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Scotland, France and the International

The Programme, The Party And The International

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Dear comrades,

We write this letter after we have read the joint declaration of SL (UIT section in Germany - IS) and SI (Socialist Initiative, a Berlin group that split away from SAV, the CWI section in Germany - IS).

Of course in general we have no problem with you cooperating or having any arrangements with the SI.

But your declaration with SI has to be seen in a context of the future relationship between SAV an SL and we are surprised that you seem not to think that it is necessary to inform us about a change in your attitude towards SAV. We think that this is a problematic method and ask ourselves by now whether your former proposals for cooperation with the perspective of a fusion had a principled political basis.

During the CWI summer school in 1997 you proposed to join SAV immediately and pushed very much for such a step. We then emphasised that a thorough discussion about the political fundamentals of our two organisations is a precondition for such a step. Then you correctly pushed for a quick meeting between the leaderships. This meeting took place in October and a positive balance sheet was drawn by both organisations and written evaluations were produced. Both evaluations which contained an assessment of the other organisation were published in SAV's membership bulletin. On that meeting we agreed to meet again as soon as possible. But since then you are not only not pushing anymore for a further meeting, you did not even react on our proposals for a date.

We ask you: what has changed in the politics, programme, perspective and method of SAV, that your interest has gone back? Which new knowledge do you have about SAV? How can you suddenly have the assessment that SAV is in a crisis and of which character is that crisis, as you have not seen it like that a few months ago.

We get the impression that your attempts to join SAV were not based on principled political considerations but on the wish overcome the isolation of a groups of five members. You followed the debate within the Berlin SAV very closely. Up to now we do not know your political assessment of the way the debate developed. If we accepted you in summer last year as SAV members, would you have left now and formed a new organisation?

We think that these questions are very important given the international discussion between UIT and CWI. We are also interested to hear, whether the international UIT leadership agrees with you action.

From our point of view nothing has changed in our attitude to the discussion. You were invited to the political part of the SAV national committee meeting after the SI was already formed in April. We still are interested to continue the discussion process and the cooperation and to see whether a fusion between the CWI and UIT is possible. But we are interested in a political assessment form you of the debate within SAV and of the document "For an other course" which the now SI put forward in January.

Given the declaration with SI and the fact that you never proposed to us to launch a joint paper or a liaison committee, we have to assume that you consider your agreement with SI as qualitatively bigger than with SAV. As our assessment of SI is that a decisive characteristic of this group is that they are not prepared to offensively raise a socialist banner and build a revolutionary socialist party and that there is an astonishing contradiction between talk and action in this group, this would of course mean it is necessary for us to rediscuss the relationship between SL and SAV again.

With socialist greetings

Dear comrades,

We have received your letter, dated 6 May 1998.

Although, we would have preferred to first talk to you personally to find a solution to the difficult situation and the problems you raise. Since there has been no answer, so far, to the proposal that was- made to your leading comrade Aron A, and since we are running out of time, we would for the present like to try to answer in written form as follows.

Shallow and not directly involved observers could allege that the agreements made between the SL and your former comrades from Berlin, now SI, represent the peak of a clever manoeuvre and fractional activity made by the SL. You know, that that is not the case and you don not raise any accusation of this kind in your letter. At this point we would like to state clearly that this agreement is a strictly internal document between the two organisations and therefore you are the only organisation that has received a copy of the German version and a copy of the Spanish translation for the CWI.

You also know that for now almost a year we have focused a great part of our energy onto the task of contributing something to help avoiding the split within the Berlin branch of the SAV and to help solving the political differences within the organisation. Nevertheless we owe you a declaration of our position and of our understanding of what has happened in written form. This is even more necessary since some questions and formulations in your letter could certainly lead to misunderstandings.

It is true, as you stated, that we are a small group and therefore, like bigger groupings, we are not in the least protected against having made mistakes in our previous development/process. Because of that we have tried from the very beginning, as soon as we learned about the growing problems within the Berlin branch, to discuss these and possible solutions with leading comrades on local, nation-wide and on international basis. Judged afterwards, it might have been a mistake that we have only discussed the problems verbally instead of putting the discussion on paper.

