For this article, I tracked down a handful of people’s stories of a range of entryist strategies: from the Nuclear Disarmament Party in the 1980s, to the emergence of the NSW Greens Party, the Jabiluka uranium mine campaign, the new Community Climate Network, and Climate Camps. I called folks who were involved in the group at the time for a conversation. All of them are still grassroots activists. I’ve not doubt there are other interpretations of history and I haven’t done in depth historical research – these are just snippets of people’s experiences. [This is abridged version – there is a longer version here.]
I have been active in social movements for about a decade – in student groups and community climate justice networks – and have faced a variety of strategies from Socialist organisations. Sometimes we have been able to work together, and some members have been our friends and allies; but I have found their behaviour as a faction in collectives – or as an organisation at conferences, summits and large actions – to be difficult, disruptive and destructive.
Sometimes it’s hard to pinpoint exactly what it is, or understand why they might be interested in our groups. It’s been helpful for me to talk to people in Socialist organisations/factions about their organisational structure, and understand how they think change happens. [Mostly, the response is: ‘building the revolutionary workers’ party that can get masses of workers onto the streets’].
It’s also been helpful to know these tactics and interventions have been happening for decades (and longer!): there are lessons to be learnt. [In fact, resistance to organised “entryism” has been around since Trotsky’s first proposed the strategy in his essays on “The French Turn” in 1934. The intervening French Trotskyists faced some resistance as they attempted to dissolve their organisation into the French Socialist Party, however they still managed to significantly raise their group’s membership. But, soon after, the French Socialist Party began to expel the Trotskyists. Hooray! …Or not? Anyhoo, I think the take home message here is, “You are not alone. This has been happening since forever.”]
Currently, the strongest ‘entryist’ organisations in the burgeoning climate movement in Sydney are Solidarity and Socialist Alliance (which is mostly made up of people from the Democratic Socialist Perspective (DSP) and their youth wing, Resistance). So far, Socialist Alternative have participated very little in Sydney-based climate organising.
But interventionist or ‘entryist’ strategies are not new to these organisations and political tendencies. Sourcewatch describes entryism as “a political tactic in which an organisation or group enters a larger organisation in an attempt to gain recruits, gain influence or to take control of the larger organisations’ structure. Characteristically, these groups intervene in single-issue campaign groups, and sometimes cause folks to spend more time on dealing with internal wrangling, than with organising work itself.
Beyond individual groups, both organisations currently prioritise participation in ‘peak’ decision-making spaces, in which many groups participate (campaign alliances, national network committees, committees to organise major rallies or large movement events like Climate Camp). They also prioritise student spaces, which they identify as the key grounds for recruitment to their organisation. Student environment collectives – some of the only active networks to survive the Howard Government’s gutting of student unionism – are seen as the largest and strongest student movement, and have faced sustained and sometimes aggressive entryism.
Recently, Wenny Theresia wrote of participation in the growing community climate movement, “An organisational philosophy of groups like Socialist Alliance and Solidarity seems to be seeing highly-charged, lengthy and (deliberately) polarised debates – dominated by a few, pre-caucused positions of these organisations – as ‘politicising’ and beneficial for the movement. Personally I’ve generally found these methods patronising, counter-effective, frustrating and often predictable: not a method that supports critical, grassroots discussion of ideas and consensus decision-making.”
To be fair, it’s possible some ordinary, new or younger members are completely unaware of the entryist tactics and strategies their organisations employ; while others don’t take issue with manipulating other groups for their own agendas (but see this as useful work to ‘politicise’ or ‘radicalise’ what they see as ‘liberal’ groups). I acknowledge members of these organisations have a right to put forward their views, act around their beliefs and join social change groups. But such groups also have the right to defend themselves – and defend consensus-based and non-hierarchical organising structures – against those who undermine them by participating with ulterior motives and hidden agendas.
Nuclear Disarmament Party 1985
In the 1984 Federal Elections, 642,435 people had cast their primary vote for the Nuclear Disarmament Party: it was a new political party, hastily put together and fast gaining thousands of members. They won one Senate seat (Western Australia’s Jo Valentine, with Peter Garrett almost winning their second).
