Anti-capitalist (Turkey)

Revolutionary Socialist Workers Party of Turkey ( _tr. Devrimci Sosyalist İşçi Partisi (DSİP)), also known by its former name, and the current name of its magazine, Anti-capitalist ( _tr. Antikapitalist), is a Trotskyist organisation in Turkey. It is part of the International Socialist Tendency led by the Socialist Workers Party (UK).

The antecedents of Antikapitalist go back to 1982 when a group named "Kurtulus Orgutu" (Liberation Organisation) was formed that stood in the Maoist political tradition. The members of this group engaged in debate with members of the International Socialist groups in Germany and Britain and were won to their views. By abandoning their Maoist views for Trotskyist ideas the members of Kurtulus Orgutu decided that the overthrow of capitalism in Turkey could only be carried out by the working class as a part of an international socialist revolution. This was a massive change in ideology for a group previously based on stagist ideas derived from Stalinism.

From April 1984 the group issued a paper called "Sosyalist Isci" which was published until February 1989. They also published a journal "Sosyalist Tartisma" from 1985 to 1987. Between 1989 and 1992 they had no publication. From 1992 they began a new period in their development as a legal political group in Turkey and again issued "Sosyalist Isci" as a monthly which in 1997 became bi-weekly.

In 1997 they formally named themselves the "DSIP". However internal problems led to a split in the new party in 1998 and a group named "Workers Democracy" (DI) left the group. The leaderships of the British and Greek SWPs supported different sides in this dispute. Some time later some members of DI left to form Antikapitalist which at the end of 2003 had fused with the DSIP.

External links

* [http://www.antikapitalist.net/ Antikapitalist web site (in Turkish)]