The history of the British revolutionary left is a complex tapestry, often characterised by persistent aspiration for unity amidst historical fragmentation. For decades, the left has been trapped in a cycle of splits, mergers, and failed attempts at unity that would be farcical if the stakes weren't so high. Just this year, we've watched as organizations fragment over strategic differences, personality conflicts, and ideological purity tests while the far-right gains ground and working-class communities face austerity, climate crisis, and rising authoritarianism.
Yet within this landscape of fragmentation, something remarkable happened when Socialist Resistance (SR), the British section of the Fourth International, and Mutiny voted to form a new organization in Cymru and England: Anti-Capitalist Resistance (ACR). This wasn't another destructive split or organizational collapse. As participants described it, this was a regroupment rather than a split - a phenomenon considered fairly rare on the left.
It continued a series of mergers: Socialist Resistance was formed through the merger of Socialist Outlook and the Socialist Solidarity Network. Socialist Outlook had been formed by the International Socialist Group and Socialist Group; The SSN was the coming together of Socialist Democracy and a group of members who had left the Socialist Party.
Unity took another step forward earlier this year when the ACR joined the British section of the Fourth International as its organization in Cymru and England, alongside ecosocialist.scot (ESS) in Scotland.
This process might have some answers to an urgent question facing today's left: How do we move beyond the endless cycle of fragmentation that has weakened our movements for generations? The Socialist Resistance experience offers crucial lessons about both the pathology of left fragmentation and a potential path toward what they termed "revolutionary democracy."
The Fragmentation Trap: Why Unity Keeps Failing
To understand why SR's approach matters, we must first confront the scale of left fragmentation. The British revolutionary left reads like a genealogy of splits. The International Marxist Group's tendency struggles (the subject of humourous jibes in the 1970s) were relatively harmonious compared to what happened to larger organizations which suppressed dissent: the supernova of the WRP; the waves of expulsions and resignations from the SWP which produced Counterfire, the ISN, Mutiny and rs21; and the Socialist Party-controlled CWI’s bureaucratic expulsions of a tendency around its founder, Ted Grant, (now called the RCI), the majority of its international co-thinkers (now in the ISA and Internationalist Standpoint), and the WIN.
The repeated failures of "broad party" prototypes, such as the Socialist Alliance and Respect, underscored the inherent tensions between revolutionary principles and compromises greater than those required for class-struggle unity. These efforts were frequently exacerbated by internal organizational rigidities and a persistent inability to overcome Labour's entrenched position, reflecting both Britian’s electoral system and its long-weakening role within the British working class and trade union movement.
The Socialist Alliance, in which SR actively participated, exemplified these problems. Conceived as a "regroupment of left organisations" to unite non-aligned socialists and smaller groups, it initially showed promise. The Scottish Socialist Party was formed as a result, with six members of the Scottish Parliament elected in 2003 (two of whom split, with the backing of the SP and SWP, to form Solidarity, which collapsed at the 2011 Scottish elections [gaining 2,800 votes compared to the SSP’s 8,300, despite the media giving Solidarity as vastly-higher profile], and later dissolved into the socially conservative, economically left-leaning Alba Party). But despite generating votes that indicated the possibility for future growth, the Alliances ultimately fell apart in Cymru and England, leading to what participants described as a "squandering" of political energy.
Many groups and individuals in the Socialist Alliances joined the subsequent Respect coalition, which followed a slightly similar trajectory. Despite achieving electoral success, winning a Member of Parliament and several local councillors, it was plagued by intense internal division and eventually imploded due to the manoeuvring of the SWP. The repeated collapse of these alliances demonstrates that a lack of genuine programmatic unity and robust internal democracy can undermine even well-intentioned efforts to build a mass political force.
The Democratic Centralism Problem
A critical internal challenge faced by SR, and indeed much of the British radical left, revolved around "orthodox notions of democratic centralism". These rigid, top-down structures, often characterised by "guru" figures, were criticised for leading to undemocratic practices, wasting activist talent, and exhibiting a poor record on relations with women and minority members.
The problems were multiple and interconnected. Many organizations developed around charismatic leaders whose authority became unquestionable, creating dependency rather than collective leadership. In the name of "unity," groups discouraged genuine debate about strategy and tactics, leading to passive compliance rather than active engagement. When internal tensions inevitably erupted, they often took the form of destructive factional warfare rather than principled political debate.
These problems weren't mere organizational inefficiencies. They reflected a fundamental misunderstanding of what revolutionary democracy requires in practice, and they directly undermined the effectiveness of external objectives such as building broad coalitions or achieving strategic goals.
Learning from Collapse: The Path to Revolutionary Democracy
SR's dissolution and the growth of ACR represent a conscious attempt to break with these destructive patterns. The regroupment was built on several key insights, predicated on a shared analysis of key political questions that had shaped the contemporary left.
Programmatic Unity Over Organizational Loyalty: Rather than prioritizing organizational preservation, the groups involved prioritized shared political analysis. They found common ground on Brexit (advocating a critical "remain" position), Corbynism (supporting the movement while recognizing its limitations), ecosocialism (embracing environmental struggle as central to socialism), and crucially, internal democracy.
Revolutionary Democracy as Alternative: ACR explicitly committed to "revolutionary democracy" as an alternative to rigid democratic centralism. This meant fostering "broad and diverse political debate," actively tolerating "public disagreements," and ensuring that "women, black and LGBT comrades also have the right to discuss together and play a full role."
