Ian Birchall, "Writing Socialist Biography: Some methodologcal problems - the biography of Tony Cliff".
Paper presented at the New Socialist Approaches to History seminar, Institute of Historical Research, October 10th 2005
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In this paper I describe some of the methodological problems I am facing in writing the biography of Tony Cliff (Ygael Gluckstein), anti-Zionist socialist, advocate of the “state capitalist” theory of Russia and leading figure in the Socialist Review Group and its successors, the International Socialists and the Socialist Workers Party. My aim is to provide a record of a unique and influential figure of the British far left in the second half of the twentieth century. I want to avoid both hagiography and dry organisational history
In embarking on the work I had to consider the general problem of socialist biography; how much importance should a socialist historian attach to the course of a single life? I also have the problem that I knew Cliff very well for nearly four decades. While this undoubtedly gives me insights, does it undermine my capacity for objectivity? Bearing in mind Trotsky’s rigorous criteria in his Preface to The History of the Russian Revolution, I have attempted to confront the questions of objectivity and partisanship. In particular I have to establish the relative weight to be given to oral testimony (including my own recollections and Cliff’s autobiography) and to printed documentation. I conclude by describing what I have achieved so far, especially with regard to Cliff’s childhood, his writings from the Middle East period and his particular contribution to the development of the theory of state capitalism.