Their Trotsky and Ours

This document, soon to be published as an independent book by Pathfinder, is a summation of the lessons of history of revolution. In its way it is in line with the Communist Manifesto, with the fundamental documents of the Comintern, knitting together the history of world revolution, and of its Marxist vanguard in particular. This is not just about Trotsky and his contributions, but about how the Cuban communists fit into the continuation of Leninism, of what lessons we can learn from the crushed revolutions in Grenada and Nicaragua and by extension Burkina Faso. There is so much, how Lenin's understanding of the importance of reaching out to farmers is true today, how new currents of workers searching for communist answers will keep emerging as they did in Cuba, how Trotsky learned Leninism, and how Trotskyists have learned like Trotsky did, not to be Trotskyists, but to be communists. For many, this pamphlet will take them back to the founding documents of the Communists International. For others this will take the to the continuing revolutionary politics of Fidel and the other Cuban communists. If you are serious about changing the world, you need to read this, study this, and follow the links this important book takes you to revolutionists throughout history and around the world.

In an age when revolutionaries come from different family trees, how do you look at the legendary Leon Trotsky, and his theory of ?permanent revolution,? that colonial countries can move directly from capitalist governments to workers governments? Jack Barnes, Socialist Workers Party national secretary, examines this issue in an article based on a 1982 speech. The volume also contains a piece by Cuban Communist Carlos Rafael Rodriguez on Lenin?s contributions to the strategy of colonial liberation and a pair of articles, by Lenin and Trotsky, on the 1916 Easter rebellion in Ireland.

What does it take to make a socialist revolution? What sort of political leadership is needed? What program and strategy? How to you create it in practice? I found this issue of New International very helpful in discussing and thinking about these questions, both to understand the world today and figure out what to do about it. Jack Barnes bases his analysis on political work done by Karl Marx and Frederick Engels and leaders of the Russian Revolution V.I. Lenin and Leon Trotsky. He discusses lessons socialists in the United States had already drawn, and then takes a fresh look in light of the 1979 worker and peasant revolutions in Nicaragua and Grenada and the debate they sparked on revolutionary strategy. The discussion takes up issues where there have often been differences among revolutionary organizations, including the character of alliances between workers and peasants or farmers, the role of armed struggle and electoral campaigns, and the type of the government to establish after overthrowing a capitalist regime. Barnes stresses the importance of the Cuban Revolution, both for the example it sets and the conscious efforts of the Cuban leadership to advance revolutionary leadership development around the world.