The International Socialist Organization and ‘Cycles of Splits’
Over a decade ago, Mike Macnair published an article 1 in the Weekly Worker describing a “slow-motion ‘split’” in the Communist Party of Great Britain - Provisional Central Committee (CPGB-PCC). Three comrades (presumably on the younger side) had left the CPGB without voicing a united or coherent oppositional perspective. One particular comrade had spoken about the difficulty he had experienced forming a coherent oppositional perspective when faced with more experienced members of the majority. The rather confused statement that the comrades would continue to defend the CPGB’s draft program in their new political homes led Macnair to state that, on its face, the departure appeared non-political. The rest of Macnair’s article details the reasons why the split was eminently political. Though a small event, the split demonstrated “core” problems facing the British far left. Macnair’s article led to a reflection on my time in the International Socialist Organisation (ISO) in the United S...