Some preliminary remarks: Despite of our failure in preventing the split, we will engage us with all our energy in turning this split into a temporarily set-back in the process of approaching each other and of checking possibilities for a future fusion of our organisations and Internationals according to the spirit of the declaration of Barcelona. Not only do we judge you as a revolutionary organisation, but also we wish to retain our privileged position and to establish our relations even further, to continue discussions, joint-work and common activities. A small example for that would be, that our comrade Hakan D., works council member at Siemens-Bosch-Hausgeraetewerk, spoke at the ABB-meeting on the 13^th May you organised, as well as sponsoring the meeting along with SAV-comrades.

The leaderships of SAV and CWI agreed quite early with us that the situation in the Berlin branch was dominated by a long-lasting polarisation which even tended to deepen. Without giving a statement about the origins of this polarisation, fact is that it has been an internal problem within the SAV. The history of this internal differences has started long before we started to work together with the SAV. When we addressed the comrades of the new SI, but also at SAV Berlin aggregate, City Committee and NC, and at the SAV February 1998 Cologne Conference, we always spoke in favour of having a discussion on a political basis among comrades and revolutionaries. After all, the new period following the collapse of Stalinism and facing the deepening crisis of the world capitalism raises a number of questions and issues to discuss, which have to be raised and afford a lot of patience and understanding. Among other things, we always pointed out that the differences between the CWI and the UIT were a lot bigger than the differences within the SAV, but that we still considered a fusion on basis of principles to be necessary and possible, while a split within the SAV would not be justified.

The split within the SAV was an expression for the fact that, in our opinion, on both sides wrong characterisations of the "other side" were established, stood against each other, were consolidated and finally led directly to the present pitiable consequences.

One example of these premature characterisations was the one you made about the new SI in the letter to us: "Our judgement of the new SI is, that it is a major characteristic of this group, that they won't be willing to offensively raise a socialist banner and build a revolutionary party and that there is an amazing contradiction between the way this group talks and the way this group acts." With such a premature judging and behaviour, which might be caused/explained by the heat of the traumatising fraction-battle, you won't help to improve the poisoned climate in the short term, to re-establish the confidence and to convince the comrades of the SI to re-join the SAV soon. We do admit, that our agreement with the SI would be build on sand if your judgement would turn out to be correct. So far we don't have this impression. But even if you were right it would be justified to try to test them and draw a conclusion afterwards.

Regarding the "crisis of the SAV"

You are criticising us for talking about a crisis within/of the SAV. But to describe the situation of the Berlin branch - one of the biggest and most important branches of the whole SAV - as a crisis in an internal protocol between the SL and the SI, definitely does not constitute an attack on the SAV. On the contrary, we have always argued that the discussions within the SAV should be regarded as a legitimate part of a worldwide discussion within the avant-garde, aimed at overcoming the crisis of the leadership of the proletariat. Under these circumstances they should be dealt with openly but also in a responsible way.

We have not, as you put it, "all of a sudden reached the conclusion, that the SAV was in a crisis", but we have discussed the polarising situation in Berlin with Sascha S. in Gent (during the 1997 CWI European • School) already and later during the (January 1998) students congress in Berlin, and also with other leading comrades, among others Aron A, Bob L, Tony S.

(...) The crucial point is that the agreement for a cooperation between the SL and the SI should not create a barrier for the process between CWI and UIT. This is reflected in the two only public mentioning of the CWI, given in the paper "Was tun!" (what to do!) published by SL and SI together, which were, without exception, positive ones: (namely on) our joint intervention at the (April 1998) Euromarch conference in Brussels, and a report on the release of the CWI comrade lonur.

