07 septembre 2006
SUR LA SCISSION DANS LE SSP
Suite à un conflit entre Tommy Sheridan, ancien porte-parole du Scottish Socialist Party et député au parlement écossais, et la majorité de la direction de celui-ci, un nouveau mouvement de la gauche radicale écossaise à vu le jour. SOLIDARITY (c'est son nom) a reçu le soutien des camarades sympathisants du SWP ainsi que celui de ceux appartenant au Comité pour une internationale ouvrière (la Gauche Révolutionnaire en France). Une autre députée au parlement écossais, Rosemary Byrne, et quelques responsables des instances locales du SSP s'y sont également ralliés. Ce n'est évidemment pas le nombre, ni même l'importance, de groupes d'extrême gauche qui lui apportent leur soutien qui fera la différence, mais la capacité du nouveau parti d'attirer les meilleurs militants des mouvements syndical, associatif, anti-guerre et d'immigrés. Cet article de Socialist Worker (G-B) fait un compte-rendu de la première réunion ouverte du nouveau parti.
Dans un article intitulé Personality is political, Chris Harman répond aux arguments de ceux qui prétendent que des socialistes doivent systématiquement se méfier des 'personnalités' qui émergent des luttes (il cite les cas de George Galloway en Angleterre et de José Bové en France).
Site de Solidarity, Scotland's Socialist Movement
Déclaration du SSP :
The Party That Dared To Tell The Truth
The Scottish Socialist Party has faced the biggest possible test of any political party in Scottish history; what do you do when the most charismatic individual leader of the left in generations demands that the party lies and covers up in order to protect his squalid secret life. For people who believe in truth and honesty there was only one answer and that was to refuse to be a part of the lies and cover up that Tommy Sheridan demanded of them. Now that Tommy Sheridan has left the SSP with his London based supporters we invite all those in Scotland who support Socialism, Independence and Internationalism to join the SSP and refound the party that shook the political establishment.
On note l'argument quelque peu démago que les membres du nouveau parti seraient "basés à Londres", donc quasiment pas de vrais Ecossais. Il est à espérer que les camarades ecossais dans leur ensemble arrivent à recentrer le débat sur la question de fond : comment mobiliser largement autour de revendications anticapitalistes et construire un parti ouvert et dynamique.
Pour sa part, Socialist Resistance (journal proche de la 4ème Interntionale - la LCR en France) a pris la défense du SSP contre le nouveau parti. Après s'être revenu longuement sur l'affaire du procès Tommy Sheridan/News of the World, le journal explique pourquoi, à son avis, l'avenir de Solidarity est plus que problématique :
/.../ This damaging split in the SSP does not in any way devalue the importance of building broad pluralist parties of the working class. Such parties are the product of objective political developments – the collapse (or semi-collapse) of the CP’s, the march to the right of social democracy, the decline of the Labour left, and the emergence of mass resistance in the form of the global justice and anti-war movements. The need for such parties is not about to go away. What has the be re-emphasised, however, is that genuine pluralism, gender equality, democracy, accountability, including the accountability of the most prominent members is not an options extra for such parties. It has to be built into their culture and their practice if they are to have a long-term role.
What are the prospects for Sheridan's new party, which will be based, presumably, on a slightly different version of the SSP manifesto? Its starting point is not good, based as it is on a wrecking action against the SSP over the refusal of SSP members to lie in court in order to protect his personal reputation. It could well be engulfed in a battle with the NoTW again before it has existed very long where all this will dragged out again. It will be an alliance – and probably called and alliance or a movement rather than a party – between Sheridan and the SWP not unlike the alliance between George Galloway and the SWP which forms the basis of Respect. It would be a huge step back from the democratic unity on which the SSP was constructed.
There is also likely to be sharp difference between it main components. The SWP have regarded Sheridan as a nationalist in the past, but maybe this is something else which will be reassessed.
Then there is the CWI, which will be in an awkward situation in this alliance given their hostile relationship with the SWP in England and Wales and the model they are pushing for their new mass workers party. They regard Sheridan as an ultra-nationalist and a parliamentary reformist. These are all forces which were held together inside the SSP by the existence of the ISM which formed the core of the organisation from its inception.
