THE 1926 BRITISH GENERAL STRIKE.

Posted on May 19, 2013 by stutteringsteps

Previously I have dealt with the often sectarian nature of calls for general strikes. [see ‘Sectarianism and the question of a General Strike’.] In a later article I presented a brief over-view of the UK social and economic ferment around the early inter-war period (1918 – 1922). [see ‘General Strike: Myth and Misconception’.] In that second article the main organisation structure for mass working class opposition to the needs of capital were based around an ‘official’ alliance of the three largest concentrations of workers, the Miners, the Railway workers and the Dockers. That agreement for mutual support became popularly known as the ‘Triple Alliance’. It is a period well worthy of study for it represents the closest analogue to the present crisis of capitalism. However, the failure of that alliance – under circumstances which were favourable to success – did not end the difficulties faced by working people. Indeed the failure made them worse.

In this third concluding article on this question I shall consider the events around the famous, (or perhaps in some ways the infamous) 1926 General Strike. Having faced a weakened ruling elite between 1918 – 1922 and lost, the working class in the post Triple Alliance period, suffered wage reductions and increased working time. Under the capitalist mode of production, wage reductions and longer working hours increase the surplus-value produced by workers and pocketed by the owners of Capital for further distribution as profits, interest and taxes. Industrial capitalists and pro-capitalist politicians at the time needed this increase in surplus-value because world competition and the effects of the first world war, had significantly reduced the post-war rate and mass of surplus-value in the UK. That situation along with high levels of surplus finance-capital was the underlying socio-economic basis of the heightened inter-war class struggles dealt with in the previous articles. But that short period of struggle was only the beginning of the dire situation for workers.

The failure of these mass-based struggles meant that the organised workers, post 1921, conducted their defensive struggles on a sectional basis – and with very little success. The arrest and black-listing of union activists involved in the triple alliance movement weakened the left and strengthened the right wing in the trade union movement. The Union elites, many of whom had backed down in face of government threats and promises, retained their exalted positions within the trade union movement along with their ideas of peaceful reformist progress. During this period the middle-class intellectuals in the Independent Labour Party (ILP) produced their own contribution to the reform of capitalism entitled ‘Socialism in our Time’. The report recommended a minimum wage and nationalisation of key industries. This was exactly the bourgeois form of ‘socialism’ that Marx had warned against in 1848. In fact when partially implemented later in 1948-50 this form of ‘socialism’ was the means of rescuing and resuscitating capitalism. However, that was in the future; meanwhile in 1925 the situation was still bleak.

A) 1925 – Manoeuvres and preparations

Despite the previous Triple Alliance debacle, the idea of a mass strike did not completely die out. Even after the earlier defeats an element of fantasy rhetoric and wishful thinking still surfaced in trade union debates. For example, A. B. Swales of the Amalgamated Engineering Union at the TUC conference in 1925, thought the collapse of capitalism was nigh and perhaps getting carried away during his speech, stated;

“…at last there are clear indications of a world movement rising in revolt and determined to shake off the shackles of wage slavery.”

Such hopeful thinking was not entirely without basis, for there was indeed rising class conflict throughout Europe. In Russia this ferment had been transformed – at least initially – into workers revolution. Some of the left delegates to the 1925 annual TUC conference, hoping for the best, could not have known what totalitarian direction the events in Russia had already taken. Nor could they perhaps anticipate that the mistakes made in 1919 – 1921 would be so quickly repeated when they passed a resolution calling for a general strike. Although the fact that the resolution was referred to the right-leaning General Council for further consideration, may have caused a few utterances of ‘Oh no! – Not again’ for some of the more critical delegates.

Outside of the conference hall it was the continuing conflict between the miners and mine-owners which continued to focus attentions of workers and government alike. The quarrel came to a head during the summer of 1925 and a 1,000 strong conference of mine workers union delegates met and agreed to take decisive action. The main thrust of this action was to be in the form of an embargo on the movement of coal to begin on July 31st. On hearing of this decision the government backed down, met the union leaders and agreed to initiate a serious inquiry on the mining industry. A Royal Commission was therefore set up to examine the problems obstructing development in the mining industry. The commission was typically dominated by businessmen and senior civil servants – not all of whom were unsympathetic to the mine workers. Six months of waiting and marking time for the miners and workers followed this announcement whilst the Royal Commission deliberated. In contrast the government was quite active during this period.

Indeed, government officials behind the scenes were very busy setting up an Organisation for the Maintenance of Supplies (OMS). It was an organisation for recruiting and deploying volunteers to do exactly what it said on the tin so to speak – maintain the supply of essential materials and goods! This organisation plus the Emergency Powers Act of 1920 as supplemented by Circular 636, together with a number of government initiated conferences, formed the main basis of the governments preparations for a possible general strike. In contrast the TUC did next to nothing to prepare for such an eventuality. After some months the Royal Commission Report on mining was published, a Report which satisfied neither the mine owners of the miners. The mine owners wanted longer hours for the same wages, the miners wanted more money for the same hours. In other words it was still – stalemate!

B) 1926 – Just eight days of action.

After numerous unsuccessful meetings between miners representatives and mine owners reps, it was clear that no compromise was possible. For this reason on the 28th April the miners attended a further delegate conference to decide yet again what action they should take. The day after this rank and file conference a meeting of executive members of the effected trade unions also took place. These two meetings followed the previous months of more formal encounters, mainly between Trade Union leaders and government representatives. Against this background of deadlocked negotiations, the mine owners decided to assert their control and institute a ‘lock-out’ to commence on April 30th. Yet meetings between Trade Union leaders and government and mine owners representatives continued.

During one such meeting the Prime Minister Baldwin declared an end to the talks. His stated reason was because printers at the Daily Mail had refused to print a Monday issue unless an unfavourable editorial was altered. The withdrawal of the government and the threatened lock-out, forced the reluctant TUC general council to go through with the threatened general strike. It was set to start from midnight May 3rd 1926, and it did. The following day no trains ran, the docks were still, no buses moved and no newspapers appeared. In addition, building workers struck as did those in iron and steel, chemical, print, road transport, electricity and gas workers. The general strike was on.

     a) Workers strike organisation.

With  thousands of workers out on strike, many more expressed a desire to join in and support the struggle, but were held back by their union leaders. Nevertheless, a wide range of local workers action-groups were quickly formed around a core of strike requirements. These activities were, picketing, publicity, transport, communications, entertainment, meetings and permits for work and movements. Throughout the country, 54 of these strike groups took the name of ‘councils of action‘, 45 adopted ‘strike committee’ as their title, 15 were designated ‘Trades Council Committees‘, nine, ‘emergency committees’ and eight bore miscellaneous names. Typically, each union leadership gave differing guidelines and instructions to their union members. This lack of cohesion was further complicated by the fact that local strike committees were not allowed to communicate directly with the TUC but had to go through their own trade union executives.

Obvious problems of continuity and lack of consistency thus emerged throughout the country and exposed the weakness of sectionalism and the reformist and half-hearted perspective of the trade union leadership. For example, the co-op movement offered to give strikers credit or vouchers during the strike, but the unions would not guarantee to settle the amount owed when the strike was over. Nevertheless, the strike continued to develop with 1.25 million workers being directly involved after a couple of days. Meanwhile, the TUC did all it could to keep control of the movement and to stifle local initiatives. During numerous local actions, many activists were arrested by the government and a growing awareness of this resulted in many of the most prominent local activist changing their place of sleeping every night. Despite such avoidance measures, over 3,000 workers were arrested during the period of the strike.

In spite of provocations and arrests the strikers in general were well organised and in high spirits. Each town and district of large cities took part in meetings, demonstrations, recreational activities, concerts and picketing operations. In addition most local groups were busy issuing permits, preventing the smooth operation of normal ‘official’ activities, ensuring their own and publishing local bulletins. However, in a number of places violence occurred when police attempted to prevent the strikers from controlling the movement of vehicles and the distribution of food. At Glasgow, Doncaster, Leeds and Barnsley violent disputes broke out over the running of buses and transport. In several areas of London violent clashes between police and strikers took place as they did to a lesser degree in other parts of the country.

However, despite the rank and file initiative and creativity within each area and locale it was the undisputed control the Trade Union leadership that was to determine the subsequent outcome. TUC officials and union heads, for example, were keen to deny government accusations that they were challenging the power of the state. Indeed, they were not, for during this period, they were frequently engaged in secret talks with government. On at least one occasion at a posh mansion belonging to a South African mine-owner between the 6th and 10th May they were busily discussing with a government intermediary. At this clandestine meeting a memorandum was agreed – but with no formal guarantees. This memorandum was eventually rejected by the miners leaders on May 11, whilst the strike was still growing in strength. Despite these unsatisfactory outcomes, at 12.20 on Wednesday May 12 a deputation from the TUC met with the Prime Minister and agreed to call off the strike.

       b) The governments organisation.

As noted above the Emergency powers and the organisational framework to break the strike were already in place during 1915 and these swung into assertive action during the months of March and April 1926. The government by this time had 99 volunteer service committees, a force of 226,000 special constables, mounted police and armed soldiers to guard convoys. Strike breaking volunteers came forward from offices, ex-army personnel, students, rugby and cricket players, banks, city of London financiers, society ladies and managers of the various parts of industry and commerce. Further numbers of volunteers were recruited from businessmen, civil servants, local government officers, and unemployed workers. As the strike took hold these volunteers drove trains, buses, unloaded ships, warehouses, drove trucks, ran canteens and published the governments propaganda. The latter mainly through the medium of the ‘British Gazette’ – a broad sheet directed against the strike. A typical statement in it read;

“The country will break the strike or the strike will break the country.” (British Gazette May 6 1926.

In addition to arresting and jailing activists, the police confiscated typewriters, duplicators and were told by the OMS instructions to be as vigorous with their truncheons as they needed to be to contain and defeat the strike. Under the Emergency Powers Act the government also assumed the right to seize, land, buildings, food, vehicles, docks, railways, coal, petrol, electricity, gas and water supplies. Public meetings were prohibited, premises searched and fraternising with the troops was declared a punishable offence. Trade Union officials were threatened with arrest and threats to sequester union funds were made. Advice was sought by the government to have the Strike made illegal, but this was not pursued. Despite some set-backs and lack of ability of the strike-breaking volunteers, with all the power of the state and the pro-capitalist classes, the governments preparations were able to dwarf those of the Trade Union bureaucracy.

The aftermath.

The BBC quickly announced the end of the strike over the radio and the TUC sent out telegrams to the local union offices calling off the strike – after just eight full days. In these communications the TUC deceitfully suggested that the miners situation was going to be resolved and for this reason the strike was no longer necessary. The rank and file greeted this news with dismay, disbelief, anger and frustration. Some decided and tried to go back to work whilst others refused and wanted to carry on. Employers were now free to take back those they wished and refuse those they thought unsuitable. Many workers were only taken back on condition they left their unions. Others had to sign a paper admitting they had broke their contracts. In this way new and therefore reduced contracts were forced upon large numbers of workers. Six months after the strike had been called off, 45, 000 railway workers had still not been accepted back at their workplaces.

Calling off the strike was considered by most workers and activists as another grand betrayal. Once again the working class had shown solidarity, initiative, good humour, discipline, organisational ability and stoicism, only to be sold out. Betrayed by a leadership which had one foot in ‘respectability’ along with ambitions for future parliamentary careers and peerages. By the11th May the strike was still spreading and indeed the engineering workers followed instructions to come out as the ‘second wave’ on the 11th. The date is important. The TUC leaders already knew in their own minds they would probably call the strike off the very next day but let the engineers strike. Many of these subsequently lost their jobs and livelihood as victimisation took hold of all employers organisations and managers. The blacklist was extended generally and many workers never regained their former employment and had to accept any type of work they could find.

The miners had now been abandoned, albeit reluctantly by the workers in other industries. Now it was every worker for themselves. No working class job was secure now this capitulation by the leadership had taken place. The miners held out for another four months before hardship began to create a sporadic drift back to work – on any terms the employers would offer. A breakaway miners union was formed in the midlands to co-ordinate this and speed it up. Eventually those miners who were accepted back at their pits had to agree to longer hours and lower pay. At the national level, the government later introduced the Trade Disputes and Trade Union Act of 1927. This Act declared sympathy strikes and assertive picketing illegal, it made future political levies subject to voluntary contributions and severed the civil service unions and associations from links with the TUC.

Conclusions.

This whole history and that preceding it during the 1918-1921 period of class struggle, reveals the extent of the forces those engaged in general strike are taking on. For this reason the period deserves serious study. It also demonstrates that the simplistic slogan ‘unity is strength’ in practice, is nothing more than a useless abstraction. Strength depends upon what kind of unity is achieved. The top-down form of trade union unity allows ’leaders’ to direct, misdirect, undermine, restrict or even totally betray working class struggles. Trade union based unity has proved more often than not, to be a weakness rather than a strength.

