I'm slowly getting through my e-mail, anyway I had a question e-mailed to me a few days ago from a chap called Nathan.

Could you please make a list of differences between leninism and marxism i cant find one anywhereand you seem to know alot, it would be greatly appreciated.

This is one of those questions you can ask 10 different socialists and get 10 different answers, unfortunately there is no such thing as the Communist Check-list, where everything is neatly divided up and we can just quickly run down and decide what is what.

I've already written a bit on this topic on the request of one of my readers, but it looks like Nathan is after a more direct answer and so I will try to be brief which I know will simply and overlook many concepts.

Marxism I suppose could be summed up as a broad set of ideas on how capitalism works, on how working people must liberate themselves from capitalism and on how history is driven, namely through class struggle.

Lenin, in my opinion brought forward two key additions.

1) Updates on how capitalism functions, from 1900 onwards, through imperialism, what he called the highest stage of capitalism. Where the imperialist countries maintain their control of, and exploitation of 3rd world countries by owning their means of production, allowing them to buy off a layer of workers in their own countries to attempt to offset revolution. Like so many aspects of Marxism, it is truer today then when it was written.

2) How in police states and under-developed countries like Russia at the time, the final act in a revolution needs to be led by a dedicated group of activists in a relatively small party.

Time and time again throughout history even in developed countries we've seen the working class led to the top of a hill by a social-bourgeois party, only to be led back down once the leaders are either brought off, or chicken out. A dedicated revolutionary party should help take them the extra step.

3) Some would also include Trotsky's work on making revolution in 3rd world countries by the small number of workers leading the peasantry to take power, and then carrying out the reforms that would of taken place in a democratic, developed country themselves, instead of sitting back and waiting for the capitalists to struggle to do them - if ever. Which essentially the Bolshevik Party adopted in the middle of 1917.

A lot of people would chuck all of that under Marxism, after all Marxism is a body of ideas and many people have contributed to it. Marxism-Leninism has I believe been widely misused by Stalinists and Maoists for their own nationalistic agendas, completely opposite to the internationalism of Marx and Lenin.

I also recommend having a look at the FAQ on YfIS.

I was invited to attend the Yeovil Trades Council meeting yesterday. I was pleased to see the discussion was very open and it sparked a debate about being in or out of the Labour Party, one I've had with myself prior to joining for many years.

I wasn't able to get all of my thoughts out at the meeting on this, so here they are.

A couple of comrades brought up the point that because the Labour government was carrying out a neo-liberal agenda, which is perfectly true, such as moving the postal service in the direction of privitisation etc, they shouldn't have our support and we should attempt to form a new party.

Lenin said the Labour Party was a bourgeois-workers party, so we shouldn't be surprised that the leadership is carrying out a bourgeois program, with some concessions that is after all what they have been doing since it was founded.

It is a valid point to say that New Labour is far worse, and that Brown is even more right-wing than Blair. So we should look for an explanation why, I believe one possible candidate would be the state of socialists within the party. I believe thanks to all the people saying work outside the party, or attempting splits it has allowed the leadership to get away with far too much.

The state of the Labour Party is the way it is firstly because of the purges during the 1980s which weakened the left, largely thanks to the help of the media, Thatcher and the Labour leaders and their "longest suicide note in history" crap, and later because of so many people calling on their comrades to abandon the party.

If we lose the Labour Party, we lose the political wing of the working class. Instead of having the couple of dozen socialists in parliament we have nobody, 2.5 business parties sitting opposite each other. In effect handing the bourgeoisie total control of the parliament.

The fight for Labour isn't over, the next few years I think will be crucial, as a few comrades mentioned the possibility of losing the next election is something we need to be aware of, the polls are grim reading. But will an election defeat strengthen New Labour? Of course not it probably destroy it, it will end the one thing they've had going for them with all the moderates inside the party "we can win elections" doesn't amount to much when you lose an election.

Marxism-Leninism also cropped up, and how that the USSR and China are bad, oppressive and so on and so forth, Dave (Bridgewater TUC). How that has any relevance is beyond me, if anything it seemed more like an ad hominem against Ken (sorry I forgot your last name) from the Communist Party of Britain.

By the same logic one would attack democracy because George Bush declares he is for democracy - or any number of things. Marxists should not hand over our words just because Stalinist and Maoist revisionists like to use them.

Marxism-Leninism, or Bolshevism is important for the working class, the Labour Party is not capable of revolution, its a mass party of the working class, but still bourgeois which we should use to win progressive advancements for the working class. However when the time comes and the labour leadership are brought off on the edge of revolution, we need a revolutionary party to finish the job.

With Respect falling apart around us, (shocking I know), the SWP seems to of reverted to a more aggressive state. Their national organiser nonetheless assaulted a previously expelled SWP member at this year's Marxism event (they're calling it a festival now).

The CPGB's Weekly Worker has the details.

On July 7, the second full day of this year's Marxism, SWP national organiser Martin Smith physically assaulted Communist Party comrade, Simon D. The attack occurred while our comrade was waiting for the session on 'Organising for fighting unions' to begin.

Simon was a member of the SWP for three years up to 2006, when he was suddenly expelled (by phone!) for "bringing the party into disrepute" - the catch-all charge loved by bureaucrats everywhere. In fact, all he was 'guilty' of was raising some criticisms and questions publicly and reporting on his blog - verbatum - the words of leading SWPers at a Respect meeting in Tower Hamlets. At the comrade’s appeal, led by Pat Stack and where Martin Smith gave 'evidence', he was not given any specific examples of his alleged crimes. He was subjected to a show trial with no pretence of allowing the comrade a fair hearing and then was simply turfed out.

The faster the SWP falls into irrelevance the better, Respect has been nothing but a joke, and the Socialist Alliance was doomed thanks to the utter bureaucracy within the SWP.

The Labour Party is the way forward, not a minor left-wing sect that goes around beating people who disagree with them up.