We have never denied that we are only a very small, a really tiny and unimportant group. But still our wish to join the SAV did not occur because of a feeling of loneliness. Basically we considered it to be legitimate, after getting to know the SAV as a revolutionary organisation with a very positive dynamic and functioning democracy, (and) despite of remaining differences, to build a joint organisation as quickly as possible to be able to fulfil our duties in the class struggle even better. None the less since it would have been a possibility to contribute to the approaching of our two international tendencies. However, we had to realise that our pressing towards a quick joining - a fusion in the original sense of the word would have been impossible because of our smallness - was a mistake, because the CWI and the SAV had to think this was to early and hasty a step. That is why we stopped further pressing and put our concentration on a continuing and parallel development of the local, national and international process.

We are not that presumptuous to believe that we could have been able to prevent the split within the Berlin branch if only we would have been allowed to join the SAV. None the less we would have been in a much better position to try it from inside the SAV than by constantly having to appeal from outside. Anyway, we can strictly deny the question if "we would have also left the SAV and launched a new organisation at that point". We still consider the split within the Berlin branch to be a sad, avoidable and hopefully reversible event.

Last but not least we are aware of our national and international responsibility. The building of a new group containing of no more than 30 ex-SAV comrades is a big nothing compared to the building of a common international revolutionary organisation of CWI and UIT and perhaps some other sectors.

Our interest in the SAV and the CWI has by no means become smaller. To keep this process open and to make it possible, is one of our main statements in this agreement between SL and SI, it is even a preliminary condition to it. At the same time has the SI agreed to abandon all public attacks against the SAV, not even to give an explanation for their resign.

It is not true that we didn't react on your proposals for dates. The problem was that you, just like we, only had quite limited time to spend and that you wanted the following meeting to take place in Cologne and with Hakan, who, because of trade union activities, could not attend.

Thomas C. has attended almost every NC meeting (except during the UIT World Congress) and the (February 1998) SAV Conference in Cologne. There he made the proposal to Bob L, that on the next IS meeting of the CWI he should argue in favour of the building - if not of an alliance and a common paper -then of an alliance-committee at least in Berlin, publishing of common leaflets and a supplement to the paper of the SAV. We chose to make such a careful step forward, in the light of the numerous other activities such as preparations for the coming general election campaign and the difficult situation in Berlin, to prevent our proposal from being again judged as pressure. We made an agreement in Cologne to organise a meeting between the SAV and the SL leaderships after the (early March) International leadership meeting of the CWI and the UIT, which unfortunately was postponed, has taken place.

One of the best experiences we had with the SAV was that we as a small group were approached with such a big amount of trust, that we could attend meetings of the leadership, of the membership and conferences. The publishing of our balance in the SAV-membership-circular set a good example.

As we said to Aron A, who agreed with us on this, we often had the impression that the SAV would not present the national and international approachment of our two organisations offensively to the public. As distinguished from the papers of other sections there was no mentioning of the common activities on the subject of Jose Rainha, the declaration of Barcelona, the intervention in France etc. Our attendance of the German Conference was only briefly mentioned in the paper in then sentence: "Greetings from befriended organisations were delivered by representatives of the SL, the VSP and the RSB", the two last mentioned are Mandelites.

All of this is legitimate, we were prepared for waiting long and having patience with the process. But, comrades, with the background already described, what were we supposed to do when finally, despite our efforts, the SAV-internal dynamics could not be slowed down and the "Berlin Opposition", after the (March) visit by Tony S, decided to split from the SAV and the CWI and then afterwards proposed to build a organisation together with us?

In Buenos Aires we already had a very open talk with Tony S about the situation and the dynamics in Berlin. Among other things we briefly discussed the problem, that a part of the "opposition" had similar political positions with us and would even like to join the SL. When Tony S came to Berlin a meeting between the SL, him, two SAV NC members (Gaetan and Aron) was called, but it was not possible to seriously discuss solutions to the problem. This was mainly because of an emotional quarrel between those comrades and one member of the opposition, who had been invited by the SAV, took place.

