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March 31, 2016
CPC(M-L) Celebrates the 46th
Anniversary of Its Founding
All Out to Turn Things Around by
Building the Party's Basic Organizations,
Committees and Institutions!
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CPC(M-L)
Celebrates
the
46th
Anniversary
of Its Founding
• All Out to Turn Things Around by Building the
Party's Basic Organizations, Committees and Institutions!
• Decisive Importance of the Organizing Method
"Collective Work, Individual Responsibility" in Building the Mass
Communist Party
• About CPC(M-L)
CPC(M-L) Celebrates the 46th Anniversary
of Its Founding
All Out to Turn Things Around by
Building the Party's Basic Organizations,
Committees and Institutions!
The Party's Central Committee sends revolutionary
greetings to all members and sympathizers of the Party across the
country on the occasion of the 46th Anniversary of its founding
in Montreal, on March 31, 1970. On this occasion, Party basic
organizations, committees and institutions are holding public and
non-public meetings to discuss the significance of the Party
at this time and the importance of party-building.
 Across the country Party
comrades are dealing with the challenge of activating the human
factor/social consciousness at a time the retrograde forces are doing
everything in their considerable power to activate the anti-human
factor/anti-social
consciousness. The aim of the reactionary forces is to concentrate
economic and political power in fewer and fewer hands.
The result of this anti-social offensive of the bourgeoisie is ever
greater exploitation and oppression and the consequent impoverishment,
insecurity and nation-wrecking as well as the
increasing danger of a world wide inter-imperialist war.
By putting the organizational work on a par with the
requirements of the Party's work for people's empowerment it is
possible to turn things around and this is the challenge
CPC(M-L) has taken up. This is why the Central Committee is calling on
the basic organizations, committees and institutions of the Party at
all levels to use the anniversary to take the time
to appreciate the crucial role the Party plays. Most importantly, they
should work out the practical measures which are required to provide
the working class with confidence and
organization to lead the people to take up their own nation-building
project and put an end to the nation-wrecking which is taking place
under the auspices of the monopolies and their
representatives in government. The organizations at all levels make
headway by paying first-rate attention to their own organizing work to
mobilize the working class and its allies to resolve
the current crisis caused by neo-liberal wrecking in a manner that
favours the people. So too the working people make headway when they
build their own organizations which take
independent political stands.
All the activities which CPC(M-L) has carried out for
the past 46 years have a common thread -- to further develop the
leading role of the working class in society. The strength of
CPC(M-L) lies in its revolutionary theory, its political line and its
organizations at various levels which are always paying attention to
the particular tasks facing the society to open the path
for progress. The cutting edge for this period is to wage the
ideological struggle and engage in ideological work to determine the
practical politics required to build the political movement
against nation-wrecking. Practical politics are required to mobilize
the working people and the youth and students to take up
nation-building on a modern basis.
The emphasis of the organizing work is to activate the
human factor/social consciousness so that responsibility is taken to
turn things around. By building committees which take their
own independent political stands, the working people and the youth and
students can make serious advance. These committees must be established
at places of work, in the educational
institutions and neighbourhoods and amongst seniors where their members
can take responsibility for their decisions and the actions of their
peers. They can address matters of concern to
themselves, the society and the world. By developing the independent
politics of the working class they can successfully deprive the
monopolies and the governments in their service of the
power to deprive the people of what belongs to them by right because
they are human and depend on the society for their well-being.
All Out to Turn Things Around by
Building the Party's
Basic
Organizations, Committees and Institutions!
Long Live CPC(ML)!
Decisive Importance of the Organizing Method
"Collective
Work, Individual Responsibility" in Building the Mass Communist Party
On the occasion of the 46th Anniversary of its
founding, the Communist Party of Canada (Marxist-Leninist) is
emphasizing the decisive importance of carrying forward the work to
implement the Resolution of the 8th Congress on Party-Building which
states, amongst other things, that Party members must lead by example
based on the guidelines -- Collective
Work, Individual Responsibility and Learning Together; Working
as a Collective; and Taking Up Social Responsibility. The Central
Committee calls on all Party organizations
and members to reflect on the dialectical relationship between
individual responsibility and the collective work and the Party's
methods of work.
Collective work, individual responsibility is a
method of work adopted by The
Internationalists, the precursor
organization of CPC(M-L), and by CPC(M-L) since its founding.
