For many years the working class of our country has been without a vanguard party to lead it in its struggle to overthrow capitalism. The betrayal of the leaders of the “Communist” Party of Canada (the “C”PC), their abandonment of the principles of Marxism-Leninism and the revolutionary path in favour of modern revisionism has left the Canadian proletariat without its most essential arm in the class struggle. The “C”PC now preaches about the “peaceful” road to socialism and acts as a servile tool of the Russian social-imperialists.
This is not to say that class antagonisms have ceased but without a revolutionary party to guide it, the Canadian working class has been able to wage only a spontaneous struggle against the immediate manifestations of capitalist exploitation. Presently the large masses of workers are entirely under the influence of bourgeois ideology – reformism, trade unionism, bourgeois nationalism, revisionism, etc. Only a handful of workers have acquired class consciousness and are actively engaged in the revolutionary movement.
However, in Canada today, a young Marxist-Leninist movement is growing and advancing to prepare the conditions to found a genuine Marxist-Leninist communist party which will lead the proletariat in the struggle for socialism and communism. Let us look back over the last ten years or so to see the general lines of the development of this movement.
The 1960’s were marked by a new rise of revolutionary struggles around the world. Above all, the Third World peoples and countries developed into a mighty force that would shake the imperialist system to its foundations. The heroic battle of the three Indo-chinese peoples against U.S. imperialism and the struggle of the Palestinian and other Arab people were a great inspiration to revolutionaries around the world. These struggles served to expose the U.S. imperialists as barbaric exploiters of the world’s peoples.
The 1960’s also witnessed the growth of a new imperialist power, Soviet social-imperialism. It has developed into a superpower and today, along with U.S. imperialism, it constitutes the number one enemy of the world’s peoples. The modern revisionists led by Khruschev captured the leadership of the party and state in a reactionary coup d’etat in 1956 and then proceeded to completely restore capitalism. The invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968 exposed the social-imperialist nature of the USSR and helped to demystify the USSR in the eyes of the world’s peoples.
Unquestionably the most important event in the international Communist movement during the 1960’s was the campaign led by the Communist Party of China under the leadership of Chairman Mao Tse-tung and by the Albanian Party of Labour under the leadership of Enver Hoxha against modern revisionism, to defend the fundamental principles of Marxism-Leninism. The success of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution in China and the consolidation of the dictatorship of the proletariat in Albania were an important impetus to the growth of the revolutionary movement throughout the world. In some countries the genuine revolutionaries succeeded in expelling the revisionist from the communist parties, and in other countries new Marxist-Leninist parties and organizations grew out of this struggle against revisionism.
During this period most of the capitalist countries began to experience an intensification of the economic crisis and a corresponding rise in the struggles of the working class. The promised capitalist “boom” of the 1960’s never materialized.
Canada was no exception. As prices began to mount dramatically and unemployment worsened, there was a marked increase in the workers’ struggles. These struggles grew not only in frequency but in militancy as the workers struggled to defend their standard of living. But because of the lack of conscious leadership the bourgeoisie was able to isolate, repress, and co-opt most of these struggles.
At this time in Canada, as in many imperialist countries, there arose a significant youth and student movement. Imperialism is capitalism at its highest stage, corrupt, moribund capitalism.
During this stage of imperialism, capitalism has lost any of the progressive and revolutionary characteristics it once possessed and bourgeois ideology assumes the most reactionary and corrupt forms. During the 1960’s many young people, faced with the decadence of bourgeois society, began to question traditional values.
In Canada, this “revolt of the youth” took diverse forms. Among the most important were movements around student issues (occupations of CEGEPs and universities, “student power”, etc), around the national question in Quebec, against U.S. imperialism’s control of Canada, and against U.S„ imperialist intervention in Indochina. But on the whole the Canadian youth movement remained isolated from the working class and broad sections of the people. This is not surprising considering the erroneous and confused ideas which held sway within the youth movement (such as the theory that the working class in the advanced capitalist countries had been bought off, and that intellectuals are the leading force in transforming society.) The youth movement in this country was greatly influenced by events around the world – in particular, those in France (May 1968) and the struggles of the Afro-American people against national oppression and the anti-war movement in the U.S.
