Hot times on the left… well, no, not if you’re in Lutte Ouvrière… September 1, 2007
Posted by WorldbyStorm in Sex, The Left.trackback
Reading Splintered Sunrise and the entertaining post about sex and the socialists I was reminded of something I noticed recently about that intriguing French Trotskyist party, Workers’ Struggle (Lutte Ouvrière).
It’s an amazing organisation, run essentially as a sort of precursor to a revolutionary conspiracy. This led to a public face only by the spokesperson and later Presidential candidate Arlette Laguiller. This was of a part with the belief of the party that it had to be ready to act covertly in the context of a revolution. But it get’s better, because if Wiki is to be believed, LO ‘discouraged’ marriages and children. Add to this a ‘code of conduct’ and we can see that in some respects this may be a very very old fashioned organisation. And part of that might lead to a remarkable stability and durability. However, one might wonder how it intends to renew itself as the first generation, or is it now the second, pass this mortal plane.
Part of the stability, on an ideological level, is perhaps due to a further belief by LO, which they share with other parties within the International Communist Union, that revolutionary programmes must follow the lines developed during the early years of the Russian Revolution. Which sounds great, but in the context of the early 21st century raises at least one or two slight issues.
Still, this revolutionary asceticism is something that is far from unknown on the left. Splinteredsunrise has suggested that the SWP might be torn on any number of issues between personal and political, indeed libertarianism and puritanism, and arguably that may have been exacerbated by recent alliances made with some groups where fun is not such a priority. On a slightly different tangent a comrade of mine in the WP who as it happened was gay had the temerity to point out (I think at the 1989 or 1990 Ard Fheis) that the party wasn’t taking the issue seriously and that statistically the number of gay and lesbian people in the party had to be more or less the same as in the broader society. This was met with a sort of stony incomprehension by certain elements in the leadership for who such issues were as best an irrelevancy and most likely had never pondered upon them at all (one wonders just what they made of Marxism Today).
The old definition of puritanism as the fear that someone somewhere is having a better time than you springs to mind.
But there are deeper dynamics at work. I’ve noted before how I saw some individuals from the SWP assume an almost ’star’ quality at various student events in the 1980s and it’s hard not to suspect that that had a certain attraction for people. It’s a natural - if often annoying - human response to prestige and power. Anyone who knows any TDs or other public representatives will recognise the way in which a general perception of them can be very much at odds with the reality, something akin to the ‘reality distortion field’ ascribed to Steve Jobs. I’ve never been in a political group small enough to be truly paranoid, but that too must generate all manner of interesting psychological responses in terms of the relationships between members (actually the history of the Red Brigades presents us with a fairly concise warning of the dangers of such things).
So, anyone know anything about this ‘code of conduct’, or indeed about other parties which use suchlike? Or is it all media hype?
Yes, LO do have the reputation for being soldier monks. I think though a lot of this is that they require so much active commitment, either you recruit your partner or they leave you.
The French left is a great example of groups being divided more by culture than ideology. If you remember that the LCR came out of the 60s student revolt, it isn’t surprising that they look a bit like the early Peoples Democracy. And bearing in mind LO’s roots in the wartime resistance…
LO have a few particularly odd aspects which serve to illustrate their conspiratorial mindset. All of their members take special ‘comrade names’ - code names that the use when in the party. They also only accept people who are classified as ouvriers as members (the french state, as is its wont, classifies everybody into a social class and ouvriers are factory workers and similar proletarian jobs). In effect this means that a decision to join LO means that you’re going to have to work in a factory at least until the revolution and get a new name - a significant level of commitment to say the least.
It’s also no surpise to learn that the rest of the french left considers them to be crazily sectarian and seperatist - they even have their own trade union.
Another aspect of the oddness of the French left is that a little while back the Lambertistes set up a small ‘anti-capitalist’ party along with an anarcho-syndicalist group. Now, this may sound like Gerry McGeough, but can it be a coincidence that the anarcho-syndicalists and the Lambertiste leadership belong to the same masonic lodge?
But what do they do? In any case sounds a bit class chauvinist to me.
What by the way is the name of the Lamertiste party?
