[The following article appeared in the April 28 issue of Inprecor, a fortnightly news bulletin published by the United Secretariat of the Fourth International.]
I. 'Euro-Communism' and the Imperialist Bourgeoisie
So-called Euro-Communism primarily represents a codification of the rightward evolution of the Western European Communist parties since the Seventh Congress of the Comintern, an evolution which has led them-with the exception of the periods between September 1939 and spring 1941 and the period during the Korean War-to close class collaboration with their own bourgeoisies.
From this standpoint, the latest congress of the French Communist party (PCF), like the abandonment of the dictatorship of the proletariat by the Italian, Spanish, British, Swedish, and Belgian Communist parties, may be regarded as the counterpart to the Görlitz Congress of the German Social Democracy. After a long period during which reformist day to day practice came into sharper and sharper contradiction with formal (literary) programmatic orthodoxy (the Erfurt Program for the Social Democracy in the past, the so-called "principles of Marxism-Leninism" for the Stalinist Communist parties today, the program was finally adjusted to the daily practice. Revisionism has thus been officially codified in theory.
Does this mean that the official codification of the neo-reformist practice of the Western European CPs will not alter their practice very much? It is true that these parties have already been practicing class collaboration for decades. At the end of the second world war, through their participation in governments, their disarming of the partisans, and their active aid in the reconstruction of the bourgeois state and bourgeois repressive apparatus (even under conditions of colonial war) and in the reconstruction of the capitalist economy, they literally saved the capitalist system in France and Italy, just as the central European Social Democracy had done after the first world war. This counterrevolutionary role of the CP leaderships had already been prefigured in republican Spain in 1936-38. At that time everything was still being done in the name of "defense of the Soviet Union." Today they are openly renouncing the Marxist-Leninist theory of the state. But does this change anything in practice?
To answer this question correctly, it must be understood that the reformist degeneration of the mass organizations of the working class constitutes a process, and not an event. In the process, day to day practice, official theory (as the basis on which cadres are educated), the manner in which members are recruited, the objective role of the class struggle, the very comprehension of the leadership, cadres, and militants of the party come into play as interlocking factors which cannot be considered as independent elements nor as forming a homogeneous whole.
After the turn toward the popular front during the 1930s and 1940s, the average militant of a Western European Communist party joined this party in spite of its reformist practice because he or she identified with the October Revolution and with the Soviet Union as the incarnation of the revolution. This is less and less true today. In the past, the cadres of these parties were prepared for tactical zigzags in Comintern policy (the tactics changed every three or four years). The present cadres of the Communist parties of Western Europe, with a few rare exceptions, have been engaged in purely reformist tactics for twenty or twenty-five years now. In this context, the codification of neo-reformism marks a new significant stage in the rightist evolution of these parties.
The imperialist bourgeoisie is quite conscious of these changes. It is not enchanted by the prospect of "Euro- Communist"
participation in governments, at least so long as it is not facing an explosive revolutionary crisis. The bourgeoisie is still suspicious of these Communist parties to a qualitatively higher degree than it is of the Social Democracy. But it understands that something has changed. One of the leading ideologues of the cold war, George Kennan, expressed this clearly in a television interview whose text was published in the January 20, 1977, issue of the New York Review of Books: *Today, when questions are being raised on the subject of the Italian and French Communist parties, we are not dealing with the same parties we had to deal with in 1947."
For several years we have used the concept of the gradual Social Democratization of the Communist parties of West Europe. Recent developments fully confirm this diagnosis. Nevertheless, as we have said, what is involved is a process. Even if the Communist parties of Western Europe now no longer support merely bourgeois parliamentary democracy,* but also the bourgeois police, in the image of the classical Social Democracy, they still maintain specific links to the Soviet Union and the "socialist camp." In spite of all the mounting criticisms of the domestic policy of the Soviet bureaucracy, their relationship to this bureaucracy is still different from that of the Social Democratic parties. Their relations with international imperialism (American, European, and Japanese) are in no way identical to the relations the Social Democracy maintains with imperialism.
* After the disturbances in Bologna in February and March, Bufalini, one of the leaders of the Italian Communist party, stated from the podium of a meeting of the CP Central Committee (March 14): "contrary to the 1950s and 1960s. ..
On the other hand, both the Soviet bureaucracy on the one hand and international capital on the other continue to act differently toward the Communist parties and Social Democratic parties.
