NEIL MURRAY reviews China's Urban Revolutionaries: Explorations in the History of Chinese Trotskyism 1921-1952, by Greg Benton, published by Humanities Press, New Jersey. £12.99. THE early Chinese trotskyists sition, are nothing like as well known as those in Europe or the United States, yet the Chinese Left Opposition, formed from four separate groups in 193l, was among the largest in the world.
The SWP in the US had more members, but the conditions under which it operated were quite different from those in China. Trotsky himself wrote in 1931 dang. that, unlike the opposition elsewhere, the Chinese trotskyist organisation "did not develop on Socialist Outlook welcomes letters. Post them to Feedback, PO Box 1109, London N4 2UU. Letters over 300 words will be edited. You can E-mail us at: [email protected] We are on the web at HTTp://www.gn.apc.org/labournet/so the basis of petty backroom intrigues but from the experience of a great revolution that was lost by an opportunist leadership."
The nature of the Chinese revolution and the strategy of Chinese communists was one of the chief issues that engaged Trotsky in 1927, and it was their first-hand. experience of this the party's grasp. which brought so many Chinese communists into the onno.
including the General Secretary. Chen Duxiu.
Stalin held that the Chinese revolton was bourdeols democratic. In line with this he argued that the Chinese communists should join and remain in the bourgeois nationalist GuominChen Duxiu, along with other Chinese communist lead- from Moscow. ers, opposed this but nevertheless loyally carried out the policy. BACK ton discusses to the villages in 1931.
This led in 1927 to the slaughter The Chinese trotskyists also of many Chinese workers and faced the hatred of the stalinists. communists at the hands of the Some were killed by the stalinists Guomindang. Trotsky argued af- during periods of armed struggle, ter 1927 that the Chinese revo- but in general there was a tacit lution had been defeated, while division of labour between the Stalin-the architect of the de- Guomindang that jailed them and feated strategy-argued that the the CCP that slandered and isovictory of the revolution was in lated them, closing off areas of politics in which they might othBenton charts how many Chierwise nave intervened Chinese trotskyism "did not develop on the basis of petty backroom intrigues but from the experience of a great revolution that was lost by an opportunist leadership"
Unese communists first came into contact with Trotsky's ideas Not only did they suffer long when several hundred young sur- prison sentences under the vivors went to Moscow to study. Guomindang, but in 1952 one He describes how they had to set thousand or so Chinese trotskyup a secret organisation but were ists and their sympathisers were then discovered and expelled arrested, tried secretly and imprisoned for "counterrevolutionThe Chinese trotskyists could ary crimes". Many died, but in not develop to their potential. 1979 a dozen survivors of the Not, primarily, because of politi- 1952 purge were finally released. cal shortcomings (although Ben- The early Chinese trotskyists them too), but were prolific in their publications, because of the odds they con- but in the 1930s and again in 1952 fronted. The cities in which they the bulk of their archives vanworked became so dangerous ished into government vaults and under the Guomindang's terror is still only available to a few sethat even the Central Committee lected historians. This history is of the official Communist Party, constructed from the limited with its vastly superior contacts amount of material in archives and resources, was forced to flee outside China and from the fading memories of survivors. Benton's book is a massive achievement.
fight for their rights.
As Benton says "the Central Com- ies across the country. mittee of the Chinese trotskyists is distinguished above all by its long, long prison record after 1931."
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Socialist August 1996 Greg Tucker SUPPORTERS of striking Liverpool dockers, meeting on july 20, launched a national campaign to raise "El a week per worker" levies spread. What was seen as automatic a decade ago for the miners will not be so easy this time round. Traditional methods of organising nave proved nara to sustain in the face of the bosses offensive. But the meeting was content mac workers will re-