It requires that every member not only implement the decisions agreed
upon but also participates in arriving at them. Whereas participating
in arriving at decisions in society or its various
collectives has historically been considered a privilege and a limited
right, CPC(M-L) emphasizes that such participation is not only a human
and political right but also a duty, according to
the principle that without carrying out duties, rights cannot be
affirmed. It is the method of work that permits the Communist Party to
grow on the soil of Canada by realizing its aim. The
extent to which individuals activate the human factor/social
consciousness is also the extent to which they affirm their right to
conscience. Thus, this method of work also ensures that Party
members can flourish.
 What does collective
work, individual responsibility
mean? It is not uncommon to hear the interpretation that the individual
does what the collective decides. But who is the
collective and how does it decide? What is the role of the individual
within the decision-making process? What is the role of the ideological
front of work in setting agendas? Unless it is
recognized that the first individual responsibility of all members of
CPC(M-L) is to set the agenda of the collective, of their basic
organizations, and what this entails in practical terms, then
all other questions remain devoid of meaning. Who decides what and who
is served by the decision and how the decisions are to be implemented
and by whom are all left in the shade. To
speak of accountability under such a circumstance would be nonsensical.
To participate in setting the agenda of one's own
organization is the point at which the human factor/social
consciousness is activated. It is a matter of determining what work the
basic
organization is to carry out to implement the decisions of the Party at
any particular time, as well as check up on the implementation of the
decisions, analyze the results and carry them
forward. To determine what work is to be performed requires first and
foremost that it be ideologized. What does this mean?
Writing in June, 1995, Comrade Bains made crucial
observations about the
social relationship and the ideological struggle. He pointed out, "The
successful conclusion of any work is determined by how
far ideological struggle is victorious. The claim that work is merely
work and does not involve any ideological struggle is only to assert
the absurdity that work has no foundation in life. As
there can be no economy without its foundation, without its social
relationship; there can be no work without its foundation, without the
ideological struggle guiding it."
Waging the ideological struggle is a prerequisite for
taking individual responsibility for the work of the collective.
Consciousness and organization are the condition for the individual to
flourish and make a contribution. Refusal to participate in setting the
agenda of the collective by addressing the political need betrays an
apolitical and/or non-revolutionary attitude which is
content to preserve the status quo of the bourgeois society where
decision-making is in the hands of the bourgeoisie and the role of the
proletariat is to merely produce what the bourgeoisie
decides. It also accepts that the role of the individual is to "help"
from the outside. This is the outlook inherited from the utilitarian
philosophy on which the bourgeois society was
established -- to be a do-gooder who wants to reform the system to make
it less cruel but does not see the necessity to change it.
It is only by building the organization that the
individual takes ownership of his or her own actions. By participating
in setting the agenda, the consciousness of an individual gets
transformed in tandem with the level of consciousness of the
organization which itself gets raised as a result of practical work of
maximum ideological and political mobilization. Without
this both the individual and the organization remain trapped within the
agenda imposed by bourgeois society and its spontaneity epitomized by
the expression, "the movement is everything,
the ultimate aim is nothing."
The collective sets the work based on the participation
of the individual with the clear ideological presentation of
what the work is as the starting point for its practical
realization. The collective work responds to the decisions taken by the
Congresses of CPC(M-L) and between Congresses, by the Central
Committee. It also corresponds to the demands of
the class struggle at any given time in particular circumstances in
accordance with these decisions and the Party's Program. The individual
plays her or his role to set and enrich the content
of the work of the collective and only on this basis can both the
individual and the collective march on with confidence and make advance.
Comrade Hardial Bains, in his Author's Preface to the
1998 edition of Necessity for Change! states, "The offensive
to establish an organization is the key thing, the most
important element in the preparation of the subjective conditions for
revolution. This organization is the most advanced and most
revolutionary instrument of proletarian revolution in a
society where such revolution has not yet taken place, and an
instrument of expanding the power of such a revolution where it has.
Reluctance, vacillation, amateurishness, spontaneity and
aloofness about such a matter as creating that most advanced, most
organized, vanguard of the working class would finish the revolution
before it even got underway."
The same can be said about
the work to consolidate the
basic organizations of the Communist Party at this time on the basis of
the Party's methods of work. This work, following the
dialectic of internal consolidation, external strength, is
urgently required at this time to embolden and enliven the working
class and position it to lead the creation of a political
movement of the people which turns things around in its favour. The
most important work an organization of the Party can carry out is to
imbue the class and its advanced forces with the
consciousness and organization required to put forward its own aims as
the aim of the society.
The demand of the Communist Party that all members
implement the Party's program by setting the agenda of work at their
level and taking responsibility for its implementation will
strengthen the advanced forces within the working class itself. It is
the starting point for going with confidence to all those who want
change and recognize the necessity for the working
class to be in the van of society and involving them in decision
making. Comrade Bains pointed out in the article "Paying
First-Rate Attention to the Need of the People for
Consciousness and Organization," "If the working class is to lead
everyone in fulfilling its historic mission to create a new society,
people's right to make decisions must be recognized as
must the demand that so doing must be considered a duty as well."
