constituent assembly needs THE proposal for assembly is directed first of all against the continuation of the Shah's rule. It gives a specific alternative to the dictatorship -and universal representative body that could debate the alternatives before the country and decide on them.
Just the call for such a reasonable and democratic alternative tremendous pressure on the Shah's regime and helps manoeuvres behind the backs of the masses aimed The demand also defending the interests of the working class, the poor peasants, the small shopkeepers, and the rest of Iran's toiling people who are exploited by world imperialism and the capitalist class.
CAPITALISTS Election of a constituent assembly would counter attempts by capitalists to impose a government of their own on the Iranian people once the Shah falls.
Leaders of the National Front have announced that they are ready to form such a government if the Shah goes. According to their scenario, the Iranian people would be presented with an accomplished fact, which they would be called upon to ratity in some type of plebiscite or referendum.
Even Ayatollah Khomeini, the nationalist Muslim religious leader who had previously been the most intransigent in his opposition to the Shah, has announced that he has "selections in mind" for the leaders of a future government.
Historically, the demand for a Masses in Iran want to determine their own government.
a constituent assembly puts undercut the perpetuating the aimed order.
opposed to the hands of the masses.
The masses the exploiters.
TASKS body must deal with.
institutions, domination, of oppressed of women.
INO constituent assembly was first raised during ine ann-cudal revolnons that gave rise to modern capitalism.
During the French Revolution of 1789-94, for example, the constituent passed the famous Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen. It abolished the old feudal rights and privileges and gave Today the demand for a constituent assembly is a demand for the most complete freedom of expression. It calls for the broadest possible debate. It insists that the masses should decide for themselves the basis of a new It is no accident that the Shah, his imperialist backers and the bourgeois opposition figures in Iran are all demand for constituent assembly. They are well aware that the whole point of capitalist government is to keep the fundamental decisions out of the need the fullest demoeratic rights so that they can organise and fight for their class interests most effectively against their Revolutionists raise side by side assembly the social tasks that such a These include dismantling the monarchy and all its uprooung imperialist emancipalon peasantry, establishment of the right nationalities self-determination, and the liberation capitalist government can accomplish these tasks, because they require the systematic mobilisation of the toilers and the abolition of the class privilege and stratification that bourgeois society rests on. government, based on the organised Only WOLKCES and farmers power of the oppressed and exploited, is capable of fulfilling the needs of the Iranian people through the socialist reorganisation of society.
Of course, it is possible that if a constituent assembly were formed, it would have a reformist majority who would seek to ally with the capitalists and oppose the establishment of a workers and farmers government. But that is not a problem arising from the form of a democratic constituent assembly.
SOVIETS This becomes clear if we recall that in February 1917, workers councils (soviets) existed in Russia and held power there. But the reformist majority in these soviets turned the power over to a capitalist provisional government. The revolutionists were able to lead the soviets to power in November 1917 only after they had successfully won the politically The fight constituent assembly and the debate within such a body is one of the most important ways in which revolutionary socialists can win the majority of the Iranian people to the idea that a workers and farmers vernes on nisa Leon In his writings on China, Trotsky singled out the importance of the constituent assembly especially in regard to the peasantry. explained:
'The essence of the question lies in the fact THal the peasant ulas. aroused to historical life, is not at all inclined place confidence advance in a leadership coming from this mass seeks a simple political the cities, even if it is proletarian;. formula that would express directly its own political strength, that is, the predominance of numbers."
INADEQUATE It is by seeing in practice the workings of a constituent assembly that the masses can best be convinced that under capitalism even the most complete formal democracy inadequate.
The workers and poor peasants need a government that represents their class interests. They need a truly democratic government based mass workers, peasants, and soldiers government excludes the capitalists.
The complementary character of the demand for assembly and the development soviets was thoroughly explained by Trotsky in his article 'The Slogan of a National Assembly in China', written in 1930.
'Even if there were soviets in China - which is not the case — this in itself would not be a reason to abandon the slogan of a Trotsky noted.
*The majority in the soviets might be certainly be organisations. interested in exposing them in the open forum of the national assembly. In this way, the majority would be won over to our side more quickly and more certainly.
Recalling the experience Russian revolution of 1917, Trotsky says that after the fall of the Czar, 'the Cadets (the main capitalist party) used every legal trick to drag out the convening of Assembly In revolutionary wave would subside. The Mensheviks Revolutionaries took their cue from masses the Cadets.
*If the Mensheviks and the Social Revolutionaries had had a little more revolutionary drive, they could have convened the Constituent Assembly in a few weeks.
BOLSHEVIKS 'Would participated in the elections and the assembly itself? Undoubtedly, for it Trotsky was we who demanded all this time speediest Constituent Assembly...
*If the Constituent Assembly had been in 1917, then all the social questions would have confronted it. propertied classes would have been compelled to show their cards; the treacherous role of the conciliators would have become apparent.
The Bolshevik faction Constituent Assembly won the greatest popularity and this would have helped Bolshevik majority in the soviets.
'Under these Constituent Assembly would have lasted not one day but possibly several is months. This would have enriched the political experience of the working masses and, rather than retard the proletarian revolution, would have accelerated it.' on the Bolsheviks who convened that constituent assembly workers and peasants soviets had constituent of during assembly, dispersed it.
and in the beginning would in the hands of would assembly.
form in Iran.
the Constituent the hope that the and the 3OCa demands Bolsheviks have convening of the convened let us say in April The in the would have elect a circumstances the As things actually turned out, it was the after the already taken power Since the assembly had been elected an earlier period revolution, its majority no longer reflected the attitudes or ideas of the masses. It opposed the revolution When the constituent assembly refused to support the democratic will of the masses as organised in the soviets, the revolutionary government CONFIDENCE The Bolsheviks were able to do this precisely because they had won the confidence of the masses during their earlier fight for the convocation of the Of course, what is important in the experience of the Bolsheviks is not that it may be repeated in the same For instance, it is possible in Iran that a constituent assembly could be convoked before any soviets exist and that soviets could grow up later in the fight over what policies the assembly should implement.
What is important is that the Bol sheviks understood that the demand for the freest and most thoroughgoing democracy was part and parcel of the socialist revolution and that such would help propel the revolution forward.
Socialist Challenge 18 January 1979 page 5
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the peasants title to the land. DEBATE