Before the Conference – defending the NDP
The March 1985 Newsletter of the Sydney branch of the Nuclear Disarmament Party reported that members of the Socialist Workers Party (later called the Democratic Socialist Perspective, and today forming the Socialist Alliance) were trying to take over the NDP by entryism and block-voting. The November 21 issue of the newspaper of the SWP and Resistance announced its entire staff had joined the NDP.
The letter (available here: http://mailstar.net/NDP-March85-p8.jpg and here http://mailstar.net/NDP-March85-p9.jpg) said:
…SWP members organise themselves tightly outside NDP circles to ensure their interests as a group are pushed with maximum effect within the NDP. Many members in Sydney and in other cities have become aware of a “block” which always argues and votes the same way. Of course, there is nothing wrong in principle with NDP members getting together to advance their views on what’s best for the NDP. It happens all the time. It’s a legitimate part of any democratic organisation. But when those people organise tightly to pursue the interests of an outside group, whose interests are separate from those of NDP, that is another matter!! For example, the SWP stands its own candidates in elections, and one of its primary purposes in working within the NDP is to recruit members to the SWP. Flowing from their view of the need to work within other groups, the SWP has a history of “takeovers” of other organisations. SWP members portray themselves as loyal members with no desire other than the well being of the host group. However, whenever it becomes possible the SWP assumes control of the host group and uses it for it’s own ends.
…The Nuclear Disarmament Party is and must remain a broadly based popular movement which will not be viable if it polarises to the left or the right.
If we were to allow members of the SWP to become, or to remain, leading members of the NDP, we should lose, or fail ever to gain, the support of the great body of the Australian public. Of that there can be no doubt.
There are compelling reasons for the view that members of other political parties should either be proscribed from joining or remaining as ordinary members of the NDP; or at least should be proscribed from being appointed or elected as spokespersons, office-bearers, delegates or committee members of the NDP.
…Our cause is peace, and it cannot go forward if we are constantly at war with those who choose to use the NDP to pursue their own political ends and recruit from our membership.
Gillian Fisher Wentworth Electorate
Rob Britten North Sydney Electorate
Edward St John Warringah Electorate
Sean Flood Sydney Electorate
Later, the Peace Studies journal, Edward St John wrote, “Once it became apparent that the SWP was making a major and moderately successful effort to assert itself prominently in the affairs of the NDP, some sort of split became inevitable. Internally, the SWP was an organised, parasitic minority bent on gaining factional advantage, the better to pursue its objectives.”
At the Nuclear Disarmament Party Inaugural Conference
Anyone with an NDP membership card issued freely for a nominal charge, could attend the conference. Of the 170 people present, it was estimated that 70 were SWP or Resistance members.
There were three proposals at the conference that the Socialist Workers’ Party in particular, objected to:
- Proscription: a standard clause that members of the NDP could not be members of another political party. The SWP objected: they wanted to be members of the Socialist Workers Party and the Nuclear Disarmament Party, as they planned to build the SWP through the NDP.
- Ratification of conference decisions: it was proposed to send the conference decisions to a postal ballot of members. SWP preferred that the meeting of members had the final say – meetings they were already ‘stacking’ with SWP members.
- A proposal that the NDP call for nuclear disarmament in the “East and West” – ie. the Nuclear Disarmament Party call for worldwide nuclear disarmament. The SWP had a relationship with Socialist parties in the ‘East’ / Soviet leadership; and wished to only call for the United States of America to disarm. Socialist Alliance’s newspaper Green Left Weekly claimed the proposal “equated Soviet and US responsibility for the nuclear arms race” and was “unnecessary concession to the US war machine.”
The Socialist Workers Party created an untenable situation: the Nuclear Disarmament Party was unable to call for global nuclear disarmament.
At the conference, the Socialist Workers Party blocked voting on any resolutions proposed, particularly those most in dispute. Out of frustration, people moved that proposals not voted on be submitted to a referendum of NDP members. This was opposed by the SWP, and defeated 87 votes to 86.
NDP Senator Jo Vallentine, Peter Garrett and around 80 members then walked out of the conference, and split from the party.
