International Socialists

There are three vital lessons to be learned from the history of the anti-fascist movement. Every movement that has stuck to these three principles has succeeded and, as the German workers' movement in the 1930s tragically proves, every movement that has ignored them has failed. These three lessons are Call the Nazis by their real name; Confront the Nazis; and Don't rely on politicians or the state. The French left needs to learn these lessons, and learn them fast, if Le Pen is to be smashed.

 

 

1) Call the Nazis by their real name

For years, people from across the political spectrum refused to recognise the very real threat posed by the Nazis. Until recently, very few people - including intellectuals who write about the National Front, politicians, media and even anti-racist activists - were unwilling to call Le Pen or other members of the NF "Nazis."

 

But we need to be very clear that this is what they are. Le Pen, who called the Holocaust a "detail of history," wants to stir up hatred against immigrants. He wants to deny immigrants equal access to housing, health and welfare. He wants to write racism into the very letter of French law. If allowed to grow the National Front would smash the organised workers' movement, unleash a campaign of persecution against France's immigrant communities and attack the most basic civil rights.

 

Calling the NF Nazis is vital because it is only by understanding what makes fascism different from other kinds of racist or reactionary movements that activists can take up the strategies to stop them.

 

 

2) Confront the Nazis

The National Front has grown because they have not been systematically challenged. The electoral success of the Nazis reveals their social weakness. Parties like the NF build by organising a soft layer of support around a hard core following. Direct, physical confrontation can break them by driving a wedge between the people who may agree with some of their false ideas - that immigrants will take away jobs, for example - and those murderous thugs who make up the hard core of the organisation.

 

Once we have driven a wedge between the hard core and the soft layer of support then the appeal and the power of the Nazis is challenged and greatly reduced. Nazi groups gain support through giving their members and followers a sense of power and purpose. If we can deprive them of this we can deprive the Nazis of their allure.

 

The best way to do this is through mass, militant confrontations. We need to organise all those who oppose the Nazis to break up their meetings, smash their marches and tear down their posters. In short, we need to make it impossible for them to organise or demonstrate By Whatever Means Necessary.

 

But won't this lead to more violence? Actually, the opposite is true. The rise of the National Front has gone hand in hand with more racist attacks and murders. Studies have shown that the highest proportion of racist murders occur in areas where the NF has support. Allowing the Nazis to organise and demonstrate gives them more confidence to attack immigrants.

 

One of the most instructive examples of a movement successfully confronting the Nazis was in Lewisham, London in 1977. On August 13 the main Nazi organisation, the National Front, planned to march towards Lewisham, a Black neighbourhood in London. Two counter demonstrations were organised - one planned to march away from the Nazis and another, called by a socialist group (the Socialist Workers' Party) and a local defence committee for Black youths, planned to stop the National Front from marching into Lewisham. The NF were protected by thousands of police.

 

The 5,000 strong demonstration - uniting Black youth, veteran anti-fascists from the 1930s, socialists, Rastafarians and others - not only prevented the Nazis from gathering at their intended rendezvous, but physically blocked their path into Lewisham. The police tried to disperse the anti-Nazis, but they regrouped and pelted the fascists with sticks, smoke bombs and bottles. The victory elated the anti-Nazis and gave their confidence a tremendous boost.

 

Lewisham completely demoralised the hard core Nazis and totally alienated their soft supporters - a blow which they have never fully recovered from in England. It is this way that the French National Front can be stopped - not by calling demonstrations that allow the Nazis to go about their business, but by physically confronting them and smashing them.

 

 

3) Don't rely on politicians or the state

The politicians who govern France - especially President Chirac - have actually contributed to an environment which breeds fascism. By scapegoating immigrants and encouraging racism, conservative and social democratic politicians have made many of the Nazis' claims seem legitimate.

 

We cannot turn to the police to stop the Nazis either - as Lewisham showed, they will side with the Nazis and protect them. Indeed, the British police needed to get revenge for the victory of the anti-fascists at Lewisham, and got it by brutally attacking an anti-Nazi demonstration and killing New Zealand socialist Blair Peach two years latter. Any laws passed to stop the Nazis meeting or marching will more likely just be used against the left and workers' organisations.

 

The force that has the power to kill the Nazi menace once and for all is the working class. In the short term we can defeat the Nazis by driving them off the streets. But in order to be truly free of the threat of fascism, we need to offer a real solution to the problems that they exploit.

 

In other words, we need to fight them on a class basis - when the National Front attacks immigrants and blames them for unemployment, anti-Nazi activists need to counter them by fighting for more jobs and better social services for all workers. That will require building a revolutionary socialist party in France that can link together individual militants in factories, hospitals and schools and not only lead them in fighting the Nazis, but in connecting their immediate demands with the fight for a socialist society.

 

 

Further reading

On the Web, check out the British Anti-Nazi League

 

Your local Socialist Review seller or International Socialists' stall should have copies of Chris Bambery's Killing the Nazi Menace available for sale. This is an excellent short pamphlet about how to stop the fascists.

 

For those who want to look at the issue in more depth, Leon Trotsky's The Struggle Against Fascism in Germany (New York: Pathfinder, 1971) is invaluable.

 

 

France: danger and hope 

[Part 1]   Le Pen - Le Fascist!

[Part 2]   How do the Nazis grow?

[Part 3]   How do we beat the Nazis?