The Importance of Program

The Importance of Program

Broletariat

A political program is a set of aims that define a party, which is to say that a party without a program lacks any definition. This definition of a party by it’s program is so radically true that Russian peasants would proclaim “we are Bolsheviks not Communists.” The Bolsheviks had set their program to be three simple points, land to the peasants, all power to the soviets, and an immediate end to the war. To all appearances, this was the definition of what a Bolshevik was and what the Bolshevik party stood for. The reason the peasantry would come to reject ‘Communism’ in favor of ‘Bolshevism’ was due to the latent conflict contained within the Bolshevik program, the program of a workers’ party interfacing with the peasantry. This latent conflict was made acute at the outbreak of the civil war where the Bolshevik program was forced to adapt to changing circumstances and led the peasantry to believe that a different party had come to power because a different program was now being carried out. Similarly, Anti-Capital has laid out a five-point program which addresses modern conditions in America.

A Marxist program is arrived at by analyzing the concrete contours of the class struggle as it is actually unfolding in real time. Not only must the immediate struggles be taken in to account, but how the logic of the struggles leads towards the ultimate emancipation of humanity. Returning to our example of the Bolsheviks, transferring power to the soviets does not, in and of itself, lead to the emancipation of humanity. It does, however, create the conditions necessary for general human emancipation. But the Bolsheviks weren’t keeping their heads in the clouds and only eyeing the far-off goal of general human emancipation, they knew that seizing power for the soviets necessarily meant dispersing the Provisional Government which was the mask beneath which the counterrevolution was organizing itself. They were, at this moment in history, firmly oriented towards communism while addressing the class struggle as it actually unfolded in front of them. Taking a point from the Anti-Capital program, we recognize that in a positive sense, the defense of LGBTQIA+ peoples, requires a welding together of the working-class to defend one of its most vulnerable sections. This welding together can serve as the basis for future emancipation as the class finds itself in a more powerful position by virtue of having constructed networks of mutual aid, defense, and struggle on behalf of LGBTQIA+ peoples which can be leveraged for new struggles as old struggles are won. In a negative sense, the defense of LGBTQIA+ peoples, prevents the rising fascist threat from consolidating power by denying them the ability to construct networks of targeted harassment and violence which inevitably become structures of generalized harassment and violence.

An adherent of any given program has a mandate to carry out that program, going beyond existing structures where and when needed, creating new ones if needed, and destroying old ones if they stand in the way. Sticking with the example of the Bolsheviks, nothing summarizes this quite as well as Sukhanov’s report on Lenin’s speech upon returning to Russia in April. “He [Lenin] swept aside legislative agrarian reform, along with all the rest of the policies of the Soviet. He spoke for an organised seizure of the land by the peasants, not anticipating … any governmental power at all.” Lenin not only knew that the program of land to the peasants was so important as to warrant stepping over governmental authority, but also nearly rent the Bolshevik party itself asunder in fighting for his April Theses. For an adherent of the Anti-Capital program this could mean working inside and outside of their local DSA, IMT, WWP, ISO, or even local Democratic Party machine if doing so would further the success of the program. All while refusing to sacrifice any part of the Anti-Capital program even if this meant breaking ‘party discipline,’ ‘codes of conduct,’ or any other types of organizational principles thrust upon you, in the recognition that the only principle to be respected is that of working-class interests which are expressed through the program.

A solid Marxist program is capable of creating its own organizational forms out of its content. Adherents to the program spontaneously organize themselves in to the most propitious organization for implementing the program. According to Liebman, by October 1917 only 1 in 20 Bolsheviks had been members of the party prior to February 1917. As workers find themselves fighting for the same program, they spontaneously come in to contact with one another during the class struggle and seek to affiliate with one another on a more permanent and durable basis to better continue fighting for the program.

A workers’ party without a program lacks definition and will quickly find itself without momentum or adherents. It will seek to remedy these problems by restructuring itself, by democratization of its structures, or by further centralization of power so that it may be more effectively wielded, or by decentralization of decision making so that the membership feels more involved in the organization, or by the implementation of recallable electeds to prevent excesses, or by affiliation with a more popular party to try and gain what little electoral victories can be achieved, or by disaffiliation with a party in order to set up a unique identity for itself, or etc. None of these measures will be taken with an explicit connection to the goals to be achieved, but to reinforce an organization that fundamentally lacks direction. Trying to ‘base-build’ or ‘build the party’ with no program is merely a political reflection of capital’s logic of accumulation. It is a dead-end that simply results in the reconstruction of the worst tendencies of Second International Marxism for whom the movement was everything and the goals nothing. A Marxist program cannot be a list of structural reforms a party undertakes in order to strengthen itself for the sake of strengthening itself. A Marxist program is inherently situated within and oriented to the class struggle and adopts and abandons forms of organization not because they strengthen the party, but because they achieve success in the implementation of the program.

June 3rd, 2023