Presentation

The first two sections of this pamphlet were written in 1973, at the suggestion of Roger Rosewell (shortly before he began his long journey to the right). It was rejected for publication in International Socialism by Chris Harman, but accepted in 1975 when Duncan Hallas became editor. The final section was written in early 1981. It offers an outline history of the Socialist Review Group/International Socialists/Socialist Workers Party over a period of thirty years.

The section on the fifties is, admittedly, weak, as I was only able to consult a very small number of documents. Between 1963 and 1974 I was a member of various leading committees and editorial boards, and it is for this period that the pamphlet may be of most value as a personal testimony. However, the account is substantiated from documents wherever possible, and I tried not to rely on purely personal recollections. Thus in 1969 I was one of the minority in the debate on the troops in Ireland; but I endeavoured to present here the majority position as fairly as possible.

The pamphlet has been widely denounced. Much criticism has come from expelled or former members of the organisation, often on the grounds that the circumstances of their own departure were not given sufficient attention. But despite claims that it is a sycophantic ‘official’ history, the pamphlet has often been regarded with suspicion within the SWP and it has never been reissued. One reason for this is that it was written during the prolonged and heated internal debate on the rôle of the Women’s Voice organisation and magazine within the party. I tried to give a fair representation of the argument at the time of writing, but by the time the published pamphlet appeared the situation had developed rapidly, culminating in the closure of Women’s Voice in July 1982. However, none of the pamphlet’s critics has ever been able to point to any serious error of fact.

The pamphlet is referred to positively, though not uncritically, in Tony Cliff’s autobiography A World to Win (Bookmarks, London 2000) and for that reason it seemed to me useful to make it available again to anyone interested in reading it as a complement to Cliff’s account. [Other relevant works are Jim Higgins, More Years, for the Locust (London 1997), a critical account by a former National Secretary expelled in 1975, and David Widgery, Beating Time (London 1986), on the Anti-Nazi League.]

Whether a fuller history of the SWP and its predecessor organisations is ever written will depend on whether we deserve it by what we achieve in the real world of the class struggle. Until then this pamphlet may be of some interest to historians of the British far left.

If I were to rewrite the pamphlet today I should doubtless not do it in quite the same way. However, I conclude by saying that I stand by the political judgements made in the pamphlet, and that I remain proud to be a member of the SWP.

Ian Birchall
October 2000

Introduction (1981)

Over the past decade the Socialist Workers Party (formerly the International Socialists) has grown into an organisation capable of small but significant interventions in the class struggle, and with a real possibility of laying the foundations for a revolutionary party in Britain. Many comrades who have joined the SWP in this period, or who have worked alongside us, quite rightly want to know where we have sprung from.

The following article will sketch out the history of the SWP and its predecessor groups over the past thirty years. The aim is not to answer all the slanders thrown at us by rival groupings; nor is it to prove that we were always right – we certainly weren’t.

‘Without revolutionary theory there is no revolutionary practice’, said Lenin in a much-quoted phrase. But, as Lenin’s whole life shows, correct theory is necessary but not enough. If the theory is not adapted and fought for by workers, it is a worthless abstraction. The history of the SWP is the history of the continued attempt to turn theory into practice.

The following brief history consists of three articles. The first two were written in early 1975 and published in International Socialism 76 and 77 in that same year. The third, which takes the story up to the 1979 Tory election victory, has been written in 1981. Readers may therefore notice certain discrepancies of style and perspective between the first two articles and the third.

In particular the closing section of the second article was written at a time when it was still not clear to any of us how long and deep the downturn in struggle that followed the Labour election victory was going to be. I have therefore dealt with this period, and the internal debate that arose during it, again in greater detail in the third article, at the price of a certain overlap. The most glaring omission in the first two articles, however, is any treatment of the development of women’s organisation it the International Socialists. I have tried to make amends for this in the third article.

A sharp attack on the account presented in the first two articles has been made by Martin Shaw, a former IS member, in The Socialist Register 1978 (Merlin Press). This article, and my reply in The Socialist Register 1979, may be of interest to any readers who want to take the argument further than is possible in this short article. Likewise, David Widgery’s The Left in Britain 1956–1968 (Penguin 1976) contains much interesting material relevant to the earlier part of this history.

I should like to thank Norah Carlin and Duncan Hallas for advice and criticism during the writing of all three of these articles.

Ian Birchall

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