Correspondence with Christoph

Correspondence with Christoph 2025

Gregor, March 23, 2025

Hello Christoph,

I have started to sort out my thoughts on your text and to write something about it. The conflict between the US and the European powers is now being brought more clearly to the centre of attention on the website, which I consider important and see as confirmation. The attempt by the European elites to gain “independence” from the US means enormous additional dangers for the working class.

From my perspective, complex political questions remain. In your text, you write that my positions are wrong and would lead to the disorientation of the party. But did you also mean my position that the struggle against centrism is becoming increasingly decisive? This position is rooted in our historical foundations.

Recently, I have tried to read more closely into the dispute of 2003–2008. There are still some questions that are unclear to me at present—for example, whether there was an adaptation at the time of the Iraq War or how we conduct the struggle against bourgeois philosophical tendencies such as empiricism and positivism.

With regard to the current article about Alex Steiner, I am unsure whether the serious accusation that Steiner and Tissot were indifferent to Bogdan’s fate is really supported by the political facts. I still regard the expulsion of Samuel Tissot from the party as a mistake that has harmed the building of the party. I also find it problematic that our Party Executive was not consulted.

It also seems to me that we reject any responsibility on our part for the reactionary political development of Daniel Reznik / Bukvasevich, although he was an important international contact with whom we worked relatively closely for several years. What lessons do we draw from this experience?

Finally, another question concerns the New Year perspective. There we explain that trade unions can once again become an instrument of the class struggle. But did the US section not expel two comrades from the party at the time because they advocated this position? Have we changed our position?

These are some of the points I am thinking about. To be honest, I perceived the last meeting as brusque and unproductive in terms of content. But if you have an idea how we can move forward together, I would be happy to meet, for example on Sunday.

I would like to participate in branch meetings again. So far, this has been difficult because I translated after work on Mondays. Perhaps I can take on another day.

 

Christoph’s reply, July 8, 2025

Dear Gregor,

I think it is time for you to produce political clarity. You explain that you are “unsure” and “unclear” with regard to Steiner, Brenner, Tissot and Co., but you essentially repeat their attacks and do not mention their bankrupt politics with a single word. In the written response you are working on, you should explain to the Party Executive what it is that politically attracts you to these people.

Steiner and Brenner left the revolutionary party more than four decades ago and have not developed any revolutionary work since. Instead, they work with Stalinists, with renegades such as Savas-Michael, and even with anti-communists such as Aidan Beatty to attack the ICFI. In doing so, they do not shy away from even the vilest lies and slanders, as the attack on Comrade Bogdan demonstrated most recently. Most recently, Steiner published the Zionist propaganda of Daniel Lazare, who condemns the uprising of October 7 and denies the Palestinians the right to resist.

The “dispute of 2003–2008,” as you call it, was not a dispute among Marxists. David North, drawing on the theoretical heritage of our movement, defended materialism against subjective-idealist conceptions. In our world party, these are not open questions; rather, they concern the political DNA of our movement.

While you are “unsure” about these questions, you apparently have little problem with Tissot spreading lies about Comrade Bogdan in collaboration with Steiner in order to undermine his defence. You even defend the attack on Bogdan when you claim that the problem is not Tissot’s publication of Bukvasevich’s lies, but the fact that we had worked with him on translations. Bukvasevich was never a member of the ICFI, was not involved in any internal discussions, and did not publish any articles on the WSWS. In what sense does that constitute “relatively close cooperation,” and why does it make us responsible for Tissot’s disgraceful behaviour?

As for Tissot’s expulsion, this was not carried out because he expressed differences, but because he refused to refrain from publishing internal party discussions. Shortly thereafter, he published internal party communications on Steiner’s blog. It is obvious that from the outset he pursued the goal of provoking internal disputes in order to publish them later.

Gregor, you invoke the struggle against centrism, but this consists precisely in the unrelenting struggle against the tendencies toward which you are “unsure” and “unclear.”

While the genocide in Gaza is intensifying, the Third World War is developing, and the ruling class throughout the world is resorting to dictatorial and fascist measures to enforce its policies of war and cuts, you are attracted to Steiner’s attacks on the ICFI, who left the revolutionary movement decades ago. Instead of responding to our detailed reply of November 8, you keep coming forward with new, superficial attacks.

You should speak plainly politically and clarify whether your place is in the revolutionary party. Also let us know by when you will send your response. Until then, we will remove you from translation work so that you can concentrate on this.

Fraternally,

Christoph

 

Christoph, November 5, 2025

The November 14 date we had planned for the discussion in the Party Executive probably won’t work, because we have to devote the meeting entirely to preparing for the event. We should therefore schedule it for one or two weeks later. I think it would make sense to prepare the discussion once again in a smaller discussion. Perhaps we can do that next week.