The so far uncrossed limits of the process of gradual Social Democratization of the West European CPs is accounted for primarily by the political and material self interest of the enormous bureaucratic apparatuses of these parties. The existence of this bureaucracy is based on its own particular identity, and this identity is still closely linked to "special relations" with the "socialist camp."
Should the process of Social Democratization continue to the bitter end, then the basis of the separate existence of these CPs from the Social Democracy would disappear. Most of the CP leaderships today do not (yet) want to take this risk, nor are they able to. Many other factorssuch as tradition, continued material links, advantages the CP maintains against the its historical
SP through clinging to identity among the combative sections of the working class, the danger that many members and sympathizers would allow their organizational links to the CP to evaporate-also come into play in accounting for the limits to the process of Social Democratization which have existed up to now.
From the historical standpoint, however, "Euro-Communism" is not simply a confirmation of the (further) rightward turn of most of the Western European CPs. It also represents a right turn under particular conditions, which are new for them. First, it is occurring during a period of rising and sometimes stormy upsurge of mass struggles in southern Europe, which has bordered on prerevolutionary and revolutionary situations. Under these conditions the shift to full adherence to bourgeois parliamentary democracy and class collaboration, even with big capital (as in Italy), marks a sharper and more open turn to class betrayal than in the past. The events in Italy during recent weeks constitute a clear sign of this. Just like the Social Democracy after 1914, the "Eurotoday the police are called upon to defend the democratic order against ... the enemies of the democratic system." You would think you were listening to a Hilferding or Severing at the height of the Weimar Republic.
Communists" are compelled to sacrifice not only the revolutionary class struggle but also the day-to-day interests of the wage earners on the altar of class reconciliation with the bourgeoisie (in order to avoid a test of strength at any price").
It is indispensable to destroy the state apparatus and repressive apparatus of the bourgeoisie if one is to prevent these apparatuses from being used to protect private property, even against the democratically expressed will of the majority of the population, including with the bloodiest violence if need be. That is a lesson they did not draw from the Chilean experience. On the contrary, the old "wisdom" of the Social Democracy was affirmed: avoid a comprehensive test of strength with the bourgeoisie. And when the exacerbation of class contradictions and the polarization of political forces in the context of a prerevolutionary or revolutionary situation leads to such a test of strength, then the political conclusions drawn from this "wisdom" is simple: curb the workers mobilization, even if this divides the toilers and demobilizes entire layers of the proletariat. The successful application of such a line can lead only to the victory of the counterrevolution.
On the other hand, the determining motive in the right turn of the "Euro- Communists" is no longer unconditional adaptation to the exigencies of Soviet diplomacy, that is, to the interests of the Soviet bureaucracy, as was the case in 1935 or after Nazi imperialism's attack on the Soviet Union. This time the decisive factor is the attempt to break out of domestic political ghettos, to break down parliamentary isolation, to seek a link with the Social Democracy and the "liberal" petty bourgeoisie. The turn of "Euro- Communism" is thus in no way the response to a command from Moscow issued at more or less the same time in various countries. The turn was made years apart in countries like Italy, Sweden, France, Spain, and Britain, which clearly shows that national and not international processes have been decisive.
Of course, in and of itself the right turn of the Western Communist parties does not disturb the Kremlin. It falls within the policy of "peaceful coexistence" and "dé- tente," that is, the freezing of the European spheres of influence of world capital and the Soviet bureaucracy as they were established at Yalta and Potsdam. Nevertheless, this turn is regarded uneasily, if not with overt hostility, by the Soviet bureaucracy and its satellite bureaucracies in East Eurode. There are various reasons for this, none of which have anything to do with the "faith" of Brezhnev and his friends in the "dictatorship of the proletariat."
One of these reasons is that the implementation of class collaboration with the bourgeoisie by the "Euro-Communists" not in order to cover for some diplomatic maneuver by the Kremlin but instead ever more exclusively for reasons of electoral and parliamentary opportunism-that is, growing integration into bourgeois society and the bourgeois state apparatus-raises the danger that in the event of a conflict between the Soviet Union and the West European imperialists the "Euro-
Communists" might stand on the side of their own bourgeoisies against the Soviet Union.
BERLINGUER: Italian Stalinist hack takes naturally to latest 'Euro-Communist' style.
Up to now, one can only hypothesize about whether this would happen. Developments have not yet gone far enough for this question to be answered yes or no. But the loss of any real political instruments in West European internal politics would be a serious setback for Moscow. That such a danger exists, at least potentially, now appears clear to the Kremlin.