Indeed, essentially the same pattern is currently being played out in Europe, particularly Greece. It will continue to do so in the US and the UK, whenever such large-scale actions occur. Governments, trade union officials and political parties of the ‘left’ and those calling themselves ‘socialist’ in the 21st century will do what they did in the 20th. In any social uprisings and challenges to the capitalist system they will ally themselves with bourgeois-liberal elements and betray the struggles of workers and oppressed. This is because they are a structural part of the ‘system’ they believe in and are a permanent part of the problem. Socialism for these people is nothing more than capitalism with a few paltry benefits – welfare capitalism for a privileged few.

The only kind of unity worth having is that built on solidarity between and among the working and oppressed themselves. And even here, the form of solidarity and unity needs to be developmentally appropriate to the varying purposes intended and the results required. Superficially, it may seem that a country-wide unity organised from a command type centre is the most appropriate form. However, idealised assumptions such as these – as we have seen – rarely materialise as imagined. The vast majority of workers and oppressed in such struggles are therefore rendered dependant upon the centre and charismatic leaders – both of which can easily be corrupted or removed.

Given the depth and breadth of the crisis capitalism is currently undergoing the unity needed is that based on the self-activity and self-governance of the working and oppressed. In the struggle for such solidarity there is a need to constantly assert and explain to those in struggle the systemic bankruptcy of the capitalist mode of production and the sterility of trying to reform it. In addition the case needs to be made for the potential and necessity of a post-capitalist perspective guided by a revolutionary-humanist outlook.

Roy Ratcliffe (May 2013.)

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RELIGION – IS – POLITICS!

Posted on May 10, 2013 by stutteringsteps

The recent pronouncement (May 2013) by Justin Welby, Archbishop of Cantebury, that UK television ought to give a high profile to religion, raises an important question. His elite male desire to have religion “stitched into our public life” brings to the fore what tends to get overlooked in the countries of the west. It is that at their root, most religions are patriarchal ideologies that seek to govern the thinking and actions of those who come within their respective spheres of control. In other words organised religions are actually a form of politics.

When western politicians claim that ‘religion should be kept out of politics’ and western theologians assert that ‘politics should be kept out of religion‘ this indicates a tacit recognition of a hard-won truce – in the west – between the competing desires of both these elite’s to exclusively govern their particular communities. However, as we know, the west is only a special and relatively recent case, and as we now see vividly manifested in the Middle East, religion is actually one of the oldest forms of politics.

The fierce struggles in Europe against religious governance during the Renaissance, the Reformation and the Enlightenment periods, finally created a bifurcation between the two sets of competing elites. The male political elite began to govern their communities according to secular law whilst the male religious elite continued to govern theirs according to ancient texts – but after the Enlightenment within a restricted sphere.

However, this split between secular politics and religious politics is less clear-cut in other countries – particularly in the Indian sub-continent and the Middle East. There, the battle between religious and secular forms of elite male governance still rages. In Iran the conflict, has been won by the religious elite – at least for the moment. In Egypt, Tunisia, Syria, Pakistan and elsewhere, the struggle ebbs and floes, but continues. The current fundamentalist religious movements exerting themselves by bomb and/or ballot-box in the Middle-East, North Africa, Afghanistan etc., represent an aggressive return to the primary political core of religions – particularly the three Abrahamic ones.

Interestingly in Europe and the UK there is also the beginning of a re-emergence of that particular struggle. It comes via calls for Shia Law to take precedence over secular decision-making – for some sections of our European and UK communities. It is time, therefore, to recognise that organised religion – at its core – is not simply a private spiritual matter, but another form of politics. It is therefore an issue of increasing public importance. On the surface, the question may appear simply as a choice between decisions based upon ancient books, or upon ballot boxes. But it is actually more than this.

Left unchallenged such a choice resolves itself into a question of which set of elite males should govern and regulate the conduct of communities, societies and nations. This is because ‘patriarchal power’ is the sun around which these two competing forms of earthly governance orbit and neither have brought peace, justice or equality, let alone gender equality. As we shall see in the next section political governance by male elite’s is hard-wired into the DNA of all three Abrahamic religions – Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Later we will see a mirror image of this patriarchal aspiration reflected in secular politics.

Religion: Politics by another name.

The neglect of serious biblical studies – even among those of ‘faith’ – leaves most people with a casual and naïve understanding of religious ideology. In fact theoretically and practically, religion is about earthly governance so religion is a form of politics. In this regard it is the existence of threats and punishments which identifies any ideology as concerned primarily with politics and governance. The three Abrahamic religions are therefore replete with threats and punishments. Reading the Torah/Old Testament quickly reveals that ‘in the beginning’ was not just light – but governance.

Genesis clearly expresses that the imagined first couple, Adam and Eve were to have no say in what they could and could not eat or how they would live. They were duly punished for gaining knowledge. The author/s of Genesis and the other books of the bible clearly did not wish humanity to be self-governing, democratic or even knowledgeable. Later, Genesis suggests that the whole of humanity, except Noah, was punished because they did not follow the dictates laid out for them. Noah is even promoted to governor general of the whole planet;

“And the fear of you and the terror of you shall be on every beast of the earth and of every bird of the sky:” (Genesis 9 v 2.)

Later still, Abram is said to have, circumcised every member of his family and household. No, discussion, no contradiction, no alternative and no vote on the matter was to be allowed. The inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrah, who refused to live according to such dictates, were duly wiped out. The true political import of such narratives is missed if only their authenticity or historical credibility is discussed. In each case, the texts are purposeful, polemical narratives used as political weapons in order to establish at least three hierarchical-based objectives.

First, to establish and confirm an exclusive, collective community. Second, to gain and maintain leadership control of that collective community by a governing male elite. Third, to promote and consolidate the attributes and objectives considered desirable by that governing elite, which by sleight of hand they present as the word of God.

“But if you will not harken to the voice of the Lord your God, and do not observe and do all his commandments and his statutes which I command you this day, then all these curses shall come upon you and overtake you…..The Lord shall send upon you ruin, confusion, and rebuke in all that you set your hand to do, until you are destroyed, and until you perish quickly; because of your evil doings, because you have forsaken me.” (Torah/Old Testament. Deut. 28 v 15 and 20.)

The real political essence of this passage (and countless others) is the demand to ‘do’ (ie obey) all the commandments and statutes’ which are decreed by the religious elite. The demand, in typical totalitarian fashion, is backed up by threats of punishments up to and including total destruction of those who resist. The narratives of Exodus and Leviticus are also full of rules and regulations that were to be forcefully imposed upon tribal members by the leaders of the tribe. What these texts demonstrate is the aim of an elite to govern every aspect of personal and community life. One further example;

“They will bow down to you with their faces to the earth. And lick the dust of your feet.”…”And your descendants shall posses nations.”..”.the nation and the kingdom which will not serve you will perish.” “You will eat the wealth of nations, and in their riches you will boast.” (Isaiah 49 v 23; 54 v 3; 60 v 12;61 v 6.)

What is clear is that these are not spiritual concerns. They are political aspirations and fantasies. Although they were never realised, the patriarchal political nature and essence of Judaism did not atrophy or become extinct. Jewish women and the Palestinians have born witness to how this aspiration to govern others still virulently operates. The desire to become a political power governing human conduct is also clearly evident in the Christian Gospels.

“Where is He who has been born King of the Jews?…In Bethlehem…For out of you shall come forth a ruler.” (Mathew 2 v 2-5 and 6.)

The gospel narrators at this point were not anxious to gain a mystical interpreter of theology – they wanted much more. Because religion is essentially politics, its political nature did not (and still does not) disappear even when its advocates are forced by circumstances to play a subordinate role. Recall the empire-wide Christian governance achieved on the back of the conversion of the Roman Emperors, Constantine and Justinian to Christianity. This was a hegemony that led to Europe-wide community domination and oppression throughout the middle ages by successive Popes, and their religious/political lieutenants. It also led to the infamous bloody crusades to assert domination over the Middle East. Next consider the political foundation of Islam, which calls for submission and obedience to men, particularly elite men.

“O you who believe! Obey Allah and obey the Apostle and those in authority from among you; then if you quarrel about anything refer it to Allah and the Apostle,..” (Surah 4 v 59)

This is clearly an instruction to submit to a form of earthly governance controlled by Muhammud and ‘those in authority‘, which is not restricted purely to spiritual matters. The ’anything’ in this quotation applies to all aspects of communal living. The above, and many other instances in the Qur’an are political directives aimed at the total governance of human communities by a male elite. From the conquest of Mecca in 630 CE, through the armed establishment of the Islamic Empire in the 9th to the 13th century, the politics of Islam governed all aspects of life with rigorous detail and ruthless determination. For;

“Allah has promised to those of you who believe and do good that He will most certainly make them rulers of the earth as He made rulers those before them…” (Surah 24 v 55)

Here we have the third, Abrahamic monotheistic ideology, not only emphatically aspiring to the complete political governance of human communities already incorporated within their control, but ever hopeful of jurisdiction over those who as yet remain outside it.

An important point arises here. The racist nature of some of those who criticise Islam, particularly in the West, is revealed by their partiality. They correctly recognise the political nature of Islam and its frequent ruthless suppression of opposition, but do not criticise Judaism and Christianity for this identical political aspiration and practice. Nor do they criticise Christianised liberal democratic capitalist politics for its immorality, corruption and support for exploitation of the worlds’ people and environment. Religion in the west, is no less a form of male politics, even though it has become a subordinate and colluding partner with another form of hierarchical male domination – politics via the ballot box.

Politics: A new form of religion.

In western countries in particular, politics has become an alternative universal absolute. For some people, ‘faith’ in politics has replaced ‘faith’ in an invisible higher power. Politics has, like religion, become seen as something universally and eternally good – whose existence is rarely questioned – even if its honesty is. Political parties have even taken on the form and some of the content of religious denominations and sects. Like religions they are dominated by male hierarchies, who decide rules along with acceptable ‘norms’ for their membership. They also promise future benefits to mankind – under their leadership – and continually preach the ‘good news’ to members who duly attend conferences to listen.

Some political parties are more democratic than others, and like Protestant Congregationalism and Presbyterianism, allow a varying degree of participation to members. But again like religion, it is generally a form of participation, restricted to financially supporting the elite and serving them practically. Unfortunately, this is not the worst aspect of politics, for political parties create and encourage an attitude of unwarranted ‘belief’. Belief in ‘the party’, in spite of any contradictory evidence; ‘belief’ in the leadership, in spite of obvious failings; and ‘belief’ in the party dogma and ideology – without question. It becomes, a religious type commitment.

Take for example the words of Trotsky’s 1924, speech to the 13th congress of the Russian Communist Party; ”..in the last analysis, the party is always right…‘right or wrong, this is my party”. This statement is so close to a form of nationalistic passion or religious zeal as to be an adequate indicator that even the politics of the ‘left’ is effected by this ‘absolutist’ phenomenon. That a fervent anti-capitalist and highly intelligent intellectual such as Leon Trotsky can succumb to such political ‘intoxication’ shows how powerfully this secular ‘universal absolute’ has become – and he was not on his own to fetishise ‘the party’!

Nor is it something now relegated to the past. For was this sentiment (my party right or wrong) not powerfully exhibited by some members of the SWP in the recent troubling events? Unfortunately it is not restricted to this one UK sectarian organisation but infects most of them. Indeed, as Marx long ago wrote; “Every sect is in fact religious”. Yet there are still many contemporary anti-capitalists who unquestioningly accept (ie ‘believe’ in) the absolute necessity for a political party to deliver the oppressed from exploitation by the capitalist classes. The party in this perspective is seen as a missionary type project whose elite will guide and lead the workers to a new-Jerusalem salvation.

This ‘belief’ in the ‘party’ exists despite the evidence that political parties are the problem not the solution to the problems facing the working and oppressed classes. And it is here that the distinction between belief-based ideas and evidence-based ideas becomes starkly apparent. Advocates of belief-based ideas accept only evidence that supports their beliefs and reject evidence that does not. Even highly intelligent anti-capitalists will trawl through copious amounts of material in order to extract evidence that confirms what they already believe. They rarely, if ever, search out or trawl through historical material to find evidence that contradicts their views. This partisan research method distinguishes between those who say they follow Marx and those who actually follow Marx’s advice on research and politics. For example;

“Hence too, a revolution with a political soul, in accordance with the limited and dichotomous nature of its soul, organises a ruling stratum in society at the expense of society itself.” (Marx in ‘Marx/Engels. Collected Works. Volume 3 page 205.)

Marx’s negative appraisal of politics and the political mentality was the other side of the coin so to speak of his oft-repeated advocacy that “The emancipation of the working class, must be achieved by the working classes themselves.” It also coincides with his decision not to co-operate with people who stated that the workers must be “..freed from above by philanthropic persons from the upper and lower middle classes.” These opinions rarely get an airing on the ‘left’ nor are they seriously considered by those who continue to ‘believe’ in the Leninist project of creating a ‘vanguard’ party to emancipate the working class. This is despite the fact that Leninism from 1917 and beyond did in fact organise a ruling stratum in soviet society at the expense of workers of soviet society.