Since you are raising these questions and expressing your incomprehension regarding the decision concerning Tissot, I would first ask you to briefly explain in writing that you are not in contact with opponents of the ICFI such as Steiner, Brenner or Tissot and that you will not share internal discussions and documents with people outside the party, either now or in the future. That is, of course, the basis of any discussion in the Party Executive.

Gregor, November 14, 2025

Hello Christoph,

There is no problem with postponing the meeting. However, I find it problematic to narrow the circle further—one of my criticisms is precisely that important political debates are too often kept out of the party bodies. What do you hope to achieve by doing so?

I have not been and am not in contact with Steiner/Brenner. However, I have read the correspondence and think that some of the arguments in David’s book are given valid answers there. I temporarily got in touch with Sam to inquire about his well-being and to hear his view of the accusations. This seemed to me to be humanly necessary and necessary for my own political clarity.

I consider it extremely important to actively engage with criticism of the party and, where appropriate, to acknowledge legitimate points. Even though I currently have no contact with the group around “Permanent Revolution,” I cannot and do not want to categorically rule out entering into constructive discussions with them in the future. That depends on the further course of our discussions. After all, it is not the case that Sam left because he no longer agrees with the goals or fundamental convictions of the socialist movement.

If you were to expel me—and you have already indicated that you are at least considering this—then, according to your wording, I would in the future no longer be able to express myself politically at all, since I would necessarily have to explain to my circle how this came about. That is, I would have to “share an internal discussion” “outside the party.” This is precisely the dynamic that could be observed in Sam’s case. The wording includes any discussions with friends, family and political contacts.

Regardless of this, it goes without saying for me that I would not share personal information about comrades or the like—regardless of the context. I would welcome it if we were to establish as a matter of principle that Marxist self-criticism is not merely “permitted,” but indispensable to the success of the socialist revolution and (in Rosa Luxemburg’s words) the “life-breath of the proletarian movement.”

Element notification from Christoph (PDF), November 21, 2025

Removal as a member of the SGP

Dear Gregor,

Your Berlin-South branch has requested that the Party Executive remove you as a member of the Socialist Equality Party pursuant to Paragraph IX, section c.) of the statutes, because you last transferred your membership dues on May 22, 2024. Although you were employed by the party full-time in the interim, that was ten months ago, and during that period you have not paid any membership dues at all. Since you earned sufficient income during this period and also did not contact the branch executive about this matter, the Berlin-South branch executive saw no special circumstances at its meeting of November 20, 2025, that would justify the arrears. The Party Executive therefore unanimously approved the request to remove your membership at its meeting of November 21, 2025.

Our statutes provide, for good reason, that membership rights are tied to actively participating in the work of the party and paying membership dues. This is not a formality, but goes to the heart of the Bolshevik conception of the party.

In your case, the refusal to pay membership dues is clearly connected with a political turning away from the party. Over the past 18 months, you have repeatedly expressed positions that cannot be reconciled with the principles of our party. Above all, however, you have refused to conduct a proper discussion about them.

After you informed the Secretariat of political differences on July 11, 2024, we took the time to respond to you in detail on November 8, 2024. At the Party Executive meeting on January 24, you had the opportunity to respond to this reply, but asked for more time to think through the questions and prepare a thorough response. The Party Executive granted you this time and from then on released you from party work so that you could concentrate on this.

On October 13, that is, only after eleven months, nine of which you had been released from political work, you sent the Party Executive the brief beginning of a response that did not address most of the points in our letter at all and in no way constitutes a serious engagement with our 20-page document. Prior to this, you had already rejected numerous offers from comrades in the party leadership to discuss the issues.

When we then asked you to give the self-evident assurance, before any further discussion in the Party Executive, that you would not publish the internal discussions and, in particular, would not share them with opponents of the party, you refused to accept this. On November 14 of this year, you even sent me a message in which you threatened the party with doing precisely that if a discussion in the Party Executive did not proceed to your satisfaction. Furthermore, you do not want to rule out having “constructive discussions” with declared enemies of the party.

Gregor, all of this shows that your refusal to pay membership dues is an expression of your turning away from our revolutionary principles. For over a year, you have refused to engage in a serious discussion and have ultimately threatened to ally yourself with opponents of the party. The Party Executive therefore saw no reason not to approve your branch’s request.

Nevertheless, we strongly urge you not to continue down this path, but to seriously think through the questions you have raised and discuss them with us. Then there is nothing standing in the way of a new membership application.

For the Party Executive

Christoph Vandreier