politiest iveake A Tich ef genuiri internationalison a conti tendencies on these questions. This week we open up with Not even the bourgeoisie doubts any longer that the world capitalist system is in deep trouble. Even the most optimistic of capitalist 'experts", who a few years ago were denouncing outdated Marxist cant', have themselves become prophets of The evidence of this crisis is all around us. Inflation -and with it the wearing down of the living standards of the maj ority of the population- is a woridwide fact of life. In the industrialised capitalist countries, mass unemployment has once again appeared on the doorstep. In the 'underdeveloped world (the victims of centuries of plundering by capitalist imperialism) the wolf appears in an even more ruthless form: mass starvation.
But the mass of people -workers and impoverished peasants- who are suffering the effects of this crisis are not about to accept it lying down. Increasingly they are beginn ing to fight back, giving the capitalists a timely reminder of the fact that the age of capitalist crisis is also the age of revolution.
Here in Britain the working class has, over the past few years, delivered to the British ruling class several powerful blows -proof of its immense power and determination to resist all efforts to force it to foot the bill for the capitalist crisis. The struggle against the Industrial Relations Act, the fight to free the Pantonville 5, the two national miners' strikes and, finally, the collapse of the Tory Government, are just the most memorable episodes.
The upshot of this is that the British ruling class finds itself in the midst of a crisis-ridden sea without a reliable political vessel in which to place its hope. The present Labour Government is thoroughly devoted to the preservation of capitalism. But a party which depends so heavily on the organisations of the working class and working class votes cannot he counted upon to lead unhesitatingly the kind of offensive against the working class which the capitalists are demanding -and which the capitalist system needs in order to survive.
The present Labour Government -despite the talk of the 'social contract - cannot operate like pravious Labour Gorernments, handing out a few concessions to the working class in order to better serve the aims of the capitalists. What it will do is try its best to give the capitalists what they want -as Denis Healey and Michael Foot have been doing recently. But capitalism can afford no 'sweetener' in which to wrap up this bitter pill for the working class, The inevitable result will be a growing wave of mass struggles directed against the policies of the Labour Goverment, and a growing awareness on the part of the more politically aware workers, the leaders of these struggles, of the need to fight the present leadership of: the Labour Party and their supporters in the trade union lea dership.
The ruling class will not let these developments take place under their nose without trying to resist. Of course they will NO BICTIONS - HOUSING FOR ALL attempt to use repression against those who are fighting for a better life, as they already have in the north of Ireland and with the Shrewsbury pickets. But, as all the struggles of the past years have shown, repression cannot succeed against a united working class.
The Inait, besk of the ruling class in this time of crisis, especially as the ability of the social democratic misleaders to prevent struggle declines, must be to utilise the demoralisation created by the Labour leadership to gout the working class. To do this they will use every dirty trick in the book findeed have already started to use most of thom) Racism anti-frish feeling, national chauvinism, fealings by men thet women should be 'kept in their place (the home ted bait ing and selective repression of left wingers, attempting to set the low paid against the slightly better paid, wit all be emp loyed to this end.
This situation otten the revolutionary lett huge opportun ities and even greater responsibilities. Only the ideas of revolutionary socialism can build on the instinetive and spontannoes urge to struggle of the working class to produce a real solution to the crisis: Only the mobillisation of the working class around a programme of socialist measures can prevent the ruling cles taking advantage of the confusion that the bureaucracy creates among the mass of workuri about the cause of the crisis to sow their divisive ideas and false solut.
But the revolutionary lett in Britali has a long listory of emptuous attitude towards serious political discussion, and an/ absence of real internal democracy inside their organisatices revolutionary left suffers from a crippling propagandism -the belief that revolutionary forces can be accumulated and the working class won to revolutionary polities merely by propaganda about socialism coupled with denunciations of reformism and stalinism.
Throughout its brief history the international Marxist Group has struggled against these negative features of Britis revolutionary groups. We have attempted to raise the bann of internationalism through our membership in the Fourth International, our continual efforts to understand political events in Britain as part of a world class struggle, and our emphasis on questions of international solidarity. As well as this, the IMG has marked itself off sharply from the trac ition of other revolutionary left organisations by its break with propagandism -by its belief that a change in the relationship of forces between revolutionaries and reformists, and thus the construction of a revolutionary party, can only be accomplished by practical intervention in the struggles of the masses and of the vanguard. Hence our emphasis on bui ding the broadest possible unity around campaigns on all th major issues confronting the working class.
That is why the debate at this conterence takes the form it does: a debate over the tactical and strategic lines which must govern the intervention of revolutionaries in Britain today.
And it is this practical experience of class struggle which makes democratic centralism so indispensable to the IMG. In the International Marxist Group debate takes place in an organised manner -with written documents, prepared disc ussions, and representative meetings of our membershipbut also in a democratic manner, with every member free to Propound their point of view in words or in print, and groups of members free to form organised tendencies to work out and present their particular point of view to the membership as a whole.
At the present moment the International Marxist Group is in the midst of just such a discussion, in preparation for our forthcoming delegate conference at which the line of the organisation for the coming struggles will be debated and determined.
Given the present state of the class struggle, the subject matter of these debates is of crucial importance, not just to the ING or the ravolutionary left, but to all those who are concerned to assist the victory of the working class and the defeat of capital.
For this reason Red Weekly has agreed to devote substantial space over the next few weeks to the pre-conference discussion of the IMG, publishing the views of our various general statements of position from the two largest tenden cies so far formed Tendency A, and Tendency B (which represents the majority of the outgoing National Committee of the IMG).
влір. coming period of casis should be brought together in an Action Programme which should become the basis for united work in every field. Each element in this Progr amme should provide a concrete alternative to the politics of Labouriam. At the limit, the Government itself might be forced under pressure po adopt one or another of the measures contained in the Programme, and some local parties might go further. Hut in its entirety such • Propramme poses the necessity of break with capitalism, and this will never be accepted by any Labour Government or Labour leaderThe propagation of an Action Programme within the mass organ isations would aim to encourage the
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these shortcomings have stymied the revolutionary lefti Most decisive of all in the present situation in Britain, the ALL LONDON SQUATTERS TORM TON