About CPC(M-L)
On March 31, 1970 in Montreal, the Communist Party of
Canada (Marxist-Leninist) was declared founded. With a bold headline,
the newspaper Mass Line
announced "There Is Such a Party!"
CPC(M-L) was founded following six years of political,
ideological and organizational work in the universities, at the places
of work and in the communities, especially since May
1968. This work created ample material conditions for the building of
the party of the proletariat of the new type, the Communist Party of
Canada (Marxist-Leninist), based on
Marxism-Leninism and the experience of revolution and socialism
throughout the world.
Prior to the Party's founding, a three-month discussion
took place across the country on a document circulated to all the
comrades who had come forward to join the Canadian
Communist Movement (Marxist-Leninist). The same document was also
presented for discussion to the delegates who attended the Vancouver
Conference held from December 26-31, 1969.
The founding of the Party was declared at the Patriot's Conference held
in Montreal on March 31, 1970.
The founding of the Communist Party of Canada
(Marxist-Leninist) signalled the birth of the main and most important
subjective force for revolution. Based on the theory of
Marxism-Leninism and the practice of revolution, CPC(M-L)
differentiated itself from all old political and ideological trends
right from the day of its birth.
The Party held its First Congress in Guelph, Ontario
from May 8-22, 1971. The Congress adopted the Party's Constitution and
elected its first Central Committee, comprised of 13
people. Together with the founding of the Party, the First Congress
signaled the victory over all those who did not believe that, to be
effective, the conscious factor had to be provided with
an organizational form. They fought CPC(M-L) in order to smash the form
and destroy the conscious factor, but they were not successful. Even
today, this is the main way attempts are
made to undermine CPC(M-L), leading our Party to pay first-rate
attention to developing the Party's inner-party life guided by its
organizational principle of democratic centralism as the
condition for the success of all its endeavours. The constant attention
the Party pays to its organizational principle is reflected in all its
documents. Party leader Hardial Bains, in the report
on the work of the Central Committee to the Party's Fourth Congress,
pointed out:
"... our Party has also set for itself the continuous
task of defending the organizational principle of democratic
centralism. Democratic centralism can be defended only by defending the
purity of Marxism-Leninism. It is the continuous strengthening of the
Party organization on the basis of Marxism-Leninism in the course of
revolutionary practice. It is the education and
tempering of the comrades as revolutionary Marxist-Leninist fighters.
The Party has taken concrete measures to strengthen the application of
the Leninist principle of democratic centralism;
the ability of the Party to act as a unified and organized force, a
force which is not divorced from the class but lives and works in the
very being of the class as its conscious and most
organized vanguard and its general staff."
Guided by its theory of Contemporary Marxist-Leninist
Thought, the Party establishes unity in thinking on the basis of those
who participate in elaborating the Party's line of march for
any given period or work. Without this, the line of "many centres"
prevails, depriving the working class of its vanguard without which it
loses its bearings. The organizational principle of
democratic centralism serves as a guide so that under all conditions
and circumstances the Party's unity in thinking and action are
realized. Throughout its history the Party has rejected all
the self-serving arguments, many in the name of democratic centralism,
which sought to justify depriving the Party of its unity for purposes
of establishing competing centres. Addressing
two of the main forms the attack on democratic centralism takes,
Hardial Bains pointed out:
"The attack on democratic centralism also takes the
form of bureaucratism, turning the norms based on democratic centralism
into a mere phrase which in fact is aimed at destroying
the Leninist norms as effective revolutionary principles which provide
the Party with iron discipline and safeguard it from all alien class
elements and trends. It also takes the form of
liberalism and neglect of the revolutionary interest. The strengthening
of democratic centralism is the strengthening of the Party's
ideological, political and organizational bases, the resolute
application of the democratic centralist principle in all the work of
the Party and in the mass organizations, in both theory and practice,
and the thorough understanding of all its profound
implications for the diverse fronts on which the Party acts in the
proletariat and other strata as well. All this is absolutely necessary
for the consolidation of the Party as the party of the
class with its revolutionary style. Modern revisionists of all hues and
the opportunists of various shades kowtow to the idea of democratic
centralism and use it pragmatically according to
what suits them for the moment. At one time, they reduce the question
of democratic centralism to mere formality in implementing rules
without regard to the revolutionary interest. At
other times, they demand 'freedom of criticism' and call for the
violation of all norms in order to cause chaos and confusion, aiming to
change the Marxist-Leninist ideology and political
line of the Party. The pragmatic manoeuvres of the modern revisionists
and opportunists and the outright attacks of the anarchists on
democratic centralism aim to deprive the Party of its
stability and fighting capacity, its revolutionary Marxist-Leninist
ideological basis and consistent political strategy and tactics. Thus
in the final analysis, they aim to deprive the proletariat
of its militant and unwavering general staff, the revolutionary
Marxist-Leninist Communist Party, an indispensable weapon and the main
weapon in the class struggle of the proletariat
against the bourgeoisie."
