Militant Labour - Organisation

Organisation

The Socialist Party is a membership based organisation, with branches in localities where it has members. The annual Conference or Congress is the decisive body of the party. Branches send delegates (the number of delegates per branch is proportional to the size of the branch), to regional and national bodies, conferences and decision making annual congresses.

At the annual congresses the national organisers have only a consultative vote, and must win support for new policies. The exit from the Labour Party in 1991, and the change of name of Militant Labour to Socialist Party, are two major debates in which a substantial exchange of views took place in a period of discussion and debate at branch, regional and national level, with a number of documents circulated, before a Congress at which the matter was concluded by a vote. After a conference decision, members are generally expected to abide by the views agreed upon, at least publicly, whilst discussion may continue, or be returned to later, within the party until all concerns are addressed.

Congress elects a National Committee, which in turn elects an Executive Committee of around a dozen or so members which runs the party on a day-to-day basis. Peter Taaffe is general secretary, and Hannah Sell deputy general secretary. In 2007 the Socialist Party Executive Committee of ten or eleven has a majority of women members. Areas of responsibility for the executive apart from the development of general policy matters are various campaigning roles, such as NHS, workplace and youth campaigns, together with editorial responsibilities for The Socialist, Socialism Today and other issues such as finance raising.

The Socialist Party argues that its method of elections to the National Committee does not promote individuals, but instead is conceived as the selection of a rounded-out team, including both experienced as well as young or less experienced but promising members, together with members from the trade unions and youth and other aspects of the Socialist Party's work. Each geographical region of the Socialist Party is felt to be in need of inclusion. In general, the Executive Committee, after a period of discussion with regional representatives, presents to the National Committee its "slate" or list of members selected from all aspects of work of the party. After any amendments from the National Committee, this list is proposed by the outgoing National Committee to the annual congress.

In general, in presenting the slate to annual congress, the proposed members are listed primarily by region of the country, with an additional list of trade union and youth members, along with other variations from time to time. A session of conference is usually set aside to discuss the slate, with an executive member explaining the reasoning behind the list, and outlining the proposed changes, followed by contributions to the discussion by delegates.

Congress can approve, amend or reject the list, proposing an alternative. From time to time in the history of the Militant, the forerunner of the Socialist Party, this list has been amended at conference, although in the view of the Socialist Party, the inclusive approach of the consultation process makes this rare, and has not happened at Socialist Party congresses so far.

The Socialist Party argues that this method is an example of aspects of genuine Democratic centralism, where the widest democratic discussion and debate takes place to attempt to reach agreement before any formal meeting takes place, followed by a meeting and a vote, after which, especially in times of serious struggle, the party is expected to pull together in the direction agreed. In a document written by General Secretary Peter Taaffe in 1996 for the Socialist Party's predecessor Militant Labour, Taaffe suggests that the term 'Democratic centralism' has "Unfortunately... been partially discredited, the concept mangled and distorted by Stalinism in particular. It has come to mean, for uninformed people, something entirely opposite to its original meaning." Taaffe argues that the: "right-wing Labour leadership who usually hurl insults against the Marxists on the alleged undemocratic character of 'democratic centralism' themselves actually practice an extreme form of 'bureaucratic centralism', as the experience of the witch-hunt against Militant and others on the left in the Labour Party demonstrated."

Discussing the perceived 'dangers' of democratic centralism, Taaffe has argued that according to Leon Trotsky there are no guarantees in any form of organisation which can guard against malpractice and the form of organisation that a party takes has a material origin that reflects the circumstances it finds itself in, as well as how it orientates to them.: "The regime of a party does not fall ready made from the sky but is formed gradually in the struggle. A political line predominates over the regime." Taaffe has also written, 'Trotsky then makes a fundamental point: "Only a correct policy can guarantee a healthy party regime."'.