At the moment the split had become inevitable, we talked to Sascha S on the telephone and asked for advice and proposals, how to deal with the situation. He said, not unjustly, that he had to discuss the subject with the Berlin leadership first. We agreed that our presence at the SAV NC meeting in April would not make any sense. Firstly, because we were only invited for the political part, which was a discussion on the program for the general elections. Secondly, we thought it would be more important that at least the SL could take part in the conference on the Euromarch, which took place at the same time in Brussels, to give more weight on the agreed cooperation of CWI and UIT to intervene.

As one can easily tell from this incomplete summary of activities, we, being a small group, undertook great efforts to find a solution together with the leaderships of CWI and SAV. Nobody feels as sorry as we do that these efforts didn't have any success.

There are three points we want to make clear:

1) We do not, as you put it, "consider the agreement with the SI to be of far-reaching quality in comparison with the things in common with the SAV". Only that the SI has made a concrete offer to immediately build an alliance-committee, to immediately publish a joint newspaper, to carry on with and gradually increase the activities we've had together, and to organise a discussion process, which should aid to the building, as soon as possible, of a common revolutionary organisation. The politics of the SAV does lead towards the same result, but with a far slower rhythm, something we have to respect.

2) It is important, from our point of view, to base the co-operation with the SI from its very beginning on a clear, principled, formal agreement in written form, which leaves no room for misinterpretation, in particular concerning the process of approach between the CWI and the UIT, and which is immediately handed over to the SAV and the CWI. There was a general agreement in considering the CWI and the SAV as being revolutionary organisations and to abstain from publicly attacking or trying to split people from these organisations. As far as we know, the SI has sent a proposal for such an agreement to you.

3) We welcome statements like the following you made: "As far as we are concerned, nothing has changed in our position regarding the process of discussion... We are very interested in continuing this process and in figuring out possibilities for further cooperation..."

This is important, not only for the international process. It hints to a possibility to limit the harming and traumatising consequences a split always has, and thereby to create better conditions for building the necessary socialist-revolutionary workers party, in which revolutionary tendencies with different traditions and experiences can be assembled.

It is worth mentioning, that the split in Berlin has done away with the mutual paralysis on both sides and that the SI as well as the SAV have restarted to work on daily political issues with full power. It is positive that both groups still worked together on the important mobilisation activities for the hospital section of the OTV-Network.

There is more to it than just the clarification of the Berlin episode. The alliance between revolutionary socialists, the merger of Trotskyist organisations, which, through intervention in the class struggle, try to win the advanced layers for the building of the party of the world-wide socialist revolution, is a strategic target, and all other considerations have to be subordinated to it. The most conscious layers of the working class and of the youth demand from us, correctly, co-operation and alliances, and not splitting or narrow minded quarrelling. The merger of our two moderate but revolutionary nuclei, after all the most dynamic, if not even biggest tendencies of international Trotskyism, would play a big part, not only in Germany but internationally. A principled merger of the UIT and the CWI would be more than just their forces added together. It would be more than the synthesis of different traditions and experiences, more than a documentation of maturity, more than a better weapon to meet the increased challenges and possibilities of the class struggle. It could become a centre of attraction for new layers of working people and youth, that tend towards a socialist revolution. At least it would be seen with sympathy.

Facing our responsibility, how can we find a solution to this complex situation? We take up the main part of your letter, dated 6 May, and repeat the proposal made to Aron A on 1 May and again on 19 May, to call a meeting between SAV and the SL as soon as possible. During this meeting, the possibilities of formally establishing the process of discussion and the co-operation between the SAV, the SL and the SI and to publicly document it through creating an alliance-committee, starting joint interventions, common leaflets, paper supplements or whatever other mechanisms you think would be suitable.

From our point of view, an alliance-committee to express the loyal and open discussion and cooperation among revolutionaries would be the best way to climb a new step/reach a new niveau of relationships between our organisations.