Starting with the reorganization of The
Internationalists into a Marxist-Leninist Youth and Student Movement in
1968, which led to the founding of the Party in 1970, at each stage of
its development the Party has established how the principle of
democratic centralism is turned into organizational forms. By its
Second Congress held in March 1973, the Party celebrated
the victory of the work to unite the Marxist-Leninists into one party.
All serious groups and individuals joined CPC(M-L) during the period
leading up to its Second Congress, marking the
further consolidation and strengthening of the Communist and Workers'
Movement in Canada. Throughout this period, the mettle of CPC(M-L) was
further tempered by carrying out its
plan to unite all the Marxist-Leninists in one party in the course of
waging a life and death struggle against the state-organized attacks
aimed at eliminating CPC(M-L). Our being here today
is testimony that after 46 years of trying, the bourgeoisie and all its
agencies have not succeeded in depriving the working class of its
vanguard because of the resolve of the Canadian
communists and of the working class and people to provide themselves
with the decisive subjective factor for revolution.
The Party's Third Congress, held in
1977, marked the victory over all the anti-Marxist trends. It was
followed by a Special Congress held in 1978 which worked out the
program to
eliminate the adverse consequences of Mao Zedong Thought and
consolidate Marxism-Leninism as the guide to the Party's thinking.
In 1982, by the time the Party held its Fourth
Congress, it was ready to put forward the development of its leading
role as the main task facing the preparation of the subjective
conditions for revolution. It identified the main obstacle to the
development of the Party's leading role as dogmatic posturing which
reduces everything to the level of propaganda, to the
work of a sect which seeks to compete with other sects on the basis of
proving that its line is "correct." Based on the bourgeois world
outlook, this is the way to engage in bourgeois
politics which make social change a matter of understanding and "good"
policy objectives. It is the politics of discrediting its enemies, real
or perceived, depoliticizing the people and
depriving them of the ability to set their own agenda and exercise
control over their lives.
In his book Modern Communism, Communist Party of
Canada (Marxist-Leninist), Comrade Bains pointed out:
"The capitalist class is past master in stirring up
dust and turning all matters that pertain to the field of conscious
conduct into a series of dogmas and catechisms, so as to divert
attention from the main issue facing society. This forces people to
take up secondary questions which do not make a fundamental difference
to their lives."
Describing the method of the bourgeoisie to
depoliticize the polity, Comrade Bains pointed out how all important
matters are marginalized and passions are incited to divide the people
and divert them into doing whatever is harmful to them. This method has
now become the hallmark of political life in this country,
characterized by wrecking on every front. The same
method has its reflection in the trade union movement, amongst the
women and youth and in the Communist and Workers' Movement as well. The
Party deals with this by waging the
ideological and polemical struggle against the system itself, and on
this basis it eliminates the influence of all forms of bourgeois
ideology on the Communist and Workers' Movement
itself.
 Throughout these years a defining quality of
the Party has been to put the problems facing the society on the agenda
and involve the working class and people in providing them with a
solution. After so many years of work we have
been able to sum it up anew so as to provide it with a new impetus.
This is what we are being called upon to do
once again as well. It is this quality which makes the Party the
vanguard of the class. It is because the Party has created a human
force which puts itself at the disposal of what the society
needs, not what any individuals want, that in 1984-85 the Party was
able to sum up the objective conditions, pointing out that the world
had reached a turning point in which no force could
continue to act in the old way. It provided itself with its most
important project of work up to that time, the building of the
technical base for the Mass Party and Mass non-Party Press as
the necessary condition for the development of the enlightenment
movement. In this way, the Party provided the theory and orientation
the society requires in order to find its bearings and
progress. The Party's project to build the technical base for the Mass
Party and Mass non-Party Press remains to date an essential element to
develop the Party's leading role. To this
project, in 1995, the Party added the Modern Communism Information
Project to make sure that modern communism provides the most advanced
vision for the creation of a modern society
in which nothing is left to chance.
