International Trotskyist Committee for the Political Regeneration of the Fourth International

The International Trotskyist Committee for the Political Regeneration of the Fourth International (ITC) was a Trotskyist international tendency based around the Revolutionary Workers League in the United States.

When it was founded in the Summer of 1984 the ITC was essentially the continuation of the earlier Trotskyist International Liaison Committee, whose largest section had been the Alan Thornett-led Workers Socialist League in Britain. At the time of its foundation the ITC had the following sections:

*Workers' International Review Group, Britain
*Revolutionary Workers' League (Italy) (LOR)
*Revolutionary Workers' League (USA) (RWL)
*and a section in Denmark

Soon after the WIRG in Britain was superseded by the Revolutionary Internationalist League.

Politically the ITC was essentially an Orthodox Trotskyist group looking to the traditions of the International Committee of the Fourth International. It supplemented these established positions with a series of positions on what they described as specially oppressed social groups on whose radicalisation they placed great stress. Therefore they placed a heavy emphasis on Black Liberation and work among the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and transgendered communities.

The ITC was also in favour of working within other larger Trotskyist tendencies in order to draw them towards their politics, and their sections in Italy and Britain entered the (reunified) Fourth International's sections in their respective countries to further this aim. Within the USFI they formed the International Trotskyist Opposition.

However, by the mid-1990s there were serious tensions in both the RWL and the ITC. This led to a split of a large part of the RWL who formed the Trotskyist League, the departure of some members of the RIL and the split of the Italian section. The departing groups remained organised in the Faction for the Trotskyist International, within the United Secretariat. [http://ito.gn.apc.org/FTI_SPLT.HTM] This left a rump ITC consisting of little more than the RWL and RIL, both of which abandoned their press organs soon afterwards, preferring to work anonymously. The ITC stopped functioning at the same time. The RWL has worked in the National Women's Rights Organising Committee and the RIL has worked through the Movement for Justice.

ee also

* [http://www.myspace.com/internationaltrotskyist International Trotskyist Committee Myspace page]
* List of Trotskyist internationals
* http://www.broadleft.org/trotskyi.htm