Comrade Delta
The 2013 Crisis in Britain’s Largest Far-Left Party
DK Renton
£15 Paperback | Preorder now
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Telling the story of the infamous Comrade Delta scandal that has become synonymous with the Socialist Workers Party, this book details the year-long struggle for women’s rights and democracy on the British left.
Comrade Delta recalls the sequence of events in 2013, when hundreds of members of the Socialist Workers Party learnt for the first time that their party had mishandled an allegation of rape. The accused was one of the party’s leaders, and those handling the investigations – the leader’s friends – humiliated the complainant, asking demeaning and sexist questions before clearing the accused of all wrongdoing. When members protested the decision, supporters of the party leadership sought to drive the dissidents out of the party. For 12 months, the conflict wore on without resolution as more and more information became known to the members and the public.
Based on internal documents and interviews with more than 50 participants, including each of the main complainants, this book analyses the structures and personalities that shielded the perpetrator while victims were harassed and critics were accused of abandoning Marxism.
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DK Renton is a barrister and historian who writes for publications including The London Review of Books, Tribune, and Jacobin. He posts regularly on the themes of this book on Substack (davidrenton590934.substack.com).
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“An honest, balanced, and well-documented account of an appalling episode. If the left is to progress, it must learn from its own history.”
Ian Birchall, author of Tony Cliff: A Marxist for His Time (Bookmarks, 2011)
“Why must left anti-capitalists be extreme democrats? What could a durably open, dynamic and non-hierarchical far-left organisation look like? How exactly does sexual violence reproduce itself institutionally, destroy solidarity, undermine freedom struggles, and relate to Marxist theory? Part autoethnography, part revolutionary feminist cri de cœur, David Renton's Comrade Delta is an impeccably researched, generous, principled reckoning with the causes and consequences of a catastrophic betrayal of sexual violence survivors perpetrated by the Central Committee of the Socialist Workers Party in the period 2010-2013. I cannot recommend it enough.”
Sophie Lewis, author of Full Surrogacy Now: Feminism Against Family (Verso, 2019)
“Renton's relentless research into the most shameful of moments in the sometimes proud history of the SWP is depressing, but above all it reveals the dire consequences of creating a left party with centralised and secretive leadership. A timely and sobering contribution as we the independent left embark, with hope, on creating a new political party. Take good heed dear comrades!"
Hilary Wainwright, author of A New Politics From the Left (Polity Press 2018)
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September 2026
Ebb Books
252 Pages, 5×8Paperback ISBN: 9781738468768
Ebook ISBN: 9781738468775
Coming September 2026
“An honest, balanced, and well-documented account of an appalling episode. If the left is to progress, it must learn from its own history.”
Ian Birchall, author of Tony Cliff: A Marxist for His Time (Bookmarks, 2011)