To sum up.

The fact that religion and politics are ideologies of patriarchal governance should be obvious from their ideas and their practices. They both promote an acceptance of governance by elite males, to the detriment of women and all those below them. This governance is perpetuated by three elements. First: hegemony in thinking. Second: threats of possible punishment. Third: by actual punishments. The latter two explain the viciousness with which people, who seriously oppose their rule, are treated. Whilst some kinds of political governance may be marginally better than religious, the political elite’s still use the armed bodies of the state to club, pepper-spray, taser, kettle, gas, arrest and imprison demonstrating workers, anti-capitalist activists and other protestors against their rule.

In many non-western countries these enforcement elements are not always adequately provided by the state and therefore patriarchal vigilantes fill in the gaps. The meaning of religiously inspired shooting or beheading of women and men who do not accept governance by fundamentalist males is both to directly punish and harm the victims but also to reinforce conformity and fear among others. The bombing of polling stations and different religious communities by fanatics from other religions has the same purpose and the purpose is political. If religious community hostilities were simply about esoteric spiritual matters, disputes would be conducted in words only and agreement (or disagreement) would be reached without bloodshed.

Neither is it, as some people imagine, that religious hostility is political hostility in which spiritual matters have been unfairly introduced to confuse or justify the actions of combatants. An element of that may be occasionally true, but religiously inspired hostilities are always political hostilities, precisely because religion has always been and continues to be a form of patriarchal politics. Once again, (ie in the 21st century) religion is trying to become the new politics and the old politics has, for all intents and purposes, become a moribund religion. Neither offer real material benefits, except to their elites. They are both parasitic on their respective communities promising a better future under their leadership, but delivering worse.

To gain a future fit for all sections of humanity, without discrimination, without exploitation and oppression, the capitalism mode of production will have to be superseded and all forms of patriarchal governance – religious and political – relegated to the dustbin of history. An awareness of these two needs will take time and experience to spread widely among communities. Old habits and deference are too well ingrained to be instantly overthrown for self-activity and communal organisation.

Nevertheless, every new mode and every new paradigm of thinking has its pioneers. Among the young people of the 21st century, there are many such future trailblazers untainted by religious dogma or political sectarianism. It is these present and future generations of humanity in the east and the west, who face the task of combating the patriarchal ideologies of religion and bourgeois politics. It is to be hoped that the developing crisis will speed this process on.

Roy Ratcliffe (May 2013)

[See also ‘The shooting of Malalah’ ; ‘Religion versus Women’s Rights’; ‘Clinging onto Patriarchy’ ; ‘The Party (help or Hindrance)’ and ‘Leaders or Facilitators’ at http://www.critical-mass.net ]

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CULLING THE MIDDLE CLASSES.

Posted on May 3, 2013 by stutteringsteps

Round one.

The last three decades of hegemony by neo-liberal economists and their political allies have seen the ruthless devastation of the organised working class and the virtual annihilation of the small business class – in all advanced capitalist countries. The once large-scale trade union movement of skilled and unskilled workers, attacked by economic rationalisation and the capitalist state, has been shrunk to a fraction of its pre- and post-Second World War numbers. Its political and social influence has consequently also been radically reduced.

Running almost parallel with this deliberate onslaught against the working class has been the less direct, but no less thorough impoverishment and demise of the small business section of the middle-class. Part of this sector (retail) has been replaced by mega super-markets and internet shopping. Another part (component supply) has been largely replaced by small to middle businesses based in foreign ‘export processing zones‘ (EPZ‘s). A final segment was devastated by bank miss-selling of interest rate swaps and other financial instruments. This continual culling of its members along with their economic base has also reduced the social and political influence of the small business section of the middle-class.

These 20th century developments were the first stage in an ongoing process of assault on the middle and white-collar classes. We are now witnessing a second stage in the culling of the middle-class section of capitalism. The logic of pre-2008 and post-2008 stages of the capitalist mode of production was, and is, to find ways to invest the increasing amounts of surplus finance-capital created by the economic process. Enormous amounts of money-capital could not, and still cannot find direct or indirect investment opportunities in existing industrial and commercial projects. An alternative source of investment was needed and under capitalism, it still is.

That was the primary economic motive for the privatisation of state assets begun under Thatcher in the UK. However, a further consequence of the 20th century privatisations was the reduction of the numbers and salaries of the middle ranks of management and workforce. Now, in the 21st century, austerity measures have accelerated the process of ‘shaking out‘ this particular ‘state-employed’ section of the middle class. The planned further reductions of public spending and further privatisations will continue this process.

Round two.

Neo-liberalism represents the political and economic domination of society by the big-business, banking and bond-holder sections of capitalism. However, as a minority, they do not act alone. It is the political class and the armed forces of the state, which act as the willing agents of these financial sections. It is the politicians and their intellectual servants in universities and think-tanks who must devise means of achieving the economic and financial interests of finance-capital. It is these pro-capitalist intellectuals who also invent the justifications and rationalisations to present these sectional interests as being for the general good.

Hence the latest plans to introduce the ‘mutualisation’ of more state assets. Mutualisation is privatisation with a fig-leaf to cover up the more offensive parts. Those workers who manage to keep their jobs after mutualisation, will be given some ‘shares‘ in the private company. Shares which in the continuing crisis will probably be worth next to nothing. Hence also the constant mantra of there being ‘no alternatives’ to the current model of UK and European crisis-solving. We are told there are no alternatives to austerity, low interest rates and quantitative easing (printing money). This is despite the obvious fact that there is a clear example of an alternative.

Iceland, a finance-dominated country, for example, found the only way to temporarily save its capitalist base – as a whole – from the current capitalist crisis. It did so by repudiating the sovereign and bank debt, jailing the bankers and officials who caused it and legally restricting the freedom of banks to do the same again. Of course, the Iceland example is not an alternative which will ultimately benefit present and future generations of blue and white-collar workers, the poor and the unemployed. Nor is it an alternative which will overcome the fundamental contradictions of the capitalist mode of production.

However, it is an alternative which protects the non-financial sections of the capitalist class, larger numbers of its middle-class supporters and does not require a home grown scapegoat. The failure to even suggest such a course of action for the countries of Europe, the UK and the US, demonstrates the allegiance of the right-wing political class to the finance sector of capital. This failure also highlights the poverty of political thinking within traditional left-leaning political elites in Europe. No ‘left’ politician has even hinted at such a possibility. Even Syriza in Greece, has not promoted such radical measures as the Icelandic pro-capitalists have already implemented.

The ‘Poverty of Politics’.

In Europe, UK and North America none of the mainstream political parties seem to have accepted that the present crisis requires radical solutions. Unlike the Icelandic pro-capitalists which recognised radical measures were necessary and swiftly took them, the political elite in the UK and elsewhere are stuck in a reformist time-warp. Their current policy debates reflect an entrenched neo-liberal orthodoxy together with a compromise mentality, both of which matured during an earlier relative affluent period of capitalist expansion.

Their talk of the need for ‘economic growth’ in a situation of global warming and general over-production of commodities, waste, pollution and skill sets, is an indication of being unable or unwilling to think out of the box. They individually and collectively demonstrate a paucity of imagination and a scarcity of rigour. As the saying goes; ‘they have as yet to wake up and smell the coffee‘. Over nineteen million (19.2m) unemployed in Europe with approaching 60% for those below 25 are clearly not enough human sufferers to galvanise them into some form of radicalism.

In addition to these present numbers, the higher education establishments in all countries are massively over-producing graduates relative to the number of jobs available to them under the capitalist system. This fact alone, if none of the others, should have disturbed the numerous slow-firing neurons in the brains of the capitalist political and economic elites. For it amounts to a mammoth social problem which faces current and future generations. Where are these educated white-collar workers; lawyers, doctors, accountants, economists, computer specialists, teachers etc., to find employment under a capitalist system that doesn’t need or want that many?

Already many graduates, as with large numbers of skilled white and blue-collar workers, are having to accept low-paid, mind-numbing jobs, stacking shelves or chasing non-existing jobs. We can see, if we care to, that it is not just an economic, financial and ecological crises which now faces humanity. It is also a large-scale cultural crisis – which raises questions of what societies are for and how they should be governed. Furthermore it is a crisis which cannot be solved on the basis of the present economic system nor with the current poverty of political thinking.

A further indication of the deficiency of political thinking among the pro-capitalist elite is demonstrated by recent comments by Conservatives in the UK. Ken Clarke announced that those who join or vote for UKIP (a new right-wing political party in the UK) are stupid and racist. William Hague considered them ‘clown-like’. Their fellow Tory conservative Boris Johnson argued that UKIP and Conservative voters think exactly on the same lines, whilst Conservative Norman Tebbit says he doesn‘t blame Tory voters if they vote UKIP.

Boris Johnson and Norman Tebbit are probably correct, but calling people ‘clown-like’ and stupid say’s more about the persons who use such terms than it does of those so described. Many 20th century European commentators thought the strutting Hitler and Mussolini clown-like, but they turned out to be much more astute and dangerous than that. And of course, even extreme right-wing voters are not stupid, when they vote for the Tories or UKIP. They and others less extreme are voting for measures they think will produce the best results for themselves. Their decision may be selfish, or in some cases based upon insufficient knowledge or understanding, but they are not stupid – and they may not all be racist.

It should be obvious that many people in the advanced countries, already acknowledge, in one way or another, that there is a radical problem with the present economic and social system. I suggest they are also aware that radical problems require radical solutions. In the UK, for example, there is a general recognition that Cameron, Clegg and Miliband are weak-knee’d dilettantes who exist primarily to please the bond-holding money markets. And this negative perception extends to many of their traditional supporters. In France it is estimated that up to 75% of the population have a similar view of the self-styled ‘socialist’ Francois Hollande. A comparable case can be made for the existence of a general dissatisfaction with mainstream politicians in the rest of Europe and North America. As ex Vice President, Al Gore in the US declared on Wednesday May 1st;

“The Congress is incapable of doing what the American people want.“

The reason? Gore put it down to – ‘the influence of big money’! In the circumstances of such wide-spread dissatisfaction, it cannot be surprising that changes in voting and thinking habits will start to occur. It is to be expected that the ongoing crisis will cause an erratic yet increasingly radical shake up of all politics and political forms. This is the reason for the growth in support for parties such as UKIP, and other right-wing parties as well as the loss of support for the mainstream parties of self-serving political posturing. This is also the reason for the currently unsuccessful campaigns (with the exception of Syriza in Greece) to create radical parties of the ‘left’ in the UK and elsewhere.

People who pursue radical solutions are not stupid. They may be basing their decisions on flawed criteria and understandings or have mistaken the symptoms for the cause. However, in doing so they are not alone. Indeed, dealing with the symptom and overlooking the cause, is a commonly wielded intellectual and cultural inheritance, derived as it is from bourgeois modes of thinking. For this reason, the present crisis-fed radical and erratic ferment, represents a challenge for anti-capitalists. The challenge is to articulate alternative criteria and reasoned arguments. It is simply not good enough to write people off on the basis that if they don’t yet agree with us – they must be racist, stupid or both.

And this propensity for politically-driven intellectual poverty is not just applicable to the right-wing, but can regularly infuse the political left’s psychology. The example of the ‘party-building Stalinists in the 1930’s refusing to support non-communists in opposing the Fascists comes eerily to mind in this regard. But almost identical political poverty exists in the contemporary UK phenomena of several separate defensive campaigns against the cuts. A number of alliance groups have been set up by competing sectarian groups, who have then distanced themselves from those they don’t control – each sect considering the other as beyond the pale.

The ‘Politics of Poverty’.

It is the above-noted ‘poverty of politics’ which also gives rise to it’s mirror image – the ‘politics of poverty‘. The politics of poverty began with subtly and systematically blaming the victims of the capitalist mode of production. Because not all citizens of each country can be successfully exploited by the capitalist system it leaves many citizens unemployed or under-employed. This (first cause), has led – in the ex-imperialist countries – to the introduction of welfare benefit systems. Under the pro-capitalist ‘politics-of-poverty’ speak, these victims have been transformed from a symptom, into a cause and are now labelled – ‘scroungers‘. In other countries the same capitalist lack of employment dynamic has given rise to a second and related symptom – unemployed working people seeking employment in countries other than their own. So these two sets of victims of the global capitalist system have become cast as the scapegoats for the systems own failure.

