THESES ON THE NEW INTERNATIONAL
SITUATION AND THE TASKS OF THE
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL
I. In the last decade some fundamental changes have occurred in the world, creating by their over-all impact a new international situation which poses new problems and new tasks to the international Communist movement.
II. The main changes are as follows:
The prodigous increase of productive forces which is a consequence and cause of the technological and scientific revolution of our times; the relative decline of the economic, military, international power of the United States, in the world in general, and more particularly in the capitalist world; the appearance of a new capitalist power, that of the European Common Market, through the integration at the summit of the governments, of state capitalism and of monopoly capitalism aided by the state; the irresislible and accelerated advance taken in the field of the rate ot economic expansion and of military strength by the workers states as a whole and the Soviet Union in particular over the capitalist world as a whole and the United States in particular; the reinforced reappearance. of the contradictions inherent in capitalism and of the classical interimperiaantagonisms, following the reconstruction of capitalist economy , the progressive weakening of the stimulants created by the destruction and by other consequences of the last world war, and the shrinking of the market accessible to capitalism; the extraordinary development taken by the destructive power of nuclear arms, posing the question of a general atomic war in absolutely new terms; the magnitude and the dynamism taken by the process of de-Stalinization in the USSR, the end of bureaucratic monolithism in the workers states and in the Communist parties, the grave ideological crisis in which the official Communist movement finds itself, differentiates itself and regroups itself; the new forms taken by the progress of the world revolution in the colonial and semicolonial countries which enrich the practice and the theory of the socialist revolution of our times.
For a whole period the impetus to the productive forces unleashed during the second world war in relation to the capitalist world could develop itself and be contained within the framework of an expanded capitalist market through the needs and consequences created by the war; the accelerated renewal of fixed capital, a consequence and cause of the technological and scientific revolution in the field of energy, chemistry, and alloys; the accelerated industrialization, although in a discontinuous and uneven way, of underdeveloped regions countries; through trade likewise increased with the workers states in full growth.
But the forms of capitalist production in spite of the new means for regularizing, "planning" of economic development employed by the state, pr by the different forms of integration and co-operation among the different national state capitalisms and sectors of monopolist capitalism, have progressively again been revealed as a major obstacle to a continuous, harmonious development on an international scale.
This fact is manifest: in the revived antagonisms among the different centers of capitalist power, the United States, England, Japan, Common Market; in the increased gap between the advanced industrial areas and the underdeveloped areas and countries; in the gigantic parasitic development of the war economy which unbalances and undermines in the long run the foundations of international economic development.
At the present time the rate of economic expansion is everywhere slowed down in the advanced capitalist countries, although in an uneven way; recessions follow one another at an accelerated rate: the menace itself of a real economic crisis is more clearly revealed, with the more industrialized the United States and England. The economies of these two countries when they do not decline openly during the recessions maintain themselves on a level of quasi stagnation. The new fundamental fact in the field of capitalist economy in general is not the absence so far of an crisis, sharply and rapidly developing in a catastrophic way, as for example in 1929—1933. but its quasi stagnation once it has been rebuilt, and its marked delay, irreversible in relation to the rate of expansion of the USSR and the workers states. IV. Ten years ago the United States still appeared to be at the apogee of its economic, military, international strength in relation to world and to the capitalist countries in particular. Today this is not the case.
Its relative economic decline is shown: by the decrease in the rate of expansion as compared to that not only of the USSR but of the Common Market, too, and Japan; by the decrease of the share of production of the United States in world production and world trade; by the continuous weakening of its gold reserves and hence ultimately of its currency. Along with the relative economic decline goes the weakening of United States militarily and internationally, evidenced, among other facts by the spectacular advance of the USSR in the field of intercontinental and outer space rockets, by the difficulties encountered, and the humiliations suffered within the capitalist coalition itself, in the relations between the United States and the Europe of the Six. This relative decline is an irreversible fact, in relation to the new international dynamic which
, forward the workers states, the colonial revolution, with continental Europe integrated the level of government and the statę capitalist or
56 monopolist sectors of its economy. It will not continue however without provoking contrary reactions from Yankee capitalism, which through its reinforced tendency to export capital will try to dominate the Common Market from within, to expand it and to transform it into an Atlantic Market. This will not fail to sharpen still more the interimperialist contradictions bringing them, especially in the case of a prolonged economic depression, to a paroxysm which only the existence of reinforced workers will prevent from generating into an open armed conflict.
construction, reinforcement, viability of the Common Market, the new capitalist power, corresponds to the dynamic acquired by the restored European Captalist economy, confronted by its capitalist competitors (the United States, England, Japan) and the problems of the narrowed world market now accessible to capitalism.
