this post was submitted on 10 Sep 2025
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I've been looking at the PSL for a while now, but I am an anarcho-syndicalist and am not sure how I would be received. I WHOLLY believe that there has to be unity on the left, and I agree with a lot of ML thought, I just don't even know if I would be an acceptable candidate to join.
I guess that's to say: Do you know their thoughts on anarchists and having anarchists working within their org?
@Cowbee@lemmy.ml thanks for the summon
Everything he said in his comment is correct, so I'll just build from there.
If you're a self-identified anarchist, then your onboarding conversations will involve a lot of discussion about the difference between your positions and the party's. You're not going to be brought in as a member if you have deep, fundamental disagreements with our program, so you should read it and see how you feel. More than your take on China or the USSR, they're going to want to know about your views on how to build a revolution and what sort of organization is appropriate for that. They're far less concerned about your ideas than your willingness to operate as a party cadre per the party's expectations.
It's a different approach than the anarchist style of organizing. The focus is on training, education, discipline, and building the revolutionary vanguard party, which we see as a necessary weapon in the class war. You will be given specific roles and responsibilities, schedules, expectations, and will occasionally just need to follow orders. Though I don't want to overemphasize that. It's still an organization made of people who want to abolish all oppression and who take human dignity and liberation as their primary task, and everyone in the party has a lot of agency in what and how they want to do it.
I have seen two anarchists join my branch and both were great additions. One has been in for almost two years now and speaks in glowing terms about their work. They definitely don't identify as an anarchist anymore. The other was in for a few months and did great, but her whole social circle was the local anarchist scene and they threatened to cut her out of their lives for joining a "tankie cult", so she left due to external pressure. We're still on good terms with her and she helps with events semi-regularly.
Really, you just gotta talk to some party members. Apply to join and you'll start that conversation.
(In at least lemmy-ui, the web frontend) A markdown link must start with
https://otherwise it will have the instance url prepended. So your link becomes https://lemmy.ml/post/pslweb.org/program when it of course should have been https://pslweb.org/programhuh, have all my linkies been all fucked up?
Seems so, this one from a day ago is also fucked up.
Also, the first link in your comment above is still broken!
what a fool I've been
It's not your fault. It's a very weird feature no one would expect.
@jack@hexbear.net should be able to better give an answer, as he's one of the more vocal members I know of around here. However, they're a fully DemCent org. You can't just mouth off against the party line publicly if you become a full party member, which takes around a year of training and vetting. This means each member is a valuable, effective cadre, but it also means you're expected to uphold the party line even if you disagree with it. Debate is internal on what the party line should be, not public-facing. Personally, that's a fantastic thing IMO and it means they are more effective.
As for anarcho-syndicalism, I think that's pretty easily the simplest jump from the anarchist umbrella to ML, what about Marxism-Leninism puts you off from it? Depending on your issues with Marxism-Leninism, it may or may not be a big deal, or it may be as simple as a misconception you had. I used to be an anarchist, so I may be able to help bridge that gap if that's something you're interested in.
Thank you for the quick reply!
I wouldn't want to join to be outspokenly against anything and I understand the necessity for party unity. It absolutely makes perfect sense that disagreement should be handled internally and decided upon within the party.
But here is where I differ. I cannot bring myself to believe in a system where there is any centralized authority or hierarchy. To me it flies in the face of freedom and liberation. However, and I may be making the mistakes of the CNT/FAI, Makhno, etc..., I also believe that we must collaborate and coordinate to move toward a state-less society.
I'd love to discuss it with you. I am always open to discussion, reading, etc...
No problem, comrade!
The Marxist point of view on the state and authority vs the anarchist point of view is the big one, really. What ultimately drove me from anarchism and towards Marxism in general was the Marxist stance on the state and the concept of scientific socialism. In case you aren't super familiar, an oversimplified analysis is that the very same centralization that is economically compelled by capitalism leads to the foundations of a collectively run and planned economy.
Small, disparate firms are hard to coordinate, but the large syndicates of today have already developed the machinery necessary for collective ownership and planning. The Marxist stance is that this next stage of production, socialism, is economically prepared by capitalism itself. Anarchism on the other hand focuses more on prefiguration and decentralization as a deliberate form of praxis, which wasn't as convincing to me as a historical process, especially when it comes to large-scale production that is necessary to truly meet the needs of everyone with as little labor as possible, rather than decentralized networks.
As for the state, the Marxist interpretation is of the state as an instrument of class oppression, not a class itself. The state isn't above the ruling class, so the way to abolish the state is to abolish class. Class can only truly be abolished by fully collectivizing production, not by forming small cooperatives and communes, syndicates, etc, as this forms divisions in ownership and unequal relations to production. This means some form of state will still naturally arise to resolve differences between these classes.
Hierarchy isn't necessarily a bad thing. The strategian and tactician have different views and occupy different, necessary positions. Production is the same way! Managing huge, complex supply chains and automation requires coordination, and this requires administration. That doesn't mean this cannot be handled democratically, but at its most effective this requires administrative positions.
Overall, liberation and freedom can only be truly achieved by abolishing class, as that's the only way to move beyond the state in the eyes of Marxists. Until then, the state must be owned by the working class to oppress capitalists and resist imperialism. The state withers by gradually collectivizing production, rendering itself superfluous.
That's the gist of it! I linked a theory reading list in the beginning, I recommend the first 2 works, Why Socialism? and Why Marxism? if you want to get more in-depth with it!