Trotsky foresaw this back in 1938, although he was wrong about the timing of developments. In an article entitled "Munich, the Last Warning," he wrote the following commentary on the development of the West European CPs, which should serve as the basic point of departure for an understanding of "Euro-Communism":
"As regards the ex-Comintern, its social base, properly speaking, is of a twofold nature. On the one hand, it lives on the subsidies of the Kremlin, submits to the latter's commands, and, in this respect, every ex-Communist bureaucrat is the younger brother and subordinate of the Soviet bureaucrat. On the other hand, the various machines of the ex-Comintern feed from the same sources as the Social Democracy, that is the superprofits of imperialism. The growth of the Communist Parties in recent years, their infiltration into the ranks of the petty bourgeoisie, their installation in the state machinery, the trade unions, parliaments, municipalities, ete., have strengthened in the extreme their dependence on national imperialism at the expense of their traditional dependence on the Kremlin.
"Ten years ago it was predicted that the theory of socialism in one country must inevitably lead to the growth of nationalist tendencies in the sections of the Comintern.... Today we can predict with assurance the inception of a new stage. The growth of imperialist antagonisms, the obvious proximity of the war danger, and the equally obvious isolation of the USSR must unavoidably strengthen the centrifugal nationalist tendencies within the Comintern. Each one of its sections will begin to evolve a patriotic policy on its own account. Stalin has reconciled the Communist parties of the imperialist democracies with their national bourgeoisies. This stage has now been passed. The Bonapartist procurer has played his role. Henceforth, the Communo-chauvinists will have to worry about their own hides, whose interests by no means always coincide with the 'defense of the USSR.'" (Writings of Leon Trotsky, 1938-39, Pathfinder Press, New York, pp. 70-71.)
• curo-Communism an ne soviet Bureaucrac
But much more important than this uneasiness on the part of the Soviet bureaucracy about the future relations of the "Euro-Communists" with the Soviet Union and the "socialist camp" is the fear and hostility of the Kremlin in regard to the timid criticisms the "Euro-Communists" have made of the worst excesses of bureaucratic repression: condemnation of the invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968; condemnation of the internment of political dissidents in "psychiatric clinics" in the USSR; condemnation of attacks on democratic freedoms and civil rights; support of Charter 77 in Czechoslovakia; gentle protest against the repression of strikes in Poland; gentle condemnation of the expulsion of Wolf Biermann from East Germany and the lifting of his citizenship.
We are dealing here with a phenomenon that revolutionary Marxists have increasingly stressed in their analysis of the crisis of Stalinism since 1948—one which other tendencies critical of the Soviet leadership have not understood (or not fully understood): the fact that the Soviet bureaucracy has not cut the umbilical cord to the international workers movement and therefore to the international working class. Consequently, everything that happens in the Communist parties outside the Soviet Union (or the "People's Democracies") has repercussions on internal relations in the Soviet Union and these People's Democracies. Under certain conditions these effects can be damaging, and even downright threatening, to the stability of the rule of the Soviet bureaucracy.
In Eastern Europe and the USSR the statements of the "Euro-Communists" in favor of political pluralism and democratic freedoms are avidly received, not because they recognize capitalism and the bourgeois state, but because these statements are seen as an alternative to the present form of political rule in East Europe and the USSR (that is, alternative models of the workers state). Therein lies the great objective explosive potential of "Euro- Communism" from the standpoint of the Kremlin.
When Jimmy Carter calls for civil rights in the USSR or when Solzhenitsyn drags the October revolution through the mud it is only the internal policy of the Soviet bureaucracy which benefits. Such actions allow the bureaucracy to continue to paralyze its own working class with the alternative: either the massive unemployment of the capitalist system or bureaupower. But when cratic monopoly of Berlinguer, Carrillo, and Marchais timidly plead for "political pluralism in the building of socialism," then things change to the displeasure of the Kremlin. Either the Kremlin has to explain that the largest Communist parties in the capitalist world have crossed over to the camp of imperialism, or it must recognize that there are alternatives to the Stalinist and post- Stalinist model of power from the standpoint of the working class. Either option would undermine the Kremlin's political authority and clearly broaden the maneuvering room of opposition in the USSR and
, "People's Democracies." From the this standpoint it may be asserted that "Euro- Communism" has opened a deep breach in the international Stalinist apparatus and has deepened the crisis of this apparatus, particularly in its relations with the masses in the USSR and the "People's Democracies." It therefore accelerates development toward the political revolution.
