Trotsky
in his writings on Britain, after the betrayal of the General Strike,
by the union and labour leaders, set out the approach to the United Front - “with the workers always, with the reformist leaders sometimes.” To the extent that the reformist leaders are moving
forward, we can give them critical support. But, even when the
reformist leaders are not moving forward that does not relieve us of
the duty of “sticking with the workers” in the mass organisation,
led by those reformist leaders. We cannot simply skip over the stage
of the workers in these organisations breaking with the leaders and
moving beyond the bourgeois social-democratic ideology.
In
the US, that currently means that Marxists have to be active members
of the Democrats, in order to gain the ear of the mass of workers
that still look to that party as its representative. To the extent
that the Democrat party leaders advocate policies of fiscal
expansion, such as those set out above, or policies such as
Obamacare, which represent a forward movement, Marxists can give them
critical support, and oppose the efforts of conservatives to reverse
them. But, our support for the workers in these organisations, be
they trades unions, or social-democratic parties is not in any way
conditional upon the official positions of these organisations and
their leaders.
In
fact, in every important respect, the official position of these
organisations is irrelevant to our activity. We are not
parliamentarists, who believe that it is necessary to commit
organisations to particular positions, and for those parties and
organisations to implement them from above. We are revolutionary
socialists who believe that workers have to act themselves here and
now, to change the material conditions of their existence, and in so
doing to build up their own self-government. Marxists in the US, can
be active in the trades unions and in the Democrats to be building
worker owned and controlled organisations, providing social
insurance, for example, that can provide health insurance for workers
within the context of Obamacare. They can be working with workers in
the healthcare industry to establish co-operative healthcare
provision that can then work with these social insurance
co-operatives.
In
fact, building on the work being done by the International Co-operative Alliance, such co-ops could link up with similar co-ops
in Canada and Mexico. They can link up with co-ops in the
pharmaceutical industry, or those in biotechnology, such as have been
set up by the Mondragon Co-ops, to break the hold of the big US drug
companies.
Housing co-ops are common in the US, even amongst the rich. Marxists in the
US, working through the political machinery provided by the
Democrats, at a local level, can turn these organisations outwards
into the local communities, to build further such co-operative
structures, at a block and community level, thereby drawing in new
worker activists.
Programmes
for urban renewal, undertaken by such community co-ops, can then be
drawn up and construction co-ops, employing unemployed workers, and
providing skills training, can then be established to carry it out.
The United Steelworkers have joined with the Mondragon Co-ops to draw
up a new structure of trade union/co-op working, and to spread
worker-owned co-ops across N. America. A similar link up with trade
union locals, in the construction industry, could facilitate such a
development.
These
kinds of programmes of working-class self-activity, can be undertaken
whatever the position adopted by the party leaders. Moreover, to the
extent they grow, and pull in new worker activists, they provide the
example of the kind of alternative co-operative society that could be
built in place of capitalism. It also provides the basis for
transforming the nature of the party, and taking it beyond the
bourgeois limits placed on it by the current leaders.
Marxists
should be adopting this approach now, as the best means of moving the
Democrats forward, and establishing the basis for defeating the
forces of reaction and conservatism in the coming Congressional and
Presidential elections.
As
things stand, the most likely outcome is for Hillary Clinton to win
the Democratic nomination. She is likely to stand on the same kind
of social-democratic agenda as she did previously. Given the
divisions in the Republican party, the continuing role of the Tea
Party, and the demographic shifts in US society, the likelihood is
that she will win the Presidency.
But,
that cannot be guaranteed. Obama and the Democrats failure to face
down the Republicans, and the consequent lacklustre growth in the US
economy, has seen his popularity decline significantly. A hard core
conservative and populist vote will be mobilised by the Tea Party
against the Democrats. Unless they can provide a bold and confident
agenda that provides workers with a sufficient reason to turn out and
vote, the Democrats could lose due to apathy.
That
would be bad for US workers, but it would also be bad for big US
industrial capital. A Republican victory in either Congress, or for
the Presidency would see the US suffer from the same insane policies
of austerity that have been implemented in the UK and peripheral
Europe.
It
would be likely to send the US economy into an unnecessary recession,
at a time when it should be recovering more strongly. It would mean
a further relative deterioration of the US economy relative to China.
The underlying interest of big capital is then to resist such a
development. However, economic interest does not map directly on to
political perspective. That is why Marxists do not rely on blind
economic forces driving history in our direction, but seek to create
history via the agency of the working-class, acting consciously to
change our existing material conditions, and thereby the ideas that
flow from it.
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