In other words both these categories of victims of the capitalist system have become transformed by all the mainstream politicians and media into the reasons for some or all of the problem of the capitalist mode of production. This pro-capitalist ‘politics of poverty’ is everywhere producing an atmosphere of nationalism and racism, directed against the poor and unemployed victims of capitalist economic practices. This nationalist and racist atmosphere, which arises as any other such divisive odour from the putrid economic base of the capitalist mode of production, is the gaseous fuel which drives the machinery of mainstream politics – including UKIP and the other far right political groupings.

Yet preventing or reducing immigration as all political parties now suggest doing, will not cure the problems of unemployment, of over-production, of speculative financial crises, of tax-avoidance, of obscene bonus payments, of taxing bank accounts, of pollution and of ecological destruction. Nor will leaving the EEC ease the problems for the UK, as UKIP suggests. UKIP and the far right politicians in all countries of the world, including the Islamist political parties, are all advocates of capitalism and trying to deal with the symptoms of capitalism will not prevent or cure the problems. The predicament which faces those who intend to vote for them, but are not racists or extreme nationalists, is that they will be just helping to make things worse, not better.

To repeat the reasons for such a conclusion! Capitalism cannot profitably employ all the citizens of any country of the world. Historically, it never was able to and it was unable to do so before EEC immigration policies were introduced. For this reason capitalism cannot even remove absolute poverty let alone relative poverty. Under the capitalist mode of production poverty, pollution and ecological destruction will always be with us. And the capitalist elite will do their best during this crisis to ensure that ordinary people bear the most severe burdens. That way also, more of us will sooner or later become victims and then by the ‘politics of poverty’ – if it is not seriously challenged, – it will become our turn to be blamed for becoming a burden.

Creating a humane alternative.

From a revolutionary-humanist perspective, each country needs to employ all its people, without over-producing commodities, or causing pollution and ecological destruction. Employing all citizens of working age at radically reduced working hours and an equalisation of the wealth produced have become an existential necessity for the welfare of the planet and the majority of its inhabitants. The ‘economic growth’ so beloved of the current batch of politicians and economists is not something the planet can sustain – under any system – without catastrophic consequences. Under the capitalist mode of production that is exactly what will happen whilst large numbers of the world‘s population continue to exist in absolute or relative poverty and conflict. The system needs changing in favour of a more humane post-capitalist alternative.

The last time the capitalist system collapsed to the extent it is currently heading toward, the working classes, marched, demonstrated, rebelled and begged. The middle-classes however, played a reactionary role. The small-business and shop-keeper mentality along with the petite-bourgeois prejudices of the professional classes allied itself to nationalist and racist agenda’s. They either stood aside, joined or voted for those fascist parties which flourished on political programs of blaming the victims. These were political program’s which in turn were harnessed to the needs of 20th century capital for armed expansion.

The consequent world war (the 2nd) essentially for the control of world markets and raw material resources, witnessed the mass execution of large sections of humanity distributed as they were on two competing amalgamations of capital. The ‘Allied Powers’ of UK, France and the US and the ‘Axis Powers’ of Germany, Italy and Japan – all dominated by the need for capital augmentation. The 20th century crisis of capitalism and the poverty it engendered was resolved by wholesale destruction, not of the capitalist system, but of large swathes of humanities poor and oppressed. Upwards of 60 million. That is how the last great episode of the politics of poverty was played out.

In the 21st century however, the ingredients and social composition of the middle-classes is different. Many of them have been and currently are, employed in non-profit-making industries and services before their salaries and pensions have been raided. Others – the young graduates – were heading for such employment only to have their aspirations dashed not by the machinations of immigrants or ‘foreign’ cultures, but by those of the capitalist elite. This double-mugging and subsequent culling of the middle-classes, the white and blue-collar workers and their collective offspring is a logical economic consequence of the capitalist mode of production. It therefore has radicalising implications and consequences.

The supporters of all these erratic and unstable radicalising groups need confronting with the history and the economic reality of the capitalist mode of production, not with contemptuous taunts of being ‘stupid‘ or ‘racist‘. The majority of these citizens are better educated and more culturally integrated than their 20th century counterparts and they have the benefit of hindsight. All of which creates the possibility of them becoming revolutionary rather than reactionary. They need to be won to the anti-capitalist struggle by rational argument and appropriate examples of solidarity not impatiently written off before the struggle has seriously begun.

[see also ‘The five fold crisis of capitalism‘ and ‘Crisis: so what else can we do’. ]

Roy Ratcliffe (May 2013.)

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‘TRIPLE DIP’-STICKS. (et al)

Posted on April 26, 2013 by stutteringsteps

This week, (ending 27 April) newspapers and TV media have been full of rose-tinted chatter concerning the UK statistical office quarterly announcements. Apparently a ‘triple dip recession’ has been avoided. Bravo! We are all supposed to cheer. The three stooges of Cameron, Osborne (Tory) and Ball (Labour) have all had their say on the dubious 0.3 % growth figures produced. They have all tried to entertain those who could be bothered to tune-in to their familiar slap-stick theatrical performances. Like their cinematic counter-parts, they traded pre-rehearsed blows on television in well lit ‘sets’ against a backdrop of props which conveniently ignored the harsh, food-bank reality in the UK, Europe and the US. The growing statistics of unemployment and poverty in the UK and Europe were largely ignored by these tragi-comic actors of the UK Parliamentary Right and Left. So too was the real economic picture facing Europe, North America, and the rest of the world.

This continually revolving political theatre of the absurd was clearly a repetition of the elite class’s inability to identify the real economic signals when they are continually drowned out by superficial media noise. The ‘noise’ in question is all the multi-wavelength chatter, from politicians and economic pundits, who only see the multifarious symptoms and never the cause. Hence they are never short of something to say (ie the persistent noise) for there are so many symptoms. And of course, they can never agree with each other because the symptoms each one identifies as being the crucial ones are always different. So for the sake of simplicity, here are a couple of examples from last weeks scarcely coherent babble. First an example of Conservative listening to the noise of pundits and statistics thereby missing the obvious signals.

The noise!

The rhetorical and statistical noise was welcomed by Chancellor (what an archaic and pretentious title) George Osborne as ‘showing the economy was healing’. [Perhaps this was an unwitting admission of what most of us know – that it is actually terminally sick!] He went on;

“Despite a tough economic backdrop, we are making progress…By continuing to confront our problems head on, Britain is recovering and we are building an economy fit for the future.” (George Osborne. 25 April 2013.)

The economy of the future Osborne envisages, is of course one based upon current class divisions. Yet, despite this Osborne is not even confronting the symptoms of capitalism head-on, never mind confronting what he falsely describes as ‘our’ problems. There are no collective – ‘our’ – problems in terms of the UK, Europe, North America and elsewhere. There are only problems facing the capitalist class and its mode of production and those facing the white and blue-collar working classes and poor. And these are not the same problems. It is the latter who are being sacrificed to the elites worship of the ‘bond market’ vampires. Second example, in pale contrast, is the Labour shadow Chancellor (as with Osborne, ‘Chancer’ might be a more apt title) Ed Balls articulating similar noise inspired bullsh…t and blarney;

“Our economy is only just back to where it was six months ago and continues to flat-line.. David Cameron and George Osborne have now given us the slowest recovery for over 100 years. ” (Ed Balls. 25 April 2013.)

Notice again the economy is described as ‘our’ economy when in fact we have no real control over the politicians and state officials, never mind the economy. And notice also that all Balls is concerned about is recovering an increased capitalist inspired growth. His criticism of the Tories is that they have delivered the lowest growth for over 100 years! Here another cinematic three-some comes to mind. With Ed Balls acting as the ‘lion’ looking for courage, to Cameron’s ‘tin-man’ lacking a heart, and Osborne’s ‘scarecrow’ needing a brain, our ’Triple Dip-Sticks’ do seem to be stuck somewhere in a dream world beyond Kansas. In this UK ‘somewhere over the rainbow’ fantasy, our political class really do seem to have set off down a yellow brick road in the hope of bumping into a Wonderful Wizard.

The signals!

Yet the real signals were clearly discernable despite the massive ‘interference’ generated by the noise of superficial rhetoric and vested-interest statistical manipulation. For example;

“..recovery still faces significant obstacles ahead, with households still experiencing falling real pay and policymakers still struggling to get bank lending to rise.” (V. Redwood. Capital Economics. 25 April 2013.)

Another faint signal was also discernable in the quarterly statistical report itself. The 0.3% growth upon which Osborne based his project for building “an economy for the future”, was itself based upon a tiny increase in the service sector. Since, due to the cuts, this increase is unlikely to be in the public service sector we can assume it lies in the financial service sector of the economy. Yet anyone who really understands how the capitalist mode of production works, knows that the internal machinations of the financial services sector do not of themselves indicate economic activity let alone growth. They are merely statistical numbers generated from the internal shuffling activity of finance-capital. This is money-capital which circulates around the various national and international stock and financial markets. The incessant movement and the bonus or service deductions from this internal finance-capital activity can make it appear as if something  economic is going on, when it is not. In actual fact the vast majority of this activity is just a sophisticated game of passing the various financial-derivative parcels around various hands until the music eventually stops – as it did in 2008!

Although written from a pro-capitalist position, the above ‘Capital Economics’ quote comes closest to tuning into the actual economic signals. The real economy under the capitalist mode is based upon the production and circulation of commodities which contain surplus-value. The surplus-value is created by workers engaging with materials and tools to produce commodities which contain more value than workers are paid. The owners of capital invest their wealth in production only in order to realise this surplus-value – in the form of profit. That is their only motive. In producing these commodities the workers are paid wages which they spend on essential and non-essentials. When production has created more commodities than can be sold at a profit the owners of capital cut back production or cease it altogether – creating further unemployment. In this way on top of generally over-producing goods etc., the workers newly made redundant cease to receive wages and therefore the ‘households’ (in the above quote) cease to buy non-essential goods.  This is yet another economic signal. When this symptom becomes widespread – as it has internationally – a general economic crisis occurs.

 Fine tuning the signal.

We are not facing something as simple as a recession. We are currently well into a general world crisis of the capitalist mode of production in which falling wages and low benefits result in lower economic activity. It also creates less taxation for governments – hence the coexisting sovereign debt problems. The next economic signal which was missed is bank lending. Banks aren’t lending for three main reasons. First because in the past they have lost a lot of money due to previous speculation and so are now hanging onto more of it. Secondly, industry does not want to borrow to invest in production because there is already over-production coupled with decreasing demand. Third, ordinary citizens  either know they will not able to pay back future loans and so do not want to take the risk. No amount of gazing hopefully at statistics or printing money to be lent out, will overcome this fundamental problem. Nor will it solve the sovereign debt situation, which all governments of the capitalist world now face.

None of these fundamental problems have been caused by the working class either blue-collar, white or unemployed. They have been caused by the economic and political elite’s in each country who control government finances and the economic activity within and beyond its borders. In other words, the problems are caused by the capitalist mode of production. Yet in protecting this mode  the same elite class will sacrifice the well-being of as many ordinary people as it takes. Already in Europe unemployment is as high as 27% in some countries with youth unemployment as high as 57%. Similar figures will soon be replicated in the US and the middle east. The economy of the future for working people, under Osborne’s pro-capitalist policies – and those who share his myopic and warped vision – is one of food-bank and waste-bin foraging. For an increasingly large percentage of the world’s population, 21st century capitalism ushers in a return to the hunter-gatherer mode of production – but this time within an urban setting.

Unless, that is, the realisation dawns upon large numbers of people, that the means of production, need to be wrested from those who presently control them and used to produce – not for the profit of a few – but to supply the necessaries for all people. Of course, such production will need to be conducted at such a level that it does not continue to pillage, pollute and destroy the planet and its ecology as the current phase of capitalist inspired commodity fetishism encourages us to do. In this regard, we perhaps need to recognise and heed the words of the Greek philosopher Epicurus, who influenced the revolutionary-humanist ideas of a young Karl Marx ;

“Nature’s wealth at once has its bounds and is easy to procure; but the wealth of vain fancies recedes to an infinite distance….Of our desires some are natural and necessary, others are natural, but not necessary; others again, are neither natural nor necessary, but are due to illusory opinion.”

Of course on the way to achieving a goal of living more communally and with a lighter footprint on the planet, we will need to be rid of the vain fancies of the super-rich and the illusory opinions of the ’Triple Dip – Sticks’ in politics we are presently lumbered with. Along with ditching these parasitical elites we will need to get rid of any hierarchical systems of representation which allows such characters – well meaning or not – to percolate to the top and in the process do enormous damage. Only then will we be able to build ‘an economy fit for the future‘ of all people.

[See also ’The Five-Fold Crisis of Capitalism’.]

Roy Ratcliffe (April 2013)

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THE UN-BEAUTIFUL GAME.