Hoping, that we have succeeded in destroying all suspicions/uncertainties and that we have contributed to a new start between our two organisations, we remain with socialist greetings

Dear comrades,

The aim of this brief is to respond to your request for a clarification about the SL actions with regards to the SAV. We are doing so with the wish to reach the most possible clarification what allows us rid ourselves from any misunderstanding that may have arisen from this incident and with the goal of being able to re-establish the best possible co-operation in Germany and clear up the way for carrying on with the common task that the UIT and the CWI designed to explore the conditions for unification between both our organisations.

We are totally convinced that our comrades from the SL never encouraged a polarisation inside the SAV and even less the outcome that was produced. We arc also convinced that our comrades did not establish a relationship with the SAV in order to provoke a factional struggle but rather to give one more step forward towards building a revolutionary party.

We agree with our comrades from the SL when they say that the split of the SAV is a regrettable outcome which is completely alien to the will of the SL. It is also our opinion that the SL has not changed its opinion about the SAV, nor its willingness to reach an agreement.

From the reports of our comrades in the SL. we understood that the discussions that were developing inside the SAV were of the same kind as those that are developing inside other revolutionary parties, and even of the same kind as those that develop inside the UIT parties. We are in a stage in which differences on how to act and intervene in the class struggle inevitably emerge. We have learned, after several crises in the past years, that it is about licit differences that are caused by a new world situation that was open with the fall of Stalinism. And we learned that we have to try to sort them out - within our possibilities - in a common, principled framework.

Having learned about the course the situation inside the SAV was taking, we pointed out to our SL comrades that what is fundamental for the IS and the UIT is the relations with the CWI and they - who are the ones who decide the policies in their country should keep this framework for any relation they established.

For this reason, the UIT did not reach any political or organisational agreement with the IS and stated to its SL comrades that every relationship with the new split group from the SAV should be established on a three-condition basis: a) make the split comrades clear that we do not share the outcome that turned out and therefore we do not accept any characterization being done that changes the revolutionary character of the SAV; b) given that basis neither any public attack nor a factional struggle should be carried out on the SAV; c) our claim about the international framework established by the relationships between the CWI and the UIT.

We believe that the relations that were established between our German section and the split comrades have been conducted on the basis of these conditions; the SAV has been claimed as a sister organisation, there have been no public attacks and no factional activity, and' the relationship between the CWI and the UIT has been claimed.

Our comrades from the SL, 1 like ourselves, are open to take mistakes that may have been made into consideration. We think that more emphasis could have been made on the need for holding a meeting with the leadership of the SAV to evaluate the new situation. We believe that this case, like some others, can be overcome. And on our part we consider the proposal to form a liaison committee can allow us to resume political relations.

Doubtlessly, the impasse produced in our international relations has contributed to these misunderstandings. And on our part we believe that if we are able to overcome this situation we will place ourselves in better conditions to carry on with the common work in Germany and other countries. The IEC of the UIT, which is to meet next July, will make a more specific proposal about the steps that in our opinion should be taken so that we can resume our international relations. Meanwhile, we should carry on with the practical co-operation on the class struggle ground, as we have been doing in the last months with fruitful outcomes.

We acknowledge that the leaderships of the SAV and the SL were the first to get in touch and establish political relations which led to an approachment between the CWI and the UIT. After that, both international organisations assumed from the beginning that a new and complex, but extremely encouraging and necessary process was being started. The difficulties that have arisen should not make us change this idea, and we hope these clarifications will contribute to it.

Fraternal regards,

Dear Comrades,

We have studied both the UIT IS's 6 June and the SL's 27 May letters concerning the situation which has arisen in Germany.

Unfortunately, we do not think that either reply fully deals with the issues or answers the questions raised in the SAV EC's 6 May letter regarding the new relationship between the Socialist League (SL) and Socialist Initiative (SI), the Berlin grouping which split away from the CWI. In particular we note that the absence of a concrete answer to the SAV EC's direct question "what has changed in the politics, programme, perspective and method of SAV that your (the SL's) interest has gone back?"

