have been irving to overthrow the Shah by mass uprising HOSUTTCCHION organised, intelligent and sustained fashion they have set out to win over the rank and file soldiers on the streets, trying to induce them to turn their guns on their officers and insurgents in tearing down the old re This is why they threw flowers at the soldiers, kissed them, urged them not to fire on the people, and so on. Some soldiers momentarily mutinied, broke down in tears, some even committed SUICIOC.
Insuch circumstances, the slogan of a constituent assembly cannot be the central of agitation propaganda as some have argued.
If next time the masses come on to inesireeis in tan. uncy unduy succece in inducing the bulk of the soldiers to mutiny, then the masses will take over Tehran and the other major cities. They will overthrow the government, open the jails, arm the workers, bring SAVAK to justice, and so on.
Power will lie in the streets as it did in Russia, Germany and Spain. means mar ine victonous workers and popular masses will, in that moment, hold the future of the Iranian state in their hands. At such an hour, the question of power is posed absolutely point blank Al, the moment of victory, relipious leaders will no doubt call in the liberal bourgeois leaders to form a government anu take bowciust ds the Mensheviks and Social Revolutcalled in the Kadets in February 1917.
Are we in favour of this? No, we are The Iranian people face many tasks.
giving the land to the peasants, the TE or sen-acenanon oppressed nationalities, the liberation religious freedom press, suffrage, independence from imperialism, and soon.
But a bourgeois accomplish none of these tasks. It will only return the country to monarchy having exhausted and demoralised the people.
In that case, who should take power ontheday the masses liberate Tehran? There is only one answer: a workers demand for a workers and peasants government must be the central axis of agitation and propaganda.
Only a government of the workers ATOl democratic tasks in Iran, the socialist transformation of urban industry desired by because all these tasks require the suppression of the Iranian bourgeoisie.
During the next wave of the Iranian insurrection there must be sufficient workers leaders — people whom the masses have come to trust in the recent struggles and would government need to act decisively the moment the soldiers mutinv in large numbers and the insurgent masses break through.
These people must without delay go and arrest the present government, take possession of the governmental apparatus, and declare a provisional government. should pass decrees on all the major political questions within first forty-eight hours waiting for a constituent assembly -organisational work But what about the problem of the revolutionarv party! | here is no mass revolutionary party in Iran today.
The condition of the workers parties in Iran is weak. The Tudeh party does not appear to enjoy the confidence of large numbers of workers. A new party needs to be created.
All those declaring themselves in favour of a workers and government should be invited to form a new party (as •TOISKVISS leadership along with other tendenHowever, we should nevertheless call upon all the workers parties to seize power and form a workers and COVCHHICHL COUL Iran.
This Spain in July 1936.... the freedom, universal government will The OUL leave alone the workers, in understand the This who is equal to the tasks the revolution. without for workers WISCOUS the reins or COYCERICH November 1918). peasants Peru) and the SRs had formed a February, the demanded by Lenin). hallmark of recent debate.
who is only practice tills oly tell Providing the masses are agitating and Dcasaulls government. then even people known to be reformists can be forced to take power during ine insurrection and form a provisional Germany Of course, if reformists did so, this would not be a genuine workers and peasants government. But the workers will be able to replace it with fresh leaders more easily than they would a government of the bourgeois parties - particularly if it is made responsible to workers and soldiers councils (as was the Ebert-Haase government in Germany in 1918, and as would have government in April or Julv 1917, 'CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY', 'insurrection', "dual power', "soviets' - all these terms have been used in recent discussion in Socialist Challenge about the situation in Iran todav is a classical revolutionary situation equivalent to that which existed on the even of the Februarv revolution of 1917 that overthrew Czarism, the November revolution of 1918 in Germany that overthrew the Kaisserreich, and the revolution in Having tried to set up a provisional revolutionary government, having ensured the relative security of the capital, the next task is for masses to elect a central assembly of the workers, soldiers and popular It would be helpful if such a revolutionary parliament, or soviet, could be set up before the insurrection.
Petrograd functioned for nearly two months before the uprising (which took place in Moscow in December).
