Trotsky on Democratic Centralism: an interpretation
The fall of the Stalinist world apparatus (symbolized by the fall of the Berlin Wall) constitutes one of the most striking facts of recent class struggles.
The end of dictatorial regimes led by the Communist parties that followed the capitalist restoration performed by these same parties, in the former USSR and the countries of Eastern Europe, left the communist/Stalinist parties orphans worldwide, which realigned under the command of the Castro-Chavez trend or were turned, as in Italy and Brazil, in bourgeois electoral parties.
However, most of Trotskyism interpreted the end of the Stalinist world apparatus as the end of the historic struggle for the Dictatorship of the Proletariat and therefore capitulated to the ideology of the “end of history” that gives to capitalism the right to live and improve indefinitely. Along with the Dictatorship of the Proletariat, they threw away, for not being more appropriate for them, the internal regime of the Bolshevik party, the democratic centralism.
And therefore, most of these currents abandoned building revolutionary parties with democratic centralism and are now dedicated to build “anticapitalist” parties with full “internal democracy” and freedom for the construction of permanent tendencies, where the struggle for socialism becomes an objective for the indefinite future and their strategic objective is the “conquest” of parliamentarians seats. The example of PSOL, in Brazil, in its last electoral campaign is typical, but the same can be said about the BE (Left Bloc) from Portugal, the NPA (New Anticapitalist Party) from France and many others around the world.
Trotsky and Democratic Centralism
So, it is usual that many questions arise on this issue. What are the roots of democratic centralism? Bureaucratic centralism is a “natural” continuation of the Leninist regime and, therefore, must be repudiated?
In his later years, when he fought for the construction of the Fourth International, Trotsky was faced countless times with similar issues and devoted himself to explain its meaning “to groups of diverse backgrounds who are knocking on the doors of the Fourth International, under the impulse of the decay of reformism and Stalinism, the imminent danger of war and the intensification of the class struggle”. [1]
I believe these texts, put together in the Writings of Leon Trotsky [2], provide a helpful basis for our understanding and a correct perspective of the concept of Democratic Centralism.
The social foundations of Democratic Centralism
The Leninist concept of party regime is not the ingenious invention of a great revolutionary, but met the need of organizing the advanced workers in a militant party for the seizure of power.
As Trotsky said, “workers’ democracy is not an organizational but a social problem. In the last analysis the stifling of workers’ democracy is the result of the pressure of class enemies through the medium of the workers’ bureaucracy. This historic law is equally confirmed by the history of reformism in capitalist countries as well as the experience of the bureaucratization of the Soviet state.” [3]
That is, workers’ democracy is not only a form of organization, but has a class content, and it is necessary to bring the proletariat to victory against the bourgeoisie. Therefore, the first act of Stalinism and the Social-democracy to introduce its bureaucratic rule was to end all forms of workers’ democracy.
