THE ANTI-FASCIST PEOPLE’S FRONT

In mobilizing the mass of working people for the struggle against fascism, the formation of a wide anti-fascist People’s Front on the basis of the proletarian united front is a particularly important task. The success of the whole struggle of the proletariat is closely bound up with the establishment of a fighting alliance between the proletariat, on the one hand, and the laboring peasantry and basic mass of the urban petty bourgeoisie who together form the majority of the population even in industrially developed countries, on the other.

In its agitation, fascism, desirous of winning these masses to its own side, tries to set the mass of the working people in town and countryside against the revolutionary proletariat, frightening the petty bourgeoisie with the bogey of the “Red peril.” We must turn this weapon against those who wield it and show the working peasants, artisans and intellectuals whence the real danger threatens. We must show concretely who it is that piles the burden of taxes and imposts onto the peasant and squeezes usurious interest out of him; who it is that, while owning the best land and every form of wealth, drives the peasant and his family from their plot of land and dooms them to unemployment and poverty. We must explain concretely, patiently and persistently who it is that ruins the artisans and handicraftsmen with taxes, imposts, high rents and competition impossible for them to withstand; who it is that throws into the street and deprives of employment the wide masses of the working intelligentsia.

But this is not enough.

The fundamental, the most decisive thing in establishing an anti-fascist People’s Front is resolute action of the revolutionary proletariat in defense of the demands of these sections of the people, particularly the working peasantry — demands in line with the basic interests of the proletariat — and in the process of struggle combining the demands of the working class with these demands.

In forming an anti-fascist People’s Front, a correct approach to those organizations and parties whose membership comprises a considerable number of the working peasantry and the mass of the urban petty bourgeoisie is of great importance.

In the capitalist countries the majority of these parties and organizations, political as well as economic, are still under the influence of the bourgeoisie and follow it. The social composition of these parties and organizations is heterogeneous. They include rich peasants side by side with landless peasants, big businessmen alongside petty shopkeepers; but control is in the hands of the former, the agents of big capital. This obliges us to approach the different organizations in different ways, remembering that often the bulk of the membership ignores the real political character of its leadership. Under certain conditions we can and must try to draw these parties and organizations or certain sections of them to the side of the anti-fascist People’s Front, despite their bourgeois leadership. Such, for instance, is today the situation in France with the Radical party, in the United States with various farmers’ organizations, in Poland with the “Stronnictwo Ludowe”, in Yugoslavia with the Croatian Peasants’ Party, in Bulgaria with the Agrarian Union, in Greece with the Agrarians, etc. But regardless of whether or not there is any chance of attracting these parties and organizations as a whole to the People’s Front, our tactics must under all circumstances be directed towards drawing the small peasants, artisans, handicraftsmen, etc., among their members into an anti-fascist People’s Front.

Hence, you see that in this field we must all along the line put an end to what has not infrequently occurred in our work-neglect or contempt of the various organizations and parties of the peasants, artisans and the mass of petty bourgeoisie in the towns.