This text is meant to be a summary of the debates which took place at the Second Conference. First of all, it presents the positions which emerged in the debates in the workshops on the questions of political economy, state power and the principal contradiction in Canada, and which the chairperson considered as principal. The summary also emphasizes a certain number of elements which provoked lively debate: the imperialist character of the Canadian bourgeoisie, the strategic and tactical concepts as well as the Program which will come out of the debates on political economy, the nature of Canada, the concept of state power, etc., and the question of determining if the indigenous peoples form either a colony, a nation or neither and finally, those questions which were touched on only briefly during this conference.
This summary does not go into all of the positions of each group, but rather the principal points of debate and demarcation.
BOLSHEVIK UNION: BU recognizes the imperialist character of the Canadian bourgeoisie. However, according to BU, the Canadian bourgeoisie has merged with American imperialism. American imperialism is an internal enemy of the Canadian proletariat. Thus, state power is divided between the Canadian bourgeoisie and American imperialism. Examples were given of the Canadian Army and its role in NATO, and the decision of the Canadian courts to extradite Leonard Peltier. On the question of whether the Canadian state is imperialist or not, BU’s position is that “imperialist state” is a revisionist expression and that the concept of an imperialist state applies only to entirely independent states and thus is not applicable to the Canadian state.
According to BU, the principal contradiction in Canada is between the Canadian proletariat, and the Canadian imperialist bourgeoisie and American imperialism. The real analysis of the Canadian economy “remains to be done” is Canada independent, is it a neo-colony or is it in transition between the two?
IN STRUGGLE!: Canada is an imperialist country. In Canada the monopoly faction of the national bourgeoisie holds state power. This came about with the struggle for responsible government in the years 1840-49 and the struggle for Canadian Confederation (1867). Since then, Canada has attained its monopoly stage. Canadian monopolies were the result of a process of concentration which included the banks. There is thus Canadian finance capital which participates in the struggle to divide up the world. It participates in this struggle by means of its alliance with American imperialism which also answers to the interests of the Canadian monopoly bourgeoisie. This alliance is imperialist and this is an important, essential characteristic in understanding the nature of imperialism in Canada.
The Canadian bourgeoisie is thus the principal enemy of the Canadian proletariat and the principal contradiction is between the Canadian proletariat and the Canadian bourgeoisie.
RED STAR COLLECTIVE & WORKERS’ UNITY COLLECTIVE (EDMONTON): The Canadian bourgeoisie controls the state. But the fundamental aspect, the principal characteristic of development in Canada up until today, is the domination in the sectors of industry and commerce where 60% or more of Canada’s external trade goes to the United States, as well as in the cultural and military domains. This is the basis of RSC’s viewpoint which states that Canada is a neo-colony of American imperialism.
For RSC this doesn’t mean that the Canadian bourgeoisie is a comprador bourgeoisie. There is an alliance between the Canadian bourgeoisie and American imperialism on the basis of a division of roles and sectors. The Canadian bourgeoisie controls the banks, commerce and transport and American investments are massively concentrated in industry and raw materials, two sectors where surplus value is realized. This is the basis for RSC’s position that the Canadian bourgeoisie is not imperialist.
RSC criticizes the League’s and In Struggle!’s application of the five characteristics of imperialism as defined by Lenin.
This leads it to say, as does WUC(E), that even if monopoly capitalism has developed in Canada, this doesn’t prove that Canada is an imperialist country. Thus Canada is an independent country controlled by the Canadian bourgeoisie. However, the principal characteristic, fundamental to Canada, is its domination and control by American imperialism.
For RSC, the principal contradiction is between the Canadian proletariat and the Canadian bourgeoisie and American imperialism.
Bolshevik Union, May First Collective, In Struggle!, and October Study Group say yes, but each in a different way.
IN STRUGGLE: says yes, to the extent that Canadian monopolies dominate in the industrial sector, in the banks and in all sectors of the economy and to the extent that the process of monopolization in Canada took place through the concentration of capital and the absorption of businesses by the principal Canadian monopolies. The example of the 1500 businesses absorbed by Canadian monopolies in the first fifty years of this century was given, as was the example of 4.3 giant corporations which alone absorbed half of these businesses and the fact that 20 of these corporations were Canadian and 3 American, as shown through research based on reliable sources.
IS concluded that there had been a merger of bank and industrial capital, giving the example that the three major banks in Canada which control 60% of banking shares, share common administrators with 346, 281, and 244 businesses respectively. Thus there is Canadian finance capital, a Canadian finance oligarchy which has set out to conquer markets and participate in international cartels. This monopoly faction controls state power. The Canadian state is an imperialist state, as its participation in the two world wars, the Korean and Vietnamese wars clearly illustrates.
The particular characteristic of Canada and of the Canadian bourgeoisie is the fact that it is full partner in an imperialist alliance with American imperialism. This is a question of a fundamental characteristic of Canadian imperialism.
