CLR James

Cyril Lionel Robert James (4 January 1901–19 May 1989) was a journalist, and a prominent socialist theorist and writer.

US career and the Johnson-Forrest Tendency

James moved to the US in late 1938 and after a tour sponsored by the SWP stayed on for over twenty years. But by 1940 he had developed severe doubts about Trotsky's analysis of the Soviet Union as a degenerated workers state and left the SWP along with Max Shachtman, who formed the Workers' Party. Within the WP he formed the Johnson-Forrest Tendency with Raya Dunayevskaya (his pseudonym being Johnson and Dunayevskaja's Forrest), in order to spread their views within the new party.

Related Topics:
1940 - Soviet Union - Degenerated workers state - Max Shachtman - Workers' Party - Johnson-Forrest Tendency - Raya Dunayevskaya

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

While within the WP the views of the J-F tendency underwent considerable development and by the end of the Second World War they had definitively rejected Trotsky's theory of Russia as a degenerated workers state, instead analysing it as being state capitalist. They were increasingly looking towards the autonomous movements of oppressed minorities, a theoretical development already visible in James' thought in his discussions with Leon Trotsky which took place in 1939. An interest in such autonomous struggles came to take centre stage for the tendency.

Related Topics:
Second World War - State capitalist - 1939

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

After 1945 the WP saw the prospects for a revolutionary upsurge as receding. The J-F Tendency, by contrast, were more enthused by prospects for mass struggles and came to the conclusion that the SWP, which they considered more proletarian than the WP, thought similarly to themselves about such prospects. Therefore, after a short few months as an independent group when they published a great deal of material for a small group, the J-F tendency joined the SWP in 1947.

Related Topics:
1945 - 1947

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

James would still describe himself as a Leninist, despite his rejection of Lenin's conception of the vanguard role of the revolutionary party, and argue for socialists to support the emerging black nationalist movements. By 1949, he came to reject the idea of a vanguard party. This led his tendency to leave the Trotskyist movement and rename itself the Correspondence Publishing Committee. James' writings were influential in the development of Autonomist marxism as a current within marxist thought.

Related Topics:
Leninist - Black nationalist - 1949 - Vanguard party - Correspondence Publishing Committee - Autonomist marxism

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~