. . - but Marxism lives and grows with the changing world’ HE PROBLEM of our work with ideas is much more than simply __.4n administrative and organiza- tional question, even though adminis- trative and organizational measures will be indispensable to make the pro- €ress that is proposed, But rather than saying as we do in the draft points submitted to the con- vention for discussions, “starting with the re-establishment of a system of Schools , . .” and so forth, the job Which needs to be, must and will be done should be placed as arising from the fact that first we have to establish a fresh, new concept of the relation- Ship of our work with ideas to the rest of our work as a whole. What is involved is a reappraisal of Many approaches, a radical renovation Of concepts in many areas. Perhaps What is involved above all is the crea- tion Within the party of a climate in Which the accent is on opening up questions and not on closing down dis- Cussion, . This is the kind of climate that is Suitable to a party whose ideas are founded on a creative science and Which envisages a new world of man. Let me try to convey something of the sense of the discussion which took Place in the panel on ideological work. This discussion took place, I should Say, with a deep sense of partiness, of Concern for the party and the effec- tiveness of the party and ‘its future. _It reflected a determination to find he best possible ways to fight for our Party’s ‘class position in the battle of ideas, in struggle and debate. Ques- tions that are raised should be seen in that spirit in the party. It is under. Stood that any other approach would harm our party and indeed cripple it. _It was felt that we need to empha- Size the element of more awareness of what is happening in the realm of ideas M our country, We need to read more, to catch up With what is happening among the young people, the New Left, in the Peace movement, among workers in the trade union movement and the un- Organized workers. We need to read More on questions of social change, the relation of the immediate issues to the fundamental problems of indus- try and the arrangement of society. We need to overcome a certain in- ertness in the party’ in relation to deas, a practicalism that is a denial of the Marxist concept of practise. _ Further, we must take into account the new and exploding receptivity to Marxism, that is one of the new fea- tures of our situation. _The paper-back revolution has cat Tied with it a remarkable increase i the output of things on Marxism — most of which distort it, but many of which reflect it partly truly, partly in- Correctly. A fair bit of this literature actually makes known to people for the first time the writings of Marx, Engels and Lenin. For instance, the Sunday New York Times book review section had a head- ing: “The Second Coming of Karl Marx”. The article discussed precisely this fact that Marxism has become a central question of examination, con- What is new. contemporary Canada, on Confedera- tion, on problems of Canadian deve- lopment, on the national question of French and English Canada, has to be approached not as an inner, private party question, but as a question of our work with ideas among the peo- ple and in the labor movement. We need to stress that breadth of approach does not mean surrender of principles. To uphold the revolution- ary cause does not mean shutting our - eyes to changed circumstances. Nor does recognition of changed circum- stances imply a lapse in upholding the revolutionary cause. In fact it is its only serious implementation. There was discussion on the dia- logue, on interc’ aunciation, the im- portance of bei: ready to exchange our ideas, to converse and not vituper- ate, and pernaps to learn from other participants. The dialogue for us is a means of making known our position, of de- fending and upholding it. To do this we must read more of what people who disagree with us write because it is not possible to get into the the scrimmage of ideas and simply to give general formulas that may be 1,000 percent true, but which are not explained in a way that relates to the thinking and arguments that are cur- rent in the debates today. We hope the change we are pro- posing for The Marxist Quarterly — a change in name to Horizons, with a subtitle, The Marxist Quarterly, La Revue Trimestrielle Marxiste, with articles in French as well as in Eng- lish — will enable us tv get into a de- bate which, at present, is more. in- tense and more ‘advanced in French Canada than in English Canada. The ideological debate cannot sim- ply be equated with a military strug- gle. It is not enough to sound out the adversary’s weak spots in order to score debating points. It is necessary to confront squarely and demolish our opponents’ strongest positions. That point, made by Antonio Grams- ci, I think is valid for us. the accent NEW Published here is an excerpt from Sideration in America. This is part Of Stanley B. Ryerson’s report of a panel dis- - gussion on ideological and educational We are carrying on a fight for our Work at the Communist Party's 19th con- Presence in the Canadian centennial yention.. € are fighting to get our conception of Canada, its past and future, into the centennial discussion. The publication work proposed by the literature department of our party, _ 1 relation to a number of studies on Right: Canada in the space age—a sketch of the country’s first satellite, Alouette |. It is felt there should be added to the draft a section on the arts and sciences. It is touched on in the origi- nal, but not developed. In the discus- sion, two points arose which I want to mention: : Marxism-Leninism is a_ science, scientific socialism, which is at the very core of that revolution in science which is the hallmark of our time. Marxism-Leninism is not a collection -of unproved assumptions, of uncer- tain hypotheses, but a science of. so- ciety and of man, with certain funda- mentals that have been validated, con- firmed by historical social practise — questions of class and class struggle, of the state, of exploitation, of im- perialism, of socialism and the deve- lopment of communism. These are fundamental achieve- ments of the mind of man and of the practice of human society. But a science lives and grows with ‘the changing world. What Engels said about revolutions in materialism which accompany each great new- scientific discovery is true in the age of the breakup of the atom to a de- gree that Engels. sensed even if he couldn’t fully foresee. The changes we call for in our thinking and approach come not be- cause we think in general this would be a good idea, but from the fact that the world of man is changing, and our relation to it is changing, and also the prospects of the achievements of the aims for which we fight. But we still suffer from a tendency to invoke very general formulas as a rather comfortable substitute for con- crete analysis and study of real con- ditions, substitute appeals to our science in general, which are sup- posed to exempt us from really hav- ing to use science to explore reality. The question of democracy as a central question for our party, for its thought and action, has been one of the keynotes of this convention. It is the question of the freedom of the spirit and of the creativity of man, fought for under the shadow of the Is on H-bomb and in a situation. in which the banishing of the Bomb involves, for us, the fullest commitment of Communists and Socialists. It is the question of the achievement of such a freedom and of such conditions for freedom as will make possible the flowering of all the potential that is within, people. In our section on culture we should include our assertion as Communists that just as developing ‘science re- quires debate and. research and the freest interchange of thoughts and ex- periences, so too artistic creation is inconceivable without a searching out of solutions, without a’ diversity of currents and their confrontation. Our party appreciates and encour: ages diversity of forms of contribu- tion to human progress made by art- ists, in the free expression of their imagination, taste and originality. We urge workers in the arts and scien- tists to understand and support those ideological positions which, expres- sing the position of the working class, point the way to the creation of those conditions in which the whole spirit of man will come to flower. ‘ Lenin spoke of the party as the mind, honor and conscience of our epoch. In days when we are approaching the 50th anniversary of the great Oc- tober socialist revolution, by happy coincidence in the same year as the 100th anniversary of Canadian Confe- deration, we have an opportunity to demonstrate the meaning of our un- derstanding of the relationship be- tween proletarian internationalism and Canadian patriotism. For Canada: our dedication to the independence of our country, -the equality of our nations, the reconstruc- tion of our society, This is a prospect in which our fight is meaningful only in the fullest fu- sion of our communist vision with our every action in the course of the struggle to arouse and unite the Can- adian working people to change to- day’s reality. July 2, 1966—PACIFIC TRIBUNE—Page 9