STRUCTURE VS. MORALISM

In North America and much of the Anglosphere, when the left does not live up to its desires there is a great deal of hand wringing and mea culpas. “Why can't we convert the NDP (Canadian social democrats) to socialism? Why are some workers voting for Trump? Why is the labor movement so weak? It must be our fault and what did we do wrong? It must be the result of “identity politics”. ”

To an extent, such questions ARE necessary, but their over-emphasis and the total ignorance of an 800 pound gorilla in the room, shows an underlying and unacknowledged world view which is causing a distortion of reality. The emphasis on moralism and ideas comes straight from liberalism. A socialist and anarchist analysis emphasizes the STRUCTURAL aspects of the system, without ignoring ideas, but relegating them to a secondary level.

Liberalism in various forms is hegemonic in North American society. The “official” left, right and center are all variations of liberalism, no matter the labels they might give themselves. Whether self-styled social democrats or conservatives they are united by their neoliberalism. We should not be surprised then, that the “far left” is influenced by liberalism.

Now about the 800 pound gorilla that is being ignored. It is composed of the political-legal structure and trade union legislation.

Political structure – Both the First-Past-The-Post electoral system and the US Congressional system severely limit democratic input. The first puts enormous hurdles in the way of dissident parties such as socialists and Greens gaining seats in parliament and keeps them almost permanently reduced to a tiny minority if they should get in. The US political system with its duopoly is deliberately designed to exclude radical parties. (It is the only alleged democracy in which “third party” is a term of contempt and in which no Green or social democratic party has a seat at the national level.) Parties become “catch all” centrists and the radicals within them are marginalized.

Trade Union legislation. Given the weakness of the left, it is no wonder that a a host of unnatural hurdles are put in the way of organizing a union shop. Be that as it may, the existing system is “winner take all”, if after a union runs the obstacle course and wins a certification. The minority who do not want the union become members anyway. The only way you can change the union is during a legal “raiding period” . There is a dues check-off, which means the company automatically deducts the fees for the union. At first sight, this seems like a good system, but it has some deep flaws which serve to undermine trade union and general working class militance.

Due check off means that a union can become wealthy relative to unions which did not possess this privilege. Wealth means a highly paid, and increasingly professional (and self-serving) leadership. Having a large minority of members who are wishy-washy or even hostile to the union is a dead weight and a permanent orientation away from militance. Like political parties under FPTP, such unions are “catch-all” organizations and the permanent tendency is toward moderation. The union bureaucracy takes a dim view of radicals and does everything to isolate them and minimize their influence.

Now let's contrast the North American political and trade union system with a structure found elsewhere.

In most of continental Europe you have a parliamentary system combined with a proportional ballot. This means that any group getting more that four or five percent of the vote gets a seat. Thus it is relatively easy for new parties to get established, and hence socialist and Green parties in most European parliaments. Since the issues these parties raise are real issues, they soon grow in influence. They can then become part of a coalition government and the price for doing so, will be the enacting of certain of their positions. Thus parties to the left of the social democratic center can have an influence that they do not have in less democratic political systems.

The existence of functioning and influential radical parties, also means there will be media promoting these ideas, if not party journals and web sites, a milieu that is sympathetic to them and promotes many of their concepts. Thus, radicalism is kept alive among the population and is not completely smothered by corporate media.

In most of Europe, the trade union system is more democratic than in North America. Each workplace over a certain size is entitled to form a “works council.” In order to be represented they do not have to jump through a lot of hoops, to have a council is their right. The workers vote on who represents them on the council, and it can be from any trade union central that has members in the shop. Hence one tendency does not take over the membership and the various socialist, communist and syndicalist union representatives have to work together in some manner, without losing their independence. Class struggle and syndicalist unions thus have a chance at gaining influence. As such, in France we have the Solidarity unions, (the fourth largest union center), in Spain, the syndicalist CGT, (third largest union) the CNT and the base unions and in Italy the COBAs. (base unions). In the North American context these unions would be tiny and ineffective, whereas they have hundreds of thousands of members.

Note that “base unions” refers to the highly democratic, class struggle unions which developed in the 1980s in opposition to the more conservative bureaucratic unions. It also should be noted that in France, Italy and Spain, the “social union” tends to predominate rather than the US-style business union or right-wing social democratic unions. Social unions seek more than just the protection of their membership, but seek a “democratic socialist” reform of capitalism. One example of a social union is the French CGT, the largest of the union federations in that country.

What the labour structure means in practice is that unions are “poor” and the people in leadership positions are more likely to be there because they believe in trade unions than for a high paid position and cocktails with the bosses. Since there is no dues check-off, the shop stewards have to collect the dues, which means the rank and file have the leaders on a short leash compared to the American situation. There is no dead wood membership and those who belong to the union tend to be militants, this is further pressure to keep the union honest.

The existence of social, class struggle and syndicalist unions along with viable socialist parties, though a minority movement with the exception of the social unions, means that class consciousness is kept alive. These groups are the “keepers of the flame” for class consciousness is based upon memory, of keeping alive the traditions of struggle. If this knowledge and practice is suppressed and forgotten, workers who are better paid merge into a fake middle class, or if they are marginal workers, become lumpenized. The existence of viable Green Parties (and even better, Red-Green Parties) means that eco-awareness and the possibility of reform is much greater than where such parties are minuscule. Class consciousness helps explain the “French paradox” - France has a small union membership (about 10% of the workforce) but when strikes are called millions come out and the country is shut down. Class consciousness is much more developed here and the political and labour structures play a highly significant role in its maintenance.

This does not mean the unions, socialist and Green parties are above criticism. Just check the revolutionary media in those countries! Where these organizations are of some impact, there are also groups to the left of them. The social unions have revolutionary syndicalists nipping at their heels. The socialist parties are faced with strong anarchist and horizontalist movements. The Greens are faced with eco-anarchism and de-growth militants. It would be very unlikely that these revolutionary movements would have a fraction of the support they do without the prior existence of the more moderate groups, keeping alive some of the basic class and ecological concepts. Nothing exists in isolation.

Where does that leave North American syndicalists, anarchists and socialists? I don't think we have enough time to go through the laborious process of democratizing our politics and labour relations. I would certainly welcome any changes for the better, but the problems facing us are so extreme and so pressing that they do not allow us this luxury. It would be better to stop the blaming and hand-wringing and to face reality – the cards are well and truly stacked against us. With that realization, we can attempt to find new methods that suit the adverse conditions we face.