Declaration of the Editorial Board of Communist Flame
We are living in an epoch of capitalist decline, of crises, wars, and revolutions – at the forefront is American imperialism struggling to hold its place as a hegemonic world power. American influence continues to wane, and rising rival imperialist and regional powers see an opportunity to advance into the politico-economic vacuum left behind. This process of global capitalist realignment is a recipe for increased conflicts, from trade wars between nations, to proxy wars such as the Russo-Ukrainian conflict – the biggest military engagement in Europe since the Second World War. As capitalist competition for markets and spheres of influence continue to grow between America, a declining imperialist power, and China, an ascendant imperialist power, violent inter-imperialist conflict will become inevitable. The ever intransigent American imperialists will not retreat one inch without putting the world to fire and sword. Meanwhile, the cost of living has skyrocketed and the working class slumps deeper into debt and poverty. Far from returning to stability, we can expect further economic and political dislocation which lays the ground for monumental social explosions. While the advanced layers of the working class are already fed up with the bankrupt reformist parties and many of them are looking for revolutionary ideas, there lacks a serious Marxist organization that is able to connect with them.
The old and ossified sects can be traced back to the period after World War Two when Reformism and Stalinism emerged strengthened, and the even more difficult period following the fall of the Soviet Union, where capitalist recovery and boom again created unfavourable conditions for the building of Marxist parties. The separation of theory from practice during epochs of relative social equilibrium had dire consequences. Firstly, as the socialist revolution became a distant perspective, many sects opportunistically adapted to their immediate environment. Secondly, the flexible and dialectical method of Marxism, where a study of living and breathing reality begins with a concrete study of the facts, became transformed into its very opposite – a stale and lifeless method, where reality is forced to fit one’s preconceived abstract formulas. This replacing of dialectics with formalism lands these sects in grave error when the movement demands nuanced and critical analysis of an ever-changing political landscape.
Today, a few of these sects have grown to sizable proportions, and some have even elevated themselves to elected positions of state power. While their publications occasionally produce decent Marxist analyses on this or that subject (which we would be happy to republish in our pages), many of the most pressing questions of today’s world are not studied in sufficient depth. Their leaders also generally remain hostile to critique both from the outside and from their own members. In the end, even the best sects still remain petrified bureaucratic organizations that largely struggle to connect with the working class despite their sizable memberships.
Marx wrote in his letter to Friedrich Bolte:
The development of the system of Socialist sects and that of the real workers’ movement always stand in inverse ratio to each other. So long as the sects are (historically) justified, the working class is not yet ripe for an independent historic movement. As soon as it has attained this maturity all sects are essentially reactionary.
As the class struggle sharpens and matures, the old sects that continue to limp on will be pushed even further into the background of the workers’ movement, and begin to wither away.
The capitalist crisis has led to the emergence of right-wing populists and demagogues, behind whom gather the dark forces of the far-right, making urgent the need for workers to organize and prepare. The working class is searching desperately for solutions to the never-ending horrors of a degenerate system. Even in the imperialist countries we have seen spontaneous mass movements and even outright attempts at insurrection. The Gilets-Jaunes movement in France, the Black Lives Matter movement in America, and the international mass movement against the genocide in Gaza are only the beginning of what is to come. To lead these future movements toward the goal of overthrowing capitalism, we require a truly flexible and dynamic revolutionary party armed to the teeth with Marxist theory. A party with a rich, lively, and democratic internal environment that encourages – not suppresses – political debate, and that also has strong roots in the working class. We need a party like the Bolshevik Party under Lenin.
Toward a New Iskra
In the early part of the year 1900, Vladimir Lenin and his comrades began the task of building a newspaper to unite the fledgling and dispersed Social-Democratic groups across the Russian Empire. This was the beginning of Iskra (The Spark) which for years served to develop the forces of Russian Marxism. Iskra played a threefold role in giving workers a publication that they could call their own, organizing and helping direct the socialist movement, and unifying the movement through the theoretical struggle in its columns. The paper was a massive success and was immediately banned inside the borders of the Russian Empire. The ideas of Bolshevism, which emerged as a distinct political tendency in 1903, stem from the traditions of Iskra.
Lenin, in his own Declaration of the Editorial Board of Iskra, wrote that:
…we do not intend to make our publication a mere storehouse of various views. On the contrary, we shall conduct it in the spirit of a strictly defined tendency. This tendency can be expressed by the word Marxism, and there is hardly need to add that we stand for the consistent development of the ideas of Marx and Engels…
Marxism is not a collection of books that one must memorize; rather, it is the application of the dialectical materialist method to our concrete circumstances that constitutes its living soul. While Vladimir Lenin, Leon Trotsky, and Rosa Luxemburg helped to further develop these ideas, these individuals could not write on every subject let alone commit to extensive investigations. There are many gaps to fill in, but we have inherited the tools to do the work ourselves. All that remains is to get to work! While the main purpose of the website is to create a platform for debate, it will also include articles on topics as diverse as history, philosophy, economics, science and technology, culture and art, to improve our grasp of the Marxist method.
We resolutely welcome all points of view in the struggle against oppression. “We appeal not only to socialists and class-conscious workers,” states the first addition of Iskra, “we also call upon all who are oppressed by the present political system; we place the columns of our publications at their disposal in order that they may expose all the abominations of the Russian autocracy.”
No injustice should be left unnoticed. The struggle against racism, sexism, and discrimination toward the LGBTQ community, is extremely important for the labour movement because only by struggling against all forms of oppression can we unite the working class. As Lenin writes in What Is To Be Done?, the socialist’s “ideal should not be the trade union secretary, but the tribune of the people, who is able to react to every manifestation of tyranny and oppression…”
There exists a need to elaborate and develop Marxist theory, but that is not all. There is a dire need for discourse and debate. We do not pretend to have every answer. But with a serious publication we can create the space needed to begin to sharpen the weapons and tools in our arsenal. Polemics are not to be feared. They are in fact completely necessary to refine our ideas and increase our understanding of the world. Over time, the correct ideas will come to the fore and the false ones will dissipate into the background – around the most superior ideas will coalesce the best communists, and from here will emerge newer, genuine Marxist organizations.
Again, Lenin wrote that:
…although we shall discuss all questions from our own definite point of view, we shall give space in our columns to polemics between comrades. Open polemics, conducted in full view of all Russian Social-Democrats and class-conscious workers, are necessary and desirable in order to clarify the depth of existing differences, in order to afford discussion of disputed questions from all angles, in order to combat the extremes into which representatives, not only of various views, but even of various localities, or various “specialities” of the revolutionary movement, inevitably fall. Indeed, as noted above, we regard one of the drawbacks of the present-day movement to be the absence of open polemics between avowedly differing views, the effort to conceal differences on fundamental questions.
We do not seek to be only a literary project, but the first step in the practical work of regrouping the fragmented Marxist movement. Our columns are open to all labour militants, students, and activists fighting against exploitation and oppression of all types. By building this journal together, we can share our experiences, our difficulties, and our successes so that we may learn from them. As more people contribute to the journal, we can use the publication as a tool for organizing ourselves where we are not yet building, and strengthening ourselves where we are.
To build an all-rounded journal, with the aim of sharpening Marxist theory, assimilating the lessons of the world proletarian movement, and regrouping and unifying the scattered forces of class-conscious workers and communists – that is our ultimate goal. The future communist international will emerge from splits and fusions in the Marxist movement combined with big events in the class struggle, and we strive to become a factor in that process. Though this task is daunting, as James Connolly said: “For our demands most modest are, we only want the earth.”
We appeal to all who agree with the above declaration to help in this struggle for a genuine international Marxist publication!