This “youth movement” of the late 1960’s in fact represented the aspirations of the radicalized petty bourgeoisie, disillusioned with capitalist society and looking for an alternative. However, without a Marxist-Leninist party capable of offering clear direction the youth movement could have no perspectives. Most of its activists slipped into purely reformist politics (New Democratic Party (NDP), Parti Quebecois (PQ), etc.) or abandoned political activity in favour of degenerate bourgeois “alternate” lifestyles (communes, etc.) and the “drug culture”. Nevertheless out of this trend came many progressive individuals, some of whom later began to gravitate towards Marxism-Leninism.
Another factor which must be considered in the growth of the revolutionary movement is the national oppression of the Quebec people. During the early 1960’s, after Duplessis fell from power and the Union Nationale was replaced by a Liberal Party government, many changes occurred in Quebec and there was a certain “ideological unfreezing”.
In this situation there was a rapid rebirth of the national movement. A large number of nationalist organizations (Rassemblement pour 1’Independence Nationale, etc.) were formed in the early 60’s. While these groups resisted against some of the manifestations of national oppression, for the most part they were composed of elements from the bourgeois or petty bourgeois origins. In 1968 the nationalist movement gave rise to a split in the ruling Liberal Party, some members of which along with elements from other groups formed the Parti Quebecois, a bourgeois nationalist party. The national movement was positive in so much as it opposed some of the most blatant manifestations of national oppression, and it brought many people into contact with progressive political side. It was negative in that it was under bourgeois leadership and gave birth to a strong bourgeois nationalist party, which has hindered the development of the class consciousness of the proletariat.
The rise of the nationalist movement in Quebec of course had an important influence on the youth and student movement. This can be observed in the CEGEP occupations in 1968 for example. The influence of the nationalist movement also marked the first progressive and revolutionary groups which arose in Quebec, as we will show later.
These developments – the “youth” and student movement of the ’60’s, the struggles against the manifestations of national oppression in Quebec, and to a lesser extent, struggles such as those against U.S. control of Canada, the women’s movement, and friendship activities with China – introduced many people, particularly from the petty bourgeoisie, to progressive ideas. Some militants later began to turn towards Marxism-Leninism. It was principally from this basis that a Marxist-Leninist movement began to grow in our country.
Thus, the Marxist-Leninist movement in Canada did not arise directly out of a straggle against the Communist Party which had turned revisionist, as was the case in many other countries.
In Canada, the revolutionary movement was never as strong, nor as well implanted among the masses as it was in other countries. Not that the proletariat of our country is lacking a militant history. The Winnipeg General Strike (1919) is perhaps the most famous Canadian workers’ struggle, and there are many cases where Canadian workers sacrificed their lives fighting for their interests for the trade unions, against the rise of fascism, and for socialism in the 1920’s and 30’s. The contributions of Dr. Norman Bethune, who was a member of the Communist Party of Canada to the struggles of the Spanish and Chinese peoples and the men who fought against fascism in Spain in the MacKenzie-Papineau Battalion, organized by the CPC, attest to the internationalist spirit of the Canadian working class.
Nevertheless, the revolutionary movement in Canada was weaker than in many other countries and the betrayal of the CPC was rapid and complete. The bourgeoisie has been able to almost completely eradicate the revolutionary tradition from the memory of the masses. Further when the Communist Party degenerated there were no large splits of revolutionaries who staunchly defended the fundamental principles of Marxism-Leninism and began reconstructing a revolutionary party. An exception to this was the Progressive Workers’ Movement in Vancouver. While the analysis of PWM remains to be done it is clear that the militants who founded it did not have sufficient grasp of Marxism-Leninism to steer a clear path towards a new party.
Without making a complete analysis of the subject, we would like to note a second factor which helped retard the development of the new communist movement in Canada. This was the rapid appearance and consolidation of a completely bankrupt and counterrevolutionary group, the so-called “Communist Party of Canada (Marxist-Leninist)” which simply poses under the banner of Marxism-Leninism. Beginning their work in the early 1960’s, the founders of “CPC(ML)” have caused great harm to the rise of the Canadian communist movement. “CPC(ML)’ s” practice has taken both left and right forms but in essence their line is right opportunist. Their work of sabotage and splitting has discredited Marxism-Leninism among the masses and turned many honest progressive forces away from Marxism-Leninism and the road towards the proletarian revolution.