Posted on April 23, 2013 by stutteringsteps

Shirt-pulling, tripping, elbowing, foot-stamping, punching, kicking, holding, cheating, studs-up leg attacks, racial abuse – and that’s only on the pitch! Now ‘biting’ has been added to the ‘professional fouls’ incorporated into the self-styled beautiful game. Off the pitch, punching, racist and sexist abuse and kicking are supplemented by bottling and stabbing among some of the fans. Under the modern ‘capitalisation’ of sport, the outcomes of trying to steer a ball into the opposing sides net are clearly so high as to witness such unsporting actions – as par for the course.

Now it seems anything goes – not just so that your team wins – but that the media income continues in order to keep the ‘club‘ from bankruptcy. Instead of fouls being a rarity it is now genuine sporting gestures which are the rarity on the field of professional play. Hone your skills so you can weave around a defender and then expect your shorts to be grabbed as you pass or your legs smacked from under you by a late tackle from an incoming human projectile. Survive this and if your shot only just goes over the goal line – but none of the officials see this – expect that all the other side will deny you have scored.

What used to be a working class sport, played for working class wages, has over the years, been elevated to an arbitraged investment opportunity for billionaire owners, with players paid millions even when sat on the bench doing nothing. It is no accident that the de-regulation of industry and finance, under Thatcher was accompanied by the market financialisation of football. What used to be a relatively cheap and good-natured male-dominated afternoon out with your mates has become an extremely expensive obsession for the dedicated – some of whom have become rabid fanatics.

What used to count as ‘fair-play’ among workmates and the town and city teams of working-class communities, has disappeared along with the economic welfare of those same communities. What used to be a relatively parochial concern for the majority has become a patriarchal form of tribal warfare for a minority. The mild disappointment of your team loosing and admiration for the opposing sides skills has for many been replaced by a form of existential anger and derision – if not downright hatred for the ‘other‘.

In many ways what has happened to sport under the neo-liberal capitalist system has mirrored the capitalist mode of production itself. In the case of football, the ‘constant-capital’ of the stadium etc., has increased astronomically, so too has the circulating-capital (labour and raw and auxiliary materials) but the process is exactly the same. The capital investment (M) is used to produce the commodity (the match) which is exchanged for money (M+) where the + is the surplus value.

Therefore, the same phenomena has occurred as elsewhere under capitalism. The product has been over-developed using borrowed money to such a degree, that football clubs have begun operating primarily in debt. The income from gate takings, miscellaneous sales and TV receipts are becoming insufficient to pay for the costs of production plus a surplus. Instead of one or two, many football clubs are now nudging closer to the status of bankruptcy. The elite skilled workers (the variable-capital investment) of this male-dominated industry have left the ranks of the working class and entered the realms of the celebrity tax-dodging super-rich, living off the wages and salaries of their supporters and former neighbours.

The self-proclaimed ‘beautiful game’ has become in fact a sordid stage of the relative-overproduction of ‘sports’ capital everywhere. As such football shares the same fate as all capitalist forms of production; a shrinking consumer base along with increased competition and costs. The pressures caused by capital in its present crisis stage will continue to intensify the struggle between clubs and despite ‘trophy’ buyouts by international billionaire’s the present escalating-cost model will prove economically unsustainable.

These pressures will continue to find their way onto the pitch where the elite workers will be urged to do whatever it takes! But there are also other pressures. It is also morally unjustifiable that some people are paid millions for kicking, cueing, clubing or racketing a ball about, whilst millions are barely scraping a living on the margins of the capitalist mode of production. Sooner or later under regimes of austerity that will become obvious to more people. Capitalist control of sport disfigures and distorts human relationships – on the field of play and off it – as it does in the rest of society. This has been amply demonstrated over the past few years and now again over the past week, particularly in the case of premier class football.

Roy Ratcliffe (April 2013)

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BIFURCATED BRITAIN.

Posted on April 17, 2013 by stutteringsteps

The death and funeral arrangements for Margaret Thatcher have vividly revealed the two great class divisions within the dis-United Kingdom of Britain. There are those for Thatcher and those against. And the bizarre spectacle of austerity Britain (for workers and the poor), witnessing a no-expenses spared funeral for an ex-champion of the ruling elite, clearly demonstrates the class-based, divided nature of English society. In economic and financial terms the ascendancy of Thatcher represented the interests of the neo-liberal tendencies in capitalism. However, in political terms, her elevation to leadership represented a departure from the previous post-war one-nation Toryism. In other words, Thatcherism represented a return to the previous ‘two-nation’ – rich and poor – economics and politics of the ruling elite. The velvet glove which adorned the iron fist of the capitalist class under the Tory leadership of Edward Heath was openly discarded and wielded by the appropriately named ‘iron lady’.

Despite the initial Conservative and Liberal Democratic rhetoric of ‘we are all in this together’ the austerity measures, tax breaks for the rich and Thatcher’s £10 million plus funeral reveal that we are very definitely not. With few exceptions it is the rich and elite who benefited from the policies she initiated and it is they who have been invited to the funeral and who will affect to grieve her passing. Yet again it cannot have escaped the attention of most people, that whenever, the ruling elite need something done, they are always able to find the money. This is so whether they need to keep control of the oil in Iraq by massive expenditure in arms, get rid of someone such as Gaddafi, blow vast sums on Olympic Games or give ‘one of theirs‘ an extravagant funeral. The sheer hypocrisy of those in the political, financial and economic elite, in the UK as elsewhere, knows no bounds. It is they who dodge taxes, abuse expenses, have numerous consultancies and homes, run up national debts and then introduce cuts and bedroom taxes for the poor.

They are also the ones who will line up in St Paul’s or the Mansion House and listen to the funeral eulogies and prayers. In these restricted venues the bifurcation and hypocrisy of the capitalist mode of production will again be amply demonstrated. Here the collusion between the religious and political establishment will be once again boldly and colourfully underlined. It is said that a reading from Psalm 139 was given. I bet the clergy did not include verse 22 of Psalm 139 which aptly embodies how Mrs Thatcher and her assembled mourning acolytes viewed the miners and all anti-capitalist activists “I hate them with the utmost hatred’. I also guess that those ‘big-bang’ financiers who attended this so-called Christian service will not have been embarrassed by an apt quotation from Psalm 115 “their idols are silver and gold’ or the politicians discomforted by one from Psalm 12 reading ’”..they talk with smooth lip and double heart.”

Meanwhile, in bifurcated Britain the rich are getting richer, the poor are getting poorer and those in the now precarious middle are also getting steadily poorer. The Scots are considering making their part of bifurcated Britain ‘official’ by considering independence. The nationalist hyperbole of putting the ‘great’ back into Great Britain was never more than a pompous imperialist boast and hardly any sensible person in Britain or Europe, considers the conquests and atrocities of that period were in any way ‘great’ nor those of the present day. Now the same anachronistic fate falls to the militarily embroidered tapestry of the term United Kingdom. Despite the ideological rhetoric of the ruling class, it has never been united, because under the capitalist system it is primarily divided by class. And as the current crisis develops those class divisions will be further emphasised and fought out once again. The exalted nature of the semi-state funeral of Margaret Thatcher amid welfare cuts, rising unemployment and increased poverty, calls attention to the very obvious fact – the existing and continuing bifurcation of Britain. [See also ‘Death at the Ritz‘. at http://www.critical-mass.net]

Roy Ratcliffe (April 2013.)

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HUMANITY AT A CROSS-ROADS.

Posted on April 15, 2013 by stutteringsteps

Social production – the real foundation of humanity.

To be really radical is to grasp things at their root and this is an absolutely necessity in the current economic and financial crisis. In this context, it can hardly be denied that the fundamental requirements at the root of all human life are sufficient amounts of food, water, clothing and shelter. They are what keep us alive. All other aspects of life, education, entertainment, science, technology, fashion, politics, in short culture, are dependent upon and develop alongside these basic economic requirements. Furthermore these fundamental requirements – along with the complexity developed on the basis of these fundamentals – are the products of social forces and social means of production. Only in the realms of fantasy and fiction have human beings fulfilled their economic or social needs as isolated individuals. Social means of production, have existed – and created regular surplus products – from the earliest hunter-gather societies to the present day urban and industrial societies.

The only modifications to those social means and forces of production have occurred by a) changes in human skills and knowledge; b) changes in the technical base of these means; and c) in the relationships of those people or classes controlling those means. A recognition of this process is the basis of the historical materialism comprehensively developed by Karl Marx. His clearest formulation of this view is contained in his foreword to the ‘Critique of Political Economy’ written in 1858. From his extensive studies, Marx concluded that ..“At a certain stage of their development, the material productive forces of society come into conflict with the existing relations of production..” From that point on, Marx reasoned, these relations turn into fetters and an “era of social revolution” begins.

In this article I will outline and consider on the basis of the current ‘five-fold crisis of capitalism’, what stage of development the productive forces of society have reached in the 21st century. This will lead into an identification of in how these ‘forces’ are in conflict with the existing economic and political ‘relations’ governing them. However, before doing so it is worth bearing in mind an important warning offered by Marx.

“In studying such transformation it is always necessary to distinguish between the material transformation of the economic conditions of production”….and…“the ideological forms in which men become conscious of this conflict and fight it out.” (Marx ‘Preface to ‘Critique of Political Economy.’ emphasis added RR)

The ‘forces’ of social production in the 21st century.

At their most general, the forces of production under the 21st century mode are the same as any other. They comprise of raw materials, auxiliary materials, tools and energy – human and natural. However, who ‘controls’ these forces determines the class nature of society and how and in what form the ‘surplus’ product is extracted from the direct workers. Under systems of slavery the slave owner owned and controlled the ‘forces’ – raw materials, the auxiliary materials, the tools and the sources of energy. Under the Feudal mode, the landowning aristocracy and under the capitalist mode it is those who own ‘capital’ and ‘land’. The capitalist mode is just the latest exploitative social mode of production devised by humanity.

Using the factory system initially and later automation and interconnected machinery in place of small machine tools, the social ‘means of production’ have – during the domination of capital – become immense – along with the surplus. Utilising electrical power in place of coal and steam and fewer skilled, educated workers in place of masses of skilled and semi-skilled workers, the 20th and 21st century forces of production have been expanded to a very high degree. So high in fact that a number of game-changing ecological and social transformations have now taken place. The social forces of production are now so highly developed that they regularly produce along with huge profits, more finished items than can be sold at a profit, causing gluts, recessions and crises. They also create more pollution and ecological destruction than the planet can sustain. All these related factors are now game-changers. Humanity cannot afford either symptom any longer, nor the economic system which produces them.

Another major game-changing transformation is with regard to the ordinary citizen of capitalist countries. It is a fact that fewer and fewer workers are needed to produce more than sufficient amounts of necessaries, such as food, water, clothing, shelter and numerous other products which modern society is now accustomed. This in turn has created large-scale permanent unemployment for many people. A humane form of society cannot allow millions to exist in poverty just because industry does not need them. The third also related consequence of this development in the 20th century was to free large numbers of citizens to be employed in what have become known as the welfare and public services sectors. Any civilised society can no longer do without such ‘cultural’ aspects of life. These general changes are all irreversible transformations of the ‘material conditions – which have matured within the framework’ of capitalist society.

Thus during the 20th century we have witnessed the creation of education, health, fire, social services, local and national government etc, – all non-profit making functional economic and social forms. They are also forms which have absorbed up to 60% of the working populations in most advanced capitalist countries. It is a welfare provision that is extremely beneficial to all sectors of workers and middle-classes since the post Second-World-War period. Social production looked so good that it was seriously considered in the mid 20th century that technology and amalgamation of production – all things being equal was the new norm. It would quickly allow full employment and a reduction working hours for all workers – white-collar and blue. To the optimistically inclined, a future ‘golden age’ seemed possible. So what prevented this and how come we now find ourselves once again deep in a ‘dark age’ of wars, pollution and poverty for the bulk of humanity?

The ‘relationships’ of social production in the 21st century.

The 1960’s vision of a new golden age quickly dimmed and the harsh reality of the capitalist mode of production began to break through in the 1970’s and 80’s. This is because under this present system not all things are equal. Capitalism is not a system based upon satisfying the needs of the vast majority of people but – apart from the post-war welfare provisions reluctantly granted – it is a system dominated by the pursuit of profit. When the rate of profits started to fall around the late 1960’s the key agents and beneficiaries of the capitalist mode in many advanced countries set into sustained motion three broad tendencies.

The first was to attempt to lower wages and/or increase productivity. The second, was to re-locate industrial production abroad to places with cheap labour. [This led to increased unemployment among workers in industry adding to those shaken out by automation etc.] Third; the economist intellectuals among the capitalist class began to see that many elements of the public welfare services could be taken over and made to produce profits. All three of these tendencies were either implemented or not reversed by the successive alternating governments of Tories and Labour in the UK. From Harold Wilson (Labour), to Edward Heath (Conservative), and on to Callaghan (Labour) and Thatcher (Conservative) in one way or another they all attacked the non-profit-making sectors of society. Their counter-parts of recent times Blair/Brown (Labour) Cameron/Clegg (Conservative/Liberal) have the same aim in mind.

