PARTISAN!

Backroom arguments, secret factions and a lack of communication in the Red Ant Collective culminated in a coup led by Red Ant’s two main founders. Anthony Furia explains what happened.

On January 7th, a letter was released from Red Ant social media, and posted on their website. Now called “Red Spark,” this letter, since deleted, is published in full below – for the sake of publicity and openness in debate, whether or not the comrades involved are partial to such things. 

Dear Friends,

I am writing to inform you that the majority of the founders of Red Ant have decided to pursue the original project under a new name, Red Spark.

2024 was a successful year for the Red Ant Collective. After the tour of respected international socialist Vijay Prashad, the collective saw a rapid influx of new members. With this influx came many new ideas, some of which were significantly different from those Red Ant had been pursuing over the previous years.

At the December 2024 Red Ant Conference, it became clear that these significant differences were irreconcilable. The founders of Red Ant have decided that rather than continue with a destructive debate, it would be best to continue Red Ant as a new project: Red Spark.

Red Spark remains committed to the same ideas that Red Ant was founded on. We are resolutely anti-imperialist, socialist, and intent on moving toward a more organised political group inspired by the ideas of those from the Marxist and Leninist traditions.

We hope you’ll continue supporting the Red Spark project, just as you supported the Red Ant before it. We invite you to continue subscribing to our regular Red Spark newsletter, which will keep you informed about all our upcoming projects. You don’t need to do anything to continue to be a subscriber.

We look forward to seeing you at our future events.

Yours Truly,

Max Lane, National Chairperson of Red Spark, on behalf of the collective.

P.S. All financial contributions to Red Ant will be returned to Red Ant members in proportion to their contributions over the course of Red Ant’s existence. Red Spark will consequently be starting from a lower financial base, so any future contributions will be extremely welcome.

With no forewarning, or elaboration on what “significant differences” were (“insurmountable differences” which were never explained), Red Spark was formed from Red Ant. With a grandiose flourish, Red Spark had seized not just the website and social media of Red Ant, but also the bank account – all “financial contributions,” and money made from selling (mostly) books. 

Many comrades wondered what the “insurmountable differences” were, and whether the original Red Ant still existed. The question of what the “insurmountable differences” were remains open, yet thanks to a lengthy conversation with Brendan D, of the newly elected (just prior to the split) Political Committee of Red Ant, the second has been answered in full. And, thanks to Brendan, we now have a more comprehensive picture of the events that preceded the farcical RSDLP (Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party) cosplaying of the Red Spark/Red Ant split. Members of Red Spark were also contacted for comment, yet did not respond to requests for an interview or discussion. Without such a comment, and due to the extremely private, insular nature of any and all debate prior to the split (and indeed afterwards), we have to rely on Red Ant’s perspective. 

In the days preceding Red Ant’s 2024 national conference, Sam King (at the time an informal ‘leader’ and member of the Political Committee of Red Ant) published a piece in the internal bulletin of Red Ant criticising two members, comrades Brendan and Nandini, over a compilation of tactical disagreements ranging from thrilling ‘significant’ differences such as; meeting frequency, posters vs social media, how meetings should be run, and the utility of tabling/stalling on campus. Partisan has been provided access to this piece, and the pieces it is responding to – however, upon the request of Red Ant comrades, we will not be publishing any of them. Debate of all kinds should be had publicly – how else do we expect to learn without the conflict of ideas pertaining to tactics and strategy? Perhaps indeed the insular nature of this so-called debate was a contributing factor in the split itself. 

In the most general and good-faith interpretation of such a bitter (if seemingly one-sided) internal struggle, these questions can be seen as a manifestation of the classic conflict of the sect form; leadership opposed to membership. Old guard opposed to new. Calcified bureaucracy opposed to excitable cadres. In the main, comrades opposed to Sam King, in his own words, have engaged in an “active facilitation of non-members” in opposing the organisation’s political line, have weakened the supposed “Leninist political approach” in which the party leadership works to “raise the level of consciousness” of members. Interestingly, there is no mention of reciprocity between membership and leadership here – does the leadership simply guide members like sheep? Do they descend from heaven and impose upon membership the correct Marxist line, thanks to their enlightened consciousness? They have done this through facilitating non-members to speak at meetings (allegedly “prioritising” them), through opposing a post-Vijay Prashad tour meeting (in favour of one-on-one coffee chats with contacts), and through advocating for a casual post-tour meet and greet, as opposed to a full introductory meeting. The most egregious sins against Leninism (which here seems synonymous with ‘the ex-Democratic Socialist Party leadership of Red Ant’) are minor tactical disputes. 

