International Socialist Organization

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The International Socialist Organization (ISO) is a revolutionary socialist organization in the United States that identifies with the politics of International Socialism, a form of Trotskyism, and the Marxist political tradition that American Trotskyist writer and activist Hal Draper called "socialism from below".^[1]

Contents 1 History 2 Publications 3 Activities 4 See also 5 References 6 External links 6.1 Criticisms of the ISO

[edit] History

The ISO originated in 1976 among a number of groups in the International Socialists (IS) that were growing increasingly critical of the organization's leadership. Among them was the self-identified Left Faction, which was led by Cal and Barbara Winslow and supported by the IS's Canadian and British members. The Left Faction and its international supporters maintained that the IS's leadership had acquired a top-down style of operating that depoliticized the organisation and that it placed too much emphasis on sending student activists into working class employment (a tactic referred to as "industrialization"). These disputes followed the disagreements over the 1974 revolution in Portugal. In 1977, the Left Faction was expelled from the IS, and immediately formed the International Socialist Organization.^[2] The ISO began publication of its paper, Socialist Worker, shortly after its formation, and continues to rely on it as an organizational resource.^[3]

Some of the political theories adopted by the ISO had been developed in the British Socialist Workers Party (SWP), including that of state capitalism. State capitalist theory identifies the former Soviet Union and Eastern Bloc as exploitative class societies driven by military competition with private Western capitalism, rather than as the deformed workers' states that Trotsky describes maintained they were in The Revolution Betrayed.^[4] Disagreement over whether the Soviet Union constituted a state capitalist entity or a deformed workers' state continues to be a point of contention between socialists, as it can affect how contemporary struggles against Western imperialism are framed.^{[citation needed]}

Having a small membership in the 1980s, the ISO found that its primary organizing efforts toward rank and file work in the unions was unsustainable.^{[citation needed]} From the early 1980s, the group began organizing and recruiting on university campuses.^{[citation needed]} The decision to focus primarily on students was regarded as a necessary retreat, given the conservative nature of the Reagan era.^{[citation needed]}

In the 1990s the ISO expanded^{[citation needed]} and participated in a series of movements and campaigns, including the movement against the first Gulf War^{[citation needed]} and other US military interventions,^{[citation needed]} against racism,^[5] and for abortion rights.^[6] The group was involved in building a number of the major protests against corporate globalization in the early 2000s,^[7] and has been active in opposing what it refers to as "US imperialism" connected with the "war on terror" in the wake of September 11th, including the invasion of Afghanistan as well as the Iraq War.^[8] The group has also been active in opposing Israel's occupation of Palestine.^[9]

In 2001 the ISO was expelled from the International Socialist Tendency (IST) after a dispute between the British SWP and the leadership of the ISO. This dispute was framed by the SWP as a critique of the ISO's conservative approach to the anti-corporate/anti-capitalist movement.^[10] The ISO disputed this claim and criticized the SWP for maintaining what the ISO viewed as an exaggerated perspective for the 1990s^{[citation needed]}, which the SWP termed 'the 1930s in slow motion.'^[11]

[edit] Publications

The organization publishes an online and print newspaper, Socialist Worker with a bi-monthly Spanish language supplement, Obrero Socialista, and a bi-monthly magazine, the International Socialist Review. For much of the ISO's history Socialist Worker was printed weekly, but in February 2008 the organization announced a change to a biweekly print schedule with more regular updates to the website. ^[12] The ISO also has a publishing house, Haymarket Books started in the year 2000, which publishes both new titles and classics from the socialist tradition. Haymarket Books collaborates with many other independent publishers on common publishing projects and events.^[13]

[edit] Activities

The ISO participates in several local and national progressive movements. These include the antiwar movement,^[14] efforts to end the death penalty,^[15] support for gay marriage^[16] and abortion rights,^[17] the struggle for immigration rights,^[18] among others.

The ISO does not support either the Republican or Democratic party, both of which it views as capitalist representatives of corporate power and empire. The group has, however, campaigned for the Green Party in various races and assisted Ralph Nader's presidential campaigns in 2000 and 2004.^[19] In California in 2006, ISO member Todd Chretien challenged Diane Feinstein for a seat in the United States Senate on the Green Party ticket, receiving 139,425 votes (1.8 percent) of the vote.^[20]

[edit] See also

• Socialism
• Marxism
• Trotskyism
• List of Trotskyist internationals
• Workers' Councils
• International Socialists
• Democratic Socialists of America

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Official Website of ISO
• Socialist Worker - Paper of the ISO
• International Socialist Review - Magazine of the ISO

[edit] Criticisms of the ISO

• "How not to build an antiwar movement: a comment on the politics of the ISO", Bill Van Auken, World Socialist Website, International Committee of the Fourth International (ICFI), 1 July 2005. (Orthodox Trotsyist critisicm).
• "ISO's Right Turn to Labor", from Proletarian Revolution No. 51, published by the Communist Organization for the Fourth International (COFI). (Orthodox Trotsyist critisicm).
• "An American Tragedy: the International Socialist Organisation", from The Anti-Capitalist Movement and the Revolutionary Left, Alex Calliicos, SWP (UK), 2001. (Criticism from the International Socialist Tendency).
• What You Should Know about the International Socialist Organization, Infoshop, Anti-copyright 2009. (Anarchist criticism that sees all Leninist organizations as "authoritarian.")