Is it time for a new left party in Britain?

A contribution to the debate about a new left party by rs21 members. 

Since the general election in July, which saw the victory of five independent pro-Palestine candidates, the sense that the left’s electoral road was closed off by Corbynism’s defeat has shifted. Coupled with the large social movement around Palestine, there is renewed interest in thinking strategically about how we build towards a new left party. 

Conversations have been happening in various forms across the country on the wider left and amongst rs21 members. We don’t have any illusions that our organisation is or will become “the party”. However, as Marxists, we see the formation of a party as a crucial step in the struggle for working-class power. 

The rs21 editorial team would like to host contributions to these debates. We welcome pieces about organisational structure and party form that speak to the current conjuncture, interventions about how the party should engage with questions of oppression that are central to our politics, and reflections on how a new party could avoid the bureaucratised and opportunistic fates of many organisations that have gone before. Please send your pitch or ideas to rs21editorial@gmail.com. 

In London, Pelican House has hosted a series of meetings on the prospects for a new party. rs21 members in London have been going along to these meetings, engaging in discussions in the process of clarifying our ideas about what is needed. Below is a text some rs21 members contributed as a pamphlet to one of those meetings. 

We like to party: A contribution to ‘Party Time?’

by Tomi A, Harry H, Lotta S and Taisie T

Several of our members have been attending the Party Time? events at Pelican House, and the organisers of the event invited us to produce a document for the third session. The purpose of the below is to suggest some questions for further discussion and points which we think are important to grasp in these early days.

It’s great to see more discussion across the British left of the current moment and the need for an organisational response. People are rightly recognising that, while many are doing great work across disparate projects and groups, it’s far from enough. To develop and put into practice a collective strategy at a larger scale, we need an organisation dedicated to this. We look forward to more open meetings, written exchanges, and political discussion on this.

The discussion of parties and new organisation also builds on the shoots of possibility indicated in the 2024 election results for independents and others to the left of Labour, and the mass struggle for a free Palestine. Over the previous sessions we’ve heard input on the conjuncture from various figures and have heard some reflections from activists involved in struggles over the decade. The space for a left alternative is there and it’s right that comrades are considering the possibilities.

What do we mean by the party and what would any new organisation be for? 

There are a lot of different visions, hopes, and expectations for what a potential new organisation could look like and do, and it’s not always possible in a few meetings to map out the ideas everyone shares and the things we disagree about. 

For us, the ‘party’ is not just an electoral initiative, akin to the Labour or Green parties – it should not just be about election activities. Nor is the party just a case of getting enough members and declaring ourselves ‘the party’.

For us, the party must be a democratic coming together of sufficient socialist forces, capable of coordinating across spheres of activity (electoral, industrial, liberation movements, etc), and facilitating strategic debate and deliberation across those spheres. This must be rooted in the struggles of the working classes across Britain. Crucially then, the party is one organisation amongst many – which must provide a unique function for the various forms of class and social struggle which we have seen in recent years. How can we do this? 

The last few years have seen a wave of industrial struggles, mass protests against British police and their racist nature, waves of ecological direct action, and resistance to attacks on trans healthcare. Most notably, we’ve seen hundreds of thousands across Britain marching for a free Palestine, leading BDS campaigns, workplace organising, and taking direct action against the genocide.

How will we develop concrete connections between these spheres of struggle? What are the ways to facilitate joint strategising? How can we conduct collective learning and political education? 

As mentioned, one of the reasons there is such excitement at this moment is the unprecedented vote to the left of Labour for independents and Greens in the election, particularly for those opposed to the genocide in Palestine. There is a hope that a new organisation would attract some of the independent MPs to the left of Labour to join it. The gambit, for many, is that a few principled socialists to the left of Starmer and opposed to the genocide, along with an activist member base will politicise more people at a scale which the current level of organising projects cannot do. The challenges, if this comes about, will be several:

Relationship with MPs and electoral work: Without mechanisms to hold elected figures to account, we risk repeating the worst moments of Corbynism and the DSA in the US. This is especially true when independent figures are being elected on their opposition to the genocide, without a clear commitment to wider left politics. It is highly likely that any formation which brings along some of the independent MPs and forces exiting Corbynism will be based on a ‘broad-left’ politics – which at times may conflict with the broader struggles from below of the oppressed and exploited people we want the organisation to be led by. We should also be ready for the possibility that few or no current MPs would ultimately want to be involved in this project. How do we ensure the membership sets the policy of the organisation, and that any elected figures are accountable to those decisions? 