The military and political imperatives have reinforced the tendency towards economic integration amom and of monopolist ca selim aided by the state, which have powerfully developed in the last decade, particularly in continental Europe.
From an economic point of view the Europe of the Six is an integration of an inter-European monopoly capitalist sector specialized in the production of means of production, of consumption, of new services, and which is developing in opposition to the attempted seizure of the European market and its colonial prolongation by other monopolist sectors, in which, along with European capital, American and partially British capital dominates.
From a political and military point of view the Europe of the Six is developing on the basis of an economic integration described as the will and consciousness of a policy capable of defending this base ın a largely independent way in relation to the United States as well as to the workers states, while subordinating itself to the Atlantic Alliance in case of a threat of war with the workers states.
Moved by the dynamic of its acquired structures as pell of bathe anes Brios captaim to transform the Common Market from within into an Atlantic Market dominated by the United States, the Common Market is compelled to develop itself more and more into the most modernized sector of the capitalist economy, equipped with its own military power, and naturally atomic power first of
In this march which overturns from top to bottom the old structures in the field of industrial, agricultural, trade union organization, it is necessary to exploit politically the resistences of the affected social sectors, of the protected archaic, Malthusianist industries, of small trade, backward agriculture, of the workers in enterprises and areas becoming uneconomic, against big monopolist capital which dominates the Common Market. This however must be done within the framework of a revolutionary policy that opens the perspective of a more rapid economic development and especially balanced and profitable to the workers, a policy oriented towards socialist power in each country and towards the Socialist United States of Europe.
VI. As compared with a capitalist economy which is evolving more and more by fits and starts, from recession to recession, lacking wind, particularly in the most industrialized countries, the economies of the workers states first of all that of the USSR, are developing on the basis of a continuous very high rate of expansion, which from now on guarantees the inevitability in the near future of overtaking the overall production of the advanced capitalist countries
The USSR by itself will overtake in a few years to come the level of total production of the United States, and soon after its per capita production.
These economic victories of the workers states, greatly facilitated by the process of de-Stalinization in the USSR, by the planning begun over almost all of the workers states, although this planning is bureaucratic and mainly to the advantage of the USSR, and also by the increased trade with the rest of the world market, although they cannot by themselves ensure the victory over capitalism, will have more and more noticeable repercussions on the process of de-Stalinization inside the workers states, on the economic aid to be given to countries engaging in Socialist development, thus facilitating this commitment, on the workers movement of the advanced capitalist countries, thus stimulating its revolutionary awakening and its commitment to the fight for socialism.
VII. The revival of the contradictions inherent in the nature of capitalism and of classical interimperialist antagonisms that aim ultimately at repartition of the market which is still accessible to capitalism, acquires a new importance, that will continue to increase without end, for the solidity of the counterrevolutionary front of imperialism. This front no longer has the same quasi automatic cohesion that it had in the past and the contradictions and antagonisms pitting them in struggle for the "allied"
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war against the workers states.
The sharpness taken by the inter-imperialist antagonisms is at present such, and charged with such dynamism in so far as the struggle for markets becomes inevitably more acute, that the perspective of a war by the imperialist coalition as a whole against the workers states is seriously compromised by profound internal dissension within the coalition which threatens it with being shattered practically.
The new and growing sharpness taken by thetitic destriative power acquired by at with the poses the question of the atomic war in a new perspective.
On the side of imperialism it is always the United by far the principal force interested in the war, owing to its requirements. tendencies, and structure itself of its economy as will as its international position.
However on the other hand the power acquired in atomic armaments by the USSR, and more particularly by its superiority attained in the field of intercontinental and cosmic projectiles, places the menace of certain death on the United States in case of attack, including one by surprise.
In the present state of affairs and for a long time to come the perspective of an atomic war launched by the United States would mean practically its own certain obliteration, without the rest of the world necessarily being On the other hand the United States must from now on combine the prosecution of its war preparations against the vast coalition of the workers states from the USSR to China, with a struggle to domesticate the Atlantic coalition within which the disintegrative and even openly antagonistic element formed by the Common Market acts with an increased virulence.
