We are excited that NEFAC (Northeastern Federation of Anarcho-Communists) and the NSG (New Socialist Group) have begun to discuss and to debate the future of revolutionary socialist activism in our publications. Hopefully, these discussions and debates will strengthen our abilities to build a socialism from below current in today's movements. We welcome Wayne Price's response to our article "Anarchism, Marxism and Renewing Socialism From Below" (New Socialist, No. 32) as a positive step towards achieving this goal.

In our article we argued for the creation of a new revolutionary socialist politics informed by the best of Marxism and anarchism. We argued that the Marxist critique of capitalism and its call for activists to form their own political organizations to assist their struggles for workers' revolution are important insights that Marxism can offer the anti-capitalist movement. We also argued that the anarchist critique of the state along with its commitment to direct-action politics and its sensitivity to questions of democratic decision-making and representation are important insights that anarchism can offer the anti-capitalist movement. Finally, we made some suggestions on how Marxists and anarchists who are committed to these ideas might begin to work together.

Our main disappointment with Wayne's response is its evasion of a number of the issues we raised in our article. For example, Wayne ignores our suggestions on engaging in joint work to build more class conscious activist movements. His one comment on the topic - "We need to work together where we can, and clearly state our disagreements where we must" - doesn't move the discussion forward. We'd like to have a more focused discussion on how we can begin to work together. For example, we'd like to discuss the following questions: can we share space in our publications for ongoing debate and dialogue? Can we hold joint public forums? And how can we work together in our coalitions, unions and communities?

Wayne also misreads or misrepresents a number of our arguments, which he rebukes using the same arguments that we made! This is most clear in his comments on our call for radicals to form their own political organizations. We argued that radicals need their own organizations to develop revolutionary theory, to develop strategies for intervening in the class struggle, to help popularize anti-capitalist ideas, to co-ordinate activities across regions, to improve accountability and democratic decision-making amongst anti-capitalist activists, and to rebuild movements. Instead of addressing these arguments, Wayne makes a distinction between Leninist politics and anarchist politics and insinuates that our notion of political organizing is synonymous with his description of Leninism. Yet, Wayne's description of the goals of anarchist political organizing is extremely similar to our very clear and substantial description of the kinds of political organizing that we think need to take place. We feel that we have more in common with the politics that Wayne presents than he recognizes. We seem to have a common basis upon which to develop our theories on the role of political organizations in activism.

Wayne's comments around our discussion of the state are also disconcerting. We argued that the capitalist state cannot be used as an instrument of liberation and that, instead of participating in governments, radicals should build mass movements and institutions of workers' power from below. We were clear that "It is the construction of these movements and alternative institutions…that provides the basis for revolutionary socialist change." While Wayne elaborates on our arguments, it is not clear that we have any disagreement. We should have more concrete discussions on the nature of the institutions and organizations that could provide the basis for a transition to a stateless socialist society.

Because of space limitations, we have raised only a few issues. However, there is much more that we would like to discuss with Price and with NEFAC. We encourage NEFAC and the NSG to continue these debates and discussions.

Jerome Klassen and Todd Gordon are members of the New Socialist Group in Toronto.