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﻿<title﻿>﻿New Socialist Magazine, Another Step Toward Becoming an Anti-capitalist Party in a Difficult Situation - PDS Convention/99 - Article﻿</title>﻿
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﻿<b﻿>﻿Another Step Toward Becoming an Anti-capitalist Party in a Difficult Situation 
﻿<br﻿>﻿PDS Convention/99
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by Marc Bonhomme﻿<br﻿>﻿
﻿<i﻿>﻿New Socialist Magazine, September - October 1999﻿</i>﻿<br﻿>﻿<br﻿>﻿<br﻿>﻿
﻿</center>﻿
From June 11 to 13, the Parti de la Democratie Socialiste (PDS) held its first convention since fall 1996. This convention underlined the continuous fundamental change of the party since it severed its links with the federal NDP in 1989 and took a more ecological stance. Then, in 1991, the NPD-Quebec took up the demand for Quebec independence. In 1992, it democratized its rules, including the possibility of accepting groups as collective members. This allowed Gauche Socialiste, the Quebec section of the Fourth International, to join in 1994. The PDS's program went through two major transformations: the first one in 1994 which rejected NAFTA, and then in 1996 when its social democratic program became anti- capitalist with such demands as a freeze on the interest payments on the public debt and the expropriation of the banks. In 1995, the party changed its name from NPD-Quebec to PDS. 
﻿<br﻿>﻿<br﻿>﻿
A major pre-convention event for the PDS was its participation in the November 1998 Quebec elections with the most candidates ever for a left party in the history of Quebec, 97 out of a possible 125. But because of a shift to the right like that seen in the June 1999 Ontario election, and also because of the name change, the PDS managed only 0.6 percent of the popular vote, less than in 1994 when it got a bit less than 1 percent. But efforts to build the party in the long pre-electoral campaign, and then in the election period and its aftermath, were successful, as shown by an increase in the dues-paying membership from around 300 to around 600 in the election year and also by greater participation by members in the party's activities. 
﻿<br﻿>﻿<br﻿>﻿
Thus the June convention was attended by around 80 people compared to around 40 in 1996. There was a relatively good mix by gender and age, a good representation of activists in the popular movement but a poor representation of union activists and of anglophone and allophone minorities including visible minorities. 
﻿<br﻿>﻿<br﻿>﻿
As for the non-francophone left, with a few exceptions (e.g. the PDS treasurer is an Ukrainian-born anglophone), its supporters prefer to be active in the cosmopolitan internationalist or ecological movements (where they are over-represented) because of their opposition to, or uncomfortable relationship with, LÕIndependence. For many of them, it gives them the feeling of being more internationalist than those "nationalist" Independantistes. The other side of the coin is the relative isolation of the PDS from these communities and even from other anti-capitalist parties in Canada and in the United States.
﻿<br﻿>﻿<br﻿>﻿
Although dissident union activists have started to regroup in Quebec over the last two years, they are reluctant to go beyond rejecting the union leadership's strategy of partnership with the Parti Quebecois to strategically reject the PQ and build a workers'/people's party. Because this rupture would be strategic, a resumption of the fightback movement is probably its pre- condition. Many such activists prefer to stick with the Rassemblement Pour Une Alternative Politique (RAP) born in the fall of 1997, with its muddled movement status, its vague manifesto and its non-compromising thematic conferences. 
﻿<br﻿>﻿<br﻿>﻿
﻿<b﻿>﻿The cold love between the RAP and the PDS﻿</b>﻿
﻿<br﻿>﻿<br﻿>﻿
The participants in the PDS convention showed clearly their discontent with the RAP, which at the last minute fielded seven candidates in the election without even trying to negotiate a coalition, including in two ridings in which the PDS already had candidates. The justified discontent among PDS members revealed, however, the beginnings of a sectarian attitude towards the RAP even if the RAP announced a fall convention to debate its transformation into a party for the year 2000 (since then, this has been transformed into a seminar on the unity of the left). In any case, like it or not, it must be remembered that the RAP accurately reflects the state of mind of probably the majority of left activists in Quebec.