It is important to recognise the success of the previous ‘nationalised’ industries of aircraft, car manufacture, steel, petrol, coal, electricity, rail and road transport, water, sewage, electricity, gas, telephones, education, health services, local and national government in the UK and elsewhere. They delivered quality products and services at low costs – because they were not directly capitalist. Because of capitalisms previous failures in these sectors, they were developed as large-scale, non-profit making industries and institutions. Undoubtedly they were not perfect, but that was not the real reason for their eventual ‘privatisations’. The real reasons were that the capitalist classes and their hangers on were not satisfied with their already disproportional levels of wealth and income, they wanted even more. And with the politicians of the UK, USA and Europe in their pockets, they knew how to get their way.

Their disproportional relationships of power and control over the economic and social aspects of life, in all countries, meant the neo-liberals were in a position reverse the historic development of societies along lines of large-scale non-profit-making welfare services paralleled by automated and computerised industrial and commercial production. All the pieces were in place for advancing humanity and ensuring no-one starved or were homeless. Large-scale production of necessities and provisions, needing fewer workers was a material fact. Well developed skills and practices, in science, education, health, communications, transport, the arts, etc were also established facts. Humanity could potentially leave behind the horrors of previous Victorian and post-Victorian stages of capitalist development and move on.

Of course humanity has not moved on and is in one sense has now been put into reverse. Despite the proliferation of advanced technological gismo’s, large-scale unemployment, poverty, wars and vast disparities in wealth have returned. The reason this has occurred is in line with what was noted above; “At a certain stage of their development, the material productive forces of society come into conflict with the existing relations of production..” The potential of these productive forces of society, to feed, cloth, house, educate, heal, entertain, every person to a satisfactory standard is prevented by the existing relationships (people) propping up the existing relations of production. The huge material forces of society and the vast majority of people in each country who staff and operate them are indeed now in conflict with the existing relations of production and those who control them.

The fetters to the development and improvement of these social forces, lie in the class relationships controlling these means and forces of production. Or in more popular terminology – the ruling class and their elite supporters! They don’t just govern society but control it at all levels. The disproportional class relationships of power controlling our forces of production, are played out in the economic and political spheres of life. The control this 1% or 2% capitalist class exerts functions through its minority ownership of the means of production, exchange and communication. This economic domination is supplemented by their control and/or influence of governmental power at all levels – Parliaments, Congresses and the state – and their influence upon politicians of all political persuasions.

It is in their institutions, clubs and executive committees, that they decide what is to be produced and what is not. It is there they decide how much pollution and environmental damage is acceptable. It is how they decide when and where to go to war. It is how they decide how much tax we pay, how much tax money is spent on armaments, which type of industries are to get incentives and grants (and which are not), when to bail out their buddies in the banking industry, even who is allowed to vote to put them in power again. Using these institutions they can even decide to steal our savings as the recent case of Cyprus illustrates. This power and influence of the 1 or 2% is what the healthy, humane ‘productive forces of society’ (ie. the vast majority of the people) are in conflict with. And this conflict is played out at the ideological level.

The ideological content of this historic struggle.

Because of the wealth, power and influence the capitalist class as a whole wields, the ideas of this class tend to dominate the whole of society. The ability to pay for and set up institutions and pay the salaries of journalists, academics, economists and scientists, means that ideas which are favourable to its domination are the dominant ideas. Over its two hundred years of domination many of those ideas have come to be accepted as common-sense. Everyone, from young to old is predominantly bombarded by ideas which rationalise and justify that ‘the existing relations of production’ are the only natural and sensible ones. That the ‘individual’ is more important than the collective. That private enterprise is more efficient than collective, when it clearly isn’t – except in making profits for the already rich. Ideas such as ‘there are no other alternatives to austerity’. There are alternatives but of course they don’t get widely publicised nor will they be implemented. This makes the struggle against these capitalist ideas and assumptions a difficult one and one with very few outlets for expression.

The ideologies promoted by the capitalists classes and their pro-capitalist supporters fall into two broad categories. In the first category are those which promote private property, hierarchy and wealth accumulation. For example; the assumption that if you have enough wealth, this entitles you to exploit the labour of those who haven’t; the assumption that it is natural to have governors and governed; and the assumption that if your ancestors stole land, then you are also entitled to keep it. The second category are all those which promote divisions among humanity. Individualism, racism, nationalism, sexism, religion etc. I am more important than you. My religion, my nation, my ethnicity, my gender etc., is not only different but is better than and superior to yours. Make my sector an exception to the austerity cuts! The capitalist classes need all these ideologies and promote them because they are so few in number that they need those they rule and oppress to be as divided as possible.

These divisive ideologies are partially based upon the facts of life, but of course not the whole facts of life. In complex inter-connected economic societies such as the current global ones, complicated as they are by multiple ‘identities’ and ideologies, the simplest truths often take the longest to comprehend. The obvious fact that those who are the workers in each nation, whether blue-collar or white, have more in common with each other than with their own capitalist and pro-capitalist elites, is confused and concealed by the domination of these divisive ideologies. The obvious fact that in a general crisis, campaigns to save ones own sector from austerity cuts is self-defeating. Left on our own – you and I – cannot win and why should other sectors actively support us, if we do not actively support them? In any case the current problems are not sectional but general, the current crisis is not tangential but wholly systemic and needs a social-wide response.

Finally.

Another simple truth which seems difficult for many people to comprehend concerns the need for revolutionary change. Most people recognise revolutionary transformations in their everyday life. Rapid changes in technology, transport, medicine, understanding are welcomed as necessary for society to move on beyond previous modes of transport, medicine, technology and knowledge. Old equipment and many ideas are happily discarded and relegated to the scrap heap. But not the way society is governed. Politics at all levels is self-evidently totally corrupt, broken and outmoded, yet it is still peddled as the solution to our problems.

Even in the face of catastrophic ecological and social disasters many seem blind to the necessity for revolutionising the mode of production and governance. We no longer travel by horse, communicate by ship-bound parchment or consult tradition and magic for damaged limbs or sickly stomachs. Yet millions are still resigned to the capitalist control of economic and social welfare. This is despite the fact that they are daily ruining the economy, finances, politics, law, the environment and not least of all – ruining vast numbers of lives via indiscriminate war.

If the material conditions of social production are sufficient to solve all the major problems facing humanity, we have to ask what is stopping such a use apart from a few thousand members of the elite and their armed mercenaries? If the task facing humanity is to gain control of the current ‘forces of production’ and use them for ‘humane’ social purposes rather than for the purpose of corporate greed and wealth accumulation for the few – what is holding us back from even thinking about this? If it is the previously noted divisions of individualism, nationalism, sexism, racism, religion and sectarianism – then given the scale of the problems – isn’t it time to give these up? Clearly, the final condition necessary for such a solution lies in the material force of the majority of the population recognising that this capitalist mode of production is a fetter and needs to be burst asunder and work collectively toward that end.

Of course, alternative ideas need to search out those in struggle, but those in struggle need to seek out alternative ideas. Yet it seems only a sharp shock from the unfolding reality will wake the majority of people from their accustomed passivity; only the loss of status will rid many of their most treasured illusions. At the moment there are those who vigorously reject the neo-liberal conservatism of the Tories, Liberals and Republicans but remain wedded to the neo-liberal conservatism of the Labour Party or the Democratic Party and their analogues elsewhere. This and the pressures to look after number one, too conform or to take the easy way out, are all shameful betrayals of our common humanity. They are a betrayal and denial of the social nature of our productive forces. These ideological pressures  need to be resisted. We are once again at a cross-roads, we either struggle to become a transformative humane society or we fight among ourselves and descend into a inhumane parody of one.

It has often been said that the idea of a post-capitalist mode of production is nothing more than a utopian dream. In fact it is the continuance or resurrection of capitalism as a basis for justice, peace, equality and ecological welfare which is the utopian fantasy. Until more people come to realise this through their direct experience it is down to those who subscribe fully to humanist, non-sectarian values and practices to become part of a non-sectarian anti-capitalists movement. A movement which argues for basing the future mode of production on the best examples of non-profit-making industries and services, (suitably modified) which capitalism was forced to introduce in the 20th century. And creating alternative communal forms of organisation. [See ‘Defending Public Services’.]

 Roy Ratcliffe (April 2013.)

[See also ‘Workers and others in the 21st Century’.]

Posted in Critique, Economics, Marx, Politics | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment

DEATH AT THE RITZ.

Posted on April 9, 2013 by stutteringsteps

How fitting that the ruthless female champion of rampant capitalism, Margaret Thatcher, died in the opulent confines of an exclusive hotel – where only the bourgeois elite can afford to stay. She has been personally blamed for many things; the poll tax, union-busting, privatisation of public industries and services, de-regulation of banks and finance – just to mention the most obvious ones. However, such vitriolic condemnations, both prior to her demise and now she has finally died, serve to miss the most important function of her adult life. Her real role was to be the figurehead of the class interests of the British section of the US/UK Capitalist elite. They were the power who thrust her forward only later to unceremoniously dump her when she had served her purpose.

The capitalist class forces in the UK needed someone strong enough to front the onslaught against all those who stood in the way of a return to ’free market’ exploitation. Thatcher got on the short-list of candidates for this role not because she was female, but because her backers considered she was ruthless and determined enough to use the full power of the state. Those who stood solidly in the way of ending welfare capitalism in favour of neo-liberal capitalism were the organised workers in white and blue-collar trade unions. Dock workers, Engineers, Print workers and many other organised workers were defeated in struggles to maintain their standards of living. All that before the mine workers in the National Union of Mineworkers were finally defeated using all the powers of the state.

At the time she was Prime Minister, the popular slogans of ‘Maggie, out, out, out’ also tended to miss the point that even with Maggie out, the neo-liberal capitalist policies would continue, and continue they did. The capitalist baton of neo-liberalism was handed over to John Major, who ran with it until Tony Blair was handed it by the same back-stage forces of capitalism, who corrupt all political parties and processes.  It is now in the safe hands of the Con/Dem’s. She is rightly celebrated by those who benefited from these neo-liberal policies and who perhaps mourn for a ‘hard’ leader to continue them and rescue capitalism from its self-inflicted crisis. The fact that capitalist production was exported abroad and that financial speculation along with massive arms expenditure replaced it was the policy of a class, not a single politician.

This shop-keepers daughter, who presided over this capitalist onslaught upon the working class and the poor, also presided over the demise of the very petty-bourgeois class she was born into. The de-regulation the neo-liberal capitalists introduced, ensured that big-business could get bigger and squeeze out small businesses everywhere – including the corner grocers so beloved of many of her Conservative supporters. Of course, there will be no mention of this in the eulogies at her funeral. Nor will the fact that during her life neo-liberal policies were initiated which have caused the eventual death of UK engineering, steel, ship-building, mining and the impoverishment of countless industrial towns and villages. But there is much more she achieved.

Her eventual death – as her life – marks the almost total death of this petty, small-minded conservative small-business sector of society from which she emerged. A stroll through any town and city in the UK will present the stroller with endless empty shop fronts and empty small premises. This is also the legacy of Thatcher and post-Thatcher period of neo-liberal capitalism. Her alliance with President Ronald Reagan in the USA was the political face of the US/UK alliance of neo-liberal capitalism, so it is not surprising that the same policies were fronted by Reagan in the USA. There too the baton was handed on to other political puppets, such as Clinton, Bush and now Obama, all of whom have carried it on in the relay race which only the 1% can win. Empty shops, empty houses, empty factories, ruined small businesses and devastated communities are rife there also.

With the influence of the neo-liberal capitalist policies, firmly established in the UK and the USA, it was not long before they were exported elsewhere in the globe. The sovereign debt crises, toxic bank debt, austerity programmes and the collapse of communities, throughout Europe and the rest of the world are clear indications that there were other Thatcher’s and Reagan’s throughout the world willing to front up and initiate the neo-liberal free-market exploitation of human and natural resources. So there is now a world-wide situation of wars, poverty, pollution, ecological devastation and steadily collapsing communities of blue and white-collar workers, unemployed, disabled and poor. Not quite the legacy of Thatcher, but they are clearly a legacy of the policies she sold her humanity for in order to champion their first implementation.

For more detail on the record of Thatcher’s term of office see John Pilger’s recent article at http://johnpilger.com/articles/dance-on-thatcher-s-grave-but-remember-there-has-been-a-coup-in-britain

Roy Ratcliffe (April 2013.)

[See also ‘Defending Public Services’ and ‘The Five-Fold Crisis of Capitalism’. All at http://www.critical-mass.net ]

Posted in Critique, Politics | Tagged | 3 Comments

DAYLIGHT ROBBERY IN CYPRUS.

Posted on March 31, 2013 by stutteringsteps

Cyprus Bank Robbery – an inside job!