These guys I assume: http://www.parti-des-travailleurs.org/index.php?lng=fr
To be honest, I don’t think you need to come up with any hidden connections to explain this sort of stuff - the french left has easily enough odd stuff out in the open so that hidden connections are rarely required to understand what’s going on. They exist in a much larger pool, with much more genuine theoretical debates and a legacy of seriously broad understanding of marxist theory - mass, engaged trade unions and a popular communist party.
PCF got about 4% in the legislative elections, still that’s better than any avowedly Marxist party got here since the 1980s.
WBS - apologies for the grammar, but the popular communist party bit was supposed to be covered by the “legacy of” qualifier
Cool. I’m just being pedantic!
Trot sects always have their peculiarities. LO however does seem to be one of the dodgier ones.
How did they manage to get their woman Arlette to such high prominence in French life, given that their so obviously weird?
In repsonse to WBS point about the vote - The PCF went up from 700000 to 1.2 million votes between the first and second rounds - so the PCF and its allies won 19 seats, only 2 down from the previous parliament. And big votes in its traditional strongholds.
This compares to just 2% for the LCR, depsite their good performnce in the presidential elections.
So any regroupment of the French left that tries to ignore the PCF is a fantasy.
Trouble with left regroupment is… most of the PCF is wedded to being the PS’s junior partner indefinitely (although there are interesting noises from some of party dissidents).
The Lams have a long-term orientation towards the PS also, though they really hate the PCF.
The LCR divides between those who want to ally with the PCF, those who want to ally with LO and those who want to be splendidly unique.
LO of course already is splendidly unique, and has been doing more or less the same thing for the last 60 years.
It’s at least as difficult as regrouping the Irish left, except the French have serious groups and serious issues where we have small groups and big egos.
I’d tend to think that it is true the PCF remains culturally a significant formation, and indeed could bring pressure to bear in the future. At this point though it appears that it’s business as usual in terms of centre/rightist dominance in France. Not a terribly optimistic outlook really. Mind you, strange times indeed when formerly orthodox Moscow line CPs and Trotskyist CPs are willing to work together.
The Migs had party names, I believe - I remember Hilary Wainwright telling me she thought the whole thing was silly & insisted on going by ‘Wain’. The topic came up in conversation because the Socialist Society - the group she & I were in at the time - had just been entered by a group of Pabloites, one of whom demanded to be known as ‘Harry Curtis’. Most of us found this rather hard to take, given that (a) the meetings weren’t open to the public (b) those of us who were there all knew his real name (c) he was French & thus not very likely to be called either ‘Harry’ or ‘Curtis’, and besides (d) *nobody*’s very likely to be called ‘Harry Curtis’. (Oh, and (e) his group was trying to take over our group.)
Happy days, I think.
Party names - eh? Well, I guess it is a tradition! Still Harry Curtis, sounds like a supporting actor from Casablanca…
This thing about names reminds me of Emmett Grogan. Grogan was a key figure in the Summer of Love, SF 1967, the Diggers, street theatre, free food, demos, etc. He was self-effacing and kept a low profile. Soon it became the practice among the activists and demonstrators to give “Emmett Grogan” as their name when they were arrested by the cops, as they often were. Grogan became legendary, almost mythical. And everyone became “Emmett Grogan”.
He didn’t live long, but long enough to become a friend of Bob Dylan (Street Legal is dedicated to Grogan) and to write his astonishing autobiography, Ringolevio.
Few people know that Grogan spent a few months in Dublin in 1966, living in the Brazen Head, working in Guinness brewery, and involved in the IRA. He took part in a few IRA actions, blowing up a customs post on the border, and acting as one of the lookouts around O’Connell St the night they blew up Nelson’s Pillar.
Anyone interested should also read Peter Coyote’s beautifully written autobiography “Sleeping Where I Fall”. Coyote was Grogan’s close associate in the Summer of Love. Better known as a film star, he’s still very much alive.
Well not only politcial parties had names, in the heady days of punk rock, it was also quite common.
If I remember correctly I had punk friends called Twit, Rodent, etc. I even had a punk name myself.
With regard to the PCF, I think that the success of Die Linke in germany will be a growing factor, and the example of the former PDS may be influential with some comrades in France.
Interesting point Andy re Die Linke. Certainly there is an appetite on the left for a more muscular approach. Something some might emulate here. Soubresauts, that’s very interesting. He seems to have got around, in a good way.