Tailism – not foresight

Wellred

Core Argument

Here, Trotsky dissects the political trajectory of the Independent Labour Party (ILP), arguing that its apparent leftward turn is a superficial shift from one opportunist pole to another. The chapter’s core narrative thrust is that the ILP leadership has abandoned the bankrupt “Socialist Britain Now” sectarianism not through a Marxist process of self-criticism, but by blindly lurching into a full-blown, tailist subordination to the Labour Party bureaucracy. The conference resolutions, Trotsky contends, represent a vindication of Marxist criticism, yet the leadership has adopted the very policy—urging Labour to break the coalition and take power—that it had previously denounced as sowing illusions and preparing the ground for fascism. The key claim is that the ILP has not learned from its errors but has merely stumbled into the opposite error, now offering an even more vulgar and dangerous expression of opportunism.

Trotsky draws on Lenin’s formulations to establish the correct revolutionary approach: addressing Labour Party members directly, demanding an end to the political truce, and presenting a transitional programme. He contrasts this with the ILP leadership’s method, which he characterises as backstage manoeuvring and horse-trading with reformism. The evidence is drawn from the ILP’s own resolutions and publications. The NAC resolution’s conditional offer to call a special conference on affiliation only if Labour breaks the truce is presented as proof of the leadership’s cravenness. Trotsky argues that the question of affiliation is tactical, not principled, but the ILP’s method guarantees “unconditional surrender” to reformism, with the ILP acting as a harmless left shield for the Labour bureaucracy against the masses’ inevitable radicalisation.

The polemic is directed squarely at the ILP leadership, particularly Maxton, Brockway, and McNair. Trotsky savages Maxton’s parliamentary speech appealing to Conservative “kindness and decency” as the essence of the ILP’s betrayal—a nauseating sentimentality that disarms working-class hatred of the exploiters. McNair’s faith in Labour’s “best intentions” is dismissed with Lenin’s reminder that no “sincerometer” exists; only objective results matter. The desertion of George Buchanan to reformism, met with the leadership’s good wishes, is cited as an annihilating indictment of the party’s centrist character. The chapter concludes that on every fundamental question, the ILP’s position is identical: tailism, not foresight.