It used to be that large-scale bank robberies were committed by the organised criminal underground, breaking into banks, holding the bank staff at gunpoint and stealing as much cash as they could stuff into their duffle bags before making off. Now another criminal gang – based in Europe – have devised a cunning plan to commit bank robberies without having to break into the premises or cracking open any difficult safe. The first trial run using this remote-controlled robbery method has taken place in Cyprus. The organising gang’s headquarters are hidden away in the heart of European Economic Community. It is a part of the international Bond and Finance Mafia, criminal fraternity who have managed to achieve a ‘protected’ status. Their actions are now backed up by the law, the police and the legal system.

The example of the Cyprus government taxing deposits initially over 100, 000 Euro’s indicates that this theft, although planned outside, is also an inside job. It is government officials who are the employed accomplices of this act of European piratical confiscation. This formula for saving the system from it own toxic debts – caused by crass stupidity, systemic contradictions and greed – has formed a probable template for future raids on depositors cash savings. Very few are safe now. This first European case as revealed by Cyprus, is the thin edge of a wedge. It almost certainly means whenever and wherever, the system implodes or is in danger of failing again, deposits will be seized. Given the size of the debts racked up by their greedy search for fees, profits and exorbitant government expenditure, this first raid upon Cypriot savings will most likely be insufficient. Further deposit-snatchings are almost inevitable there and elsewhere. And the fact that only large deposits are being taxed at 40% does not mean those with less escape even this first round of daylight robbery.

Not all the assets over 100,000 Euro’s in Cyprus banks belong to rich foreigners. Some are the operating capital of small businesses, parts of individual pension schemes, investment bonds belonging to other pension and savings schemes etc. Since these assets will be ‘snatched’ some businesses will collapse as a result, creating further unemployment. Some pensioners will have less in their pension pot and therefore both categories will have less to spend – sending the Cypriot economy further into recession. At the same time the bailout conditions, which triggered this bank-deposit theft, is to obtain a further loan. In other words it is not really a bailout – except for the banks and bond-holders. As a result the government of Cyprus will be ‘bailed into’ more debt than they are already in. This so-called ‘bailout’ is nothing more than an organised form of collective debt bondage for Cypriot citizens. And in this case, Cyprus is merely a small fish in the larger European savings lake from which the bond-holding buccaneers and their co-conspirators have gained exclusive fishing rights. For it is the case that all other European and North American countries have similar – in most cases greater – sovereign and banking debt problems.

International Buccaneers and Bandits.

Unlike their 17th and 18th century counterparts in the Golden age of Piracy, the modern buccaneers, flit around the International scene in aircraft. Nevertheless, Captain Kidd, Blackbeard, Anne Bonny and Henry Morgan, do have their analogues in the 21st. Jeroen Dijsselbloem, Mario Draghi, Christene Lagarde and others of the so-called European ‘troika’, and its crew are busily raiding countries, through QE and austerity leaving the inhabitants with precious little in their pockets or purses. Up to this recent development, the confiscation of assets from the white and blue-collar working and middle classes has been through structured unemployment, commodity price rises, increased bank, water, electricity, gas charges and council payments. Now and in future – as the crisis deepens – they have signalled their intent to come for those who still have something left in the banking system. No matter that it has been saved from the combined exertions of their working life, these funds are now fair game to be raided by the upholders of capital.

In many ways this new development has heralded another degenerate stage in the approaching end-game for the capitalist mode of production. The banking system was created to assist the development of commercial and later productive capital when the means of production and circulation became to large to be funded by individuals. In order to reassure the multitude of lenders that their deposits were safe, banking and governance had to have safeguards in place to ensure the honesty and fair-dealing of the financial sector. Although losses of assets and deposits could not be avoided in cases of accident, or ineptitude in capitalist enterprises, such losses were intended to be born by the borrower and the bank not those who had deposited their money for safe keeping.

Whilst it has always attracted crooks and dishonest actors, the capitalist banking system was based fundamentally upon the need for honesty and to safeguard from theft – absolutely – the customers deposit accounts. Now that final Rubicon has been crossed in Europe as it was in a slightly different form in Argentina during 2001. The recent actions against Cyprus indicates that all the political and financial industry reassurances that Libor-rigging type criminal activity and ‘laundering drug money’ will be rooted out are not to be trusted. For even if they are, there remains such ‘legal’ ways of ensuring sufficient bonuses and bailouts continue to grease the palms of industry insiders and their supporters in governments. Like a cancerous growth within, capitalism has for some time been eating away at the healthy tissue of the planet and society. It has again reached a critical, self-destructive stage.

Capitalism is self-destructing.

It has become glaringly obvious since the 2008 banking crisis that capitalism is not only destroying the lives and welfare of working people, but also destroying the basis of its own survival. If industrial and commercial capital cannot safely store its capital in money form during the necessary non-productive periods, or gain loan-capital when it needs it, a crucial part of the circulation of modern capital is potentially interrupted and trust in it undermined. In addition to a crisis of over-production in commodities, therefore a continuing crisis is also occurring at the point of commodity circulation. This secondary feature of the current crisis has now been further amplified by the activity of the capitalist financial sector in league with government and supra-government agencies. These two inner contradictions, relative over-production and financial speculation have developed to this crisis point because the capitalist mode of production has throughout the late post-Second-World-War period been an international economy on steroids.

Fuelled by surplus finance capital and advanced methods of production, during this period, the capitalist mode of production, has spewed out masses and multiples of every conceivable product, imagination and ingenuity could create. It has saturated the markets of the world with every possible electrical and mechanical device, along with vast numbers of items of plastic, wood, glass and woven materials. This commodity fetishism has been promoted to the point of a mesmerising superfluity – but only for those who can afford to purchase them. Yet this very advance in productive technique has at the same time served to reduce the relative number of paid workers. Therefore once again there is a constantly increasing crisis of relative over-production and a banking and governmental system which can no longer be weaned off its dependency on regular injections of other peoples cash. But at the same time there is a related crisis of social and political decay.

At the national, regional, city and town levels of social organisation, the capitalist system in the advanced countries is gradually collapsing. Such is the rise of low pay and unemployment that Local Authorities are already struggling to maintain services upon which the capitalist mode of production relies. Roads, health, pensions and education are all suffering reductions as the crisis develops. The USA provides perhaps the most vivid example a the moment. Schools in North America, for example are threatened with closure as the tax base shrinks. Chicago has a $1bilion deficit and the Mayor Rahm Emanuel has proposed closing Chicago schools. Also in the USA, Michigan has achieved a balanced budget but only by firing 20 percent of its workforce, increasing its water rates by up to 50%. However, Michigan is now close to being unable to function as a normal city, as are many other urban centres. Not too far in the future, the same fate faces Cyprus and many European cities and towns, as sovereign debt issues filter down to the local levels.

The current economic and financial problems have become so vast and complex that they cannot be humanly solved from within the capitalist system itself. Once again to preserve the capitalist system, the destruction of surplus-capital, the depreciation of currencies and the reduction of working class conditions are necessary. Under this system, there can be no further economic growth, until there has been substantial economic destruction. In the 20th century (late1930’s to1945) this process of stagnation, depreciation and destruction was rapidly achieved by total war. Short of another such world-wide conflagration, such decay and the writing down of surplus-capital can only be done via a more gradual procedure. This is the economic and political reality which is currently taking the form of numerous bankruptcies, insolvencies and pro-capitalist inspired reductions in jobs, wages, salaries, benefits and welfare services on the one hand, and rises in taxes, prices and now the first stages of the sequestration of people’s bank savings.

The revolutionary implications.

This latest ‘rip-off’ banking development, as well as the growing ecological devastation, is now hitting a section of the middle-classes and entering their consciousness as well as the blue and white-collar working class. This new phase has important implications. The role of the white-collar state workers along with the middle-classes in the developing crisis is crucial to whether a post-capitalist form of production becomes a possibility or an uncertainty. As noted above, for a long time the productive capacity of capitalism has led to relatively fewer workers in the productive spheres of capital and an increase in that of the non-productive. In the guise of the welfare state, it created a large-scale alternative form of non-profit making economic activity. This overall process was evident to Marx even in the 19th century, when massive concentrations of workers in industry, commerce and transport existed and were still developing. In discussing the merits and shortcomings of Ricardo, Marx noted the following;

“What he forgets to emphasise is the constantly growing number of the middle classes, those who stand between the workman on the one hand and the capitalist and landlord on the other. The middle classes maintain themselves to an ever increasing extent directly out of revenue, they are a burden weighing heavily on the working base and increase the social security and power of the upper ten thousand.” (Marx. ‘Theories of Surplus Value’. Volume 2. page 573.)

The middle-classes have from this intermediate position been the main sources of large-scale support for the capitalist system. When class-wide conflict between the working class and the individual and corporate capitalists and their pro-capitalist supporters take place they have invariably sided with capital. In the 20th century many fascist supporters were recruited from the middle classes. In European, North American and Latin American affairs, this class played a significant reactionary role. Outside of large-scale class upheavals they have also been the reliable voting strength for Liberal, Democratic, Conservative and Republican governments. However, the same centralisation and concentration of capital that has diminished the relative numbers of productive workers has also reduced the numbers of the middle classes. In Europe and the advanced countries, small businesses involved in production, commerce, banking and retail sectors have been progressively replaced by large, even mega sized enterprises.

And it is precisely these numerously populated classes that have probably understood most clearly the dangers of left totalitarianism in the form of Bolshevism and right totalitarianism in the form of Fascism. Yet in the 21st century their own economic and social status is increasingly precarious and their financial position is undermined by every dysfunctional tremor in the banking and financial sector. Their ‘shares’ are often negatively volatile, their salaries eroded, they have been miss-sold financial instruments and now their savings are targets for pillaging. This means they will increasingly argue for, and press in the direction of, a rolling back of the neo-liberal forms of capital. They will be part of a trend looking towards a post neo-liberal consensus. They have yet to be won to a revolutionary-humanist post-capitalist perspective from which they have nothing to fear. In the coming conversations with sections of the middle and working classes, the opportunists in the workers movement will undoubtedly engage in popular front type debates and actions in which anti-capitalist ideas will be sidelined, muted or even absent.

Revolutionary-Humanist anti-capitalists on the other hand whilst not disrespectfully dismissing out of hand any naive hopes and aspirations for a return to an ‘honest’ form of welfare capitalism, should engage them with their stark analyses of the capitalist mode of production and the degeneration of Bolshevism to the fore. In common struggles against austerity and for partial demands, anti-capitalists should not be sectarian with regard to any new (or previous) forces entering the various reformist struggles, whatever their origins. But neither should they hide or subordinate their views that the capitalist mode of production has reached a multiple end-game with regard to the economic, financial, social, moral and ecological future of the planet. It remains to be seen what kind of end-game is yet to unfold and how revolutionary-humanist orientated anti-capitalists can best influence it. Two issues of importance which can assist it unfolding in a positive direction for the majority of the population is by the promotion of sufficiently detailed anti-capitalist economic analyses and an honest evaluation of the degeneration of the Soviet Union.

Roy Ratcliffe (April 2013.)

[See also ‘Workers and others in the 21st century.’; ‘Defending Public Services’; ‘Marxism against Marx’; ‘The Five-fold Crisis of Capitalism.’ and ‘Crisis: so what else can we do?’]

Posted in Economics, Finance, Politics | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment

SYRIZA: CRUCIBLE OR CUL-DE-SAC?

Posted on March 24, 2013 by stutteringsteps

Who wants a ‘Party of the People’?

Recently there has been a number of calls from within the UK anti-capitalist left, for the formation of a ‘party of the people’ to rescue the working class from the current crisis and the austerity measures implemented by the present political elite. Few of those making the call from within this anti-capitalist milieu, have bothered to seriously consider how a party might distort or dismember the necessary self-activity of the working and oppressed classes. Fewer still have described what such a party might look like or what efforts it would take to form one. For this reason these calls have been left as yet mere abstractions formulated out of a mixture of wishful thinking, impatience and lack of serious study. Suggestions of ‘a new political formation, which rejects austerity’ and recognition of ‘the obstacles’ to getting elected to the parliaments or other organs of political administration, are about as detailed as they get.

I shall ignore for the moment the obvious fact that the sources of power under the capitalist mode of production, lie outside of its Parliamentary or congressional ‘talking shops’ and consider what a more detailed proposal for such a party includes. In this regard, it cannot have escaped many observers notice that in the shape of Syriza, such a ‘party of the people’ is taking shape within Greece. Therefore, a recent speech in London (March 15 2013) by the current leader of this ‘party‘, Alexis Tsipras, allows us a glimpse into what ideas it takes to form one and what policies it adopts in order to get elected. Syriza, Tsipras asserted, will offer the ‘radical democratic changes’ which are necessary as ‘the only way out of the crisis’. The European elites he stated have ‘no viable prospect of exit from the crisis’ . Whilst this – as far as it goes – is undoubtedly true, let us consider what else he and Syriza think will prevent such an exit.

