The last few weeks haven't been nice to me. A gut infection landed me in hospitals, once in the Midwest and once in Mexico. So I've been unable to follow the discussions in the lists.
These are my belated views on the electoral strategy of the U.S. left recently discussed here:
We need to remove Bush from the White House not because he is the worst president ever or even in recent history, but because -- given the alternatives and by far -- four more years of Bush in the White House are NOT the most desirable option for people in the U.S. and the world NOW.
Let's leave off the table whether the threat of fascism is real or exaggerated. Here are some crucial, undeniable reasons why Bush needs to be removed from office right away:
Internationally, under Bush the U.S. claims an exclusive "right" to unilateral, preemptive aggression against whatever it defines as a threat. In other words, it is no exaggeration to say that the U.S. proclaims itself the *world dictator*, breaching the UN charter -- the formal framework of international coexistence adopted after WW2. Beyond mere declarations, the U.S. has already acted according to its new doctrine.
Domestically, the Bush administration has pushed a vast program of wealth redistribution in favor of the rich and especially in favor of his sponsors. It is no exaggeration to say that Bush's economic policy is subordinated to this goal. Some of the measures (tax cuts, accumulated deficits) are clearly intended to sabotage social programs and hardwire high degrees of wealth inequality in the country for years to come. That will have (if it is not having already) lasting, devastating effects on the living and working conditions of people.
The foreign and economic policy of the U.S. imposes a tremendous human cost on people, both domestically and in the rest of the world. A second Bush term is not unlikely to make things worse. Left to themselves, things can always get worse.
In a general sense, the productive and *destructive* forces of the humankind are today more powerful than ever -- and their control is highly concentrated on the U.S. bourgeoisie. The White House is the most powerful office in the world today and in history. The U.S. people has a disproportionate influence on the decisions that shape policies that seriously affect the whole world. With this influence comes a responsibility, especially to those who advocate the international cooperation of workers. If we cannot have immediate direct access to the immense power concentrated in the White House -- the ultimate basis of which is our surplus labor -- we need to at least try and limit its immediate worst uses.
A further question is whether, given the alternatives, we should replace Bush with -- say -- a Democrat, a Green, or a radical Marxist. The answer doesn't depend on our wishes -- it depends on our actual power. We may wish to have Jesus or Buda or Lenin in the White House, but our wishes won't make that happen. The best course of action depends on our strength.
Some people (e.g., José Pérez) appear to question the assertion that the left in the U.S. is ideologically and politically weak. Perhaps we should be more precise and say that the workers' movement in the U.S. is weak to accomplish radical goals immediately, but it is in a position to make a clear difference in more immediate goals.
Workers may not in the short run end capitalism, take power, or even lead the government, but they can help remove Bush from office and push (foreign and economic) policy reform. To the extent these reforms amount to progress in the workers' agenda, this struggle strengthens the independent political organization of the workers.
Some people (e.g., Jim Devine) argue that the movement has limited resources and it needs to focus on the strategic task of organizing workers independently -- presumably building a new political formation with an unmistakable workers' agenda. In this view, participating in the electoral process or supporting a DP candidate is a waste of political energy.
This is wrong. Removing Bush from office and pushing for a change in foreign and economic policy don't exclude helping workers educate themselves politically and build an independent political movement. In fact, we won't be able to build an independent political movement any time soon if we don't act seriously to stop Bush's reelection. We need to participate effectively even if we look at the election in its own narrow political logic -- if the race gets tight, for that very reason, to avoid helping Bush get reelected, and if Bush is to unravel, to bury him and his policies under the landslide.
We cannot shun the direct effects of the current presidential election. If we agitate and organize exclusively on the basis of long-term narrowly-conceived class goals -- overthrowing the two-party system, ending racism, abolishing capitalism, etc. -- that is, pretending that the immediate consequences of a crucial presidential election can be evaded, then the result will be at best small, anti-capitalist, radical groups. We might perhaps attract students and people with a preference for radical lifestyles and counter-cultural attitudes. Nothing wrong with that, but we won't be able to duly change the deeper social structures without the broader association and concerted actions of masses of workers.
Some people (e.g., Louis Proyect) assume that support to the Democratic Party in this election negates independent political action. Even people who don't question the need to participate in the presidential election believe that the only valid (or most effective) form of participation is by postulating or supporting a third-party candidate -- a Green or an Independent.