The Party analyzed that without developing the movement
for enlightenment, without imbuing the movement with the revolutionary
theory that comes from modern communism, it is
not possible to organize the working class and strengthen the conscious
factor. Without putting the development of the Mass Party Press, the
non-Party Press and the movement for
enlightenment, the elaboration of modern definitions and the defence of
the edifice of communism at the centre of the work, no other work will
succeed. It is the movement for
enlightenment and the Party's Modern Communism Information Project
which present communism in Canada in its full youth and vigour,
elaborating with clarity the final stage of
capitalism and showing that this stage has brought to the fore the task
of opening society's door to progress.
It was the Fourth Congress of the Party which laid the
basis for our current work. This program was endorsed by the Party's
Fifth Congress, held in 1987. The Fifth Congress
emphasized that CPC(M-L) must persist on the course charted during the
turning point in 1984-85. This program of work fully prepared the Party
and all progressive forces to face the
consequences of that turning point as they manifested themselves in the
1989-91 period when the former Soviet Union and regimes in Eastern
Europe collapsed at a rapid speed, ending the
bipolar division of the world and ushering in the current period marked
by the retreat of revolution and utmost retrogression.
More than a quarter of a century has passed since the
period of retrogression and retreat of revolution came into being.
Internationally, the ongoing destruction of the arrangements that
were created following the Second World War and during the era of the
bi-polar division of the world has unleashed unprecedented anarchy and
violence and revealed the impossibility of
the imperialist powers restoring or creating anew an equilibrium among
themselves. The peoples of the world and the countries which maintained
or are seeking an independent development
are fighting the retrogressive pressure, not only waging a valiant
resistance struggle to the anti-social offensive and imperialist
dictate, but seeking the ways to open a path for the progress
of their societies and for peace and security on the world scale.
 The Party's bold leadership
during these past 46 years is testimony to the indispensable need of
the working class for its own Party that can find its way in the
tumultuous and reckless
course in which the Canadian ruling circles are taking the country. As
the international financial oligarchy was doing everything to impose
its brutal anti-social offensive and retrogressive
measures, through its ideo-political and legislative dictate against
the very concept of a society, the Sixth Congress of CPC(M-L) held in
1993 boldly declared, "There is an Alternative." The task it took up to
establish the basic organizations of CPC(M-L) at all places of work, in
the educational institutions, neighbourhoods and all other places where
people such as seniors gather in significant numbers, put the solution
of the main problem facing the society at the centre of the
preoccupation and work of the Party. This is the problem of how
decision-making takes place in the society. It embarked on a new phase
of its work to
engage the bourgeoisie in a political contest so that the situation is
ended whereby no member of the polity can
exercise control over their lives. By building the basic organizations
where the work is, the Party reaffirmed the fundamental democratic
principle that everyone must be able to participate
in arriving at decisions and implementing them. This begins with
setting their own agenda which addresses the concrete reality,
identifies its needs and elaborates a program of work to
address these needs by eliminating all the obstacles which stand in the
way of progress.
Through vigorous all-sided theoretical, ideological and
organizational work to implement its decisions, CPC(M-L) was able to
present to the working class its vision and plan of action
in the form of its Historic Initiative launched on behalf of the Party
by Comrade Bains on January 1, 1995. The aim of the Historic Initiative
is to transform CPC(M-L) into a mass
communist party, lead the working class to constitute itself the nation
and vest sovereignty in the people so as to open society's path to
progress. During this period, CPC(M-L) put forward
its political program for political renewal and a modern constitution,
the program Stop Paying the Rich; Increase Funding for Social
Programs. By endorsing this vision and program
at its Seventh Congress held in March 1998, CPC(M-L) took up the task
of transforming the success of the conscious factor into victory in
order to bring about the deep-going
transformations which are so long overdue. It has established the need
to develop the human factor/social consciousness as a priority, as the
condition for transforming the Party and creating
a new society in which the humanization of the social and natural
environment become the very aim and condition of life -- the very aim
and condition necessary for the humanization of
people themselves.
The 8th Congress of the Party held in 2008 reaffirmed
the decisive role the human factor/social consciousness plays in
changing the world. The Report to the Congress emphasized:
"Winning over class-conscious workers to take up the immediate
organizational tasks of CPC(M-L) is crucial at this time. The most
pressing tasks are to continue consolidating the Mass
Party Press, to pay first rate attention to organizing the workers into
Groups of Writers and Disseminators and to mobilize the workers, women,
youth, students and minorities to take up the
work of renewal of the democratic process. The entire CPC(M-L) is
organized to win over class conscious workers and their allies
especially women, youth, students and minorities to take
up the work of the Party as their own."
CPC(M-L)'s 8th Congress, August 2008
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