The Political Situation (2/14)
In the 1920's, those mass social-democratic and communist parties, with millions of members, let alone voters, coming after a period of 25-30 years when the cause of labour had seen a steady forward march, meant that capital faced a significant challenge. It was not just that the workers had created these mass industrial and political organisations. They had also created their own economic organisations in the form of cooperatives, most visibly in the form of the giant retail cooperatives, which, in large parts of the economy, held dominant positions, which posed a threat to capital as they also were able to offer workers, better wages, shorter hours, paid holidays, as well as welfare, in the form of sickness benefits and health care etc.
Nicole Robertson in The Co-operative Movement and Communities in Britain, 1914-60 describes its nature in Britain. The St. Cuthberts Co-op in Edinburgh was established in 1859 by mostly joiners and cabinet makers. By 1960, it had over 100,000 members, 80 grocery stores, 75 bakeries, 28 fruit shops and 9 tailors, and was involved in activities ranging from dairies to wallpaper shops. The Leicester Co-op was established in 1860 by seven weavers. By the 1950's it had over 80,000 members and had a branch in every one of the 400 square miles it covered. The Birmingham Industrial Co-op was set up in 1881 by 25 mainly railway workers. By 1960, it had almost 400,000 members, The London Co-op was formed by merger in 1920/1 of the Stratford Co-op, established by railwaymen, the Edmonton Co-op established by tramwaymen, and the West London Co-op again established by railwaymen. In 1942, it pioneered the first self-service store in Britain. In 1957, it had 1.2 million members.
The Co-op was innovative in other ways. It was able to use its centralised buying, and its own production to an extent that, at the beginning of the last century, it threatened the existing Department Stores. Even in architecture it created its own style of art deco buildings.
“Many of the larger premises had distinctive features that were focal points within the areas in which they were based; for example, clock towers and flags. Department stores formed 'highly impressive, purpose built structures', with some of these arguably among Britain's finest art deco buildings.”
(Bill Lancaster, The Department Store)
And, as creations of the workers, it was natural that from the start they should have more of a role than that of just being a shop. Robertson quotes from a number of Co-op journals setting out the services ranging from “aid given to members during times of hardship (such as sickness and unemployment) to serving an array of needs for special occasions, such as wedding day.”
At the beginning of the twentieth century the Co-op was the first to introduce a 48 hour week for its workers when most other workers were still working a 50-60 hour week. That went along with paid holidays, the provision of health insurance and more, and although these retail cooperatives were consumer coops rather than workers' cooperatives, they offered to workers the vision of how these large socialised capitals could be run democratically by their members, the majority of whom were workers.
The workers had also created their own friendly societies, which provided similar benefits, and unemployment insurance, as well as having created their own educational institutions, for example the Plebs League and the National Association of Labour Colleges in Britain, and across Europe, workers had created a wide array of social and sporting associations that represented the first signs of the working-class exercising its own self-activity, and self government in opposition to the capitalist state.
After WWI, the London Trades Councils worked with the London Cooperative Societies to independently monitor the prices being charged by retailers, who were being accused of price gouging, and similarly the co-op's own facilities enabled them to test the products being sold by these other retailers to identify where they were dangerous, or were being adulterated. Again, this was an example of how the working-class and its organisations were able to exercise self-activity and self government. The experience of the Cooperative Societies in organising rationing, during WWI, was also used as a basis for them working with the Triple Alliance to prepare to distribute food to striking workers, and they were also able to provide funds for strikers too, which was again put into practice during the General Strike.
When capital began to try to implement these strategies of introducing new technologies to replace labour, which results in lay-offs, and also then leads to attempts to reduce wages, to claw back reductions in the working-day, paid holidays and so on, it meets solid organised resistance by workers. It faces the strike of the Triple Alliance in 1921, and again in the General Strike of 1926; in Italy, it sees workers occupy factories, and establish workers councils across many cities. In Germany, the Communist Party heads up the revolution of 1923. Ultimately, in changed economic conditions, and also as a result of the mistakes and betrayals of Stalinism, the workers everywhere go down to defeat, but again, its necessary to look at what the forces against them constituted, and what their goals were.
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