Anthony Furia discusses the necessity of socialists in setting out clear political strategy.
Hurried Patience. There is no shortcut to workers’ power. The road to a communist party is necessarily a long one, and one we must march patiently. This is the essence of Hurried Patience – a strategic plank of our newly adopted program, ratified and applauded at Congress less than a month ago. It is a crucial aspect of our strategic orientation, and one that we would do well to keep firmly in mind over the coming years – particularly this one. What does Hurried Patience look like in practice, currently, at this moment? It looks like understanding our limits and capabilities. It looks like refining and limiting our tasks. It looks like ensuring our strategic road in the immediate future is clear, and unburdened by tactical follies or aspirations that we have neither the resources nor the time to pursue.
Is this the current trajectory of the Revolutionary Communist Organisation (RCO)? It can be, but it is by no means guaranteed. Also at our national conference, we ratified several motions outlining tasks for the long-term – tasks to take place over multiple conferences, multiple central committees, multiple years of growth and refinement. These tasks include the building of several affiliated mass organisations; Reds!, Liberation, The Communist Womens Front, an Anti-Imperialist Solidarity front, United 4 Ecosocialism, and potential groupings such as Anti-Fascist Leagues and Anti-Repression Committees. These tasks (by no means a comprehensive account) compose an abundance of responsibilities and aspirations. An abundance which makes the danger of conflating long term and immediate aspirations all the more real.
There are some in the organisation, both today and in our short history, who have experienced bouts of a frantic frustration – a desire to do it all faced with the crushingly limited capacities of a small, new, inexperienced organisation. These comrades are by no means fools! They certainly mean well – they believe in our task so wholeheartedly they wish to achieve it as quickly as possible. Rather, the problem with these bouts of manic desire is the potential damage, and detriment, they can do to the organisation – despite their positive intentions. We must focus on our primary tasks, on the immediate points of tactical concern, with one eye always on the strategic future. This is precisely the purpose of motions such as Motion #E05 – All-Socialist Mass Organisations, which establishes RCO support for several mass organisational projects into the future. Such motions from our conference maintain our long term vision and strategic orientation, and by no means lock us into a strict path! Were we to find these models unacceptable or impossible in the future, we can, and will, change our tactical approach as suited to our ultimate orientation – the refoundation of the communist party.
Thus I do believe such motions are a positive aspect of the organisation – revealing a longer term tactical thinking and a deep rooted, healthy sense of ambition. Yet we must not let this ambition confuse us. We must not let it make us slaves of a thousand projects, a million tasks and goals, which simply remain unachievable to any satisfactory extent with our current capacities.
The critical component here is that, by affirming our commitment to longer term projects, longer term tasks, at the conference, we by no means explicitly established the pace of work on these projects. We do not need to rush ahead madly, attempting to do anything and everything in order to create from thin air mass organisations with dedicated cadres distinct from the RCO. Indeed, the work we do on these mass organisations and longer term projects necessarily takes a backseat in our organising efforts. We work steadily, patiently, on these goals where possible and advantageous, and where it doesn’t detract from our primary (and pressing) immediate efforts. This article is thus primarily a word of caution. We have not yet set our path in the wrong direction, on an uncorrectable trajectory, but we have not yet refined it appropriately – not yet ensured that our strategic goals are pursued and prioritised in the most necessary sense. This we must do.
Thus I do believe such motions are a positive aspect of the organisation – revealing a longer term tactical thinking and a deep rooted, healthy sense of ambition. Yet we must not let this ambition confuse us. We must not let it make us slaves of a thousand projects, a million tasks and goals, which simply remain unachievable to any satisfactory extent with our current capacities.
So what, precisely, are our immediate tasks? Thankfully, these have also been helpfully provided by our conference. In summary, we seek in the immediate term (over the next 12 months):
• The professionalisation of our membership and cell structures,
• Continued engagement in Palestinian struggle in varying forms of work,
• The development and deepening of education on all levels of the organisation,
• Engagement with and within Victorian Socialists,
• And, perhaps most critically, the serious strengthening, in every aspect, of The Partisan as a professional organisational publication read as widely as possible within the socialist movement
These are the tasks we cannot delay on. These are essential aspects of our organisation, and each accompanies many other smaller tasks and steps – many of which have been laid out through our 2024 conference (although for the sake of brevity are not listed here). In sharpening our attention and focus, we can redirect the restlessness of comrades – the eagerness and frenetic frustration – into directly productive activity. Activity that is both achievable and of critical importance to the immediate future of our organisation.
Our congress was a success – absolutely – and now is the time for action. Now is the time to prove the words we so strongly approved of carry weight, and throw ourselves fully – patiently, determinedly, and with fiery passion – into our work, into our immediate tasks.
PARTISAN! 
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