Transitional Program
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The Transitional Program, the full name of which is The Death Agony of Capitalism and the Tasks of the Fourth International, is a political platform adopted by the 1938 founding congress of the Fourth International, the international Leninist organization founded by Leon Trotsky.
The "transitional" idea of this program, roughly, is the following. The working class is not ready to embrace the revolutionary ideas of the Fourth International. Hence, it is necessary to come up with slogans that it can embrace: better working conditions, peace, etc. By fighting for these "transitional" demands, in the opinion of the Trotskyists, the workers will come to realize that capitalism cannot meet their needs, and they will then embrace the full program of the Fourth (Trotskyist) International.
The program was proposed to the Congress by the National Committee of the Socialist Workers Party (US). The program was developed through discussions between Leon Trotsky, who did much of the drafting of the document, and leaders of the SWP such as James P. Cannon. Those involved were at pains to ensure that the Program was seen as a document of the FI. However, Trotskyist currents that have departed the Fourth International tend to present the Program as a work authored by Trotsky individually.
In 1981, Labor Publications issued a new translation, based on the Russian-language original, which carried the subtitle "The Mobilization of the Masses around Transitional Demands to Prepare the Conquest of Power".