After the conference – what people said about entryism in the NDP
Western Australian NDP Senator (later Greens Senator and lifelong and ongoing grassroots nuclear-free activist) told media: “The conference was dominated by members of SWP, who attended in order to block a proposal that would have barred members of other parties from membership of the NDP.”
Another member, Ms Melzer said, “We wanted a party that was not dominated by anybody. The SWP members are cuckoos. They wait until an organisation is formed, and then they plonk themselves in that organisation’s nest.”
Jabiluka Uranium Mine campaign 1997 – 8
Thousands of people, in scores of groups across Australia, were part of a huge and successful campaign to support Mirrar Traditional owners to stop the Jabiluka uranium mine in the Kakadu National Park.
As actions began to take place in cities, the Mirrar Traditional Owners, and their organisation, the Gundjemi Corporation, created a framework for people to act in solidarity with indigenous people. This protocol was set up specifically to manage the emerging situation of Socialist organisations beginning to intervene and direct the campaign.
The Mirrar’s protocol applied to groups wishing to call themselves ‘Jabiluka Action Groups’ for planned actions and media releases to stop the Jabiluka uranium mine on Mirrar land. These groups needed to agree to the protocol that included Traditional Owners being informed of and supportive of any planned actions and media releases. Traditional Owners could suggest amendments for the media release, or reject an action proposal outright.
The protocol aimed to give Traditional Owners agency of the solidarity campaign and actions done in their names and about their country. It was created for people acting in solidarity to be accountable to the affected Traditional Owners. This was a new and exciting model for solidarity organising – and certainly, it would been challenging – for Traditional Owners as thousands of people wanted to be ‘active’ to help win their campaign, and for solidarity activists.
Western Australia Jabiluka Action Group
In Western Australia, activists were beginning a Jabiluka Action Group, after travelling to the Northern Territory for the first action camp at the Jabiluka uranium mine in 1997. At this time, Socialist organisations, particularly Resistance and the Democratic Socialist Perspective (who now form the Socialist Alliance) began to take notice, and by 1998, party members were attending Jabiluka Action Groups meetings across the country.
Socialist Alliance members began attending – and stacking out – the meetings of the Western Australia Jabiluka Action Group. They refused to work under the Mirrar Traditional Owners protocol. They ‘stacked’ meetings with many party members, and put forward proposals to reject the Mirrar protocol and understanding. One member described their political approach was: “This is our campaign, and we’re going to do it our way.”
In response, members of the group simply “out-stacked the stackers” and who voted them out of the group. In a meeting, they stated the rules of the group (including the Mirrar Protocol), and asserted that if someone could not abide by those rules, they could not be in the group. This conflict in Western Australia went on for eight months “simmering”, and three months of “horrible” conflict.
Melbourne Jabiluka Action Group
In Melbourne, too, there were significant conflicts. An organiser said, “The Jabiluka campaign became an organic beast that grew and grew and grew. JAG meetings in Melbourne would have 100 to 150 people at them. There was an uneasy alliance that ended up developing for the groups involved, but eventually we were able to recognise and respect the roles that people played.”
One organiser credited the involvement and leadership of local Aboriginal leaders such as Gary Foley (who also had existing relationship with Mirrar Traditional Owners). They described his role as to “hammer home the fact that indigenous sovereignty issues were at the heart of this campaign. Many people came to the campaign with other goals: peace and anti-nukes, or the general-uprising-workers-mass-movement-on-the-streets… The leaders of those groups were tamed into submission. He helped to frighten [the DSP] into the most respectful route.”
As the movement grew, activists took the threat of entryism, stacking, takeover and other forms of political opportunism seriously. An organiser said, “There were significant issues we considered: how are we going to deal with this? How are we going to make sure the don’t take over? There were a lot of people to buffer it, and they were determined to buffer it and not just let them take over.”
There were clear ways and processes by which people were inducted into the campaign – which generated understanding of protocols and processes people needed to follow and respect. They believe the diversity of groups involved was crucial – church groups, student groups, etc, who approached the campaign from many different angles.
The NSW Greens Party 1991
For some time, the Greens had been a loose alliance, but was growing rapidly and developing into a national political party and a potent political movement.