We will concentrate on examining the recent history of the revolutionary movement in Quebec. It is here that the movement is the most developed and it is here that the Canadian Communist League (Marxist-Leninist) has been founded – as yet we have but a limited knowledge of the rest of the country.
The late 1960’s saw the creation of a number of different political groupings in Quebec. In general the national struggle was considered primary and parallels were frequently drawn between the struggle in Quebec and the national liberation movements of the Third World. It was thought that the revolution would take place in Quebec alone. Some advanced the need for a two-stage revolution, others said the struggle for socialism should begin immediately, but all were united in their general confusion concerning the nature of the contradictions in society, and in cutting Quebec off from the rest of Canada. It was the “people” who would make the revolution and the leading role of the proletariat and its party was negated.
On the whole completely spontaneous ideas dominated – that the revolution would happen spontaneously if it was given the spark. Among the groups which existed at this time were the Front de Liberation du Quebec (FLQ – a terroritst organization), the Front de Liberation Populaire (FLP – a group characterized by activism and spontaneity which concentrated on mass campaigns: McGill Francais, Bill 63, etc.) and the populist community, youth, and citizen’s committees.
All these groups were ideologically heterogeneous. A variety of opportunist lines were rampant: terrorism, anarchism, populism, trotskyism, and narrow nationalism. There were also some individuals who leaned towards Marxism-Leninism. While a few groups made vague references to Marxism, there was no systematic study of Marxist-Leninist principles or attempts to apply them to the concrete situation. In short the period was characterized by spontaneity, and the absence of ideological or political clarity.
The Laporte-Cross kidnapping “crisis” of October 1970 brought-this period to an end. The true isolation of these groups from the masses was revealed and the bourgeoisie’s repression smashed most of the existing political formations. After the obvious failure of this period of spontaneity and terrorism, many militants and sympathizers of these groups turned towards bourgeois nationalism and the PQ or simply became discouraged and abandoned political work altogether. Nineteen-seventy was the high point of the terrorist activity, however in the following year the terrorist line was increasingly exposed and discredited.
During the following few years the dominant political trend among the progressive forces in Quebec was the Comites d’Action Politique (CAP) – CAPs St. Jacques and de Maisonneuve in particular. The CAPs had their origins in the citizen’s committees (which later regrouped to form the social-democratic citizen’s movement Front d’Action Politique (FRAP)) and had decided to made a “turn towards the working class.”
Grouped around these two CAPs were several smaller “CAPs” and other collectives of militants who were active in different milieux. They put forward the need to do political work at the point of production, made vague references to Marxism-Leninism and spoke of the need to create an “Organisation Politique Autonome des Travailleurs.”
The CAPs never made a clear break with social-democracy and were heavily marked with spontaneist and bourgeois nationalist ideology. No serious study of Marxism-Leninism was undertaken to determine a clear political line, and the CAPs and their satellite groups wallowed in right opportunism. The CAPs, in particular the Secteur Travail,[1] negated the role of revolutionary theory and held contempt for militants who were not working in factories. Their practice in the working class amounted to little more than radical trade unionism.
The CAPs’ economist “theory of implantation” held that just being with the workers in a factory was enough to advance the workers towards class consciousness. They thus negated the role of communist agitation and propaganda. According to their “theory of stages” workers first had to be interested in economic problems before political issues could be broached. Further the CAPs did not distinguish between the roles of a mass and a vanguard organization and said that workers’ committees (committees regrouping militant workers in a factory in order to carry out economic struggle) were the basis of the future party. They did not have a clear understanding of the international situation, notably neglecting the struggle against revisionism and Soviet social-imperialism. In general, the line of the CAPs can be summed up as economist, revisionist, and right opportunist.