﻿<br﻿>﻿<br﻿>﻿
Fortunately, the executive of the RAP met with the executive of the PDS in early July to invite it to the RAP seminar as a party and not only as a collection of activists to be plundered. It remains to be seen where the relationship with the RAP will lead the PDS: to a full merger because the RAP has given itself a somewhat anti-capitalist program and practice, a partial merger in which the PDS would become the left wing of a more or less social democratic party, an electoral coalition of two different parties or not even that. Or will the RAP remain a movement backing (or not backing) the PDS, as more and more people are suggesting ? 
﻿<br﻿>﻿<br﻿>﻿
To be sure, the PDS is ready to make major steps in order for the Quebec nation to have a mass workers'/people's party for the first time in its history. The bungling of the Parti Socialiste du Quebec (PSQ) in the sixties because it missed the independence issue, the sectarian ultra- left marxist-leninist experience of the seventies and finally the purely electoralist Mouvement Socialiste (MS) of the early eighties (right at the beginning of the neo- liberal counter-offensive), are enough missed opportunities.
﻿<br﻿>﻿<br﻿>﻿
﻿<b﻿>﻿The difficulty and challenge of "building the party in the social struggle"﻿</b>﻿
﻿<br﻿>﻿<br﻿>﻿
The purpose of the PDS convention was "to build the party in the social struggle," that is to say to go from an anti-capitalist program to an anti-capitalist practice. To do this, the party decided to propose to the social movements the waging of a campaign for a major immediate reinvestment of at least $10 billion in public services, for employment equity and for jobs. The reason for this campaign is, first, that the cutbacks of the federal Liberals and the PQ since 1994 have given rise to a vast list of demands by unions and popular groups to increase public social spending. 
﻿<br﻿>﻿<br﻿>﻿
Second, now that the zero deficit has been achieved, these demands are thwarted by the bosses, fully backed by the PQ and more and more by the federal Liberals, who insist on major tax cuts to be competitive with either Harris' Ontario or the US in the context of NAFTA and the World Trade Organization. The convention almost unanimously backed the campaign but at the same time showed a strong hesitation to wage it. Because of the weakness of the social organisations and of the fightback movement, the absence of strategic debates due to the strength of neo-liberalism and the partnership strategy associated with it and because of bad memories of the seventies' marxist- leninist practice of taking over social movement leaderships, many participants showed a strong reluctance to take the $10 billion campaign to the grassroots level. 
﻿<br﻿>﻿<br﻿>﻿
The challenge of a grassroots campaign this fall will be huge, especially if the PQ manages to win over the public sector unions, creating a further demobilisation. The incapacity of the public sector unions to mobilise themselves to back the courageous and very popular July "illegal" nurses' strike is a bad omen. Formally organised into a Common Front, the public sector unions are in r﻿eality paralysed by bickering over the spoils of the expected budget surplus (from which the income tax cuts will be subtracted.) because the leadership and even a majority of activists accept the neo-liberal paradigm
﻿<br﻿>﻿<br﻿>﻿
Hence, at this time, the result of the nurses' strike seems a defeat, especially on the crucial wage issue which was at the core of their demands. One has also to bear in mind the crushing weight of $15 million worth of fines against the union plus two extra days of wages lost per day of strike for each striker (due to repressive laws 160 and 72). That such laws combined with overwhelming but not organised public support for the nurses did not trigger an upheaval in the public sector unions shows how deep the divisions and the passivity of the majority of activists are. 
﻿<br﻿>﻿<br﻿>﻿

﻿<font﻿ ﻿size="1"﻿>﻿Marc Bonhomme is a member of the PDS and Gauche Socialiste.﻿</font>﻿</font>﻿<br﻿>﻿<br﻿>﻿

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