The grounds for this view are that participation within the two-party system is incompatible with political independence. There are constant invokations to the historical sins of these political formations, which automatically kills in the germ any cooperation with them. Thus the only or best way to achieve political independence for the workers' movement is by having a third-party candidate -- it is claimed.
That idea is wrong. Political independence is not mechanical separation, but a process by which the workers advance their own, broader and longer-ranging interests, extending and deepening the cooperation between larger segments of the class. Because the class antagonism between workers and capitalists is not always or everywhere a zero-sum game, it is entirely possible for an improvement in the workers' position to be compatible with punctual, temporary benefits for some sectors of the capitalist class. While in most contexts, Marxists emphasize the opposition of interests, Marx's writings do not ignore the cases where the interests of workers and capitalists coincide.
Specific political formations (e.g., the DP, the Green party, etc.) can help or not as concrete vehicles for the attainment of specific goals along the path. We should not confuse ends with means. Running away from the parents' home may or may not be a necessary step to personal independence. It all depends on maturity, experience, possibilities, and even concrete opportunities available. In some cases, staying at the parents' home, doing boring chores, graduating from high school, and getting a steady job before taking the big step may or may not be best. But the goal is not to make empty gestures against parental oppression. It is to ensure what's best for the youngster in the long haul. Timing and circumstances count.
Some people (e.g., Louis Proyect) seem to believe that alliances with "bourgeois parties" such as the DP are to be avoided, while only alliances with clearly "proletarian parties" are kosher. This is wrong. The nature of each alliance depends on the strength of the movement and the goals in question. Louis' profession of Leninist faith is not consistent with Lenin's views and practice. Lenin frequently emphasized the necessity of alliances -- even with the "devil" if circumstances thus required. The premise of any alliance is the independence of interests and purpose of those who take part in an alliance. If the movement has clear its interests and goals, alliances are useful.
Apparently, in Louis' views, the Greens and Independents -- just because they are not Republican or Democrat, and/or because they are new or small -- manage to escape the corrupting political gravitation exercised by capital. No doubt, the historical inertia of the political machines is to be reckoned with, but novelty, physical separation, radical programs or fancier (less "Zinovievist") versions of "democratic centralism" are no political vaccines.
The only vaccine that works is engagement, concrete action. The best path to political independence cannot be chartered beforehand. As the strength of the movement grows, we will need to decide in due time whether the best path to political independence is to struggle for control of existing political formations or to create new ones from scratch. These decisions will result from concrete political cost-benefit analyses -- not from ideological posturing.
We are of course free to create new political formations from scratch -- whether they'll succeed or not is another issue. What we cannot do is attain political independence in a social or political vacuum. In this sense, there's no start from scratch. Whatever we do, we begin with what we have -- good and bad. Creating a new political formation is like re-marrying after a divorce. The old issues -- if left unresolved -- reappear in the new marriage.
Just because we start anew (with a "party" that carries a lighter historical baggage) doesn't mean that we will be able to avoid the minefields that have confined us into our little niches. We cannot just divorce the DP and marry the Greens or any other third party, because the old, ugly, unresolved issue that drags us backwards is the ideological and political center of gravity of U.S. society, which is skewed to the right.
We can only shift the ideological and political center of gravity of the country to the left with smart strategic and tactical maneuvering that makes us bigger and stronger. We cannot shift it with empty ideological posturing, because mass self organization and education cannot be separated from concrete tactical actions, from agitation, from the issues of the day and the effort to shape them up effectively. Masses of people are not persuaded by words -- they are persuaded by words matched with practical results.
Right now, creating a new political formation to intervene in the electoral process is not even an option. And there's little point in supporting a third-party alternative. Banning accidents (that do happen), it is clear that we need to work within the Democratic Party. We need to walk and chew gum. We can lead voting registration campaigns, support a candidate campaign, etc. while laying out our rationale and extending our grassroots. We don't need to abandon our beliefs about the limits and conflicts of the two-party system or capitalism.
The electoral process has its own logic. We need to support a candidate. We know the tradeoff: Electability dilutes the agenda and a stronger agenda lowers electability. We cannot pretend this tradeoff doesn't exist. We want to replace Bush with the one who is furthest to the left. But the furthest to the left we pick, the lower our chances of defeating Bush -- that is, the higher the chances of unintentionally helping him get reelected. The question "What side are we on?" cannot be solved with declarations only, but with concrete choices.
