Trotskyism is the political ideology and branch of Marxism developed by Russian revolutionary Leon Trotsky and some other members of the Left Opposition and Fourth International. Trotsky described himself as an orthodox Marxist,a revolutionary Marxist,and a Bolshevik–Leninist as well as a follower of Marx,Engels,Vladimir Lenin,Karl Liebknecht,and Rosa Luxemburg.
The Fourth International (FI) was established in France in 1938 by Leon Trotsky and his supporters,having been expelled from the Soviet Union and the Communist International.
Shachtmanism is the form of Marxism associated with Max Shachtman (1904–1972). It has two major components:a bureaucratic collectivist analysis of the Soviet Union and a third camp approach to world politics. Shachtmanites believe that the Stalinist rulers of proclaimed socialist countries are a new ruling class distinct from the workers and reject Trotsky's description of Stalinist Russia as a "degenerated workers' state".
Max Shachtman was an American Marxist theorist. He went from being an associate of Leon Trotsky to a social democrat and mentor of senior assistants to AFL–CIO President George Meany.
Martin "Marty" Abern was a Marxist politician who was an important leader of the Communist youth movement of the 1920s as well as a founder of the American Trotskyist movement.
Farrell Dobbs was an American Trotskyist,trade unionist,politician,and historian.
James Robertson (1928–2019) was the long-time and founding National Chairman of the Spartacist League (US),the original national section of the International Communist League. In his later years,Robertson was consultative member of the ICL's international executive committee.
The Revolutionary Socialist League (RSL) was a Trotskyist group in the United States established in 1973 and disbanded in 1989.
The Socialist Union of America,also called American Socialist Union,Socialist Union or Cochranites were a Trotskyist group that split from the Socialist Workers Party in 1953 and disbanded in 1959. It included most of the SWPs trade union base,as well as others sympathetic to the "Pabloist" line of the International Secretariat of the Fourth International,though it was never recognized as a section of the ISFI.
The Spartacist League is a Trotskyist political grouping which is the United States section of the International Communist League,formerly the International Spartacist Tendency. This Spartacist League named themselves after the original Spartacus League of Weimar Republic in Germany,but has no formal descent from it. The League self-identifies as a "revolutionary communist" organization.
The International Committee of the Fourth International (ICFI) is the name of two Trotskyist internationals;one with sections named Socialist Equality Party which publishes the World Socialist Web Site,and another linked to the Workers Revolutionary Party in the UK.
The Socialist Equality Party (SEP) is a Trotskyist political party in the United States,one of several Socialist Equality parties around the world affiliated with the International Committee of the Fourth International (ICFI). The ICFI publishes daily news articles,perspectives and commentaries on the World Socialist Web Site and maintains Mehring Books as publishing house.
The Fourth International (FI),founded in 1938,is a Trotskyist international. In 1963,following a ten-year schism,the majorities of the two public factions of the Fourth International,the International Secretariat and the International Committee,reunited,electing a United Secretariat of the Fourth International. In 2003,the United Secretariat was replaced by an Executive Bureau and an International Committee,although some other Trotskyists still refer to the organisation as the USFI or USec.
The International Socialist Organization (ISO) was a Trotskyist group active primarily on college campuses in the United States that was founded in 1976 and dissolved in 2019. The organization held Leninist positions on imperialism and the role of a vanguard party. However,it did not believe that necessary conditions for a revolutionary party in the United States were met;ISO believed that it was preparing the ground for such a party. The organization held a Trotskyist critique of nominally socialist states,which it considered class societies. In contrast,the organization advocated the tradition of "socialism from below." as articulated by Hal Draper. Initially founded as a section of the International Socialist Tendency (IST),it was strongly influenced by the perspectives of Draper and Tony Cliff of the British Socialist Workers Party. It broke from the IST in 2001,but continued to exist as an independent organization for the next eighteen years. The organization advocated independence from the U.S. two-party system and sometimes supported electoral strategies by outside parties,especially the Green Party of the United States.
The Socialist Workers Party (SWP) is a far-left political party in the United Kingdom. Founded as the Socialist Review Group by supporters of Tony Cliff in 1950,it became the International Socialists in 1962 and the SWP in 1977. The party considers itself to be Trotskyist. Cliff and his followers criticised the Soviet Union and its satellites,calling them state capitalist rather than socialist countries.
James Patrick Cannon was an American Trotskyist and a leader of the Socialist Workers Party.
Joseph Leroy Hansen was an American Trotskyist and leading figure in the Socialist Workers Party.
Tony Cliff was a Trotskyist activist. Born to a Jewish family in Ottoman Palestine,he moved to Britain in 1947 and by the end of the 1950s had assumed the pen name of Tony Cliff. A founding member of the Socialist Review Group,which became the International Socialists and then the Socialist Workers Party,in 1977 Cliff was effectively the leader of all three.
The Socialist Workers Party (SWP) is a Trotskyist party in the United States. Originally a group in the Communist Party USA that supported Leon Trotsky against Soviet leader Joseph Stalin,it places a priority on "solidarity work" to aid strikes and is strongly supportive of Cuba. The SWP publishes The Militant,a weekly newspaper that dates back to 1928. It also maintains Pathfinder Press.
Far-left politics in the United Kingdom have existed since at least the 1840s,with the formation of various organisations following ideologies such as Marxism,revolutionary socialism,communism,anarchism and syndicalism.