The current problems according to Syriza.

The first and emphasised problem identified in his speech was ‘austerity’. “Austerity is leading the Greek economy and society down a catastrophic path.”, he argued. He made no mention of the fact that it was the capitalist mode of production and its domination by finance-capital whose agents have devised these policies – and not always out of mistaken ignorance or meanness! Instead his primary focus was on the symptom – not the cause. From this viewpoint it is austerity policies – the symptoms – which have led to ‘cuts in benefits, deregulation and deterioration of the welfare state’, not the underlying fundamental crisis of the entire economic and political system. Superficially, this abstract and partial formulation is of course stating no more than what is glaringly obvious to every working person in every advanced capitalist economy. However, it remains a surface analysis and one woefully inadequate to enlighten or guide the very ‘people’ he seeks to recruit to assist him and his colleagues to obtain governmental ’power’.

He also identified the following problems – also notably formulated as bourgeois abstractions – a lack of ‘justice’, ‘equality’ and ‘freedom’‘. A further and related problem, he noted, concerned the current elite in Europe and Greece;

“They seek the creation of an economic environment based on cheap labour, special economic zones, de-regulation of the labour-market, tax exemptions for capital and extensive privatisations of public goods and services.” (A. Tspiras. London March 15 2013.)

This too is telling us nothing new! Haven’t they always sought and achieved these? Then follows a perhaps revealing formulation which claims the powerful forces of neo-liberalism aim to; “exclude alternative political programmes”. I shall come back to this point later, but a few other points of the speech are worth considering. He points out that sections of the political elite had ‘circumvented the separation of powers’ and the constitution’ and have passed legislation and decrees; “..without Parliamentary approval“! Isn’t that what any ruling elite do – tear up their own laws when it suits them? Isn’t that what they will increasingly do as the crisis deepens. Will the capitalist class and their elite supporters really allow a ‘constitutional’ overthrow of their system or even a radical reform of it – if it does not suit their purposes? A study of history suggests otherwise.

The speech by Mr Tspiras continued to attempt to hook a left audience into agreement with him with descriptions of the present governing elite unleashing ‘unlimited state violence’, repression, torture and fascist thugs’ all of which endanger – the European liberal and humanist tradition’. Indeed it does, but what is the purpose of this one-sided seductive talk about the European tradition of liberalism and humanism? Aren’t such ideological abstractions nothing but a bourgeois smokescreen for ruthless exploitation of their own working people and those of foreign countries? The tradition of European capitalism, despite its public rhetoric of liberty, fraternity, equality, justice and declarations of human rights, has been one of unmitigated ruthless genocidal, Colonialism, and Imperialism. Even in the 21st century, Europe still authorises the bombing of villages in Iraq, Afghanistan etc., and has done elsewhere since the 19th century. The European Community still chooses to ignore the slow genocide of the Palestinians by the Zionist state of Israel and supports the latter in many economic and military ways.

The solutions proposed by Syriza.

Some of the solutions to the above noted ‘problems’ suggested by Mr Tspiras, are as follows. Stop austerity, stop tax avoidance, reform the taxation policies, restore the minimum wage, freeze the current reductions in salaries, wages and pensions, re-capitalise the banks and restore the dignity of the working classes. But it also includes more. For example;

“A future government will put a stop to the austerity policies, while at the same time re-negotiating the loan agreement with our creditors. Syriza argues that an economically viable strategy must follow the model of the 1953 London Debt Agreement which gave post-war German economy a kick start and helped create the economic miracle of the post-war era.” (A.Tsipras. March 15 2013.)

He then informed the audience that Syriza sees no reason in 2013 that a similar ‘Marshal Plan’ for the whole of the south and Greece why such a settlement should not be an appropriate way forward. In other words Syriza wants ‘debt reduction’ and financial terms from Europe ‘linked to export and growth performance‘. It cannot escape the notice of listeners to the speech or readers of its printed reproduction that everything in these policy headings are completely in accordance with the most enlightened members of the capitalist classes. They are the same bourgeois aspirations which informed and motivated the tendency of ‘bourgeois and petite bourgeois socialism’ castigated by Marx and Engels. It cannot have escaped anyone who lived in the post Second World War or who has studied its politics and economics, that these – and more – were largely granted by the capitalists and their supporters at the time. They did so in order to stave off revolution and have clawed everyone of them back as fast as possible.

In the face of the most profound and sustained crisis of capitalism since the 1930’s, Syriza in its pursuit of power seems it cannot envisage anything further than the temporary heights of the post-war socio-economic accommodation granted by the then guardians of the capitalist system. It’s policy proposals represent a mood of understandable nostalgia among the working and middle-classes, for the brief period in which a small degree of welfare and well-being was created. That is to say on the basis of the post-war re-construction needed because of the massive destruction of life, property and means of production during the intensity of total war during 1939 – 1945. It is a feeling of longing for the past which is particularly strong in the UK and is largely behind the Left Unity ideas of ‘People’s Assemblies’, the ‘need to reject Tory cuts’ and form a new party headed by the unions, Labour activists and the Green Party. Such nostalgia has been vividly illustrated by the recent film ‘The Spirit of ‘45’ by Ken Loach. Yet it was only this 20th century massive capitalist inspired destruction of human and non-human capital which created the foundation for the short-lived post-war European growth which Syriza considers is now possible for Greece and other struggling capitalist countries.

In the 21st century, this foundation no longer exists. Indeed the very crisis of the system which has given rise to the symptoms of ’austerity’ are the very opposite of those in the 1950’s. The current crisis is one of massive over-production of commodities, industrial capacity, financial instruments, together with over-production of pollutants, over-exploitation of natural resources, over production of arms and armaments and over-production of government debt. These problems cannot be exited or overcome by any of the policy means outlined by Syriza. Indeed the means proposed by Syriza are the very ones which many of the more naive and disolusioned capitalists themselves now vainly wish to see implemented. This then goes some way to describe the content and essence of the alternative political programme, noted earlier, which Syriza has identified as being one of the ones the elite wish to ‘exclude’.

The revolutionary alternative to nostalgia.

Not all, the bourgeoisie have benefited from the last two decades of neo-liberal globalisation. Many of them, particularly small business proprietors, local shopkeepers and local trades-people, have suffered from high monopoly prices now charged by the social utilities, high taxation, bank collapses and competition from mega producers and suppliers. Many have also suffered losses of investments due to the collapses of speculative finance. More are yet to see their lucrative posts in the higher levels of government and the capitalist state, disappear as the sovereign debt crisis matures. There is therefore, growing criticism of the capitalist mode of production from these sectors along with the above noted nostalgia for parts of the post-war consensus.

In face of this situation there are several possibilities for intervention. One can play to the mood of nostalgia and try to create and offer a reformist programme or one can face people with the reality and explain the real situation they face. The reality is that austerity is not the result of a new bout of meanness or incompetence, by the pro-capitalist elite but a considered strategy motivated by the fundamental contradictions of capital. Yet instead, of probing below ‘appearances’ and wanting to mobilise the working and oppressed classes to take control of production, Tsipras says Syriza wishes to mobilise; “all the social forces who have an interest in fighting corruption, cronyism, clientelism, and public sector inefficiency.”  In other words almost a perfect late 20th century bourgeois programme. And, incidentally, by asserting reform  is possible, it is a programme which plays into the hands of the authoritarians who also want to reform capitalism – in their own fascistic way.

Those who are currently suffering from the crisis – in all its forms – can of course, be encouraged to look backward for inspiration and try to replicate an elite-led resurrection of welfare capitalism – without the post EEC immigration – or they can be encouraged to look forward to a self-determined alternative. The melancholy pro-capitalists and workers ‘leaders’ and those who bought the high-value dodgy derivatives, are among the forces which are pressing in the direction of creating a reformist programme for the continuance of capitalism in a more gentile form. Obligingly, Syriza in Greece is providing one. These sectors are getting more voluble at every setback in the banking system. Instead of explaining reality to them, the needs of the moment and the logic emerging from a study of the capitalist system, Syriza offers them ‘hope’ for future growth.  Instead of a revolutionary transformation of the mode of production which is essential, Syriza offers in its own words, ‘a minimum wage‘, ‘a prevention of tax avoidance’, an economic ’kick-start’ to capitalist economic growth and a restoration of the ‘dignity’ of the working and oppressed classes.”

If this putitive programme is not part of some convoluted manoeuvre then the ‘dignity’ of the working class is to be achieved not by revolution, but by their so-called representatives ‘grovelling’ to the European Bond-Holders and ‘begging’ for a Marshal Plan from the IMF. On the other hand, if these policies are part of a convoluted top-down manoeuvre to fool the capitalist class until Syriza achieves a majority in parliament, then such deceit will effectively fool the working and oppressed. It will also deflect and prevent any large-scale alternative self-activity of the workers and oppressed as many will be diverted into divisive electoral activities, rather than solidarity in community defensive activity. And it is only the development of the latter which will create an effective – crucial – defence for embattled communities and at the same time create the necessary solidarity from which any revolutionary opportunities can be launched.

The reactionary nature of political solutions.

The reactionary nature of those ‘socialists’ – not just those in Syriza – who exclusively raise demands which have already been met by capitalists at one stage and withdrawn at another, is demonstrated by the illusions they are now trying to inflict upon the present generation of workers and oppressed. Facing as they do, a war against them, the working and oppressed classes are to be armed by Syriza and others by accepting a belief in outmoded abstractions and miracle promises of economic ‘growth‘. Such ideas, purporting to be socialist but not thoroughly and clearly anti-capitalist, amount to a subterfuge which is either the result of dishonesty or naivety. These bourgeois abstractions are fundamentally reactionary; for in the current situation they sow illusions and confusions among those who seek to struggle against the impositions of the pro-capitalist elite. They also serve to create an ideological basis for solidarity between workers in struggle with those proponents of the capitalist mode of production – who also want change – but also want retain the economic essence of their system.

Such parties ‘of the people’ are projects for class collaboration in which the capitalist class – who have managed to screw-up the world in so many ways – will retain their positions of power and influence through their continued control of the means of production. Such ‘socialists’ who promote these ’parties’ are happy to direct demands upon the bourgeois state and promise benefits from it, because they see themselves as becoming an influential part of it. Yet even if the honest and naive ones among them succeed in gaining a majority in the ‘talking shops’ of parliaments or congresses, they will remain powerless to do anything of lasting benefit to workers and the oppressed. The power of the bourgeois classes lie not in Parliaments or Congresses, but in their control of the means of production, the commodities and services resulting from this production, the production of the ‘means of production’ the means of circulation and the means of repression (police, judiciary, army, navy, air-force, prisons etc.).

In any attempted electoral ‘coup’ of parliament or congress by a radical left political force, those who are not bumped off beforehand will be arrested and incarcerated during or after the attempted coup. It is naive to think, or Machiavellian to pretend, otherwise. The history of the bourgeois class, provides ample evidence of this method in all countries of the world. Are the workers to be really conned into working their guts out to create a reformist political organisation? Are they to sink all their energies and slender resources into building it, only to recreate the very pro-capitalist social scaffolding which has failed them before and will later be used to dismantle their organisations and decimate their ranks? I think not! The circumstances of the fundamental crisis of capitalism, ecologically, financially, economically, socially and morally, require nothing less than a revolutionary solution.

Not to make this revolutionary necessity clearly, unambiguously and continually available by the anti-capitalist left to the masses of working people and oppressed is to betray every sacrifice made before in the struggles to overcome the capitalist mode of production. To prioritise the building of a political party over the facilitating the self-activity of the working and oppressed classes is to continue to blindly make the tragic mistakes of previous attempts to go beyond capital. It also serves to disarm large sections of them. As Marx noted in his critique of the Gotha Programme, anti-capitalists cannot pass over in silence such bourgeois phrases as appear in the speech by Alex Tsipras. Marx considered the insertion of such bourgeois and petite bourgeois phrases ‘a monstrous attack upon the understanding‘. And deplored the;

“…dogmas, ideas, which in a certain period had some meaning but have now become obsolete verbal rubbish, while again perverting, on the other, the realistic outlook which it cost to instil..” (Marx. Critique of the Gotha Programme. Section 3)

The realistic outlook is that there is no way back to the conditions of European capitalism during 1945 -1965. There is only the prospect of a re-run of 1920’s and 1930’s situation in Europe and North America or of moving on to a post-capitalist form of production. These stark alternatives need to be presented clearly and unequivocally to all we can reach. Nostalgia may be comfortingly soporific but it is no basis for deciding where to put ones energies.

Roy Ratcliffe (March 2013

[In this context see also ‘The Five-fold Crisis of Capitalism’; ‘Crisis: So what else can we do?‘ Uprisings and Revolutions’ and ‘Form and Essence in the anti-capitalist struggle.’ and ‘Leaders or Facilitators?’]

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