In these conditions the tendency inherent in Yankee imperialism towards counter-revolutionary war must be adapted to a certain extent with these new elements. This does not prevent the threat of a general atomic war from being posed each time some of the vital interests of imperialism are menaced by the progression of the World Revolution.
Hence the necessity to always envisage the possibility of a general atomic war, launched by means of present arms having an apocalyptic destructive power, as an historical defeat of mankind, eliminating totally or in very large part the material and cultural preconditions historically acquired for the victory and construction of world socialism.
These considerations therefore involve a revolupractically visualizing the outbreak of the war.
This strategy must be carried out by all the sectors of the World Revolution, the Workers States, the Colonial Revolution, the revolutionary movement of the advanced capitalist countries, according to the the means and conditions peculiar to each sector.
In respect to the considerations, abstractly correct but defeatist in practice, according to which the possibility of avoiding an atomic war depends on the preliminary victory of the revolution in the United States, it is necessary to first state forcefully that this possibility is practically created by the progress of the Colonial Revolution and the continuous reinforcement of the Workers States. This is the combined process which can historically create and is actually creating such a strategic, economic and encirclement imperialism.--of Yankee imperialism in particular-that any attempt at atomic war likely to be made becomes an operation of unilateral suicide.
Without relying on the sure stimulating effect for the workers revolutionary movement that this process will exercise and is already exercising in a number of advanced capitalist countries, outside of the United States, especially in the context of an economic conjuncture which is evolving unfavorably.
The question is not one of knowing under what theoreticaly ideal conditions the atomic war would cease to menace the fate of all mankind, but how the menace could be practically combatted, starting from the present concrete conditions of the present real progress of the World Revolution.
IX. Ten years after the death of Stalin the procèss of de-Stalinization in the USSR in particular has taken such scope that it has become not only irreversible but it has already laid down the bases for the revolutionary renewal of the international Communist movement as a whole.
It is the new economic and cultural conditons particular to the USSR in interaction with the new revolutionary conditions in the world which are acting more and more powerfully so that the Soviet masses and their new vanguard which is being formed will re-enter the world revolutionary scene as one of the main factors which in the coming years will conthe radical renewal of the international Communist movement.
The USSR is not taking the road towards a more "reformist" era while being left behind on the plane of revolutionary leadership by no matter what other workers state; but on the contrary is moving towards a firmer, more determined and clear role in support
"Khrushchevism"— itself, continuously evolving since its appearance-on the average-more to the left, is destined to be further propelled in this direction under the growing revolutionary pressure in the USSR and in the world.
The progressive internal aspects of de-Stalinization in the USSR are the determinants for adjusting the foreign policy included in the revolutionary character of the internal evolution of the country.
The case is the same with Yugoslavia, for example, which is increasing its practical aid to the Colonial
The internal de-Stalinization to the extent that it signifies among other things a more ample and free participation of the working masses in the management of the country in full development, a retreat of the intimidating power of the bureaucracy, a clearer consciousness of the growing strength of the USSR, of the Workers States, of the World Revolution; has as an ineluctable consequence the maturing by leaps and bounds of a new revolutionary situation nant wing of the bureaucracy, the one most sensitive to this pressure, the Khrushchevist wing.
It is necessary to grasp completely the profundity already acquired by the irreversible process of the internal de-Stalinization of the USSR, as well as its ineluctable revolutionary consequences on the foreign policy of the Soviet Union. The most significant expression of these developments which have begun is the support given to the Cuban Revolution, support which continues and the importance of which has been and remains decisive for the consolidation of the victory of this Revolution.
The de-Stalinization in the USSR is likewise decisive in regard to the end of the ideological monolithism of the Communist parties, for the irreversible process which has begun of ideological differentiation and regroupment, hence for the renovation that has begun of the international Communist movement.
The Sino-Soviet conflict which is placed in this framework accelerates enormously and positively the development in this direction.
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It is this aspect of the conflict; the open end of monolithism, the dispute centred on the fundamental problems of the international Communist movement which is by far the positive aspect of the conflict.
As to the attempt to present the positions of the Chinese bureaucracy, taken as a whole, as the more decisive for influencing the revolutionary renewal of the international Communist movement, it 1s necessary to reject firmly these conclusions which are confusionist, drawn supertically, and which can only throw discredit on the Fourth International.