The DSP (now forming Socialist Alliance) upped-the-ante in their participation, and even changed the name of its weekly newspaper from “Direct Action” to “Green Left”. They indicated they were prepared to “dissolve” their organisation and work through the Greens as their primary political vehicle.
At a regular administrative meeting in NSW, twelve DSP members turned up (when generally one DSP member usually attended). Stacking the meeting to have the majority vote, they made organisational changes, including electing a DSP member as Registered Officer (the person recognised by the Electoral Act as the party representative able to endorse candidates), and almost gaining access to membership database. In the end, there was a court hearing [adjudicated by the Electoral Commission] to determine who were the ‘real Greens’.
The response
Having been a fairly open and loose alliance, the Greens decided to insert a clause into their constitution that banned members of all other political parties [a standard clause for other Australian political parties]. One member added, “We should have included their junior organisations too”.
They agreed to ensure local groups and state branches were free of members from other political parties within six months. Another Greens member said: “Once that decision was made, the DSP went feral and started organising to stack a meeting in NSW to prevent this change from happening. They really went into action and made it hard; but did it in such a heavy-handed way, people realised it was the right decision.
“They were grabbing positions, or [already] held positions and had not disclosed they were DSP members. They always kept a couple of “sleepers” [DSP members who didn’t disclose their membership] – which is a dangerous situation. The local groups just rebelled, and quickly a number of them kicked out their DSP members. Three or four groups wouldn’t – they faded and within a few years there new groups in that area.
“It was volatile for a few months, it was really well worth it.”
“We shed the DSP – it was a real battle we managed to win. It hurt us momentarily, they were so active, and had officer bearers in positions; but we quickly recovered from that, people became involved as soon as they were gone.”
One member says, “Since then, our strategy has been to not have an argument with them and not get into bed with them – and keep our distance. To be courteous and respectful, without getting too close. I guess our strategy is to side-step them, politely, and to never be part of alliances in which they can dominate.”
Some Lessons Learned
One member says, “Socialist Alliance are quite tenacious – they have real tenacity and commitment, they work quite hard. It sounds like they have their teeth now in the community climate movement to a similar extent that that they did with NSW Greens in the early 1990s.
“[Socialist Alliance’s] strategy is, if there’s an organisation that’s on the move in terms of rapidly growing membership, or getting media, or growing assets, they try to move in to control and capitalise. But it has the opposite effect: the broader membership gets annoyed at the domination and unethical behaviour and practice, and they leave.”
“When they’re moving in on your group, it’s very difficult, you might need to develop some rules about who can and can’t be office holders. Because, once they’re in there as full members, it’s very difficult. You could confront them and the issue directly, put it as an agenda item at meetings, and talk about how it is affecting the group. If people start speaking openly about it, maybe they will need to pull back.”
Climate Camp 2008
A broad collective mostly from Sydney and Newcastle (but also Brisbane, Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth) faced disruptive tactics from various members of Solidarity (who were also simultaneously disrupting the Sydney University Environment Collective).
Whilst invited consistently, Solidarity members failed to attend a single organising or working group meeting in the nine-month organising period.
Solidarity took issue with the target – the largest coal port on earth, set to triple in size. They wrote, “Rather than focus on concrete demands that could mobilise large numbers on an ongoing basis, the focus of the Camp is once again on coal exports and Newcastle as a coal port. By labelling this as the number one priority of the Camp and the climate campaign, the Camp has taken the focus off the domestic polluters.” Solidarity preferred “the action… targeted state government offices or power stations, as well as corporate vandals in Newcastle.” (Not sure who that would be, aside from say, the companies running world’s largest coal port?)
At Climate Camp 2008, Solidarity attempted to organise against the Climate Camp decision-making space (spokescouncils), arguing ad nauseum over the meeting process, and taking up a lot of time (there were only a handful of hours available for the entire camp to meet – Solidarity forced much of this time to be wasted debating the merits of mass voting versus spokescouncils).
Solidarity also pushed hard for groups to approve their statement/demands at Climate Camp, which restated existing event propaganda (but eventually people just approved it to be able to move on). Solidarity claimed their statement “injected a much-needed connection between the tactics of the day, and the inaction of the Rudd Government,” [because, uh, maybe people hadn’t made that connection themselves?]
