Victorian Socialists’ national expansion has proven to be a huge success, attracting thousands of socialists across the country and making us unquestionably the largest socialist force in Australia since the collapse of the Communist Party. This is not something to brush past. However, while it is an extraordinary achievement, as Lenin said, “Without revolutionary theory there can be no revolutionary movement”, and this holds true for the Socialist Party (SP) more than ever. Many members joining are new to organised socialist politics with limited education. For the working class to dismantle capitalism it cannot do so blindly, it must be consciously developed in the science of socialism and revolution. This work must start now, and it must start within the SP. From the perspective of organised socialists, socialist politics may seem intuitive, as we can easily identify the way in which capital shapes and malforms all of society. Despite this however, they remain counterintuitive to the common sense which we are taught of private property, free markets and universal human rights. We are not born socialists, and we are constantly bombarded with capitalist ideology. This means that for the working class to take power a serious campaign of mass education is required, and for the SP to lead this we must begin by educating ourselves.
Not only is education required to strengthen the SP, but it is also necessary for a democratic party. If we are to be truly member led, members must be given an education to engage in all theoretical debate and decisions. If we do not have an educated membership, we will be left with a bureaucratic leadership of intellectuals and those who have received education elsewhere. The important decisions of the party must be for everyone to participate in, yet participation in decisions has already been shown to be a problem in the SP. At the Victorian Socialists (non-delegated) conference in 2025, less than half of the membership attended and almost all of those in attendance were from groupings outside of VS. The issue is even worse at the branch level, where decisions are left almost exclusively to the appointed local coordinator, who unless actively removed, can act unilaterally. As it stands the membership, lacking any form of education, has left the power in the hands of those with education elsewhere. The only way to combat this is through the extensive education of all members, for a party in which everyone can participate in.
Critics of the need for education in the leadership of the SP, will repute this on the basis that education already exists in a non-centralised system. Instead of organising education through the SP, members should be free and encouraged to join education groups of any kind, such as Socialist Alternatives reading groups. It is easy to see why comrades in external groups would be favourable to this position, which pushes the SP members into external reading (and recruitment) groups. Not only is this approach undemocratic, allowing for minority groupings to be in control over the education of the SP. However; it is also not capable of the scale of education required of the SP. The education of a party of a few thousand members cannot be swept off to different socialist sects of a few hundred. Members of the SP joined the SP, not Socialist Alternative, or the RCO, or any other sect, and education must not be conditional on these groups. We must build up the capacity of the party as we grow, not held back by the different sects, to build a single socialist mass party
Another reason why an external education of the SP is defended, is that education may require us to decide on a ‘line’ on specific topics. Ignoring the fact that this issue is not solved by external groups which unaccountably dictate the line of party education, this critique of internal education is hardly a critique. It is true that education may help us define our own politics, this is crucial for the SP. In What is to be done, Lenin continued from his aforementioned quote to explain that education is especially crucial in the formative period of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP), as its politics has not yet become defined, and it has not settled its differences with non-socialist currents. This is precisely why we need education, in order to define our politics through rigorous investigation and debate through the participation of all members. How can the SP become a revolutionary party which challenges capitalism if we are unsure of who we are ourselves and what our tasks are? These questions cannot be glossed over, and a ‘line’ of the party must be developed, which can be critiqued and debated internally.
The Communist Caucus calls for an education committee, which will organise education for all members of all theoretical levels. This is necessary for a revolutionary and democratic working-class party.
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