Small meetings of dedicated political activists should never be entirely ignored. After all, the sometimes comical and often turgid debates of a small group of now dead white males in mid-nineteenth century Britain led to the ideological command of billions in the second half of the next.

Similarly, the arrival of an angry demobbed corporal in a Munich meeting of equally angry workers led to the death of millions within thirty years. The intellectual origins of the Protestant Reformation were said to lie in the networking of no more than 500 educated individuals.

Things in the Round

There are the grand movements of history and there are the small triggers such as Sarajevo but there are also the machinations of small groups at every level of society, open and closed conspiracies, that change history without the public at large noticing until it happens.

We have often concentrated in these postings and in our private briefings on the intellectual underpinnings behind the rise of the European New Right - as complex in their opinions and mutual competition as anything that appeared in nineteenth century European socialism or anarchism.

The legacy of Guenon, Eliade, Evola, even Junger and Mishima, and the current thinking of such intellectuals as De Benoist and Dugin seem to be finding their time in history as 'modernisation', in the context of globalisation, comes under increasing strain.

But what of similar movements on the Left. The 'bourgeois' democratic Left has become the establishment now, even more so with the collapse in the West of Marxism, and there is no doubt that European Socialism has become sclerotic and increasingly disconnected from the public at large.

Even in longstanding social democracies such as Denmark, welfare policies are increasingly becoming connected with questions of identity. The emergence of the migrant 'other' results in new ambiguities.

Most progressive responses wish away the discomfort of the indigenous population on moralistic terms - Europeans 'should' be green and tolerant regardless of whether they actually are. Meanwhile others link identity, welfarism and secularism in an increasingly aggressive assault on those who refuse to conform.

The Political Market & The Left

What seems to have died, except perhaps in France and in disconnected cases of industrial action often linked to imported labour, is any sense of a workerist revolt and of socialism, at least as the term might have been understood at any time in or before the 1980s.

Intellectuals have walked away not only from Marxism but from the working classes altogether. Public sector academia is no longer the safe haven for safe dissidence. To live as an intellectual is to be poor or to write for the media and the wider public within a peer community that holds liberal values.

Market competition in ideas has meant that the game is to be 'new', often to distil serious research into brands that can be recirculated as reviews rather than books actually read - 'nudge', 'end of history', civilisational war. Bloggers fight to be taken up by the Guardian or Times.

But this is only at elite and metropolitan levels where a very closed system - of politicians, media, intellectuals, state servants, lobbyists, service sector business leaders - creates a group think in the main cities. Surprisingly few people presume to set the world view for the rest of the country.

Or so it operated until very recently. The crisis of confidence in the elite caused by the economic crisis comes just as new media tools are transforming the ability of new voices to reach new audiences. The first fruits of this have been on the Right but could new thinking be emerging on the Left as well?

So far, there has been little sign of this in the United Kingdom. The Leftist challenge, as so often, is split between what amounts to groupuscules, many of which still hold to a somewhat primitive Marxist philosophy, squabble amongst themselves or hold to a workerism that has not adapted to change.

The Far Left in Britain Today

In the recent Euro-elections, No2EU was the 'popular front' for the revolt within the Labour Movement to the stranglehold of neo-liberalism on the political arm of the movement. It 'competed' against the Socialist Labour Party so the combined votes of both give a reasonable sense of the size of the Far Left.

And it is not massive by any means - certainly smaller-scale than the challenge from the 'national socialist' BNP (6.26%). On a regional basis, only the traditional Labour strongholds of Scotland, Wales and the North (East and West) got as much as 3% of the vote.

Nationally the two competing wings of the Far Left were getting barely over 1% each and both parties did worst in the 'deep' South (East and West).

Still, this tiny war band of angry resistors to the dominance of the British centre-left by the official Labour Movement's Party could claim a national presence. This record is still better (just) than the BNP's 0.7% in the 2005 General Election.

The obvious point to make is that it is possible (simply on precedent with the BNP) for the Far Left to get traction from 1% to 6-7% within four to five years and certainly by the time of the next round of Euro- elections and of the General Election after next - well, in theory, that is.

The key to reaching this level is not some compromise with the middle classes although this would have to come if a Far Left Party ever wanted to reach the first booster stage of politics, 15%, where its ideology can enter the polity as credible.

What the Left has to do ...

The key lies in the unification of the Far Left and the attachment of more than one trades union. At the moment, the RMT finances and organises No2EU and there are limits to what it can do with members' monies, especially as the Government seems to be promising significant investment in the rail sector.

The recently announced pre-election investment in rail electrification has less to do with undermining Bob Crow's revolutionary appeal and much more to do with buttressing the pro-Labour business vote in Wales and elsewhere outside the South East.

On the other hand, the deferral (it is no better than that) of the partial privatisation of the Post Office before the election, though treated as a victory by the 'official' opposition within the Labour Party led by Compass, has owed something to the fear that the CWU might abandon New Labour altogether.

On top of this, the Political Officers of some of the major unions went into blind panic at the implications for the unity of the Labour Movement of the growing number of 'wildcat strikes' in the early part of the year.

The reason for the panic was that the cry of 'British jobs for British workers', though initially positioned in the media as a drift into BNP territory was actually something very different. It was an internationalist labour resistance to neo-liberal economic policy driving down wage rates amongst the relatively skilled.

This was the same concern that led to German workers organising against Slav workers in early twentieth century Europe, the very basis of the first draft of the National Socialist Workers Party, but, in the UK, it equally underpinned the platform of radical Marxists associated with No2EU.

Trades Union Issues

Rivals of No2EU - such as various Trotskyists (including those associated with Galloway's increasingly marginalised Respect), Left-Labour loyalists and progressives more concerned with green, liberal and minority issues - tried hard to paint this as a dangerous concession to fascism but with little success.

