we stressed union democracy more. We understood well the mass nature of trade unions, as vehicles for the defense of workers’ immediate economic interests and that socialists should be where the masses are. But we confined our work to improving the union movement and did not point out its serious limitations.
We did not grasp that “trade union activity – the struggle to improve wages and conditions – though vitally important, does not of itself challenge capitalism and does not of itself in any way strengthen the socialist consciousness of the working class. On the contrary, unless it is handled in a particular way, it can strengthen trade union politics, i.e., the acceptance of capitalism by the working class”.[27] The very existence of trade unions under capitalism is based upon the defense of the workers against capitalists, i.e., the acceptance of the idea of the permanence of the capitalists and the permanence of the working class. Trade unionism enables the sellers of labour power to sell their ’commodity’ on better terms and to fight the purchasers over a purely commercial deal. Socialism, however, leads the struggle of the working class “not only for better terms for the sale of laboui power, but for the abolition of the social system that compels the propertyless to sell themselves to the rich”.[28]
Trade union struggles in themselves are reformist – they can lead to the development of revolutionary consciousness only if communists work as such within the unions, going beyond the immediate economic struggle, to expose the nature of the profit system, the class nature of the state and its repressive apparatus the cause of inflation, etc. Class consciousness among the workers thus grows, even though the actual demands posed may be accommodated by the system.
Lenin also points out the economist error of concentrating the attention and consciousness of the working class exclusively upon itself. He refutes the notion that class consciousness develops in stages, and states:
In reality, it is possible to raise the activity of the working masses only when this activity is not restricted to political agitation on an economic basis...working class consciousness cannot be genuine political consciousness unless the workers are trained to respond to all cases of tyranny, oppression violence and abuse, no matter what class is affected.[29]
Our work, both inside and outside the OW, in defense of the living standards of the working masses, failed to build such class consciousness. Instead of fusing socialist theory with the working class, we fused individual socialists with the trade union movement.
Historically, our collective had a clear position that Canada was an advanced capitalist country with a ruling class both independent and dependent upon the U.S. bourgeoisie. We consciously rejected a national liberation strategy modeled on the third world as the path to socialism in Canada. By joining the OW we set aside these principles in the hopes of “building the mass anti-imperialist movement” and overcoming our “isolation from the masses”.
Our opportunism around the national question was rooted in an economist view of politics.
If it is true that you develop workers’ consciousness step-by-step, then in relation to U.S. imperialism it makes sense to first build anti-U.S. sentiment, then anti-U.S. ruling ciass sentiment, and finally, anti-U.S. and Canadian ruling class sentiment. It was assumed that to immediately identify a capitalist class in Canada with both independent and dependent interests vis-a-vis the U.S. would scare off workers and cause us to be isolated from the working class. Our goal was to build a powerful broad-based anti-imperialist movement. It therefore became very easy to view “the movement as everything and the ultimate aim as nothing”.
We passively accepted the Waffle’s petty-bourgeois view of imperialism as an external system impinging on Canada. We did not put forward an analysis of its base of support within Canada (even though we had one), nor did we link up, from a class perspective, U.S. exploitation of the Canadian economy with other oppressive features of monopoly capitalism, i.e., exploitation of women, inflation, the role of the State, etc.
Our efforts to build a mass anti-imperialist movement ended in opportunism because we had no clear analysis of the different class forces interested in opposing U.S. imperialism. The interests of the petty bourgeoisie in opposing imperialism differ from the proletariat. Yet our political line boiled down to the simplistic slogan: unite all those possible against the principal enemy. This line could only give rise to opportunism. In practice, we did not grasp that a united front against imperialism is a front of various classes with different and sometimes conflicting interests and that the proletariat must at all times be in the leadership of such a united front. We accepted the OW’s all-inclusive “nationalism” uncritically.
.. .and with respect to organization (economism results) in the failure to understand that the mass character of the movement does not diminish, but increases, our obligation to establish a strong and centralized organization of revolutionaries capable of leading the preparatory struggle, every unexpected outbreak, and finally, the decisive assault.[30]
Our position on building a Marxist-Leninist party was based on the following political assumption: the relatively low political consciousness of the proletariat means there will be a considerable period of time before the most advanced elements of the proletariat will be able to join in forming a genuine Communist party. From this, we concluded that building a Marxist-Leninist organization, let alone the Party, was not on the current political agenda. The problem, however, inherent in this position, is that if you never raise the issue with workers, consciousness never develops.
