The establishment of a radical worker's party in South Africa

Abstract

This dissertation is about the establishment of a Workers’ Party in South Africa today. The aims, reasons and motivation for the study is to explain and outline why a Workers’ Party independent of nationalism (an ideology and movement promoting the interest of a particular nation) has not materialised previously and why the conditions are conducive for it to do so now. The dissertation starts with an outline in Chapter one of the analytical framework which includes the motivation, the problem statement, the aims and methodology of the study. From this we develop our central theoretical statement, our reseach approach and explain the significance of the study and its contribution to the topic. In Chapter two I try to outline the characteristic features of political parties by looking at the theoretical questions with special attention to the development, history and conceptualisation of political parties. This includes focussing especially on the organisational and ideological elements which assists us in understanding the main features of political parties. In Chapter three I look at the historical, organisational and ideological genesis of Workers’ Parties using a Marxist paradigm. I explain the meaning and distinctive characteristics of this paradigm and deal with the character of class society, the capitalist crisis, the evolution and development of consciousness of the working class and the question of reform and revolution. This is followed by an examination of the organisational question and a discussion on the international nature of class struggle. The dissertation also reflects on the ideological divided between Bolshevism and all other ‘neo-Marxist’ views and traces the evolution of the Communist Movement from the First Communist International to the post-Stalinist Social Democratic Euro-Communist organisations. In Chapter four the dissertation examines the historical development of Workers Parties in South Africa with special reference to theoretical standpoint of the Communist Party of South Africa (CPSA) and the South African Communist Party (SACP) and explain that their capitulation to nationalism has its basis in the theoretical and ideological foundations of Stalinism. This chapter includes examining and exploring the underlying theoretical questions such as ‘Colonialism of a Special Type’, ‘national liberation’ theory, the character of ‘national democracy’ and the strategy of a ‘negotiated path to power’. This will also include an examination of the call by the Federation of South African Trade Unions (FOSATU) for the formation of a Workers’ Party in South Africa in the 1980’s. Chapter five deals with the post-Apartheid period and examines the development of the politics of the ANC and analyse its evolution from a party of liberation to a fully fledged capitalist party. Here I will reflect on the economic crisis of post-Apartheid South Africa and deal with the political evolution of the African National Congress (ANC) from the Nelson Mandela presidency to the election of Cyril Ramaphosa at the ANC National Congress in December 2017. The chapter will also deal with the crisis of the SACP and the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) who have been instrumental in tying the working class to the bourgeois nationalist programme of the ANC. It will conclude with a look at the working class fight back and the tragedy of the Marikana massacre which it is argued is a turning point in the class struggle. Chapter six looks at the evolution of the idea of establishing a Workers’ Party in South Africa and examines whether political formations like the Democratic Left Front (DLF), the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) or the Workers and Socialist Party (WASP) represent the embryonic features of a Workers’ Party in South Africa today. It then deals in detail with the ‘NUMSA Moment’, its historical genesis and resolutions which lead up to the formation of the Socialist Revolutionary Workers’ Party (SRWP). The dissertation then reflects on the philosophy, objectives, principles, programme, formal organisation and strategy and tactics of the SRWP. In the concluding Chapter the dissertation will reflect on the key observations of the study and try to explain the connections between all the chapters so as to provided a coherent understanding of the argument and its connection with the objectives of the research. It will explain how and why the ‘NUMSA Moment’ and the formation of the SRWP has materialised and is the most important political development in leftwing politics since the advent of democracy.