But the real power in the land - those with the cash and membership muscle, the Union Political Officers - saw this for what it was. The potential arrival of a revolutionary syndicalism might rip apart the cosy relationship between trades union elites and its political party that had existed since 1926.

They moved quickly to try and appropriate and neuter the revolt with only partial success. Syndicalist organisation has started in an almost underground fashion (given current strike-related legislation) with much opportunity for mayhem as major infrastructural projects come on line in the up-turn.

For the moment and in the run-up to the next Election, 'official' Labour has stopped the drift of angry workers into aggressive opposition. No doubt, the Party Conference managers will use fear of the Tories and traditional appeals to loyalty to ensure a unified front as an election nears.

This strategy is likely to be successful in the near term but the survival of New Labour is getting close to becoming dependent on a sufficient vote in the election that re-establishes it firmly as second party in the land if not as the next Government.

The tiny Leftist rump sits there on the margins as the nightmare for a Party that has its back to the wall and might well face the worst case of scenario of not being clearly ahead of UKIP and the Liberal Democrats, with its regional base crumbling and vengeful Tory legislation against the trades unions.

Can the Far Left crack it?

A conservative England that is slowly recovering could probably put down any syndicalist revolt with relative ease and with full public backing - especially as the industrial base of the country is getting dangerously irrelevant to the national economic model.

But what if the global crisis worsens? What if the Government can't borrow and public spending is slashed to levels that really hurt the middle class? What if inflation starts to mount? And the Government is humiliated in an Afghan defeat? And green and other protest creates serious disorder in the streets?

A lot of 'ifs' but none of them represent absurd propositions as they might have done only three years ago.

No2EU's relative failure in the recent elections came down to lack of resources, inability to get media coverage, the enmity of much of its own 'side' in ideological terms, the four year lead of the BNP in getting a purchase on white working class rage and the lack of faith in socialist solutions in the country.

None of these problems are easy to overcome. Resources and media coverage come only with success (despite paranoia in some quarters, there is no conspiracy at the BBC). The competition from the BNP and the lack of faith in socialism are serious political problems in themselves.

The question is whether the No2EU wing of the Far Left will take the bull by the horns and have the same determination as the BNP or, earlier, the Greens and UKIP, in entering the political market with a proposition that can pick up 5% or more of the market within five years and possibly 15% in ten.

The CNWP

Much of the thinking for this appears to be going on within the CNWP (Campaign for a New Workers' Party), led as Chair by leading former Militant activist and MP, Dave Nellist.

Nellist was an MP from 1983 to 1992 and was deselected in a brutal fight with the Kinnock leadership at the very beginning of the process that created New Labour. He is not an insignificant figure.

Militant became the Socialist Party and Nellist may be regarded as a revolutionary socialist though not one so ideologically rigid as his opponents and rivals in the Socialist Workers Party The SWP tends to eschew electoral politics altogether and prefer 'campaigns'.

You can already see a plethora of parties in the links above. The CNWP has a mountain to climb in developing a credible electoral challenge that avoids sectarianism and the ideological nonsense that alienates any red-blooded British worker and attracts mainstream trades unionists.

Nevertheless, Nellist chaired a meeting of the CNWP in London on 20 July in order to plan its next moves.

What appears to have been agreed is that the initial temporary electoral coalition of the the RMT trades union, the Socialist Party, The Communist Party of Great Britain (now a Trotskyist rump from the Soviet era) and 'others' will continue with a plan for possible participation in the next General Election.

Probable Tactics

What is being said suggests that the CNWP has no illusions about the scale of the task ahead and that efforts will go into ensuring a decent roster of independent working class candidates to challenge New Labour.

The general public may see little of it in the coming months. With limited resources, CNWP funds will go into building a base within the trades union movement, undercutting New Labour at the point where it is most vulnerable financially and in terms of internal structure.

Meetings, which will often be extremely cantankerous, are being slated, mostly in industral areas. This is how the Left does things but it should not be dismissed lightly. Viral marketing was invented by workers.

CNWP tactics are tried and true, building links to community campaigns, an approach uncannily like the Liberal Democrats - and, of course, in competition with them. It is also unlikely to give up on its attempt to detach the CWU from New Labour.

Is a socialist challenge in support of independent worker representation (often forgotten as the original motive for the foundation of the Labour Party) possible from a revolutionary socialist perspective?

The Alternative

There is an alternative model from within the official Party, the Labour Representation Committee, linked to Benn historically and led by the talented John McDonnell, MP, yet another Trotskyist in orientation but one who has managed to survive periodic New Labour purges.

Unfortunately for the credibility of any move to create socialism from within the Party, the element around LRC has achieved nothing of consequence in twenty years and cannot even combine with Compass to create a stronger Left presence within the Party.

It is possible LRC and CNWP, with the backing of two or three unions and with the SLP stood down, could create a formidable Left counterweight to the BNP - never a Government or more than a rump in Parliament but capable of setting the terms of political debate.

But don't let it keep you awake at nights whether in horror or anticipation. CNWP is a pariah in the official Labour Movement while LRC and others have staked their whole political careers on working within the system.

CNWP probably has no choice but to follow the Greens, UKIP and the BNP in the hard slog of community organisation with set-backs and a hardening of the soul as the price. Will it get there? That depends on its own organisational talents and economic conditions. But do not assume not. 

[An excellent source on developments in the British Far Left is the Blog A Very Public Sociologist which is written from a Socialist Party perspective but is mercifully free of theory and jargon. It also gives out very useful and reliable facts alongside opinion. Material can sometimes be picked up through Twitter.]

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