What Matters is What You're For, Not What You're Against

Lessons for Today: Workers' Fight & Lutte Ouvrière

The Fourth Internationalists in France long ago identified the critical weakness in LO (Lutte Ouvrière)’s politics with surgical precision: they wrote endlessly about what the Ligue Communiste Révolutionnaire was doing wrong, but propose an alternative line themselves? Explain to workers how to organise after a strike ends, on what slogans, with what forms of struggle? Silence. This wasn’t modesty; it was political bankruptcy. What matters is what you’re for, not what you’re against.

Workers’ Fight, the British current that is now the AWL, modelled itself on LO in some ways, and suffered the same disease. Ask them what the organisation should actually build—not politically, organisationally—and you’d get the habitual empty phrasemongering of British Trotskyists. Long on denunciation. Short on concrete plans. Critique without programme, opposition without alternative. Death by a thousand “against” statements with no “for” to guide the work.

The Trap That Kills Movements

This pattern destroys more revolutionary potential than any reformist betrayal. Being against capitalism, against the state, against reformism: all necessary. None sufficient. What breaks movements isn’t the strength of their critique but the absence of what comes after it. LO’s factory bulletins denounced bureaucrats and complained about vending machines and hot water—economistic to the core—while revolutionary political alternatives remained perpetually unstated. The reason? LO wouldn’t propose what they couldn’t personally ensure would be realised.

What matters is what you’re for. LO knew what it was against—bureaucratic betrayals, reformist illusions, capitalist exploitation. But when the question became “how to continue?” after the struggle hit difficulties, they had no answer. They couldn’t explain how workers should organise, what slogans to advance, what forms of struggle to pursue: instead, the answer was to build LO. A passive critique masquerading as a revolutionary principle, producing nothing but a sentiment of helplessness and an invitation into hyperactivite propagandism.

The PCF ceased advocating revolutionary transformation sometime in the 1930s. They’d already ceased, were already aiming to conquer positions within the existing state apparatus rather than smash it. Their “left” verbalism couldn’t disguise a strategy that sometimes fell short of defending workers’ immediate interests, advocating dispersed action when unity was required. Against capitalism in words; for integration into state structures in practice.

The CFDT leadership refused to link reduction of work time with salary questions or industrial policy, treating each demand as isolated rather than part of a unified strategy. Contractual action over mobilisation. Bureaucratic control stifling base initiatives. Even the Algerian FLN, despite objective radicalisation in its ranks, became a fourre-tout—a catch-all encompassing radical and conservative positions simultaneously, lacking any clear programmatic content beyond liberation itself.

Better to critique than to lead. Safer to denounce than to build. This is the method gap that Livio Maitan identified in revolutionary organisations that master political criticism but cannot bridge to organisational tasks, programme development, strategic construction of the capacity for victory.

What Being “For” Actually Requires

What matters is what you’re for, and being “for” something demands concrete answers. It requires defining organisational tasks: not just political abstractions but concrete steps for how political goals translate into practice. The question “what is to be done?” isn’t answered by listing what’s wrong with social democracy. WF’s failure wasn’t their critique of reformism but their inability to articulate organisational tasks distinct from political denunciation.

Being “for” requires developing programme and strategy. Immediate demands must link to transitional and socialist goals through an articulated path. Revolutions don’t emerge from defending immediate interests alone; revolutionaries must propose alternative tactics within mass struggles, integrating the revolutionary organisation’s conscious role in guiding the fight forward. The LCR hammered LO on precisely this point: focusing on criticising bureaucrats without proposing alternative tactics isn’t revolutionary practice; it’s sophisticated commentary.

Active intervention, not passive observation. LO mastered the critique but couldn’t cross the threshold into proposing concrete actions and organisational forms within struggles. Not just presence but leadership, guidance, the ability to be a step ahead of the masses rather than trailing their average consciousness. Political knowledge doesn’t spontaneously develop; revolutionaries must bring it to workers, explain complex political differences and their practical implications.