The CWI has always believed that the only basis for a successful fusion between different currents is firstly securing a principled political agreement on the issues of programme, perspectives and tasks, and secondly establishing trust and confidence between comrades from different backgrounds.

As a result of the meeting between us in Barcelona in October and November 1997 we jointly issued a public declaration which announced that "a period of collaboration and discussion between both organisations... has opened up... This is taking place with the objective to explore the possibility of unifying our two organisations".

In our discussions we explained that we did not expect 100% agreement between us on all issues. But politically, an agreement for a fusion cannot be based upon generalised political phrases which can, in fact, hide important disagreements regarding concrete situations and the questions of how revolutionaries should proceed.

The UIT IS's letter, while implying disagreement with the SI's split, avoids making any political characterisation of the disputed issues in Germany. This is surprising given that the UIT comrades have been aware for some time of the debate and, via the SL comrades in Berlin, actually participated in it. Indeed on 29 January 1998 Pedro F had a personal discussion with Bob L in London on the situation in Berlin. PF then said that he was not sure about all the disputed issues, particularly in regard to the SAV standing in the coming 1998 Bundestag election. However PF, correctly in our view, commented that "it seemed that the Berlin opposition (now the SI) did not emphasise enough building the party". Given that comrade PF later visited Berlin in April, when presumably he would have had the opportunity to examine the disputed issues for himself, we are surprised at this absence of any political comments in the UIT IS's letter.

In the first months of this year, as the Berlin controversy reached its peak, the SL's interest in discussing with the SAV EC appeared to change. It is not a question, as the UIT IS writes, that "more emphasis could have been made on the need for holding a meeting". The fact is that the SL did not even reply to the SAV EC's proposal for a second leadership meeting. The SL now writes that the particular date the SAV EC suggested was not suitable, but this is not a reason why an alternative proposal could not have been made.

Despite participating in many of the local and national discussions involving the Berlin opposition, the SL refused to politically comment on the issues, apart from generally supporting the idea of calling for a "Workers List" in this year's Bundestag election. But even on this question it is not clear whether the SL simply thought that this was a good idea in abstract or whether they opposed the SAV standing in the current situation when there is no sign of any basis of support for such a "Workers List".

The SL now writes that "we have focused a great part of our energy into the task of contributing something to help avoiding the split within the Berlin branch of the SAV and to help solving the political differences within the organisation". Leaving aside the slightly patronising tone of the SL's letter we have to say that fundamentally the SL still does not comment on the broader political issues which came up in the debate.

But the "proof of the pudding is in the eating". Now the SL is producing a joint journal, Was Tun!, with the SI whose content seems to show that there now is political agreement between the SL and SI.

This new journal is a precise example of the political mistakes of the former Berlin opposition. Apart from other questions, generally this journal does not use the transitional method as it does not raise the question of changing society. The journal does not describe itself as a socialist paper, rather a "paper for employee's politics". This reflects the policy of the SI grouping. When the SI members were still in the SAV the one branch which they controlled, Berlin Wedding, decided not to sell the SAV paper to or produce a SAV leaflet for the workers involved in a struggle in the AEG/AMC factory, instead organising solidarity action simply as "activists".

Only in one small Was Tun! article, which describes the SI and SL, is the word "socialism" actually used. In the main political article, "For a different policy! For Workers Lists!", there is no mention whatsoever of the need for the expropriation of the capitalists and a planned economy, despite the fact that the authors mention the Communist Manifesto. In other words it seems that the SL agrees with the SI that a transitional programme does not have to raise the question of nationalisation or socialism. If this is the case, then it is easier to understand why the SL lost interest in discussing with the SAV EC. Furthermore the article, while calling for "Workers Lists", does not put forward any concrete position or steps that activists should take towards the coming Bundestag election.

The SL write that they hope to establish co-operation between the SAV, SL and SI. While naturally in the course of the concrete class struggle we can co operate, that is something different from a broad political process examining the possibility of fusion.

