It occurred to me last night that its ironical that the vast majority of people who decry the Labour Party for no longer being a "Workers Party" are themselves middle class, whilst the majority of actual workers themselves DO continue to see it as a Workers Party.
I'm sure there is something significant there somewhere.
4 comments:
Oh, touche Boffy.
But perhaps it might be wise to just wait and check out the demographic split of the votes before being quite so sweeping on this point?
Just a thought.
First of all most workers do not vote Labour, and they have not done at any point in my life time.
Second of all where's your evidence for the class composition of the left?
If Labour win this election we will still have a government of war, cuts and privatisation and that is why those on the left oppose it - because it's policies are anti-working class - not because of some abstractions.
Get rid of the word "vast."
Being a worker myself, there is a sharp difference between a three kinds of parties I outlined in my previous comments.
Labour parties based merely on trade union support is not a model for workers organization: in the Anglosphere (UK, US, Canada, Australia) or anywhere else.
On the basis of the empirical evidence at least a plurality of workers votes cast go to the LP. So Charlie, I will adjust my view if an when that changes, not based on assumption of what might, or what I might or miht not hope may happen to fit in with my own prejudices.
Secondly, Jim what is clear is that even if it is only a plurality of workers rather than an actual Majority, there are certainly something like 25-30 times more who vote Labour than do for any parties to its Left, or even temporary alliances of those organisations. In fact, there are normally between 3-5 times as many workers who vote for the BNP than who vote for those organisations.
If, we see that in this election a very significant number of workers vote for rthe Lib Dems, then we would have to consider to what extent that makes them a "Workers Party" in the sense that Marx and Engels used the term, and what thaat would mean in terms of how Marxists would have to relate to them, whether it would mean calling on the LP to establish a United Front with them in order to try to prise those workers back again etc.
As far as the sociological composition of the Left I am basing my statement on my own experience of having been in one of those organisations and many, many years of working with members of such organisations. The majority of members are either students, or former students, for example. If you llok at how marxists in the past have designated such people it is as being petit-bourgeois. That is true even when they decide for political reasons to become workers. It is why Lenin and Trotsky were very cautious about such layers, and Trotsky in particular argued that they should have to spend many years as candidate members, acting as gofers for real worker members, beore being given full membership right. If these organisations did that today they would have very few full members, and most of their student members would simply disappear.
Jacob, there may be a question as to whether the best arrangement for a Socialist Party is to be based directly on the affiliation of Trade Unions. No one I think doubts that a strong link is desirable, however. Moreover, the point is that in determining whether a Party is a Workers Party or not, the existence of such a relationship is an important factor.
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