It looks like the DSA has a left wing after all. However, if these guys
are so anxious to break with the Democrat party I would suggest to them
that it might be a good idea to break with the DSA too.
http://socialistviewpoint.org/novdec_17/novdec_17_08.html
Social Democracy or Revolutionary Socialism?
Statement by the Eugene Debs Caucus of the Democratic Socialists of America
“The first great step of importance for every country newly entering
into the movement is always the organization of the workers as an
independent political party, no matter how, so long as it is a distinct
workers’ party.... The masses must have time and opportunity to develop
and they can only have the opportunity when they have their own
movement—no matter in what form so long as it is only their own
movement—in which they are driven further by their own mistakes and
learn wisdom by hurting themselves.”
So wrote Frederick Engels about the U.S. working class in 1886. That
step—the organization of the U.S. working class as its own political
party—has yet to be accomplished. But today, when both the main
political parties of the U.S. capitalist class are in crisis, there is
an opening like never since the 1930s. For socialists, one of the first
steps in taking advantage of this opportunity would be to run
independent, working class representatives for local office. These would
be candidates who explicitly link the local issues with the necessity of
building a mass working class political party.
With its extremely rapid growth, Democratic Socialists of America (DSA)
can play a vital role in helping the creation of such a party. It can
put the creation of such a party on the agenda; raise the issue in the
minds of millions of workers. It also has the resources to run
successful independent, working class representatives for local office
and start to bring these local campaigns together into one national,
working class movement, independent of and opposed to the two main
capitalist parties.
Liberalism
For too long, radical social movements have been sacrificed on the altar
of the Democratic Party in the name of being “practical.” Once lured
into the party’s sphere of influence, these groups forfeit their
independence and become subordinate to the agenda of the Democratic
Party itself. In practice, this means dancing to the tune of, or never
going beyond, the program of the “progressive” wing of the Democrats.
That is why it is impossible to preserve the political and
organizational independence of working class movements while supporting
Democratic Party candidates.
Taking such a step is impossible as long as we support any Democratic
Party candidates. How, after all, can we explain the class nature of the
Democrats, the role of their “progressive” wing as bait for the trap,
the necessity of the working class to build its own party, while at the
same time supporting some Democrats? Everything in the tumultuous last
12 months proves it cannot be done.
The significance of a mass working class party
First of all, we should be clear on what the working class is: This is
the class that depends on selling its labor-power for a wage. This also
includes those who are fraudulently classified as “independent
contractors” such as Uber and Lyft drivers. It is not only the
traditional blue collar workers like construction or factory workers,
but also baristas, secretaries and clerical workers, teachers, grocery
clerks and even incarcerated workers. We are all bound together by our
common interests as a class—in other words our relationship to the
“means of production.” What is necessary, as Engels explained, is for
the class to be united through its own political party.
Presently, the union leadership and the non-profits confine themselves
to “pressuring the Democrats.” In reality this means allowing this
capitalist-controlled party to set the political agenda. It means being
unable to clearly point to the class nature of politics.
The building of a mass working class party would be a huge first step
forward. It would start to place all issues on a class basis. It would
start to clarify that the solutions rest on the working class. It would
also open the door to revolutionary socialists starting to gain a real
base in the working class.
This last point must not be forgotten, exactly because while the
creation of such a party would be a huge first step, it would be only
that—a first step.
Liberals think workers don’t need their own political party and can rely
on the capitalist Democratic Party. The social democrats at least go
beyond that and understand that workers do need their own party.
However, what sort of party do they think is required?
“Mixed” economy?
The social democrats generally advocate a “mixed” economy, with some
elements of nationalization (such as public utilities, railroads, etc.)
along side a robust, for-profit capitalist economy. The problem is that
the essence of a socialist economy is democratic state planning, and
it’s impossible to plan an economy where huge sectors are controlled by
the anarchic, for-profit market. The social democrats point to countries
like Sweden as a model, but they forget that the Swedish Social
Democrats have been cutting back on their social programs since 2008,
and in Germany the main cuts against the social programs have been
carried out by the Social Democrats too. This has been the case
throughout Europe. Just like in the U.S., these societies have growing
far right, chauvinist and racist movements exactly as a result of the
confusion that social democracy has created there. In other words, these
“socialist” countries are not socialist; they are neither run by workers
nor outside the crisis of capitalism.
History of social democracy
Social democracy originated as the movement of revolutionary Marxism.
However, it then degenerated and became an attempt to balance between
the socialist traditions of the working class and the needs and
interests of the capitalist class. At times of crisis, that balancing
act was impossible and the social democratic leaders came down
decisively on the side of the capitalist class.
This is what happened in the years leading up to World War I, when the
different imperialist powers could only settle their rivalries through
war. Throughout Europe, almost all the social democratic leaders
supported their own capitalist class in that imperialist slaughter.
Following World War I and the Russian Revolution, capitalism was in
another crisis and revolution was on the agenda, especially in Germany.
There, it was the social democratic leadership who saved the day for
capitalism, including orchestrating the murder of revolutionary leaders,
Rosa Luxembourg and Karl Liebknecht.
They supported their own capitalists’ imperialist ventures in Asia and
Africa.
In the economic upswing following World War II, the social democrats did
produce some major reforms for the working class throughout Europe. This
is what present-day supporters of social democracy point to, but now,
under the economic crisis of capitalism, in most European countries it
is the social democrats who are trying to preserve the profits of
“their” capitalists by leading the way in cutting social benefits.