The behaviour of Solidarity was strongly resisted and condemned by most at Climate Camp. Facilitators of the spokescouncils had a very difficult time (which in the Climate Camp 2008 evaluation, participants overwhelming complimented facilitators on a good job under difficult circumstances).
One spokescouncil facilitator and long-term community activist wrote to the organising collective after the camp:
“Socialists were difficult to deal with. We need to prepare for more belligerent tactics as the climate movement grows. Their version of democracy doesn’t integrate the idea of action teams and the autonomous organising (that, in my view was extremely effective at the camp), and that was an important part of climate camp.
“We need to be prepared for tactics that will try and impose their mode of operating, as well as being completely accountable and clear about decision-making processes.
“[Also, as facilitators], we should have called them on trying to send multiple representatives for the spokescouncil for what was essentially the same action teams.” [Solidarity scattered themselves around a meeting of hundreds of people so they could speak more often.]
Climate Camp 2009
In 2009, Solidarity again did not participate in any organising, but did criticise Climate Camp before the event: “As a focus for climate activism it is somewhat disorienting… Lots of the coal mining in Australia is for export to China and India. Opposing these exports can play into the common argument that China and India’s development needs to be held back… China and India have a right to better living standards and we should not shut off their steel supply.” After the event, Paddy Gibson wrote on Solidarity’s website, “Targeting coking coal mines digging for export shoots yourself in the foot.”
Socialist Alliance was involved and supported, to some extent, the organising of the camp, particularly because of the location near Wollongong, and the ‘strength’ of the party there. Activists (some of whom were paid) attended monthly all-in organising meetings. Disappointingly, no Socialist Alliance folks helped with the multiple days of work setting up and packing down the camp; nor the maintenance of the site throughout the camp. At the camp, they prioritised attending workshops to dominate workshop spaces, and put forward their proposals/resolutions/analysis.
Some tensions stemmed from Socialist Alliance folks acting as a bloc in meeting spaces, and a great deal of time and energy was wasted with attempts to create ‘debates’ around the core messages and principles of Climate Camp. One organiser wrote, “It took 2 months plus to decide one sentence for the front of an invitation… I felt frustrated. Rather than moving on and working on things we could agree on, we were just continually presented again and again [with the same proposal]. That is the antithesis of good consensus process.”
Some organisers were concerned when Socialist Alliance identified Climate Camp as the lead ‘priority’ for the latter half of 2009 to ‘assign resources’. One organiser wrote, “I assume this is the time of paid staff and core activists, as there have been no financial donations… Climate Camp – last year and this – has been committed to grassroots, non-hierarchical decision-making. Strategic interventions from national political parties, with demands/resolutions formulated weeks before Climate Camp, will undermine this, and has done so in the past.”
In response, Socialist Alliance claimed they had no paid staff. However, some people participating in Climate Camp were paid full-time by Resistance and Green Left Weekly – respectively, the youth wing and newspaper of Socialist Alliance.
Climate Emergency Rallies 2009
[See the previous article.] A heated dispute arose around a particular demand of the rallies, to be held across Australia in June 2009. At the NSW rally organising committee meeting to decide their position, more than 7 members of Socialist Alliance, most of whom had not been to an organising meeting previously, attended to ‘stack’ and subsequently ‘won’ the vote. Socialist Alliance activists also secured the majority of representatives to in the national rally coordinating committee. Simon Butler’s report to Socialist Alliance (see http://www.dsp.org.au/node/227) celebrated that, ‘we [the Socialist Alliance] waged a successful campaign to keep [100% renewables by 2020] as the chief demand for the June 13 rallies.’
Reflecting on the rallies, the DSP congratulated Resistance activists for their “significant commitment” to the climate movement, noting “[t]his is already bearing fruit for the movement and winning new youth activists to the socialist movement” (see http://www.dsp.org.au/node/233).
Simon Butler on behalf of the Democratic Socialist Perspective (DSP) National Executive asserted, “We need to relate to local groups where we can, but assign resources to city-wide committees and organising for climate camps and the pre-Copenhagen protests.”
Facing Entryism From Socialist Organisations 