During this period (January 1972), MREQ was founded by a handful of students at a Montreal university who wished to base themselves on Marxism-Leninism and fixed themselves tasks to accomplish in the student milieu. At the outset MREQ’s references to Marxism-Leninism remained vague and it adopted a spontaneous approach towards party-building.
While recognizing in theory the need for a communist party to lead the proletariat in its class struggle, MREQ confined itself to working with students, saying that it would put itself under the leadership of the party when one was formed.
The group En Lutte! (EL – originally the Equipe du Journal) was formed in 1973 in reaction to the economist work of the CAPs. It emphasized the need to carry out ideological struggle by publishing a bi-monthly newspaper, do propaganda among the working class, and struggle for the creation of a proletarian party. Although quite confused on many questions of political line, EL played an important role in opposing the line of the CAPs.
With time, the CAPs degenerated organizationally. Rocked by internal bickering, they finally spawned the Regroupment de Comites de Travailleurs (RCT) which continued and developed the CAP’s right opportunist line under the new name.[2] During this process of disintegration, groups of militants split off from the CAPs for various reasons. Those who undoubtedly left on the clearest political basis were the militants who later founded the Cellule Militante Ouvriere (CMO). After developing the struggle against opportunism within the CAPs these militants formed a group which summed up this struggle and went on to define their own political line. Thus CMO was born.
At the beginning of 1974 another Marxist-Leninist group, the Cellule Ouvriere Revolutionnaire (COR), was founded by some militants in a working class community in Montreal. This group was the result of a struggle against reformism and populism, which were rampant in the “citizen’s” groups, and against the attempts of the bourgeois state to co-opt the struggles in the communities by integrating the community groups into the state apparatus by means of the Local Centers for Community Service (CLSCs).
With the gradual disintegration of the CAPs and the creation of groups which sincerely tried to base themselves on Marxism-Leninism and apply it to the concrete situation (during 1973 and 1974) we can date the birth of the Marxist-Leninist movement in Quebec.
At the outset, this movement was very young and the degree of theoretical and political development was low0 While most Marxist-Leninists agreed that the struggle to build a new communist party was the central task, and there was a genuine desire to apply Marxism-Leninism, many mistakes were committed.
There was much confusion in understanding the contradictions in Canadian society. Most militants made the serious error of believing that the party would be built in Quebec and not throughout Canada. Further, the political lines and positions of the groups were very general and the differences between them imprecise.
The genuine Marxist-Leninist groups undertook the study of Marxist-Leninist theory and struggled to apply it to the concrete conditions in Canada. They combatted opportunism and took up the struggle for the unity of communists. The Marxist-Leninist groups began to undertake the task of rallying the most advanced workers to communism and preparing the conditions for the creation of a Marxist-Leninist communist party in Canada.
Some groups, however, made only formal references to Marxism-Leninism. They called themselves Marxist-Leninist but in fact they did not undertake the tasks of communists. They opportunistically cloaked themselves with the name Marxist-Leninist without actually trying to base themselves on the principles, without breaking with opportunism and struggling towards the party. It is important for us to distinguish between true and false communists.
For example, we believe that Librairie Progressiste cannot at present be considered a Marxist-Leninist group. Over the past two years their political line has been characterized by eclecticism, confusion, and right-opportunism. They have not firmly based themselves on Marxist-Leninist theory and tried to bring this theory to the working class. They have constantly put questions of tactics before strategy and immediate problems before principles Despite certain general references to Marxism-Leninism, their political line, and the practice based on it, is not Marxist-Leninist.[3]
When they were first formed, the genuine Marxist-Leninist groups made many errors and were confused, however, they honestly struggled forward and tried to rectify these errors.
During the last year, considerable progress has been made by the Marxist-Leninist movement. Several groups have clarified their positions and the points of difference and convergence among the Marxist-Leninist groups have become more evident. In the fall of 1974 and m the first few months of 1975, several important documents were produced. MREQ published a text entitled “Towards the Marxist-Leninist Organization”, CMO published “Pour l’unification des marxistes-leninistes” , and COR came out with “Pour l’organisation marxiste-leniniste”. The student group, Groupe de intervention Politique (GRIP),produced their own document as well, and En Lutte! presented their text “Creons l’organisation marxiste-leniniste de lutte pour le parti”.