Centralism responds equally to this social need. Trotsky did not oppose Centralism to Democracy because both are combined in the necessary synthesis for revolutionary action: “We can’t forget that, if we are centralists, we are democratic centralists, we employ centralism for the good of the revolutionary cause, not to cement the “prestige” of chiefs.“
The “laws” of Democratic Centralism
Unlike today, when Democratic Centralism is considered a “historical curiosity” by the so-called anti-capitalist currents, it was not in question in the times of our analysis, however, it was completely distorted by Stalinism, for whom it was reduced to the final word of the “chief”: “By means of the state apparatus, the Stalinist bureaucracy liquidated the party, soviet and trade union democracy, not only in essence but also in form. The regime of personal dictatorship was fully transmitted from the Communist Party of the Soviet Union to all communist parties of the capitalist countries. The party bureaucrats’ sole aim is to interpret the supreme will. The party masses have only one right: to keep silence and to obey. Repressions, baiting, bribery are the usual methods for keeping “order” in the party.” [4]
It was necessary to avoid the overwhelming influence of the bureaucratic regime of the communist parties and at the same time avoid the plebiscitary practices that emerged as a reaction to this influence. So it always arose many questions about the proper application of democratic centralism. In a letter to Socialist Appeal, Trotsky said: “Individual comrades ask me to give a “clear and exact formula on democratic centralism” which would preclude false interpretations.” [5]
His own reply was: “Neither do I think that I can give such a formula on democratic centralism that ‘once and for all’ would eliminate misunderstandings and false interpretations. A party is an active organism. It develops in the struggle with outside obstacles and inner contradictions. The malignant decomposition of the Second and Third Internationals, under severe conditions of the imperialist epoch, creates for the Fourth International difficulties unprecedented in history. One cannot overcome them with some sort of magic formula. The regime of a party does not fall ready made from the sky but is formed gradually in struggle.” [6]
And concludes: “A political line predominates over the regime. First of all, it is necessary to define strategic problems and tactical methods correctly in order to solve them. The organisational forms should correspond to the strategy and the tactic. Only a correct policy can guarantee a healthy party regime.” [7]
Besides external obstacles to the party: the class struggle and the result of its political line applied by the party in the workers movement; its internal contradictions: the leadership, the party’s social composition, its experience, must be taken into account (plus a correct policy) to ensure a healthy party regime.
In this sense, Trotsky stressed the need for the leadership to conquer political authority among the rank and file based on a successful political line for its intervention, so that democratic centralism could function properly:
“Of course, in case of need, the Bolshevik Central Committee could give orders. But subordination to the Committee was made possible thanks to its well known absolute loyalty to the party’s rank and file, as well as the permanent disposition of the leadership to submit all relevant polemics to the consideration of the party. Finally, and most importantly, the Central Committee enjoyed a colossal theoretical and political authority, gradually won over the years, not by means of orders, not shouting, not through repression, but due to a correct political line, demonstrated in practice in great events and struggles.” [8]
And added in a letter to James Cannon, leader of the American SWP, a party whose leadership enjoyed such political authority, that:
“The purely formal democratic rules mentioned in paragraph (a) and pure negative measures – not terrorize, not mocking; marked in (b) are not enough. Both the local committees and the Central Committee are required to maintain an active and informal contact with the rank and file, especially during the elaboration of a new slogan, a new campaign or checking the aftermath of a campaign that has just ended.” [9]
Neither the strict compliance of the party statutes (i.e., the formal rules in paragraph (a) of his letter), nor avoiding coercive methods on the rank and file are sufficient, it is also necessary to maintain a patient, fraternal, educational approach and an ongoing informal contact with the membership. This attitude, far from being a leadership’s Bonapartist attitude, as is often said, is essential for a healthy regime.
The party democracy
Internal democracy is not only the possibility to discuss the party line in the party bodies. This, indeed, is the culmination of a whole democratic practice by the militants. It is the result and not the basis of party democracy.
Likewise, compliance with the statutes, the realization of congresses and conferences are essential ingredients of a democratic regime, but to Trotsky, these formal provisions only have real effect if: “A revolutionary is formed in an environment of criticism to all existing things, including its own organization“; “The basis of party democracy rests in facilitating to the membership a timely and complete information on the important issues of their lives and their struggles“; “The regime’s health depends largely on the party leaders and their ability to timely hear the voice of their critics“; “When Lenin proposed to expel Orjonikije from the Party (1923), he said rightly that a rank and file member has the right to revolt, but not the member of the Central Committee.“
There is no democracy without the possibility of criticism, without a critical attitude on the part of the rank and file and without the supply of information so that this criticism can be drafted, because “it’s not great merit [on the part of the leadership] to be satisfied ‘with whom is satisfied with me’” [10]. This does not mean that “everything is valid,” for “the maturity of each member of the party expresses itself particularly in the fact that he does not demand from the party regime more than it can give.” [11]
For anti-capitalist parties this detail does not exist. Rather, they found their internal regime on the basis that “anything is valid” in their eagerness to prove that it is a more democratic regime. Such positions were opposed by Trotsky, especially when the leadership felt entitled to be rebellious. For example, in relation to the positions taken by the French and Greek sections in a specific moment.