The new SL/SI journal Was Tun! has a different political method compared to that of the CWI. This different approach has also been seen in the OTV (public sector and transport union) where the SI opposes attempts to build an organised opposition id the trade union bureaucracy.

Furthermore, our experience of the SI is that they were an increasingly disloyal opposition when they were still in the SAV. The main political leader of the SI, Thomas B, refused to attend either the 1997 or 1998 SAV Conferences and refused to stand for re-election to the SAV NC in 1997, preferring to lei others debate the issues nationally. From 1997 onwards leading members of the Berlin opposition attempted to politically justify their refusal to fully paricipate in fund raising for the SAV. After their defeat at the 1998 SAV Conference the Berlin opposition cut their membership dues and then split. Given this behaviour, the SI members cannot be simply readmitted into the SAV.

After this experience with the Berlin opposition, Lenin's comment "At all events, a split is better than confusion, which hampers the ideological, theoretical and revolutionary growth and maturing of the party. and its harmonious, really organised practical work" (Left Wing Communism, Appendix One) fully applies to the SI for the coming period.

If we are going to continue working towards establishing both political broad agreement and mist between members of the CWI and UIT, then we have to rapidly work to clear up any questions which come up.

Unfortunately, we do not think, despite writing about further steps to develop our relationship, that either the UIT IS or SL letters do this with regard to our recent experience in Germany.

Comradely greetings,

Resolution about the CWI

To propose to the leadership of the CWI the formation of a Liaison Committee of their leadership and ours to:

1. To organise campaigns based upon the world class struggle explaining the need to respond at an international level by:

Developing international solidarity with the big workers' struggles, such as support for the Russian miners' strike and General Motors in the USA.

To take forward the coordination of the workers' vanguard against the trade union bureaucracy, that has already taken place with the dockers: specifically in Europe the need for a meeting of the workers of the East and West as we have proposed in the meeting of the Euromarch.

Solidarity with the workers and popular movements against the governments that are applying neo-liberal plans and measures of the IMF. The international support for revolutions such as Indonesia, the struggles of the Albanians in Kosovo. In Europe, the struggle against the Maastricht and Amsterdam Treaties.

The denunciation and mobilisation against Imperialist aggression.

2. The Liaison Committee is also to retake the initiative in organising political discussion of differences and agreements between our organisations and the production of a Bulletin of Discussion with the objective of continuing to explore the political and programmatic basis for unification.

3. In this framework, the IEC considers that the actions of our German section, in respect to the SAV, to be a political mistake. As a result, the responsibility of this mistake is assumed by the IS of the UIT.

This mistake has consisted in reaching a political agreement with the comrades that have carried through a split with the SAV without having firstly fully informed (UIT emphasis) the SAV and the leadership of the CWI about the situation.

But it must also be seen that this mistake was in the framework of a political principle and not factionalism towards the SAV. Because the agreement is principally based for the common intervention in the class struggle to obtain the construction of a revolutionary party, considering that the SAV is a revolutionary organisation and with the commitment of not making public attacks against it or working in a factional manner towards it.

Drawing a balance sheet of this mistake, the IEC considers that, when confronted with the fact that the comrades that today form the Socialist Initiative have proposed their incorporation into the UIT, it is necessary to inform the CWI and its German section with a view to have an interchange about this new situation. The IEC, that declares itself favourable to the request for affiliation of these comrades, at the next meeting of the IEC, considers that the SAV and the CWI should not be faced with an accomplished fact.

The IS invites the leadership of the CWI to our cadre school at the end of August in Montpellier.

Dear Comrades,

Thank you for the copy of the resolution that was carried at your recent IEC meeting concerning relations with the CWI and the situation that has arisen in Germany.

Unfortunately, this resolution fails to answer any of the political issues that we raised in the letter sent to you by our IS and the EC of the SAV on I July 1998. It also still does not answer the points raised in the letter sent by the SAV on 6 May 1998.The split from the SAV by a disloyal group who then formed the SI posed important political questions as well as questions of procedure and method.

