Finally, there are the supporters of the creation of a Party of Labour. • Why have you decided to support the Party of Labour option rather than the organization of a new party that would appear as a successor of the CPSU?
Some members of the coordinating committee of the Marxist Platform support the initiative for the creation of a new party — the Union of Communists -which hopes to represent the better traditions of the CPSU. Unlike these comrades I think that the CPSU has been terminally discredited by the bureaucratic policies of its leaders and the conformism of the majority of its rank-and-file members. The problem of forming a left opposition can only be met by another party.
However we agree with them in the sense of not wanting to break with traditions of support for social justice, democracy, humanism and the friendship of nations that have been built up within the Russian socialist movement in its century Russian socialist movement in its centurv long existence. These traditions need to be continued and given new life in a new historical situation.
The problem of creating a left, that is, a democratic socialist opposition, cannot be resolved either by reviving the CPSU or by creating a new Communist Party. And without such an opposition even a very fine democracy will degenerate into a dictatorship or some other kind of authoritarian form. The rising wave of populism and the attempts to start a witch-hunt mean that there is a real threat of a Pinochet-style dictatorship based on private property and the market. Only real democracy is a guarantee against such a threat. • And what is your answer to the talk about your "illegality"?
Patiently I will say it once again. We are fully open to all our supporters and our critics. Our aim is dialogue, not conspiracy. Our contact telephone number is 29977-39.*