Syriza
Greece is a perfect example of the failure of social democracy. For
years the Greek Socialist Party carried out cut after cut of essential
services for working class people. In response, the Greek working class
rose up, threw the Socialist Party out of office and voted in a radical
left alternative in 2015—Syriza. This was a milestone not only for the
Greek working class but for the workers’ struggle against cuts and
austerity worldwide. Led by Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras and Finance
Minister Yanis Varoufakis, Syriza struggled to reverse these cuts. But
exactly because of their limited strategy and program, they were unable
to accomplish this and ended up carrying out the exact same attacks on
the Greek working class that they’d been elected to reverse!
Chile 1973
Nor can capitalism be legislated out of existence or socialism be
accomplished through the capitalist state. Take, for instance, the
example of Chile’s Salvador Allende, who came to power in the early
1970s in that country. That was exactly what Allende tried to do—build
socialism in Chile through the capitalist state. He ended up so
antagonizing the Chilean capitalist class that—along with the CIA—they
organized a military coup, assassinated him and tens-of-thousands of
others. The Pinochet dictatorship that ruled Chile for years afterwards
was one of the most brutal in Latin America’s history of brutal
dictatorships.
A U.S. workers government
And how about the U.S.?
Even if a president were elected from a mass working class political
party, she or he would be frustrated at every turn. Since only one third
of the Senators are elected at any one cycle, the Senate would probably
remain firmly under capitalist control. Even if it weren’t, the
capitalists could count on the judicial system to stymy a socialist
president and congress.
Then there is the rest of the state apparatus—the heads of the
bureaucracies, the military brass and the police. All of these form the
real base of the state—the capitalist state in this case. In a situation
of real crisis, they would be used to topple a socialist-led government
in the U.S., just like they have in many other countries, throughout
history.
But that is not the end of the story.
Committees of struggle:
A rival to the capitalist state
A president from a mass working class party in the U.S. would only come
into office in a time of tremendous turmoil, a time when
tens-of-millions of workers and working class youth were in motion. It
would be a time when, as Engels put it, workers would be driven further
by their own mistakes. While they almost certainly would be involved in
capitalist elections, workers would not simply leave matters there; they
would be organizing and fighting for their needs in the streets, work
places, working class communities and schools. They would be building
their own organs, their own committees, to carry their struggles forward.
Among other things, these would be self-defense committees. But they
would also probably involve themselves with such things as organizing
classes in colleges and universities, maybe controlling prices and the
flow of goods, etc. In other words, they would start to rival the
capitalist state.
This happened in every radical working class uprising, from that in
Chile in the 1970s to the revolution against the Shah of Iran in 1978-9
to the early days of the revolution in Syria in 2011. There were even
elements of this in the Seattle general strike of 1919. In that
instance, the general strike committee not only ran the strike that shut
down Seattle, it determined which goods (such as basic food and
medicine) were allowed to be brought into the city.
In this way, a rival to the institutions of the capitalist state would
start to develop. The question would start to pose itself: Which shall
rule—the working class committees of struggle or the capitalist state?
Revolutionary socialists
The working class would be driven further down the road towards putting
its own committees of struggle into full power in society, which means
bringing down the capitalist state. But once again, history shows that
they would have limited time in which to draw that conclusion and act on
it. That’s why it’s important to have a revolutionary socialist wing of
a new mass working class party—to learn along with the working class but
also to help make this unconscious learning process conscious, thereby
speeding it up.
Conclusion
To sum up: A mass working class party would be the independent
organizing center for the struggles of the working class, of, by, and
for, itself. It would be the gathering point, coordinating body and
learning center of the class struggle. This does not mean subordinating
issues like racism, sexism, LGBTQ rights or the environment to the class
struggle but, rather, clarifying that it is the role of the working
class to resolve them through their own organization. While
participating in capitalist elections is far from the only role a mass
working class party would play, ultimately the party will have to either
run its own candidates or it will get swept up into and become
subordinate to the Democratic Party or possibly another capitalist party.
Karl Marx said that the emancipation of the working class must be
conquered by the working classes themselves. This can only be done by
relying on our own forces and overthrowing both the political and
economic system of capitalism, root and branch.
Further reading
The Gene Debs Caucus of East Bay DSA also suggests some further reading:
Left Wing Communism, an Infantile Disorder, by Lenin.
Some on the left conclude that because it’s not possible to simply “vote
in” socialism that therefore the working class movement should not
participate in elections. This is not a new idea, and Lenin in his
famous little book decisively argues against it. It’s one thing, he
said, for revolutionaries to reject capitalist elections; it’s something
entirely different for millions of workers to do so.
“Social Democracy or Capitalist Realities?”
This short article gives a little more history and analysis of social
democracy and its shortcomings, not to mention outright betrayals. See
it online at:
https://oaklandsocialist.com/2017/07/19/social-democracy-or-
capitalist-realities/
What is Revolution?
This pamphlet develops further the question of how, under what
circumstances is a socialist revolution possible and how, through what
process, can the capitalist state be overthrown. Read it online at:
https://oaklandsocialist.com/2015/02/07/what-is-revolution/
Socialism, Utopian and Scientific, by Frederick Engels.
This is an introduction to the method and ideas of scientific socialism
as postulated by Marx and Engels.
For more information, contact us at:
EDC.DSA@xxxxxxx
Also find us on Facebook at: DSA Eugene Debs Caucus
—Oakland Socialist, September 16, 2017
https://oaklandsocialist.com/2017/09/16/dsa-eugene-debs-caucus-formed/
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