These texts contributed significantly to the development of the ideological struggle among Marxist-Leninists. While diverse positions were presented on many questions, all these statements agreed on the need to establish a Marxist-Leninist organization to work to realize the conditions for the creation of a communist party in Canada and the importance of the struggle for the unity of Marxist-Leninists to found such an organization.
With the creation of a number of genuine Marxist-Leninist groups in Quebec (1973-’74), the question of unity began to be raised. Most groups wanted to end the primitiveness and division that had characterized their work and to build the greatest possible unity in order to advance towards the party.
The problem was, how to realize this unity? One of the first deviations in the new Marxist-Leninist movement was manifested around this question. Some groups suggested the method of “common practice”, proposing that unity could be reached by focussing on common practical activities. Those who defended this position negated the principle that it is the correctness or incorrectness of the ideological and political line that determines everything. Actually they were proposing unity without a clear political foundation based on nothing more than the recognition of the need for a party and the desire for unity.
Various proposals and attempts at making unity had their origins in this theory of “common practice”. For example, when the Marxist-Leninist group En Lutte! founded the Comite de Solidarite avec les Luttes Ouvrieres (CSLO – in English, Solidarity Committee with Workers’ Struggles) in the fall of 1973, they had this perspective in mind – that is, that the CSLO could help bring about the unity of Marxist-Leninists.
Other projects, such as the Comite Ad Hoc were also launched.[4] Some members of En Lutte!’s leadership went so far as to suggest making unity in a conspiratorial manner. They tried to pluck out the best militants from existing mass and Marxist-Leninist groups to secretly form an organization. No clear political basis of unity was proposed for this.
All these projects, from the large and open CSLO to the under-the-table manipulations predictably failed to achieve the unity of Marxist-Leninists. They discouraged the development of ideological struggle and thus did not favor a solid unity based on correct principles.
The appearance of the manifestoes of each group at the end of 1974 and the beginning of 1975 was a major step forward toward clarifying the political situation and breaking with the vagueness and ambiguity of the past.
Lenin wrote:
Before we can unite, and in order that we may unite, we must first of all draw firm and definite lines of demarcation. Otherwise our unity will be purely fictitious, it will conceal the prevailing confusion and hinder its radical elimination. (“Declaration of the Editorial Board of Iskra”)
The publication of these statements exposed the lines of the groups and helped identify the major questions around which debate would be waged. By emphasizing the importance of political line, these texts laid the basis for undertaking the struggle for unity among Marxist-Leninist groups in order to found a Marxist-Leninist organization and later the party. The publication of the documents thus dealt a blow to the theory of “common practice.”
In the months that followed the publication of these texts Marxist-Leninist groups began to meet to debate important questions of political line in order to advance towards unity and the creation of a Marxist-Leninist organization. This was when MREQ, CMO, and COR began to meet with each other. We shall return later to explain how the process of unity developed among our three groups.
However, even if the theory of “common practice” had been discredited, all the Marxist-Leninist groups did not necessarily adopt a correct attitude towards the question of unity. For example, the Marxist-Leninist group En Lutte!, one of the most influential groups in Quebec, held an erroneous position. At present many important questions of political line separate us and En Lutte! However, the immediate obstacle to the resolution of these political divergences, and the reason why unity between us and En Lutte! in the near future is impossible, is because of the erroneous attitude En Lutte! has adopted towards other Marxist-Leninist groups. En Lutte!’s position has been characterized by big group chauvinism, by seeing itself as the “center” and, above all, by refusing to meet and carry out ideological struggle with other Marxist-Leninist groups.
After the publication of their political documents in the winter of 1974, En Lutte! and MREQ held a series of meetings to debate major questions of political line and to struggle to achieve unity of views. Despite many meetings spread over more than six months, however, the two groups never got around to discussing major political line questions. En Lutte! used one pretext after another to block the process of debate, seizing any excuse to avoid discussion with MREQ.
CMO approached En Lutte! to discuss political line several months ago. However, CMO did not see the point of continuing the discussions once En Lutte! made it clear that they were not interested in discussing political line but only the “differences” between the two groups.