Learning from Broader Movements: The regroupment drew lessons from feminist organizing, which had long advocated for autonomous spaces and challenged male-dominated left organizations. Rather than seeing this as divisive "identity politics," they recognized it as essential for building genuinely inclusive and effective organizations.
Rejecting "Guru" Politics: ACR aimed to be "rooted in struggles from below" and avoid the pitfalls of being a "top down party directed by personalities or a cartel of existing left currents." This meant developing collective leadership and decision-making processes that empowered diverse voices.
This conscious evolution maintained core principles like anti-capitalism, revolutionary transformation, and internationalism, while explicitly shifting towards a more pluralist, open internal culture that avoids being directed by personalities or existing left cartels.
International Models?
The regroupment also drew inspiration from successful examples of “useful parties” elsewhere, particularly SYRIZA in Greece, which demonstrated how a "confederal coalition of diverse left currents" could effectively fill the space to the left of social democracy. SYRIZA's initial success stemmed from embracing internal diversity as a virtue, building sound relationships with various social movements without attempting to control them, and maintaining consistent political presence between electoral campaigns.
Of course, SYRIZA's later experience in government revealed the limitations of electoral strategy under capitalism. But its initial success in building a credible left alternative offered important lessons about internal organization and movement building that informed ACR's approach to the long-term project for the political representation of the working class, which necessarily has different dynamics in Cymru, Scotland and England.
Current Challenges: The Ongoing Fragmentation Problem
These lessons become particularly relevant when examining current left organizing challenges. In Scotland, current discussions about launching a new left party reveal many of the same tensions that SR sought to overcome. Left organizations are too often "generals without an army" - with high-level strategic discussions disconnected from grassroots organising.
Meanwhile, concerns about internal democracy within existing organizations echo broader left patterns. Decisions imposed "top down" without sufficient member input create processes that undermine organizational legitimacy and member engagement. These problems reflect the same organizational pathologies that SR identified: abstract strategy divorced from concrete organizing and the substitution of leadership discussions for genuine mass engagement.
Five Principles for Revolutionary Democracy
Based on SR's experience and broader left lessons, several principles emerge for building unified and effective revolutionary organizations:
1. Integrating Diverse Liberation Struggles
Ecosocialism, feminism, anti-racism, and disability rights must be central to the socialist project, moving beyond narrow, class-reductionist interpretations of Marxism. This involves active participation in campaigns such as climate activism, anti-racism, LGBT struggles, workplace struggles, and women’s struggles. Support for the national struggles in Cymru and Scotland is essential.
2. Cultivating Genuine Internal Democracy
Prioritising democratic internal structures that allow for "broad and diverse political debate," actively tolerate "public disagreements," and ensure the full participation and leadership of "women, Black, and LGBT comrades." This explicitly rejects the pitfalls of "guru" figures and top-down leadership.
3. Strategic Engagement with Broader Movements
A "useful" new left party must fundamentally "help to build social movements and resistance from below." Over-reliance on electoral politics risks creating a "narrow electoralist party unable to build active roots in working class communities, workplaces and in social struggles."
4. Reinforcing Internationalism
Building cross-border solidarity in a globalized capitalist system, maintaining strong international affiliations, and consciously challenging "ingrained nationalist/imperialist reflexes" within the left itself.
5. Navigating Mainstream Party Relations
Developing effective strategies that avoid sectarianism while understanding established parties' continued structural role in the overall labour movement. The aim should be building an independent socialist force that champions struggle in the streets and workplaces.
The Current Moment: Learning from Strategic Regroupment
The SR to ACR transition offers crucial and actionable lessons for future attempts at revolutionary regroupment. This strategic reconstitution, where dissolution leads to a new organizational form, suggests a maturity within this segment of the British left, moving beyond a purely reactive or dogmatic approach.
It implies a recognition that organizational form is critical to political effectiveness and that ideological evolution and internal democracy are prerequisites for building a genuinely mass-based and impactful revolutionary force in the current era. The Fourth International’s decades-long commitment to "regroupment" offers a potential pathway for the left to overcome its historical fragmentation.
Success hinges on a flexible, inclusive, and self-critical approach that prioritises addressing both programmatic clarity and organizational practice. Only by tackling both dimensions simultaneously can truly unified and effective organizations emerge.
Beyond Fragmentation: Building for the Future
The path forward requires learning from both successes and failures. SR's evolution and the success of ACR demonstrates that alternatives to endless fragmentation are possible, but only through conscious analysis of historical dynamics and commitment to avoiding their repetition.
The stakes could not be higher. Climate breakdown, rising authoritarianism, and deepening inequality demand responses that only unified, effective left organizations can provide. The working class and oppressed communities cannot afford another generation of left fragmentation while capitalism destroys the conditions for human survival.
What's needed now is the political courage to apply these lessons in practice. This means prioritizing the hard work of democratic organizing over the easier path of sectarian purity. It means building organizations that can contain disagreement without fracturing, that can develop collective leadership without bureaucracy, and that can engage with broader movements without losing revolutionary direction.
The self-critical adaptation seen in the formation of ACR, with its explicit commitment to revolutionary democracy and integrated ecosocialist principles, signals a crucial maturity within this segment of the left. Only by addressing both programmatic clarity and organizational practice can a truly useful and impactful party emerge, one capable of confronting capitalism's multifaceted crises and building a viable path towards a socialist future on a living planet.
The fragmentation trap can be broken. The question is whether today's left has the wisdom and discipline to learn from past failures and build the kind of revolutionary democracy that our historical moment demands.
Share this post