On the basis of tactical disagreements such as these, Sam King attacks both comrades in the article – Brendan’s name is mentioned seventeen times in a seven page document, and Nandini and Brendan are accused of running a “wrecking operation” against “key aspects of our work.” Allegedly backed by an article released by Max Lane (not available to Partisan), Sam King’s position on these two comrades, and on the seemingly laughably minor tactical disagreements at stake, proved to be wildly unpopular with the broader membership. According to Brendan, this was in large part due to the tone of the piece – which was, Partisan can confirm, sectarian, and hyperbolic. Regardless of the reasons, the unpopularity of Sam’s position (and, generally, Sam King) were readily displayed in two instances. The first was at Red Ant’s third day of conference – wherein Sam King and Max Lane’s plans for the organisation into the future were either shot down or approved by an exceedingly narrow majority, and Sam King himself was elected to the new seven-person Political Committee as the seventh member; with a tied vote broken by the other nominee stepping down. 

The second instance directly precedes conference – where Sam King, Max Lane, and those who align with his catastrophisation of minor tactical differences, began to organise in secrecy as a ‘faction’. Previously, Red Ant has had no definitive position on whether or not factions are allowed – but secret ones are undoubtedly a breach of democratic centralism. The goals of this group remain unclear to Partisan – generally, the “plan” seemed to have been to regain control of Red Ant through some sort of coup or purge and expulsion of the members who opposed their supreme Leninist tradition. Yet when such a secret faction was outed with the broader membership, they opted instead for a split, taking with them both the digital assets of Red Ant and the finances of the operation (which were under a single comrade’s name, and not subject to any sort of democratic management or oversight). Such a stunning maneuver evidently won them no favours with the general membership, and proved the minority status of their position, with only fifteen comrades from the organisation opting to split.

Why split a communist organisation which occupied, quite evidently, a certain niche in the vile ecosystem of sects in their anti-imperialist emphasis and international connections? Neither possible answer is particularly satisfying, nor positive. Perhaps Sam King, Max Lane and affiliates are utterly enmeshed in their belief in purity through splitting, in the DSP “true Leninism” (traced back 100+ years to develop the correct ‘line’ on every single strategic point or historical struggle) which must, on every point of tactical concern and strategy, shine brilliantly through. In which case this split is entirely logical from their perspectives – after all, the correct Marxism is with them. The masses will, with time, follow – after they find all the other sects offering something extremely similar (including Red Ant) to fall short in some fatal criteria which they themselves meet.

The alternative is that this split is wholly, consciously self-motivated. It is, in its content, a split of an old bureaucracy from a new and increasingly experienced membership basis –  this is a fact. The question is whether or not Sam King, Max Lane, Rjurik and others are conscious of this fact, and attempted a coup of the organisation self-servingly in order to preserve their personal power (over an organisation of fifty-five people). This is probably not the case – although subconsciously it is almost certainly a motivating factor in the split and coup attempt. The reality of this split is likely a mix of the two – a farcical Bolshevism providing the comforting lie to comrades that they are motivated by a higher truth, by their correct Leninism, and not by interpersonal conflict or their decreasing influence within the organisation.

The Red Ant/Red Spark split is thus almost boring in its content. Despite the dramatic context (seizure and redistribution of finances, primarily) it is the same embarrassing tale that communists have been retreading for the past 40 years (and in many cases more). A sect forms, based upon a specific theoretical line and tradition that seeks to preserve itself and dominate over all others. This sect maintains its own bureaucracy – largely founders of the organisation – who dictate in the main both the political and organisational life of the sect. The sect grows to a certain size, as it fulfils a certain ‘niche’ in the far-left ecosystem that is not yet adequately filled. Conflicts of personality are exacerbated as membership increases, and debates are had over tactical questions which become increasingly existentialism (it’s my way – ‘Leninism’ – or the highway – the total succumbing of the organisation to wreckers and revisionism). The membership peels away to form some other project surrounding new personalities that collapses or develops itself politically (the new, new, new line which has been on the correct side since Marx), or the leadership splits to preserve their ideological purity.

The RCO is not entirely immune to this treacherous cycle of development – to think so would be arrogant and unproven. However, we do attempt to do several things differently, in order to work towards an end to the sect form entirely. In the place of theoretical, ideological unity, we centre programmatic unity. We facilitate and promote factions developing surrounding this program and its content. We publicise debate, we argue and disagree, and we unite in action (a democratic centralism that remembers the “democratic” aspect). Perhaps most importantly (although impossible without the other aspects) we prioritise above all our own self-abolition; the formation of the communist party, the end to the dominance of sects, including the RCO.

This is our escape from the humiliation ritual of the sect lifecycle. This is our way out of the distorted, maimed, inept state of the Marxist Left in Australia and (generally speaking) internationally. Without a party, we continue in limbo – the planet burns around us, workers die in droves, capital consumes itself, and we split, dissolve, reform, and split again into extinction. The communist party is our first step to anything other than an endless stream of Red Sparks without a flame. The question that should be on every Marxist’s lips is; how do we get there? The RCO thinks we have part of the answer – and perhaps so do you. 

Our best wishes to Red Ant and Red Spark in their respective political journeys; our publication remains open, and our members remain enthusiastic, to debate, talk, and organise with you all.