The negative, even hostile, attitude taken by the Chinese bureaucracy against the decisive process of de-Stalinization in the USSR, its alliance with the bloody Albanian regime, as well as with the casehardened Stalinists of the USSR and elsewhere; the criticisms and the slanders, all of them Stalinist, which it formulates against the Yugoslav conceptions which have been enriching workers management, the withering away of the state and the general way of tackling the problems of the construction of socialism in the framework of one country, especially an underdeveloped one; the maintenance of its absurd and extremely dangerous position on general atomic war which according to them will distroy only imperialism, etc; its theoretical and practical opportunism towards the "national bourgeoisie" and more particularly towards its "allies" of the type of Soekarno, and the Communist parties which support it (like the Indonesian Communist party which reopen the chapter of the Revolution not only in Indonesia but throughout all Asia), the very strict bureaucratic rule imposed on the whole economic, political and cultural life of the country, etc,: all these fundamental aspects of the policies of the Chinese bureaucracy must be taken into consideration when it is a matter of making an over-all judgement on the way in which this bureaucracy is actually contributing to the renovation of the international Communist movement now underway.
Certainly there is no question of minimizing the very positive aspects of the criticisms which the Chinese wing of the bureaucracy has been led to formulate against the Khrushchev wing tn the struggle underway to establish their reciprocal leadership in the international Communist movement, starting from their own positions and interests.
It is extremely useful and necessary to utilize the conflict in itself, the debate which it is provoking, the themes on which the discussion unfolds, as well as all the valid arguments put forward by the Chinese n their "left" criticism of those who criticize them in order to maintain, deepen and clarify the discussion on all the problems, and help the vanguard elements to discover anew the integral Marxist revolutionary position, cleansed of its bureaucratic limitations, deformations and falsifications.
X. It is the experience and the specific development of the Cuban Revolution, and now likewise the Algerian Revolution, which will prove themselves by far to be the most propitious for enriching the theory and practice of the Revolution in a large number of colonial and semicolonial countries, and of the Socialist Revolution in general.
It is wịth the authentic revolutionary currents engendered by these revolutions, that the Fourth International must seek to fuse in the near future in a number of countries, while incorporating in its theoretical arsenal the most valid of the new les. sons of these revolutionary experiences.
The Cuban and Algerian experience has definitively sealed the extreme revolutionary importance of the landless peasantry engaging in guerrilla with a leadership other than that of a Marxist party claiming to be Marxist, and capable of launching and of advancing for quite a time in a number of semicolonial and colonial countries a genuine revolutionary process, impregnated with a dynamism which in the last analysis belongs to a proletarian and socialist revolution.
That is the most striking demonstration of the power and influence gained in our Workers States and the World Socialist Revolution.
What opens revolutionary perspectives the domain of the Colonial Revolution and allows us to perceive from now on a cascade of victories in the coming years in Latin America as well as in Africa and Asia, especially favourable areas for the immediate expansion for the world revolution.
On the other hand each new victory achieved in any country, how ever modest its former specific weight in the international arena may have been, has international reverberations out of all proportion, and becomes a dynamic center catalyzing the revolutionary energy in infinitely larger regions.
This is the case with the Cuban Revolution which has upset the revolutionary field in all of Latin America, without counting its repercussions in the world as a whole.
This will likewise be the case with the Algerian Socialist Revolution now profoundly overturn the whole chessboard of Africa, the Middle East, and even part of Europe.
The major importance of the sector of the Colonial Revolution at the present stage of the World Revolution is thus again confirmed, implying the duty of the Fourth International to implant itself more seriously than in the past in these regions where its immediate and future development incontestably lie.
XI. It is only to the extent that the Fourth International familiarizes itself more, theoretically and practically with the problems of the Colonial Reers States that it can survive and progress, revolutionary sectors of the World Revolution.
This implies, newed center of the international install itself somewhere in these regions; that the activity of its section in the advanced capitalist countries where the euphoric economic of capitalism still weighs, finds anew its revolutionary dynamism in an activity combining entryist work everywhere in the traditional mass organizations, conducted on a principled line, not deliberately opportunistic, with independent work by means, among others, of regular organs one huncent revolutionary Marxist and which themselves more specially to the young generations in order to organize among others their struggle against atomic arms and atomic war, for unilateral disarmament, of the Colonial Revolution, for propaganda for the European and American Socialist Revolution.
April 30, 1953. Michael Pablo.
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