Communist Party record in Harlem reassessed

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Fourth International sponsors youth summer camp 14 SOCIALIST ACTION OCTOBER 1984 Communists in Harlem During the Great Depression, by Mark Naison. University of Illinois Press, 1983, 335 pp., $19.95.

A young professor of Afro-American studies at Fordham University and a veteran of the New Left, Mark Naison is part of a new generation of radical scholars dedicated to reassessing the history of the Communist Party of the United States. Naison and his associates tend to be critical of Stalinism but are unwilling to accept earlier depictions of the Communist movement as a conspiracy of dupes following orders from Moscow in lockstep fashion. ConseBOOK REVIEW quently, they have returned to a study of primary materials—publications, collections of papers, documents, and personal interviews-in order to humanize the participants in the Communist movement and examine the practical work of the party with greater subtlety.

Communists in Harlem during the Great Depression is perhaps the outstanding work of this school to date, typifying the strengths aș well as weaknesses of this endeavor. Naison provides a careful scrutiny of what was actually done in Harlem by the Communists between 1928 and 1941, as well as a portrait of the men and women who carried out the work.

The book's strength lies in its description of specific episodes that recapture the central experiences of the era. Two of the most dramatic are the recreations of the 1935 uprising known as the "Harlem Riot," and the 25,000-strong mass mobilization of Blacks and whites in Harlem against the Italian invasion of Ethiopia. Naison also provides wellcrafted vignettes of many party and non-party figures.

The Communists began their work in Harlem in the late 1920s with about 15 members, mostly West Indians. Under directives from the party leadership, scores of white members-mostly second-generation East European Jews who worked as teachers and social workers-moved into Harlem and began agitating. Following the national success of its defense campaign for the "Scottsboro Boys" (nine Black youths framed up on rape charges in the South), the party continued to grow until it reached nearly 1000 by the end of the thirties.

Popular Front strategy

The turning point for all of Communist history in the Depression is unquestionably the adoption of the Popular Front strategy in 1935. At the behest of the Communist International [under Stalin], the American Party switched from an ultra-revolutionary orientation to a liberal one that included backhanded support to Franklin Delano Distributors of Socialist Action in Canada:

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Socialist Challenge Box 12082 Edmonton, Alta. Roosevelt. In Harlem, the mass mobilizations that were the hallmark of the party in the early 1930s were progressively displaced by an emphasis on electoral organizations, and the more nationalist West Indian leaders were replaced by less independent-minded Afro-Americans with an inflexible integrationist perspective.

Unfortunately, it is precisely in coming to grips with this crucial phenomenon that Naison falters. He does aptly point out specific problems and weaknesses stemming from the Popular Front. These include the disastrous series of political turn-abouts that came at the time of the Hitler-Stalin Pact (the Communists had to drop their support for Frank Crosswaith's candidacy in mid-election, switching to Adam Clayton Powell, who kept silent about Stalin's treachery), and the decline of militancy caused by the Communists' decision to support the United States government during World War II.

Nevertheless, Naison's assessment of the Popular Front is ambiguous: Is he only distressed because the Communists The Black Forest region of West Germany was the scene of an exciting event July 20-29. Over 600 young socialist activists-average age 21—gathered to exchange ideas and strategies. They came from mass movements as varied as the school strikes in Belgium and the enormous and still-growing Youth Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (YCND) in Britain.

The event was the first of a planned series of International Youth Summer Camps sponsored by youth organizations in solidarity with the Fourth International.

The largest delegations were those of the Roter Maulwurf (Red Mole) from West Germany, with 150 people, and the Jeunesses Communistes Revolutionaires (Revolutionary Communist Youth), with about 120 from France. Other countries represented by substantial delegations were Switzerland, Italy, Sweden, Denmark, and Great Britain. Spain was represented by about 30 young people, many of whom were Catalan or Basque. Austria, the Netherlands, Belgium, and Luxembourg sent smaller contingents, and People's Democracy, the section of the Fourth International acted undemocratically, hypocritically, and on orders from a foreign power? Or does he also understand that Popular Front strategy itself (the subordination of independent working-class politics to the liberal bourgeoisie) was a political disaster for the left and the Black liberation struggle?

Lacks perspective

There is no question that Communists in Harlem is a work of serious scholarship dedicated to the goal of interracial solidarity. However, in spite of its accomplishment in humanizing the Communist movement and providing new details, the book is rather sketchy when it comes to projecting policies that might have led to greater success.

Naison obviously favors greater autonomy for Black party members and suggests that the formation of all-Black party branches and cultural organizations might have resolved certain tensions. But he lacks a clear and incisive perspective on a strategy for Black liberation that shows an effective relation"Roter Maulwurf," symbol of the German youth group of the Fourth International rising squatters' movements throughout Europe, or the Youth Training Schemes in Britain. Other themes for meetings included the fights against the missiles and militarization, against racism, and ship for Black and white militants, such as can be found in George Breitman's useful pamphlet How a Minority Can Change Society (Merit, 1968).

Without a cogent theorization of the class forces involved in the struggle, as well as the dynamics of national oppression, Naison's book actually lends itself to fostering a variety of political conclusions, including the very liberal anti-communism that under certain circumstances gave birth to the kind of scholarship that Naison and his associates are trying to transcend.

Still, the data made available in Communists in Harlem will assist contemporary Marxist activists in assessing the meaning of various debates and the correctness of certain policies, positions, and attitudes. It will be the integration of Breitman's kind of theoretical consciousness about political strategy with Naison's kind of careful empirical research into the experience of predecessor socialists, that will bring about the full recovery of our radical heritage and enable us to continue our efforts to eradicate racism. against the oppression of women. Evenings were filled with film showings, informal discussions, and disco.

The most important aspect of the camp was the unique opportunity to hear about work that other youth organizations all over the world were doing and to exchange ideas and discuss tactics. The high point occurred with the visit of Uriel Ortega, the representative of Juventud Sandinista, the youth organization of the FSLN, on the day devoted to Central American solidarity. Ortega was welcomed with a full-scale demonstration and the singing of the Sandinista national anthem. One of the practical fruits of this collaboration was a meeting between the heads of each delegation and Ortega in order to plan for a second European tour of young Nicaraguans.

The camp provided an opportunity to create closer ties and promote mutual confidence and respect among young people and their organizations from all over the world. It closed with a resolution to send more young people to the next Fourth International Summer Youth Camp.