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Session 3 – Friday, 10 November 1922 Report of the Executive Committee (Conclusion, Discussion) Conclusion of the ECCI report. Discussion of the ECCI report. Speakers: Zinoviev, Bordiga, Radek, Vajtauer, Ernst Meyer, Varga, Ruth Fischer, Neurath Convened: 11:30 a.m. Chairpersons: Kolarov, Zinoviev Zinoviev: Comrades, I hope that the theses that I have proposed on this question have been distrib- uted or will be distributed shortly.1 I will limit myself to a commentary on these theses. We must begin with the questions of the economic situation, the international political situation, and the situation in the workers’ movement. As for the first question, I do not believe we need to change in any fundamental way what we decided at the Third Congress. In my theses, I pro- pose that the Fourth Congress merely confirm the theses of Trotsky and Varga at the Third Congress on the economic situation.2 We can and should note that the evolution during the last fifteen months has basically and generally confirmed these theses. The course of events did, in fact, take the form that 1. Delegates had received draft resolution on the ECCI report, which was adopted in Session 7 (see pp. 289–90). However, Zinoviev’s remark regarding his theses appar- ently refers to an early draft of the Theses on Tactics (pp. 1149–63). 2. For the Third Congress theses, see Adler (ed.) 1980, pp. 184–203. For Trotsky’s report on the topic, see Trotsky 1972b, 1, pp. 174–226. 120 • Session 3 – 10 November 1922 we had foreseen in these theses. Although there is a temporary upturn in the United States, Britain, Japan, and France, and perhaps also in some other countries, it is quite clear that this upturn is only momentary, and that Comrade Varga was right in his recent pamphlet to characterise the situation as a period of capitalist decline.3 What we are now experiencing is not one of capitalism’s periodic crises but the crisis of capitalism, its twilight, its disintegration. Despite some improvement in a number of countries, the world economic situation remains as before. Capitalism cannot save itself from this situation. The only rescue for humankind, the only rescue for the productive forces lies in socialist revolution. In this sense, the diagnosis is fully as before, and we can confidently stand by what the Third Congress said: the objective situation remains revolutionary. Capitalism cannot find within itself the resources needed to save itself from the decisive crisis of the entire capitalist world. Now, as to the international political situation. Here, too, we can say that the contradictions are sharpening daily, and the objective situation remains revolutionary. During the last fifteen months, the disintegration of the Entente has proceeded with great strides. We have experienced an actual liquidation of the Versailles Treaty in various forms, and this treaty’s disintegration con- tinues. Bourgeois ‘pacifism’, which found its outstanding representative in the person of Lloyd George, is completely bankrupt. The Genoa and Hague Conferences sealed the bankruptcy of bourgeois pacifism.4 The election cam- paign now under way in Britain demonstrates an unprecedented lack of ideas on the part of the bourgeois parties. This battle between the old classical bour- geois parties in the oldest capitalist country displays not an iota of principle. It marks a total spiritual collapse of the bourgeoisie – a struggle of cliques, underlining what was already clear: that bourgeois pacifism has fallen into complete bankruptcy, and that the bourgeois parties are no longer capable of carrying out major struggles on issues of principle. The colonial and semi-colonial countries, one of the most important fac- tors in the process that we call the world-revolution, raised their struggle 3. See Varga 1921. 4. The Genoa Conference (10 April–19 May 1922) was convened to discuss economic reconstruction in Eastern Europe, and especially measures to improve relations with Soviet Russia. The inclusion of Russia among the thirty-four invited governments was a significant gain for the Soviet Republic. However, negotiations broke down over French and British insistence that Russia fully pay the debts incurred under tsarism before 1914 and fully restore nationalised foreign-owned property. It was during the Conference (16 April) that Russia and Germany signed the Rapallo Treaty to normalise relations and strengthen economic and military cooperation. An attempt was made to overcome the Genoa deadlock at the Hague Conference (26 June–20 July 1922), with equally negative results..

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