A better model for an approach to Syriza than Greek far-left coalition Antarsya’s approach of outright rejection, declaring the defeat of Syriza predetermined, and giving up on any battle to hold Syriza to its promises, would be Trotsky's proposal for the tasks of Belgian Marxists in relation to the reformist programme of Belgian social-democracy in the mid-30s.
"First, to explain to the advanced workers the political meaning of the 'plan', that is, decipher the manoeuvres of the social-democracy at all stages; secondly, to show in practice to possibly wider circles of workers that insofar as the bourgeoisie tries to put obstacles to the realisation of the plan we fight hand in hand with the workers to help them make this experiment.
"We share the difficulties of the struggle but not the illusions. Our criticism of the illusions must, however, not increase the passivity of the workers and give it a pseudo-theoretic justification but on the contrary push the workers forward. Under these conditions, the inevitable disappointment with the 'Labor Plan' will not spell the deepening of passivity but, on the contrary, the going over of the workers to the revolutionary road".
"If we had to present a plan to the Belgian proletariat, this plan would have had an altogether different aspect. Unfortunately, the Belgian proletariat gave this mandate not to us but to the Belgian Labor Party [POB], and the plan reflects two facts: the pressure of the proletariat on the POB and the conservative character of this party...
"When we say to the masses that to realize this imperfect plan it is necessary to struggle to the end, we are far from covering up the deception; on the contrary, we are helping the masses to expose it by their own experience...
"The leaders of the POB do not want a struggle. But they are caught in the wheels of the crisis of capitalism and of reformism. They were forced to proclaim the plan and even to make of it the platform of the Belgian proletariat. It is a fact. What is our task? To help the workers to turn the wheels into which the opportunist leaders have been forced to thrust their hands".
Trotsky explained for Belgium why it would be idle fantasy to demand instead that the POB have a socialist programme.
"The revolutionary task consists in demanding that the POB take power in order to put its own plan into effect. Vereecken [a sectarian critic of Trotsky] replies to this: No!... the plan is no good... I, Vereecken, I will propose a better plan.
"Is this serious? No, it is ridiculous. Vereecken sets himself outside of reality. He constructs in his imagination a united front that does not exist in Belgium. For this imaginary united front he proposes an imaginary program, that is, Vandervelde [the POB] and Jacquemotte [the Belgian Stalinists] ought to fight together for the perfect plan dreamed up by Vereecken. In this way matters will be splendidly arranged..."
A similar approach in Greece would be to demand of Syriza that it carry through its programme, and at the same time explain to workers that the programme is deficient and workers need to take up other struggles too.