Isn't there a contradiction, then, in asserting that "Euro-Communism" represents primarily a right-wing turn, that is, an adaptation to the West European Social Democracy, to the petty bourgeoisie, and in part to big capital? To resolve the apparent contradiction it is enough to formulate the question differently: Why are the West European CPs now criticizing internal policy and repression under the rule of the Soviet bureaucracy in growing (although still completely insufficient) measure? Is it mainly a matter of seeking to please the West European bourgeoisie, of breaking into bourgeois "salon society"? This would be a simplistic interpretation.
As we have already shown, the main reason for all the tactical turns of the "Euro-Communists" during past years has related to electoral policy: it is a matter of overcoming a specific obstacle to reaching voters (and trade-union sympathizers to some extent). From this standpoint, the
"Euro-Communists'" criticism of the repressive policies of the Soviet bureaucracy can in no way be aimed at winning bourgeois or "upper middle class" votes. The opportunist electoralist policy is aimed at the working class and the decisive middle layers. It is also among these cireles that the strongest CPs (especially the Italian, French, and Spanish) can have the greatest success with their "Euro- Communism." In other words: the growing criticism of the Soviet bureaucracy is a concession primarily to the West European working class itself and not to the West European bourgeoisies.
One may try to undermine this analysis by stressing the reformist and Social Democratic influence within the working class, that is, the predominance of the influence of bourgeois or petty-bourgeois ideology within the class. There is undoubtedly a kernel of truth in this contention, but only a kernel. It is a fact that in Italy it is the Communist party and not the Social Democracy that has held hegemony over the working class and the workers movement for years. And it is difficult to claim that the combative working class in Spain during past years has been developing under reformist hegemony.
On the contrary, insofar as there is an upswing of workers struggles in southern Europe, and to some extent in other European countries, this upsurge is accompanied by the growth of anticapitalist and not class collaborationist trends among broad layers of workers. Under these conditions, the "Euro-Communists'" criticism of the Kremlin is in large part not a to bourgeois ideology and concession influence within the working class, but a concession to the antibureaucratic component of the average consciousness of the combative layers of workers, which is now undoubtedly much stronger than it was in the past.
It follows that we must regard this aspect of "Euro-Communism" positively and not negatively. It would be paradoxical to say the least if revolutionary Marxists, who for years have denounced the crimes of the Soviet bureaucracy against its own working class and against those of Eastern Europe, should suddenly become uncertain when a small echo of this criticism is heard from the leaders of many official CPs in the West. What we condemn about the "Euro-Communists" on this point is not alleged "capitulation to imperialism," but rather inconsistency and lack of courage in carrying their own thought through to the end. An "objective" critique of Stalinism in the style of Elleinstein, which seeks to explain everything by "historical conditions"; a vague call for a "political pluralism" which does not clearly demand the right to form various different Soviet parties as the working people of the Soviet Union and the "People's Democracies" desire, including opposition parties and an opposition press; a fleeting reference to "socialist democracy" without clearly and openly calling for a democratic regime of workers councils, that is, for free and democratically elected councils as the political backbone of workers self-administration-all these things make the current "Euro- Communist" criticism of the political relations which prevail in the East incoherent and scarcely credible. Only a
Marxist explanation of the nature of the Soviet bureaucracy as a privileged social layer; only an explanation of Stalinism as on the material interests of this based bureaucracy; only an understanding of the interaction of this political problem with the problem of any society midway between capitalism and socialism, with its specific relations of production and its own contradictions and dynamic, can clarify the structural and superstructural reality of Soviet society and scientifically define the perspectives of the struggle to break the bureaucracy's monopoly of power, the struggle for workers power and the political revolution.
is lacking in "Euro-
All this Communism." We therefore criticize the "Euro-Communist" theses on Soviet society. But the dialogue with their cadres and members on this question is qualitatively easier today than it was in the past. This is progress and not retrogression.
