Letters

Not persuasive

Foppe de Haan’s latest response in our exchange on the question of the ‘professional managerial class’ and meritocracy (‘Addressing the central issues’, September 30) is unfortunately weaker than his original intervention (‘Appeals of class society’, May 20). As Jim Nelson said last week (Letters, October 7), comrade de Haan fails to define his terms clearly, with the result that the argument sprawls and largely does not respond to my objections in my ‘Centrality of class’ article (June 3).

If anything, this indeterminacy involves comrade de Haan redefining things in a way which collapses the concept of ‘class’ into all forms of oppression and inequality. And, as I said in my June 3 article, the state as such disappears from view. Indeed, he writes that “our movement is substantially to blame, because we were (and most of us still are) far too focussed on the question of gaining state power”.

There is a really serious political problem here. This is that, although the theoretical route is different, the practical conclusion is British Eurocommunism, as manifested around the 1984-85 miners’ strike: that is, that the actual warts-and-all trade union movement and strike action is to be subordinated to a more perfect anti-racist, feminist, etc, movement with pre-commitments to opposing the small use-value privileges of men, etc. The problem with this approach is demonstrated precisely by that struggle. When the miners took action, the lead they gave mobilised not just the actual strikers, but women of the pit communities and an enormously broad, male and female movement across the UK. What was lacking was explicit political solidarity against the manoeuvres of the British state, of the sort that had characterised the miners’ strikes of 1972 and 1974 and the ‘Free the Five’ strike movement of 1972.

The reason why this was lacking was primarily that the old Communist Party, which had done an enormous amount of the legwork in the mobilisation of solidarity against Ted Heath, had in the meantime been captured by a leadership informed by Eurocommunism and the belief that strike struggles over wages, etc, were infected with male privilege. Moreover, the Euros had entered into a commitment to broad-frontism and constitutionalism, which implied opposition to the sort of challenge to the state power as such, which had happened in 1972-74. With the Communist Party disarmed and the left groups too small and divided to be effective (and also disarmed by their tailism), the strike ended in a defeat which might have been avoided.

The theoretical issue which underlies the point is about the fundamentals of Marxism. Because the proletariat as a class is separated from the means of production, workers cannot simply withdraw (unlike dentists, who withdrew individually from the NHS), but need to create collective organisations to defend their interests against the capitalist class - trade unions, co-ops, mutuals, political campaigns, collectivist political parties. These collectivist organisations - warts and all - are capable of mobilising far wider forces behind their struggles (as the National Union of Mineworkers did for some months), and of posing an image of cooperation in a future society (as the organisations of the Second and Third Internationals did at different times and different places). The fact that much of the time they don’t do so does not alter the point. This capability is in spite of small use-value privileges of one sort or another of the kind comrade de Haan plays up. In contrast, the ‘privilege-based’ movements have proved - repeatedly - to be incapable of sustaining this sort of solidarity and inspiration.

The one point at which comrade de Haan directly responds to my argument is in relation to the question whether capitalism is in decline (he argues it isn’t) and the role of the state (he argues that state intervention is good for capitalist society). This is an issue worth discussing, but comrade de Haan’s account of it in his September 30 article is too historically ill-informed for it to be actually useful to engage with it in depth as an argument; so I will merely point out that I do not find what he has to say on these issues persuasive.

Mike Macnair
Oxford

Reductionism

I have no idea why Arthur Bough thinks the definition of ‘trolling’ is taking exception to his vulgarisation of Marxism (Letters, October 7).

There is a reason that Marx required three volumes and more to arrive at a satisfactory understanding of capital formation. There is a reason he had to start with simple commodity production, and work things out from there. This is because capital formation cannot be understood without preceding historic circumstances, without unravelling all the inner connections. He didn’t do it so people like Bough can produce superficial reductionism.

To say that competition drives accumulation is an abandonment of the Marxist method - it operates at the superficial level. You might just as easily conclude that accumulation drives competition. Or you could be more reductive and say that human nature drives accumulation, or that scarcity drives accumulation. Bough’s reasoning is along these lines, and he raises tiresome detours and superficial objections.

In actual fact Marx writes in volume 3 of Capital that capitalists share a kind of fraternal relationship during good economic periods, but when they begin to share losses competition manifests in a more antagonistic way. For Marx, competition is derivative. Of course, it has its own logical properties and implications. We could quote him here as an example: “... so it is that a fall in the rate of profit calls forth a competitive struggle among capitalists, not vice versa.” But that in itself is a superficial methodology, because quotes need the full context, which require following all the logic and threads previously described.

Bough is both vulgar and tiresome and that is enough from me!

Maren Clarke
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Authoritarian

I strongly object to Arthur Bough’s use of the word ‘trolling’ in two separate responses in relation to his debate with Maren Clarke. The term is unpleasant and offensive, and a crude attempt to shout and shut down someone who disagrees with him. It is therefore a form of bullying.

Moreover, it is simply not true as a description of Maren Clarke’s contributions. Maren writes concisely, insightfully and effectively and makes a lot of persuasive arguments. Arthur Bough is clearly well immersed in all volumes of Capital and writes at considerable, perhaps excessive, length - although Maren Clarke appears even better read, to have understood it better and certainly how to apply it.

I do read Arthur’s lengthy contributions as carefully as I can, although I am always made to wonder - being faced with the daily grind under the capitalist economic and social system and thinking about what we and I can do to help overthrow it - what the present-day political significance might be of Arthur’s various points, arguments and quotes; what relevant political conclusions, strategies and actions might possibly stem from them. I suspect none whatsoever.

