It sounds to me like it comes down to whether permanent, formal, pro-revolutionary workplace organisations are a worthwhile thing to pursue. It's obvious from the above that SolFed think it is, and that the ICC and others disagree.
This again I think points to the confusion in terminology - but I also think it's a genuine point of disagreement (but one which gets caught up in the terminology arguments).
I'd love to see a permanent, formally organised, 'network of pro-revolutionaries/militants' based around workplace activity - which has points of agreement on fundamentals like representation, mass meetings, etc - essentially broad enough to encompass those of us who agree on this thread (which is somewhat representative of views of at least some within SolFed, the AF and various people who aren't in either), but with a focused scope of actual activity - so that it excludes both union-building activities (a la IWW) and explicitly political activities - basically anything which JK would put into the Anarchist Federation or ICC category.
Where I disagree is that this network attempts to organise a workplace as such - in fact I agree 100% with Steven's point here:
I see what you're getting at here, but I don't think this is a likely chain of events.I think is very unlikely that any point in the foreseeable future that a group of pro-revolutionaries will have a "critical mass of well-respected militants in a given workplace" who could call a meeting. But in any case, this is not a big issue, because it would not be the group of pro-revolutionaries that would instigate a meeting, it would be the informal grouping of radicalised workers in a workplace.
For example, when I started organising workplace meetings I spoke to five or six workmates, who had all been around for quite a while, then did it with their help.
So the relation between this sort of activity and the network (or "revolutionary union") I think would be more indirect, the network practically would be able to do things like propagandise for mass meetings etc, but not practically organise them itself.
This boils down to the following - I've used network-of-militants vs. revolutionary union to represent the two sides, hopefully to show where the semantic differences either obscure or reflect an actual point of disagreement. If that point of disagreement doesn't actually exist, then we need to clarify that, and IMO get on with sorting it out (although I can't make the bookfair this year).
Network-of-militants position:
1. The network organises the (pro-)revolutionaries.
2. The 'informal grouping of radicalised workers' organises the mass meeting.
3. The mass meeting organises the struggle.
(4. Political groups have members in the organisation but it's not a merger or a federation of political groups since it won't be taking on those functions.)
Revolutionary union position:
1. The network oragnises the (pro-revolutionaries). When it gets big enough, it organises mass-meetings too.
2. This happens, it's a good thing, but it's not a 'strategy'.
3. ibid.
4. ibid - except not sure if they want to turn SolFed into the network itself or not.
Everyone on this thread agrees on 3. I think there's a line somewhere between Knightrose/Alf/Steven/me and SolFed/JK on 1/2 that needs to be explored more thoroughly. I think raw's post somewhat contradicts 4.
I also reckon that if SolFed wants to become this network, it'd be a smoother process to open up networks to non-members, and then if that goes well eventually strip back anything it does which isn't contained in the activity of the networks if a decision was taken that it needs to be the same thing. That's less of an ask than having people 'join solfed', and it's also less of an ask than for SolFed to immediately dissolve itself into a new structure.
Just showing solidarity to fellow workers, surely? (solidarity is JK's name for his cock btw) (jk JK)
~J.