Die-hard sectarians who would seek to pretend that "Eurodeny this Communism" represents either a cynical Kremlin trick aimed at facilitating the
"international détente" or else an outright abandoning of "defense of the Soviet Union." The first argument is ridiculous. Does anyone believe in all seriousness that the Kremlin ordered Carrillo, Marchais, and Berlinguer to criticize the Kremlin? The second argument leads to dangerous conclusions, for in reality neither in
Czechoslovakia nor in Poland, not mention the USSR itself, is there a conflict today between imperialism and Soviet society that poses the restoration of capitalism as an immediate possibility. Instead there are conflicts between the Soviet bureaucracy and layers (or the majority) of the oppressed, muzzled, and atomized working people which in no way involve an attempt to restore private property (only the most hopeless idiots fall for the crude slanders spread by the bureaucracy on this subject). And in a conflict between the working class and the bureaucracy we stand 100% on the side of the workers, whatever their ideological level may be (and if it is low and confused, this is a result of the bureaucratic dictatorship and will be able to be raised only in the process of overthrowing this dictatorship). Those who equate a conflict between the bureaucracy and the toiling population with a conflict between Soviet society and international capital are capitulating to Stalinism.
Nest Eurom Wormand as and the
The fact that the programmatic and political right turn
"Euroof the
Communists" chronologically coincides with an upsurge of mass struggles and a sharpening of the social crisis, at least in the countries of southern Europe which have strong "Euro-Communist"
parties, permits us to account for the contradiction between the the "Eurofact that
Communists" are compelled to make concessions simultaneously to reformist petty-bourgeois pressure from the right and antibureaucratic pressure from the left. An understanding of this special aspect of "Euro-Communism" enables an understanding of its internal contradictions, especially the contradiction in its dynamic, much more completely than if it is examined solely in terms of its relationship to the Soviet bureaucracy.
Classical Stalinism was an internally sealed system expressing a particular social logic (although a logic which led to totalitarian madness). It may be summarized this way: The Soviet Union was the homeland of the toiling people of the entire world and the capital of world revolution. All interests were represented by the "Leninist Central Committee of the CPSU," with the omniscient general secretary at its head. Any criticism of the Central Committee or the general secre tary was thus automatically an expression of the political pressure (or influence) of enemy social classes and in the final analysis an expression of betrayal of the working class. Whoever did not stand behind Stalin unconditionally was "objectively" against socialism and for imperialism.
At least since the Twentieth Congress of the CPSU, if not since the rehabilitation of Tito or even since Moscow's break with Tito, this closed system has been springing more and more leaks. With the "Euro- Communists," there is scarcely anything left to salvage. Today it is openly or implicitly accepted that one can remain "in the camp of the international workers movement" while also making merciless criticisms of the policy of the Soviet leadership on many questions. At the same time, it is being openly or implicitly acknowledged that Soviet society, far from being a "workers' paradise," has many features that no "Euro-Communist" party would introduce in the event of the overthrow of capitalism in their own countries. In place of a series of solidified dogmas, today we increasingly find critical questions and timid demands for open discussion (in which we must take as active a part as possible; we have worked far longer on these questions and have reached much more serious Marxist conclusions than any other current of the international workers movement).
But there is no Chinese wall between the alleged infallibility of the "great Stalin" and the alleged infallibility of the "little" Stalins on the national, regional, and local levels. If the leadership of the CPSU can make a mistake, so can the leadership of the Italian, French, or Spanish Communist parties. The demand for critical reflection on the current policy of the Soviet bureaucracy (beginning with critical reflection on the history of Soviet society) inevitably leads to the demand for critical reflection on the current policy of the "Euro-Communists" themselves (beginning with the understanding they have of their own history).
In other words, the dynamie of "Euro- Communism" undoubtedly widens the field for workers democracy, for free internal and public discussion in the West European workers movement, in the West European Communist parties, and in the mass organizations controlled or influenced by them, particularly the unions. You cannot eternally recognize "pluralism" in the state and society (including in a future workers state) and simultaneously cling to the dogma of the "monolithic" party, and still less the "monolithic" trade union.
But the greater space for workers demo-
• "Eurocracy objectively opened up by Communism" clashes with the objective and especially the subjective consequences
"Euroof the right turn of the Communists." You cannot preach "tolerance" and "democracy" and simultaneously expect that an austerity policy (in Italy), or pressure politics (Spain) can be forced down the throats of combative workers with impunity. "Euro-Communism" thus inevitably leads, at least in the phase of rising mass struggles, to growing differentiation within the CP-led trade unions, growing differentiation within the mass Communist parties themselves (above all among the youth and working-class members), a growing shaking of bureaucratic control over significant sections of vanguard workers, and growing demands for the right of tendencies in CPs, trade unions, and mass organizations. The difference may be easily seen by comparing the results of Berlinguer's course during 1974-77 with those of Togliatti's policy in the big factories of northern Italy from 1943 to 1947.