What matters is what you’re for, and that requires building the organisation itself. Recruiting, training militants, diffusing knowledge, establishing local structures. A clear political line differentiated from reformist strategies. All of this requires knowing what you’re building toward, not just what you’re fighting against.

The Sandinista Contrast: Programme in Practice

The FSLN understood what Maitan advocated. They produced a “Plan of Struggle” as their programme for the people, and then created a propagandist’s guide instructing militants on explaining it, responding to counter-revolutionary arguments, addressing errors frankly, and presenting the Plan as the people’s instrument for resolving problems in the FSLN’s own mobilisation. House visits, discussions, linking programme to their history of practical struggle.

They were consciously articulating their aims, engaging the population in that vision. When they addressed women specifically, they detailed revolutionary gains for children and women’s own demands for equality, connecting programme to immediate action. An organisation that knew its purpose and could explain it. Not just against Somoza’s dictatorship; for a concrete alternative with practical steps for implementation.

Compare that to LO’s hesitation, WF’s empty phrases, the PCF’s integration into the state apparatus it claimed to oppose. The difference isn’t tactical sophistication—it’s whether the organisation has a clear answer to “what are we building and how do we get there?” What matters is what you’re for.

Strategic Lessons for Today

Current revolutionaries face Maitan’s challenge directly. Critique comes easily: social democracy’s bankruptcy, trade union bureaucracy’s betrayals, the capitalist state’s violence are all obvious enough. What proves difficult is articulating the alternative, developing the capacity to implement it, building organisations capable of leading struggles toward victory rather than chronicling their defeats.

The LCR tradition itself faced these questions: how to fully develop self-management theory, how to address ecology’s challenge to traditional productivist politics, how to move from critique of Stalinism to positive programme for workers’ democracy. These weren’t academic exercises but strategic necessities. An organisation defined by what it opposes cannot guide the working class toward emancipation.

The lesson from Maitan’s critique: being against is insufficient when it substitutes for being for something. Revolutionary rhetoric without revolutionary programme produces helplessness, not transformation. The ability to explain what we’re building, how we plan to reach it, what organisational tasks that requires—this separates genuine revolutionary politics from sophisticated commentary on others’ failures.

What matters is what you’re for. We need organisations that can answer the worker who asks “what do we do Monday morning?” Not with denunciations of bureaucrats or catalogues of capitalism’s crimes, but with concrete proposals for advancing the struggle, building power, moving toward workers’ control and socialist transformation. The method gap isn’t bridged by better critique but by developing the organisational capacity to implement programme, to lead struggles, to build toward victory.

Everything else is just better-informed observation of our own defeat.

This article has been updated. For further reading, see the article below

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Further Reading

For those wishing to delve deeper into the historical experiences discussed and the source materials, the following French documents offer valuable insights:

• "Le guide du propagandiste du Front" (The Front's Propagandist Guide): This excerpt details the practical methods used by FSLN militants in Nicaragua to explain their Plan of Struggle (see the English translation in October 1, 1984, Intercontinental Press) to the population. It provides arguments to counter "counter-revolutionary lies" and highlights the importance of an open but firm approach, capable of self-criticism and sensitive to the people's questions. The guide includes concrete suggestions for discussions during house visits and underscores the electoral campaign's significance as an opportunity to develop political consciousness and popular self-organisation. A related excerpt shows the FSLN specifically addressing women, detailing revolutionary gains for children and addressing women's own demands for equality, linking the programme to practical action like house visits. This document exemplifies an organisation consciously articulating and disseminating what it is for.

• Texts on the CFDT Debate: "CFDT: des forces importantes pour redresser la barre" (CFDT: Important Forces to Right the Ship): These articles (and for a summary, see Critique Communiste) report on internal opposition within the CFDT trade union confederation, particularly critiquing the leadership's "recentering" towards integrating its action within a "durable capitalist system." Texts from the Basse-Normandie region and the Hacuitex federation reject the fundamental choices of the confederation, advocating for a class and mass unionism ("syndicalisme de classe et de masse") and explicitly calling for unity of action, primarily with the CGT, despite divergences, in the perspective of mobilising workers and pursuing an anti-capitalist struggle. This highlights a debate within a major workers' organisation over defining what it should be for in strategic terms.