COR, for its part, had experience with En Lutte!. in the Comite Ad Hoc and “Project A” (see COR’s auto-critique), COR fell victim more than once to En Lutte!’s big-group chauvinism. Because of this, unity procedures never went much beyond an exchange of letters in which En Lutte! claimed to be the rallying point of all genuine Marxist-Leninists.
The experiences of MREQ[5], CMO, and COR with En Lutte! testify that the latter was not genuinely interested in meeting and discussing with other groups with whom they had differences. En Lutte! has shown itself to be not really interested in struggling for unity – they did not start from the desire for unity. Despite our errors we have always been willing to debate key questions of line with other Marxist-Leninists.
En Lutte!’s constant insistence on demarcation was a position of all-struggle, no unity. En Lutte! has ranted about the “bourgeois line in the Marxist-Leninist movement” without specifying who holds this line.
They have thus contributed to the development of sectarian attitudes among militants. En Lutte!’s confusion is so profound that they even situate the counter-revolutionary “CPC(ml)” within the communist movement, according to their supplement entitled “Intensifions la lutte contre le courant neo-revisioniste au sein du mouvement marxiste-leniniste.” By talking about a “center,” applying democratic centralism to the process of unity, “poles of reference,” and by negating the role that even the smallest group can play in the struggle to build a revolutionary organization, En Lutte! has discouraged many Marxist-Leninist groups from clarifying their lines and participating in the ideological struggle. Despite all their calls for ideological struggle, En Lutte! showed itself unwilling to discuss the major questions of political line. This opportunist position sabotaged any chance that there was in the short run of resolving our differences of political line and achieving unity.
However, we must stress that the ideological struggle that has developed in Quebec over the last months has been positive.
Temporary set backs should be expected. The struggle to unite all genuine Marxist-Leninists will be complex and protracted. But if we adopt a correct attitude of unity-criticism-unity, struggle to correct our errors, and make questions of political line primary, we will certainly be able to overcome all differences and build the unity necessary to create a genuine Marxist-Leninist communist party in Canada.
We shall now briefly examine how unity was achieved among the groups CMO, COR, and MREQ.
At the beginning of 1975 each of our groups approached the others to begin discussions to arrive at political unity. Based on the Marxist-Leninist method of unity-criticism-unity, these discussions covered the major questions of political line – from the basic principles of Marxism-Leninism and the international situation to the present tasks in the labor movement. Over a period of several months, it became evident that basic agreement existed on most major questions.
The main problem which had not been resolved was the deepening of the analysis of the class contradictions in Canada and, in particular, the identification of the principal contradiction.
Considering the general unity already attained in the difficult series of meetings, the three groups decided to proceed from bilateral to tripartite discussions and create a special commission drawn from the three groups to investigate the problem of the principal contradiction.
After over a month of intense study and ideological struggle this commission reached unanimity on major points of analysis of the class contradictions in Canada. The groups then decided to set up a tripartite committee to finalize the political unity, struggle over any remaining secondary questions, and prepare for the realization of organizational unity. Some general comments can be made on how this process unfolded.
This struggle was solidly based on Marxist-Leninist principles. Our three groups did not start off agreeing on everything nor did we just sit down at a table and write out an “entente”. On the contrary, there were some major differences which separated us at the outset. On many smaller points there were differences in perspective and attitudes. This is understandable when groups from different backgrounds and with different experiences come together today, when the level of ideological development of the Marxist-Leninist movement is still low. Narrow group spirit manifested itself more than once during this process, but by wielding the arm of criticism and self-criticism, it was possible to crush this dangerous tendency.
Through the process of struggle we were able to arrive at a correct line based on Marxist-Leninist principles through rejecting false ideas and adopting correct ones
We do not wish to offer our course to unity as a universal model or claim that it was accomplished without errors. For example, it was erroneous for us to neglect the importance of polemics. We also underestimated the importance of some questions, leaving their consideration to the end to the tripartite discussions and we all manifested to some degree an attitude of waiting in regard to the Marxist-Leninist organization (i.e. putting off accomplishing some tasks until the organization was created). In each concrete situation Marxist-Leninists must determine the best way to carry on the concrete struggle for the unity of political line. What is universal is that Marxist-Leninists must always strive to achieve unity, that such unity can only be founded on correct political line based on Marxist-Leninist principles, and that once such unity has been achieved, there is a responsibility to translate it on the organizational level.