“Most of your Central Committee (ie the Greek section) says that fighting occurs around the organizational principles. What are these principles? In France, Comrade Witte actually defended the right of every militant not be brought under the discipline of the organization, the right of a member of the International Secretariat to implement a policy on the back of the Secretariat and directed against the Secretariat itself, the right of the organization’s minority not to submit to the immense majority of the conference decision; in a word, the worst individual and anarchist principles.” [12]
It’s not that what we see being applied in anti-capitalist parties, where “everything is valid?” And the result is always a war of public statements between the “majority” (ie the internal tendencies with parliamentary seats) and the minorities, as in the recent case of municipal elections in Brazil, when the majority sectors from PSOL made alliances with bourgeois parties (in Macapá city, capital of Amapá state) and the PT government (in Belém city, capital of Pará state) in an attempt to win the elections in 2012 (they really did in Macapá), not to mention the funding by capitalist companies of the PSOL campaign in Porto Alegre (2010). They call that “democracy”.
The aftermath was “predicted” by Trotsky. Although he was referring only to the case of the Greek section, whose majority defended the positions of Witte, he enunciated what we may call a general trend: “From what I can judge, in Greece, the majority of the Central Committee advocates and now applies directly opposed principles, since they deny for the minority the right to openly defend its position before all the membership. Thus, individualist anarchism turns into its opposite, ie, the bureaucratic centralism. But both extremes that very easily become one another, have nothing in common with Bolshevism, which both in national and international scale builds the organization on the basis of democratic centralism.” [13]
The size of this article prevents me from a further analysis of some important concepts discussed by Trotsky, as the question of fractions and the “mobility” of the democratic and centralist poles around its synthesis, which I’ll leave for a possible next article.
But it is important, before finishing, to clarify this idea of synthesis. Is usual to split the Democratic Centralism into two parts, or, what is the same, considering it as the sum of two parts, separated in time; democracy, at first, and secondly centralism. Thus, democracy should be exercised when the rank and file discusses and centralism when the leadership decides. This view prevents from understanding democratic centralism as a synthesis, ie, as an indivisible whole, which is not the absolute democracy (as claimed by anti-capitalists and anarchists) nor the absolute centralism (as claimed by the bureaucrats), neither just their sum. As Trotsky says, “the fundamental content of party’s life lies not in the discussion, but in the struggle” [14] and democratic centralism (discussion and decision) should be at the service of the struggle.
We could say, therefore, that there is nothing more democratic than a decision of the leading body – elected by delegates in Congress – that puts the party into motion to fight the bourgeoisie, and nothing more bureaucratic than permanent discussions in a rank and file branch that paralyze the party.
“Each real revolutionist who notes down the blunders of the party regime should first of all say to himself: ‘We must bring into the party a dozen new workers!’” [15]
____________________________
[1] Las fracciones y la Cuarta Internacional, 1935
[2] Writings of Leon Trotsky is a 14-volume set collection of the writings of Leon Trotsky between the years 1929 and 1940, published by Pathfinder Press.
[3] Declaration of International Left Opposition to Left Socialist Conference, 17 August 1933
[4] Idem
[5] On Democratic Centralism and the Regime, 8 December 1937
[6] Idem
[7] Idem
[8] The Crisis of the German Section, 17 February 1931
[9] Observaciones adicionales sobre el régimen partidario, 3 October 1937
[10] Idem
[11] On Democratic Centralism and the Regime, 8 December 1937
[12] The Crisis of the Greek Section, 5 April 1934
[13] Idem
[14] Las fracciones y la Cuarta Internacional, 1935
[15] On Democratic Centralism and the Regime, 8 December 1937