Since our central task was to build a broad-based anti-imperialist movement, mass organizations became the real question under “organizational tasks” ” and our only form of organization. Building links with the masses was elevated to the level or organizational principle.
The OW appeared to fill the vacuum as such a mass anti-imperialist organization. Once within, our Leninist principles faded to the point where we called for the OW to become the new “mass party” for Canadian independence and socialism. We liquidated any autonomous call for a proletarian Marxist-Leninist party. This stems in part from opportunism around the national question. Our concept of a united front against U.S. imperialism did not put central the question of proletarian leadership within such a united fromt and needless to say, such leadership can only be exercised through a Marxist-Leninist party.
The root of the right opportunism of our collective was our attempt to find a “short cut” to revolutionary working class consciousness. We believed that the working class was neither interested in nor capable of grasping communist ideas. As a result we turned to promoting trade unionism, nationalism, feminism, etc., as steps toward revolution. In reality, however, there is no such “short cut” to building Marxist-Leninist consciousness among workers. Attempts to find one lead to reformism, not revolution, as the experience of our collective illustrates. Our experience also shows the need for a good theoretical understanding of social democracy and modern day revisionism, since these are bound to emerge in new ways as the old forms and organizations become discredited. In our case we were unable to recognize social democracy the first time we encountered it in a new form, in the shape of the Ontario Waffle.
[1] The social basis of social democracy is the petty bourgeoisie, labour aristocracy, and trade union bureaucracy. We suggest that the tactical differences between OW and the NDP arose because the interests of some of these groups, notably the petty bourgeois intelligentsia, conflicted more sharply with American imperialism than others. The penetration of cultural production by American imperialism particularly threatened the position of the intelligencia.
[2] Waffle Manifesto.
[3] The Waffle and the NDP. OW Federal Election leaflet, 1974.
[4] Toward an Independent Socialist Canada, OW Federal Election programme, 1974, p. 7.
[5] Executive Strategy Statement of September 14, 1974, OW internal document, p. 7.
[6] Executive Strategy Statement, p. 8.
[7] Alliances for Independence, R. Laxer, position paper in Advance,internal discussion journal of the OW.
[8] Executive Strategy Statement, p. 6.
[9] Executive Strategy Statement, p. 8.
[10] Waffle Manifesto.
[11] Critique of Waffle Policy, W. Kashtan, Communist Viewpoint, May-June, 1974.
[12] The leading group always used Marxist “window dressing” to try to recruit independent revolutionaries as Waffle activists. After leaving the NDP their “conversion” to Marxism created an atmosphere which made it easier for them to get rid of the most right-wing environmentalists, libertarians, etc., who had left the NDP with the OW. There was also pressure from the York student group for a more left-sounding ideology.
[13] State and Revolution, V. I. Lenin, quoted in Peking Review, February 28, 1975, p. 6.
[14] Toward an Independent Socialist Canada, p. 15.
[15] Toward an Independent Socialist Canada, p. 11.
[16] Aero-Space Industry in Crisis, OW Federal election leaflet, 1974.
[17] Prospects for Independence and Socialism, OW leaflet, November 1973.
[18] Towards an Independent Socialist Canada, p. 7.
[19] Labour Policy, OW Leaflet, July 1973.
[20] If merely attending monthly meetings had been a membership qualification, 60-80 per cent of OW members would have been out.
[21] What is to be Done, V. I. Lenin, in Selected Works, Volume I, Moscow 1970, p. 168.
[22] What is to be Done, V. I. Lenin, p. 168.
[23] This is the essence of the “Six Point Programme” contained in For a Fully Independent and Militant Union Movement in Canada, OW leaflet, May 1973.
[24] Quoted in Albania Today, 2 (9) 1973, p. 41.
[25] A Talk with Defenders of Economism, V. I. Lenin, in Selected Works, Moscow 1968, pp. 47-8.
[26] What is to be Done. V. I. Lenin, pp. 150-51.
[27] Looking Backwards, Looking Forwards, E. F. Hill, p. 12.
[28] What is to be Done, V. I. Lenin, p. 164.
[29] What is to be Done, V. I. Lenin, p. 174.
[30] A Talk with Defenders of Economism, V. I. Lenin, p. 48.