Overall the struggle for unity between our groups was extremely positive. Its successful conclusion represents a significant advance for the Marxist-Leninist movement in Canada. This struggle was firmly based on Marxism-Leninism and on the need to combat opportunism. The lesson to draw, is that if Marxist-Leninists apply resolutely the principle that the political and ideological line determines everything, do not compromise with opportunism, and start from the desire for unity, it is possible to overcome differences and realize unity.
The realization of unity between MREQ, CMO, and COR is an important step forward in the struggle to build the party. It is clear, however, that the struggle to unite all genuine Marxist-Leninists has only begun. As yet the communist forces in Canada are divided. There are many major questions of political line that must be resolved if a solid unity is to be achieved.
For example, presently there are important political differences which separate us from En Lutte!. We have different analyses of the principal contradiction in Canada, the international situation, the tasks of communists in Canada, and communist work in trade unions, to name but a few. (Our views on these questions are elaborated in the “entente” text.) These differences cannot be glossed over and the only possibility of resolving them is through serious ideological struggle.
We consider En Lutte! a part of the Marxist-Leninist movement. Thus, we will continue to struggle with En Lutte!, as with all genuine Marxist-Leninists, to realize unity. But it is vital to understand that this unity must come about in struggle. Without the wide development of ideological struggle among Marxist-Leninists, without debate and exchange on the major questions, the theoretical and political clarity necessary to found the party cannot be achieved.
With the creation of the Canadian Communist League (Marxist- Leninist) we clearly affirm our intention to continue the struggle for unity. The CCL(ML) will concentrate its forces to develop its line and to test the correctness of this line in practice. The CCL (ML) will undertake a resolute struggle to defend the basic principles of Marxism-Leninism, to apply them to the concrete conditions of Canada, to oppose all opportunism, to struggle for the unity of Marxist-Leninists and so advance towards the party.
[1] The Secteur Travail was the part of the CAP responsible for work in the factories. There were two other sectors – the Secteur Scolaire (schools) and the Secteur Quartier (community work). The CAP did not function on democratic centralism and each sector proceeded independently. The Secteur was particularly adamant in opposing any centralized leadership.
[2] The RCT has fallen to pieces, torn with internal bickering. The small number of workers which it had once attracted have drifted away and some of its leaders are now moving close to Trotskyist groups.
[3]This text is not the place for us to document in detail our differences with Librairie Progressiste, however, we shall note just a couple of examples of the anti-Marxist-Leninist character of their line.
They have a confused view of the international situation, neglecting the danger of Soviet social-imperialism. On the question of the struggle against revisionism and capitalist restoration in the Soviet Union, they cast doubt on the role placed by comrade Stalin. They support various types of groups around the world, playing up, for instance, the Trotskyist Chilean group, the M.I.R., as “revolutionary.” Librairie Progressiste has developed a bankrupt theory of “building the party in the masses,” failing to understand the key role of revolutionary theory and the need to build a revolutionary organization from the top down. Recently they went so far as to develop a neo-Trotskyite theory of “continental revolution” in North America.
We are not implying that every member of Librairie Progressiste and groups like them are die-hard opportunists, but simply that such groups cannot be considered Marxist-Leninist unless they make a radical break with their present lines – with their eclecticism and opportunism – and conduct a serious and profound self-criticism of their errors.
[4] The Comite Ad Hoc was a nebulous group of representatives from many mass and Marxist-Leninist groups organized with En Lutte! to discuss unity. The Comite never even established who was a Marxist-Leninist and after several months of futile debate it collapsed.
[5] For a more complete account of the relations between MREQ and En Lutte!, see “On the Unity of Marxists-Leninists: Lessons from the debates between En Lutte! and MREQ” published by MREQ in October ’75.