BOLSHEVIK UNION: Based on what has come out of the workshops and the presentation, we can say that BU is generally in agreement with the thesis that the Canadian bourgeoisie is imperialist. BU adds that Canada possesses a colony in the North from which it draws its principal source of superprofits, from the exploitation of the natural wealth of this territory. According to BU, this position is central to the extent that the exploitation of the natural resources and the profits which result permit the Canadian bourgeoisie to pay the labour aristocracy, which, because of this, puts forward social-chauvinist positions. This colony is also an important source of superprofits for American imperialism. There is thus a joint exploitation of this colony by the Canadian bourgeoisie and American imperialism.
BU bases itself on the position of the Communist International of 1928, that the Canadian bourgeoisie is an imperialist bourgeoisie. BU criticizes RSC for denying the lessons of the international communist movement on this question.
RED STAR COLLECTIVE: The Canadian bourgeoisie controls a large part of the banks, commerce and transport in Canada. But there are no Canadian monopolies in industry, or rather not to any considerable extent. There has not been a merger between Canadian banking and industrial capital. The exporting of Canadian capital is not an essential characteristic of the political economy in Canada, especially if we compare this exporting of capital with the exporting of commodities by Canada and with the importing of foreign capital into Canada and the exporting of finished products by Canada.
On the other hand, RSC recognizes that the Canadian bourgeoisie has imperialist activities. For example, the exporting of capital, the role of the banks in the Caribbean, the role of Noranda in Chile, that of Brascan, etc. But this is insufficient to characterize the Canadian bourgeoisie as imperialist. Finally Canadian imperialism has no colonies and thus Canada does not participate in the division of the world.
The second essential element of RSC’s position affirms that Canada is a colony of American imperialism, that although the Canadian bourgeoisie is not imperialist, it is not a comprador bourgeoisie, either, and that there is an alliance between the Canadian bourgeoisie and American imperialism on the basis of a division of roles.
VANCOUVER RED COLLECTIVE: Showed its indecision on whether the Canadian bourgeoisie is imperialist or not.
The principal debate was on the positions of In Struggle! and Red Star Collective on the one hand and the League on the other.
In Struggle! criticized RSC for its inconsistency, saying that if for RSC Canada is only formally independent and if the bourgeoisie is so weak, why isn’t the principal task in Canada a national liberation struggle, a national democratic revolution? How can we take up Progressive Workers’ Movement’s (PWM) analysis and draw out a different strategy?
RSC answered that in Canada, the task is not a national democratic revolution. However, because of the penetration of American imperialism in Canada, there is no real independence in Canada, and only socialism will allow this independence. It is thus a one stage revolution which will lead to independence.
Generally, all the groups, at least formally, consider that revolution in Canada will take place in one single stage. But in the relation between war and revolution, all say that we must not put the revolutionary struggle into second place, to the profit of the struggle for national independence, on the basis of the fact that the alliance between the Canadian bourgeoisie and American imperialism means that the interests of the Canadian bourgeoisie does not lie in struggling against American imperialism.
However, the conference debates did not clarify how each group sees the process of struggle against each of the two enemies, all groups being in agreement that these are the two important enemies of the Canadian proletariat. RSC affirms that the position of In Struggle! and especially that of the Canadian Communist League (ML) where there is much attention devoted to the opposing interests of the Canadian bourgeoisie and American imperialism can lead to a social-chauvinist position with regard to allying with the Canadian bourgeoisie in the case of an intervention by American imperialism in Canada.
BOLSHEVIK UNION: We must make an analysis of the concrete place of the Native peoples in Canada from which we can draw the following conclusions. As found among the criteria that Stalin put forward on this question, there is a territorial community on which the Indian and Inuit nation live, that is, the Canadian north. But this is not the determinant criteria. Rather it is because they form a people oppressed by the Canadian bourgeoisie and American imperialism, the north of the country being a zone of plunder and superprofit for the Canadian bourgeoisie and American imperialism. The Department of Indian Affairs plays the role of a colonial administrator.
According to BU, In Struggle! has an opportunist position because it recognizes the right of nations to self-determination except for colonies of the Canadian bourgeoisie. In Struggle! has a trotskyite position on this question because it drowns the national liberation struggle in the overall struggle for socialism.
MASS LINE COLLECTIVE (TORONTO): This group spoke from the floor to say that regardless of whether the native people are a nation or a national minority, the important thing is to determine if the Native people form a colony. According to MLC, they are definitely a colony. Thus their national liberation struggle from Canadian imperialism is a just struggle.
IN STRUGGLE!: Bolshevik Union has not proven that the Amerindians form a nation. For example, the criterion of a linguistic community does not exist. Secondly, even if they form a nation, is separation the means for their emancipation? In Struggle! answers no, that the means is the struggle for socialism, as much for the native peoples as for the Quebec nation.
Bolshevik Union puts this question above the socialist revolution and does not analyse it from a class point of view.
The national question, which is a concrete Question at the present stage, as well as the woman question, and the analysis of the Canadian proletariat and of the other social classes were not the object of deep debate.
On the question of the analysis of the Canadian proletariat, there was, however, a short debate where BU reproached IS! for putting school teachers into the proletariat saying that IS! puts all those who are not in the bourgeoisie into the proletariat and thus denies the leading role of the proletariat.