The Workers Struggle

 STRUGGLE,  RESISTANCE AND CLASS WAR

All over the world the working class, defined as those who sell their own labour power to the owners of capital, is growing in size and gaining in economic, social, and political importance. At the same time many members of the working class are backward in political and social outlook, and unaware of their class identity, holding racist-minded conservative views.  Many of today’s radicals emphasise the undeniable shortcomings of the labour movement rather than its positive accomplishments. Sometimes they appear to deny it any progressive features. They neglect the working conditions before unionisation, the fourteen- to sixteen-hour day, the exploitation of child labour, the early mortality rate for all workers; and they neglect to study what happens when unions are weak and fragmented or subordinated to totalitarian states. Thus according to some of these radical ideologues, workers will never become a force ready, willing, and able to transform society. They view the present characteristics, attitudes, and relations of workers are essentially unalterable by any foreseeable change in circumstances.

Along with the capitalist rulers today there is an arrogant faith in the longevity of the system, that firmly believes that the empire of the almighty dollar is assured of perpetual dominion at home and abroad. The capitalist class have succeeded in concentrating economic, political, military, and cultural power in their hands. They have grown stronger and richer than ever before. They hold the commanding heights over of the globe. This unequal and oppressive relationship has its consequences.

There are wage-workers who are up in arms against intolerable conditions of life and labour but substituting for this rebellious mass is a political saviour-force. Intellectuals, academics and party leaders self-selected to lead the way to the abolition of capitalism. At best they are paternalisti, a benevolent elite, but at worse,  a malevolent bureaucracy. How are they, or anyone else, going to promote a revolution along democratic lines without the conscious consent and active participation of the majority? And what happens if that majority remains apathetic and resistant to the ongoing revolution – as they should, according to certain preconceptions? If the workers cannot be revolutionised under any conceivable circumstances, then the prospects for expanding democracy are not optimistic,  much less the task of achieving socialism. The self-reliance of the workers is so weakened that they do not realise they can escape capitalist domination of the status quo.

It is ironical that certain radicals who reject Big Business replicate its low opinion of the working class potential for self-activity. They visualise workers as contented sheep who cannot look beyond their bellies, who cannot be inspired to struggle for broad social causes and political aims. The reactions of the workers are primarily and ultimately determined by what happens to them in the labour market and at the point of production. That is where they encounter speed-ups, lay-offs, discrimination, insecurity, wage reductions, and all the other evils of exploitation. That is why any drastic fluctuation in their economic welfare can quickly alter their tolerance of the existing state of affairs. Growing numbers of in the "white-collar", professional, and technical occupations are becoming more subjected to capitalist exploitation and alienation, more and more proletarianised, more responsive to unionisation and its methods of action, more and more detached from loyalty to their corporate employers. These trends can flare into massive anti-capitalist movements. Under capitalism, automation and new technology threaten the jobs of skilled and unskilled alike, in one industry after another. The dislocations and job instability caused by these processes have to be guarded against by both the economic action and political organisation of the working class.

The capitalist regime is well aware of the latent power of the strike weapon wielded by workers and constantly seeks to hamper its use. In practice, the rulers have little doubt about its revolutionary potential. Capitalist production cannot do without an ample laboring force, no matter how many are unemployed, because profit-making and the accumulation of capital depend upon the consumption of large quantities of labour power which creates value in the form of commodities. Although this or that segment or individual may be squeezed out of jobs temporarily or permanently, the industrial work force as such is not expendable, no matter how fast or how far automation proceeds under capitalist auspices. Workers are far from obsolescent. Indeed, the inherent limitations upon its introduction and extension under capitalism, the inability of the profit-seekers to fully  utilize the immense potential of the new science and technology for reducing the working day and rationalising production provide further reasons for socialism.

The working class is not an extinct volcano but its explosive energies simmer in its depths, in the bowels of the Earth. During inactivity, people come to believe that capitalism will never generate insurrectionary moods and movements in their time - until the eruption of intense class struggles. Time and again funeral liturgies have been conducted for this or that section of the working class, or the class in general, but they have turned out to be premature. An overestimation of the “reasonableness” of capitalism on the one hand and an underestimation of the latent capacities of workers on the other creates the shock-waves of the rebelliousness as the oppressed burst to life. What prevents them from organizing a mass political party of their own, being won over to socialist ideas?  Why can’t worker make history and remake society and, in the process, remake themselves?  If they wage and win wars for the ruling why can’t they conduct the class war in defence of their own interests.  When they again rise up workers will have to seek the road of independent political action to promote their objectives, as workers have always done.

The working class has colossal tasks ahead of it. It confronts the most formidable and ferocious of adversaries in the capitalists. The working class will be roused from its slumber by events beyond anyone’s control. The Socialist Party does not believe that the masses can be summoned into battle on anyone’s command. The class struggle unfolds with a rhythm of its own, according to internal laws determined by historical conditions. We recognise that the working class can launch mighty offensives on their own initiative once capitalism goads them into action. Yet we also acknowledge that  the most powerful spontaneous upsurge can fall short of its mark, drain away, and be suppressed. This misfortune has befallen the workers’ movement many times in the past.

The will to win is an indispensable factor in the way to win. The working class can go forward only as they become convinced that the bosses are not born to rule, that they are not omnipotent and unbeatable, that their system of exploitation is not everlasting but has to go and can be abolished. Workers are realising that the 1% are leading  the world to catastrophe. This is the essential message of Marx who taught that the workers are qualified and mandated by historical progress to supplant the plutocrats as the directors and organisers of economic and political life and become the pioneers of the first truly human society. The course and outcome of the struggle for socialism, if not the very survival of society, depend upon whether workers themselves have the confidence to take up the baton.