These developments are a defeat for the radical left in Scotland and internationally. This is a defeat brought about by the determination of one man to put his ego, his desire to create an image of a respectable family man, before the interests of the party he and others had worked for nearly a decade to build.
The only winners from a split in the SSP will be the pro-market forces in Scotland, the nationalists, and the Blarites. Socialist Resistance will stand with the comrades of the SSP in their determination to rebuild their party out of the debris.
NOUVEAU
Pourquoi le SSP a-t-il scissioné ? de Mike GONZALEZ (ex-membre de la direction du SSP, membre de SOLIDARITY)
Dans un article intitulé Personality is political, Chris Harman répond aux arguments de ceux qui prétendent que des socialistes doivent systématiquement se méfier des 'personnalités' qui émergent des luttes (il cite les cas de George Galloway en Angleterre et de José Bové en France).
Site de Solidarity, Scotland's Socialist Movement
Déclaration du SSP :
The Party That Dared To Tell The Truth
The Scottish Socialist Party has faced the biggest possible test of any political party in Scottish history; what do you do when the most charismatic individual leader of the left in generations demands that the party lies and covers up in order to protect his squalid secret life. For people who believe in truth and honesty there was only one answer and that was to refuse to be a part of the lies and cover up that Tommy Sheridan demanded of them. Now that Tommy Sheridan has left the SSP with his London based supporters we invite all those in Scotland who support Socialism, Independence and Internationalism to join the SSP and refound the party that shook the political establishment.
On note l'argument quelque peu démago que les membres du nouveau parti seraient "basés à Londres", donc quasiment pas de vrais Ecossais. Il est à espérer que les camarades ecossais dans leur ensemble arrivent à recentrer le débat sur la question de fond : comment mobiliser largement autour de revendications anticapitalistes et construire un parti ouvert et dynamique.
Pour sa part, Socialist Resistance (journal proche de la 4ème Interntionale - la LCR en France) a pris la défense du SSP contre le nouveau parti. Après s'être revenu longuement sur l'affaire du procès Tommy Sheridan/News of the World, le journal explique pourquoi, à son avis, l'avenir de Solidarity est plus que problématique :
/.../ This damaging split in the SSP does not in any way devalue the importance of building broad pluralist parties of the working class. Such parties are the product of objective political developments – the collapse (or semi-collapse) of the CP’s, the march to the right of social democracy, the decline of the Labour left, and the emergence of mass resistance in the form of the global justice and anti-war movements. The need for such parties is not about to go away. What has the be re-emphasised, however, is that genuine pluralism, gender equality, democracy, accountability, including the accountability of the most prominent members is not an options extra for such parties. It has to be built into their culture and their practice if they are to have a long-term role.
What are the prospects for Sheridan's new party, which will be based, presumably, on a slightly different version of the SSP manifesto? Its starting point is not good, based as it is on a wrecking action against the SSP over the refusal of SSP members to lie in court in order to protect his personal reputation. It could well be engulfed in a battle with the NoTW again before it has existed very long where all this will dragged out again. It will be an alliance – and probably called and alliance or a movement rather than a party – between Sheridan and the SWP not unlike the alliance between George Galloway and the SWP which forms the basis of Respect. It would be a huge step back from the democratic unity on which the SSP was constructed.
There is also likely to be sharp difference between it main components. The SWP have regarded Sheridan as a nationalist in the past, but maybe this is something else which will be reassessed.
Then there is the CWI, which will be in an awkward situation in this alliance given their hostile relationship with the SWP in England and Wales and the model they are pushing for their new mass workers party. They regard Sheridan as an ultra-nationalist and a parliamentary reformist. These are all forces which were held together inside the SSP by the existence of the ISM which formed the core of the organisation from its inception.
These developments are a defeat for the radical left in Scotland and internationally. This is a defeat brought about by the determination of one man to put his ego, his desire to create an image of a respectable family man, before the interests of the party he and others had worked for nearly a decade to build.
The only winners from a split in the SSP will be the pro-market forces in Scotland, the nationalists, and the Blarites. Socialist Resistance will stand with the comrades of the SSP in their determination to rebuild their party out of the debris.
NOUVEAU
Pourquoi le SSP a-t-il scissioné ? de Mike GONZALEZ (ex-membre de la direction du SSP, membre de SOLIDARITY)
Libellés : Ecosse, Royaume-Uni