It seems to me that Dean, Gephardt, Kerry, and Edwards are roughly equally electable. And they are all to the left of Bush. Once the primaries are over, banning accidents and catastrophes, we should support the selected DP candidate. Among these four, I clearly prefer Dean as a first choice, because he has a more robust base of support -- in the sense that his candidacy depends less on the support of a small group of rich sponsors. Consequently, he's more likely to set a democratic agenda with a real popular backup to stand the pressure from the elites.
I'm not naive enough to think that a broad financial base would stop Dean or anyone else from adopting a more elitist agenda once in office. There are constraints to pushing a progressive agenda once in office. While a DP candidate will owe us one if we support him, he will be more likely to default on the obligation if we are in no position to reclaim payment. The litmus test of our smart tactical support of the DP will be whether we actually strengthen the workers movement and create conditions to collect our dues in the form of actual policy changes.
Again, there's no mutual exclusion between strengthening the independent organization of workers and intervening in the electoral process by supporting a DP candidate. That is a false dilemma. Unfortunately, that political independence and support to a political party are two different things is something that the religious right understands much better than the Left.
Post-Keynesian economists say that there's no long run growth per se, but only a sequence of policy successes in the short-run that add up to "long-run" growth. Likewise, there is no full political independence for the workers' movement but a sequence of tactical moves that result on the advancement of the concrete interests of workers.
Some people (e.g. Louis Proyect) seem to think that it is *tactically* best to support a radical, third-party candidate even though the chances of his being elected approach zero. The rationale is that, over time, as an inevitable economic or political catastrophe shakes the country, those who have shown their fidelity to radical ideas and supported lost electoral causes will become the natural leaders of the workers' movement -- magnets around whose leadership the workers will converge. By some sort of political epiphany, workers will realize that their true leaders are those who never supported or cooperated with Democrats and Republicans.
I don't think this tactical view is stupid, but it is weak. I'm not willing to deny that it may lead to some measure of political success to particular individuals. Economic catastrophes and mass political epiphanies do happen and people do appreciate those who stick to their guns. But, by nature, these events are hard to anticipate concretely. In fact, economic, political, and even military catastrophes have shaken U.S. society in the last forty years -- and what interests have capitalized on them? What assurances do we have that things will be different when the next economic or political shock hits us?
The convergence of social and political circumstances required to push small radical groups from their isolated, sectarian background to the political forefront, and the ability of such groups to rise to the occasion (with little or no contact with direct public service and policy making) are too flimsy a basis for a serious political strategy. If this strategy where so good, we'd have a lot of successful historical instances to prove it so. But why would workers trust leaders who have refused to share in their daily political disappointments only to preserve their political virginity?
What attracts people disappointed with the economic or political system is not so much "leaders" who with useless long-run "foresight" warn us endlessly that the two-party system and capitalism are rotten beyond hope. Given basic personal honesty, what attracts people's trust is concrete, positive political (and administrative!) experience. After all whether the system is rotten beyond hope or not is to be established in practice -- not stated on the basis of ideology.
Imagine we're choosing a driver for a chartered bus. One driver refuses to drive it and warns us that it is broken, that we should dump it altogether, and buy a new vehicle, which she'll be happy to drive for us. Another driver gets at the steering wheel, shows us his imperfect but overall consistent driving record, shares our risks and headaches and -- without fostering hopes on the eternal reliability of the bus -- she is willing to take it to the shop when it sputters and leaks oil, sensitive and patient enough to understand that replacement only makes sense to us when the cost of use and repair *clearly* exceeds the cost of replacement. Which driver will we pick?
An independent political movement cannot be built by turning our backs on political realities because turning our backs on realities doesn't make them vanish. The political two-party system is a hardened political reality of our times. It won't disappear because we decide to ignore elections or waste our vote and electoral effort in radical posturing. With people who massively -- by action and omission, by vote and abstention, by active support and tolerance -- prop up the political system as it is, two-party and all, what are we to do? Should we rationalize the passive withdrawal of those who refuse to vote or the passive aggression of those who only bother to vote on the basis of abstract "principles" to make a "strategy" out of these rationalizations? I think not.
Julio
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