But it may be that the Soviet cannot be created in Iran much before the day of victory. Repression might rule this out, except in some individual cities which are temporarily liberated (e.g.
Tabriz).
However, the absence of a Soviet before the insurrection need not prove decisive. In most of the European revolutions, the Soviet has usually been set up only on the day after the victory of the insurrection. and This was true in Russia, Germany and Spain. It is however vital to propagate the the idea of a Soviet, so that setting it up after the victory becomes easier.
NaDOCHS. must a reason the day of the victory - or at least the dar assume responsibility provisionalrevolutionary government (or lead the struggle to overthrow the bourgeois government, if that is what Soviet emerges from the uprising).
when does une constituent assembly tical relevance and what does it mean If a bourgeois unfortunately born then the constituent assembly assumes considcrable moor lance Trotsky once Provisional Government great had been compelled to call such an assembly during the spring of 1917, it would have hastened the downfall of however.
SHICVIK. whether is qure crucal Bere WOTACTS (USPD). early o danudly its bourgeois constitution, place curing the In Russia, Soviet after for the electoral lists. slogar ot a assume de ionarv assemblv.
out of the struggle for said that if the in Russia Iran!
Genuine constituent assemblies are normally empowered to decide all powe unlike parliaments which COTC-CAISHINE They decide not only partic should be the government, but also what form of governent the country should have (the constitution) - theoretically they decide for parliamentary republic, constitutional monarchy, a soviet republic, and so.
Like Lenin, if we should I find ourselves fighting for a constituent bourgeois government, we must use it to help overthrow this government and its replacement by a workersand peasants government and we must also avoid constitutional fetishism. The Boloverthrew the bourgeois government in 1917 as soon as the opportunity arose and did not wait for the assembly to be convened.
On the other hard, if the workers and peasants manage to set up a provisional revolutionary government composco reformists or, better still, a genuine workers and beasants governmenthe constituent assembly acquires a It would probably still be necessary in a country like Iran, where large parts of the rural population might not immediately understand the need to join the council system. The elections to a constituent assembly can then be used to draw them into the soviet Rut historical experience shows that the question of timing (yet again)
- cvenicEnal The German Revolution of 1918 provides a salutory lesson here. The Ebert-Haase government created by the November revolution looked like a government. The Berlin Soviet was the sovereign power Germany from the day it was set up (10 November), and the government was responsibie tou. rue government wa composed purely of soviet parties, the SrD and tne macpendent sociansts But Ebert was a reformist who had no intention of carrying out a single Instead, by secret agreement with the German High Command, he immediately sought a constituent assembly from the workers' councils.
Ine UPD sensed the danger of ar constituent assembly (the German countryside was relatively backward) and correctly demanded its postponement unt ance me proper consolidation of the revolution But Ebert got his carly constituen assembly and elections to it took place 19th, 1919. As Ébert hoped, the bourgeois parties got a majority. Ebert formed a coalition government with the bourgeois parties in early February, and then, while the constituent assembly at Weimar, with majority, set about elaborating a bourgeois parliamentary the new government used the reikorps to laudate the formerly sovereign soviets. This took bitter civil war of January-June 1919.
following the October Lenin went over from demanding the immediate convocation of the assembly to advocating its postponement. He wanted to give the country time to absorb the meaning of Unfortunately the assembly elections went ahead as planned, a mere two weeks after the October revolution and before the split in the Revolutionary Party (the peasant party) was reflected in th This produced a counter-revolutunrepresentative o popular feeling. Instead of adding thie weight of its authority to the soviet republic, it opposed the soviet power Asaresult, the Bolsheviks were forced to dissolve it in January 1918.
A classical revolutionary situation exists in Iran. It calls for classical revolutionary solutions.
Victory to the Iranian Revolution! Victory to the workers and peasants of Socialist Challenge 7 December 1978 page 11
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Situations like these always demand considerable precision from revolutionaries in the way they pose the question of power. Such precision has not always been the In a personal contribution, DAVE BAILEY argues that what we are witnessing in