These political issues include the questions of building an opposition to the bureaucratic leadership of the OTV public sector trades union, the question of the SAV standing candidates in the forthcoming German election and the attitude towards the SPD. In addition to these issues, is the attitude of the SI members towards the building of a revolutionary party and their total lack of loyalty to the SAV.

The SAV has given a clear political characterisation of the small forces involved in the SI. The IS of the CWI agrees with the conclusions reached by our German comrades. Neither your German section or the UIT IS has commented on this and have evaded replying to the political questions outlined above. In our opinion this is a wrong method.

At the same time, you have not commented upon the factional behaviour of the leadership of the SL in its discussions with the SI members when they were still members of the SAV. Comrades Thomas of the SL attended factional meetings of former SAV members before they split. He did this without discussion with the SAV leadership and after agreeing in discussion with SAV EC members not to continue to do so.

The CWI and the SAV have asked the SL and the UIT for a full political explanation of the conduct of your IS and German section. This request was made again to the UIT representatives who attended the CWI school in Germany. Unfortunately, the resolution that you have sent us once again fails to do this. We can only express our disappointment at your response so far to this question. The SAV will also communicate its view to you on these issues. We again await a full political reply from the UIT and the SL on all the questions that have arisen in Germany on this matter.

Comradely,

Dear comrades of the UIT,

We want to express our disappointment about the resolution which was adopted by the UIT IEC. We do not consider this resolution as a political answer to the questions we raised in our previous letter and especially in our long discussion with the two UIT representatives at the CWI European School.

We understand that you consider the actions of your German group as a mistake of procedure. But you do not answer the political questions we have raised.

We still do not know how the UIT or Socialist League assess the political documents and speeches at our national conference (which we published in our membership bulletin) by the now SI during the factional struggle (do you agree with SI that SAV conducts an ultra-left policy in the movement?).

How you assess the disloyal behaviour and break of revolutionary discipline and democratic centralism carried out by the now SI members when they still were members of SAV.

How you assess the reflection of this attitude towards democratic centralism in the resolutions which were put forward by the now members SI members at our national conference concerning the constitution of SAV.

How you assess the discussion on the question of an election call in Germany and the fact that SL and SI see it as a possibility to call for a SPD vote.

And how you assess the independent candidature of SAV in some west German constituencies (as you hopefully know the election call of SAV is to vote PDS with the decisive second vote - in order not to have a sectarian position and to make clear that we want to get rid of the Kohl government - but to stand SAV candidates in some constituencies in west Germany for the first vote which is the vote for the candidate in the constituency in order to raise the profile of SAV and recruit to our party).

How you assess the actions of a leading SI member at the Berlin meeting of the public sector union opposition group ('Netzwerk') where he spoke against the need for an opposition inside the union and defended parts of the bureaucracy.

How you assess the first issue of the joint paper of SL and SI and the fact that it does not call to build the opposition in the public sector union.

These are some of the important political questions you do not comment on although your representatives at the CWI European School promised answers to these questions.

You also do not answer some questions about the procedure of SL we have raised, like the fact that from the beginning the comrades from SL almost exclusively attended those branch meetings of SAV which were dominated by the now SI and did not attempt to have an equal discussion process with those Berlin SAV members who represented the national majority position or the fact that comrade Thomas from SL attended factional meetings even after he agreed to myself as and SAV EC member not to do that any more, or the fact that a joint public meeting was organised with a Mandelite organisation without approaching SAV to be an equal organiser of that meeting.

We cannot be satisfied with the general statements in this resolution and your previous letter. The only basis for a future closer collaboration between SL and SAV is political clarity about the position of SL concerning the posed questions and clarity about where SL differs with SI, especially given the situation that the UIT IEC seems to agree to the incorporation of SI into the UIT. This would obviously make the SI group the majority of the German section of UIT. Given our experiences with that grouping and our assessment of the political direction into it develops we could not agree to steps for a closer collaboration at this stage. Fraternally,