Opposing the British state: Opposition to the state’s support for the genocide in Palestine, to its police murders and violence, to the expansion of the border regime, to its violence against trans people – all these struggles, which have inspired us all, share a desire for real freedom against the British state and our ruling classes. If we are serious about an organisation which reflects and builds these struggles, we should be preparing for the British media and state system to turn on the organisation hard – to attempt to win over the most-rightward element of our base and membership to soft loyalty to the British state. How can we work together to ensure the organisation is steadfast in these struggles against the British state? 

The uneven development of the left: Different areas of Britain will need different types of political activity and focuses of struggle. It won’t be electoral work everywhere, nor should it be. We should discuss this now, to develop our analyses beyond simplistic calls to ‘return to the Red Wall’ – as if these areas are not places which contain struggle and are unable to develop without ‘us’. Rather than counterposing different sections of the working class in Britain, we must construct a politics that unites it across geography. Where are our bases to be built and what struggles are leading there?

Liberation movements are class politics: Anti-racist organising, feminist and queer movements are part of class struggle, and there is no chance of a socialist future without them.  In a new formation, we will have to struggle against both calls to pander to bigotry and desires to sidestep engagement with these struggles against oppression in favour of a distorted and backwards notion of a ‘class-first’ politics. At the same time, a situation where social movements align with a new left party while unions are led by their bureaucrats into sticking with Starmer’s Labour is very possible. It will be crucial to work against any separation between organised socialists and workers in unions, and that will require ground-level involvement in workplace struggles around the country. How can we make sure that the organisation is rooted in movements against oppression and workplace organising, and organises for liberation across the whole class, not just sections of it?

Being an opposition organisation: Any such project to the left of Labour, even with some initial MPs, will not reach the scale of the vote or position that was reached in 2017-19 under Corbyn. There is a real tension between seeing this as a project of ‘left government’ versus a project which really articulates the revolutionary politics of the struggles of recent years. A year into the genocide, as the murderer of Chris Kaba is acquitted, and Tommy Robinson attempts to organise off the back of racist riots, with ecological breakdown in view – we can’t just be patiently building the infrastructure for a small electoral opposition. This is why we would need to incorporate militant activists from extra-parliamentary movements within the membership, ensure we are rooted in wider mass struggle, and be capable of mobilising when moments of crisis emerge. Threading the needle between a patient oppositional politics, and those moments of real mass resistance which we want to emerge, is the challenge. What are these crisis points for us to agitate around? 

So there’s a lot more to discuss. We look forward to working through it with you. It is highly likely that a new organisation, attached to the MPs, will bring a lot of excitement – but those of us committed to a wider revolutionary project need to keep our eyes on the prize.

What next? 

Firstly, we welcome public discussions of the style like ‘Party Time?’ Public assemblies on such questions open up dialogue and raise the level. We need further meetings, as well as written exchanges, to actually clarify meanings and stakes. It would be great to see meetings like these in cities around Britain.

We need to build on the already widespread work across and between tendencies on the left, first during the strike wave and second during the resistance to the genocide. We should argue for more collaboration and dialogue based on these links. Conversations about the politics of a new organisation should be in public, accessible, and sustained over time. 

If a new organisation or party doesn’t come together in the next couple of years, we need to find ways to lay the groundwork for something bigger than all of us to be built. This will be difficult: there are so many battles we are fighting every day that the long-term work we desperately need is hard to make space for. We should take the energy boost from the election result and run with it as far as we can, but be ready to keep on marching if things stall and slow down.

Finally, we wouldn’t be a Marxist group if we didn’t make an argument for ourselves. rs21 has attempted to thread the needle between bureaucratic narrow groups and the network model of many groups. In doing so, we believe we have created a lively and democratic organisation of Marxists involved in activities from community and workers organising to direct action. From helping to put on the rank-and-file trade unionist conference Troublemakers at Work, to starting a new ecological publication Red Bird, we are engaged in a wide array of activities. Next year, we are planning a national conference on socialist politics. If you are inclined to Marxist politics and are looking for collective organising and discussion amongst Marxists you can join us at revsoc21.org.uk/join 

We look forward to more events, discussions, and exchanges!