• "Lutte ouvrière" et la révolution mondiale ("Lutte Ouvrière" and the World Revolution): This document offers a critique of Lutte Ouvrière's (LO) analysis of revolutionary processes internationally. It examines LO's method of analysis and its implications, particularly concerning the nature of revolutions and state power in China, Cuba, and the popular democracies of Eastern Europe. The critique suggests theoretical and practical deviations in LO's approach, which, from the perspective of the analysis presented, hindered a clear understanding of the international revolutionary dynamic.

• Critiques of Lutte Ouvrière's Practice and Theory in lutte ouvrière" ou la tendance prolétarienne": This comprehensive analysis delves into the structure and political practice of Lutte Ouvrière, contrasting it with the approach of the Ligue Communiste (LC/LCR). It critiques LO's system of press, particularly its factory bulletins, which are described as often focusing on immediate, even trivial, issues ("économiste") and lacking clear political slogans or alternative actions. The text highlights LO's perceived "passive critique" of other organisations and bureaucrats without proposing alternative lines or explaining how workers should organise or continue struggles. It points to a hesitation in defining specific organisational tasks and a tendency towards a "sentiment of helplessness" when struggles face difficulties. The critique suggests this approach focuses on what LO cannot immediately ensure rather than actively proposing and fighting for necessary steps. The document argues for the revolutionary organisation's necessity to assume and define organisational tasks and bring political knowledge to workers. It also touches upon LO's relationship with student movements.

• "Construire le parti, construire l’Internationale" (Building the Party, Building the International): These documents stem from the preparatory debate for the founding congress of the Ligue Communiste. They are dedicated to the theory and system of organisation (Part 1) and the relationship between internationalism and the International (Part 2). These titles themselves indicate a focus on the active construction of the revolutionary instrument, defining the practical tasks required to achieve the revolutionary goal—explicitly outlining what the organisation is for in terms of its structure and international role.

• "Pédagogie et crise de la bourgeoisie" (Pedagogy and Crisis of the Bourgeoisie): Authored by the teaching cell of the Ligue Communiste in Toulouse, this brochure analyses the education system within the context of the capitalist state. It critiques reformist approaches to education, including those from the PCF and certain union tendencies, highlighting their limitations in challenging the fundamental function of the school under bourgeois rule. The document aims to provide a basis for revolutionary militants in defining their line of struggle within the education sector, outlining orientations for transforming pedagogy and fighting the crisis of the bourgeoisie as it affects schooling.

• "Fascisme et démocratie. Les formes de domination de l’état capitaliste. Suivi de Bonapartisme et fascisme" (Fascism and Democracy. Forms of Domination of the Capitalist State. Followed by Bonapartism and Fascism): This document provides a foundational Marxist theoretical analysis of different forms of the capitalist state, including bourgeois democracy, Bonapartism, and Fascism, including classic texts by Leon Trotsky on the subject. Understanding the nature of the state is crucial for revolutionaries to define what they are against (the capitalist state) and also implicitly shapes their understanding of what they are for (a workers' state, socialism), by defining the structures of domination that must be overthrown.

• Critiques of the French Communist Party (PCF): See Critique communiste n°22, Février-Mars 1978 These excerpts include a discussion on the evolution of the PCF and the "Stalinist system," particularly focusing on the PCF's perceived "sectarian turn" after September 1977. One article is titled "PCF: the impossible strategy." Critiques of the PCF's positions, such as regarding a "capitalist private sector" within "advanced democracy" or their general political line, highlight the perceived lack of a viable revolutionary strategy. This serves as an example of a major political force whose strategy is analysed and found wanting from a revolutionary perspective, underscoring the need for revolutionaries to articulate a concrete alternative for achieving socialism.