Apart from the revolt of the workingclass and trade-union rank and file against the course followed by Berlinguer (see the appeal supported by the delegates of more than 600 factory councils published in the last issue of Inprecor, No. 4, new series, 14 April 1977), the Central Committee of the CP itself has divided into three tendencies: a "right wing" around Amendola, a "center" around Berlinguer, and a "hard-line" wing around Cossuta and the old Stalinist Luigi Longo. A similar phenomenon has arisen in the
Spanish CP, where a "left wing" around Camacho opposed a "right wing" which favored the dissolution of the Workers Commissions, while the "center," around Santiago Carrillo, after negotiating with the right, finally lined up with Camacho on this question.
We have no illusion in the possibility of a "self-reform" of the Stalinist bureaucracy, whether in the USSR or in the "Euro- Communist" mass parties of the imperialist countries. These parties cannot be transformed into revolutionary or centrist parties "under the pressure of the masses." But we are fully convinced that the slackening of bureaucratic control which is being touched off by the dynamic of "Euro- Communism" will introduce a new and higher stage in the crisis of these parties. How will this crisis evolve? What portion of the militant Communist workers and youth will be able to break from the bureaucratic apparatus? To what extent will the growing oppositions in these parties set some limits to the leadership's ability to maneuver? These are questions which will be answered only by the relationship of forces. And in the final analysis the activity of the masses and the role played by revolutionary Marxists both in the mass struggles and in programmatic and political debate will be of decisive importance in determining this relation. ship of forces.
The big trump card the "Euro- Communists" have been able to play up to now in countries like Italy, France, and Spain has been the fact that in the eyes of the masses they seem to present a credible comprehensive political strategy.
The reformist content of this strategy is less noticed (and taken less seriously: the anticommunist campaigns of the big bourgeoisie play an important role in concealing this aspect from the eyes of the broad masses). What has attracted the workers, and still attracts them in part, is the fact that for the first time since 1968 they see a possible way out of a political stalemate which has lasted for years and which the masses instinctively or semiconsciously identify with the deepening social crisis of late capitalism. "The unions of the left will win more and more votes. After two or three attempts they will win majorities in parliament. Then when it comes to a test of strength, they will have a better starting point." This is how the broad masses understand "Euro-
Communism"; it is also how the German toilers understood Kautsky's "attrition strategy," and Ebert-Scheidemann's "longterm tactics" (the historical precursors of the strategy of "Euro-Communism").
But the sharper the economic difficulties of the era of late capitalism become, the stronger the employers'
attacks on the positions the working class has already won, and the more the social crisis and class conflicts sharpen objectively, the faster this strategy will approach its moment of truth. Collaboration with the bourgeoisie, not to mention a "historic compromise," is no longer possible on the basis of new reforms. It requires new sacrifices, which are imposed on the working class in order to raise the rate of profit. No matter how positive and credible the broad masses may find the "left alternative," they are increasingly less prepared to accept sacrifices in their living standards and democratic freedoms in order to bring it about. They will inevitably collide with the CP apparatus on this point. And this collision will entail a severe crisis for "Euro-Communism," precisely as a consequence of its ideologicalpolitical dynamic.
A negative outcome of this crisis-that is, a defeat of the workers in a class struggle against the employers and the bourgeois state as a consequence of the diversion of their struggles by the CP bureaucracy and the lack of a political alternative-would entail a shift in the relationship of forces to the advantage of big capital, which could have weighty consequences. A victory of the working class in this crisis (which is unthinkable without the qualitative strengthening of a new revolutionary leadership) would require the involvement of broad layers of workers in anticapitalist practice, selforganization, and a political strike against the will of the "Euro-Communists." This would open the way to socialist revolution in Western Europe. One way or the other, the "Euro-Communist" strategy is bankrupt.
Many sincere Communist workers, youth, and intellectuals who have been encouraged in their critical attitude toward Stalinism by "Euro-Communism" will in the future fight in the front ranks of the battle for the interests of their class, for the socialist revolution. A firm and principled policy of unity in action for immediate and transitional demands corresponding to the burning needs of the masses, combined with a patient and pedagogical explanation of the essence of Stalinism, our program of socialist coun cils, and our alternative strategy are the most important weapons in opening the road for them to come into our ranks. "Euro-Communism" is nothing but a transit station, without a timetable. For real communists there is no other way than Leninism, the way of the Fourth International.