On a different matter, I welcome Jennifer Wilkinson’s letter (September 30). I am no anti-vaxxer: I have had both Covid jabs, always have the flu vaccine and will shortly have the Covid booster. But I do worry about just how quickly the Covid vaccines have been produced and the track record of all so-called ‘wonder drugs’ throughout history. Jennifer is right to point to the incredibly long lists of side effects associated with virtually all medications and deciding to take any must be a matter of judgment and informed choice, based on an assessment of the balance of respective risks.

I am also extremely concerned about giving any vaccine to groups of the population who will not benefit directly from it, such as younger people and especially children. Jennifer points to the uncomfortable truth that the vast majority of deaths from Covid were very old people, for whom death will not have been a complete stranger, and older people with underlying chronic health conditions - a lot due to lifestyle. Yes, a lot of other people died from Covid as well, but younger people can and do die for a whole host of reasons and factors. It is shocking, tragic and upsetting, but it is a part of life.

I too was shocked and appalled by how the government could so easily suspend and remove a whole raft of basic democratic rights and civil liberties, especially freedom of association and movement. The turning off and on of various lockdown measures over the past 18 months seemed to me to be the government and central authorities playing with their new-found powers and toys, and they seemed to exhibit a certain sadistic pleasure in doing so. Certainly, if I never see or hear the death-warmed-up figures of Chris Whitty and Patrick Vallance pronouncing in funereal and depressing tones the need for continued indefinite restrictions it will be far too soon.

Even worse in my opinion were certain sections of the left also advocating repeated, renewed and longer lockdowns. What planet are these people on? I don’t suggest they did because secretly they hope to exercise such dictatorial powers one day, but I do think they wanted to appear ‘responsible’ and ‘on the right side’ in a ‘national emergency’, in which ‘we are all in this together’.

I supported the first lockdown - which wasn’t really a lockdown, as it was conducted with the consent and solidarity of the great majority of people. There was simply no need for coercive measures or aggressive policing. That first ‘lockdown’ achieved a massive slowdown of the spread of the virus and provided the necessary breathing space for other actions to be implemented, which would have made the country more resilient and able to manage and absorb the pandemic - actions which were never taken (perhaps because the government got the taste for being able to shut down and start up the country at will, switching democratic rights and freedoms on and off like a tap). I and most people in my work and community settings wanted the first ‘lockdown’ to go on for longer, to get the numbers right down, to make this genuine national effort really effective.

Having lifted the first ‘lockdown’ too early, subsequent lockdowns were inevitably far less supported, implemented or effective, were increasingly counterproductive and pointless, were backed up by authoritarian, coercive state measures and should never have been supported by anyone on the left, by democratic or progressive opinion. They now carry some responsibility for any future major restrictions on basic democratic rights and freedoms, including the latest Policing and Sentencing Bill.

Andrew Northall
Kettering

Reversion

On October 6, the Government followed through on its planned £20 weekly slash to all universal credit claims. The reduction is equivalent to 25% of many single claimants’ personal income. But that’s excluding rent and the vast majority of private renters will now be squeezed even harder - substantial parts of this standard allowance are relied upon to stop the gap in the amount of rent that can be claimed, which is capped for renters in the private sector. Meanwhile the moratoriums on evictions have already ended in all parts of the UK.

Along with the closure of the furlough and ‘Self-Employment Income Support’ schemes on October 1, and other welfare benefit rule ‘easements’ coming to pass, the short-lived parliamentary consensus to attempt to protect the hundreds of thousands from some of the darkest economic impacts of Covid is now well and truly over.

In fact, the 25% cut pales in comparison with some of the other barbarism that has either been let back off the chain or which has been brewing all this time. There are those claimants who never even had the 25% increase: for the most part, those who are unable to work long-term due to disability and their carers. The average such claimant is already roughly £1,500 worse off than their UC counterparts (and over £2,000 for carers).

Disabled people who claimed UC at any time since the start of 2020 have often missed out altogether on additional amounts for being ‘not fit for work’, worth £341 every month. They are underpaid by up to an eye-watering £7,500 (and counting) since the start of Covid restrictions - a political scandal that is as little spoken about as it is understood.

On July 31 the Department for Work and Pensions regained the authority to deem self-employed workers to be earning the minimum wage (£8.91 per hour) for 35 hours a week when in fact they aren’t - if the DWP believes their line of work is no longer affected by Coronavirus. That’s a heavy hit of up to £1,351 every month from your UC payments - potentially ending tens of thousands of claims at the press of a button.

Despite superficial media interest, the biggest political controversy leading up to the £86.67 cut to standard allowances was when Thérèse Coffey, secretary of state for work and pensions, gaffed that it’d only be about another two hours of work for someone earning around the minimum wage to make up the loss.

Mathematically speaking, she was wrong. Most UC “customers” (the actual DWP terminology) see 63% of their earnings clawed back, as Angela Rayner and others pointed out, so the lowest earners need more like a full additional working day to make up for the loss. The more pernicious logical truth to Coffey’s statement was uncontested: that it is up to claimants themselves to keep their heads above increasingly troubled water.

40% of UC claimants simply don’t have a boss to beg for an extra day’s work from each month. Over 1.3 million people on UC either have an acknowledged disability or care for someone who does, relieving them of the expectation to find waged work. Add to this another 1.2 million who either juggle the same needs around part-time work or are working 35 hours per week already anyway.

UC simply isn’t ‘social security’ in the conventional sense of the term. We should at least give the Tories credit where credit is due: they always said they would overhaul the benefits system, and in myriad ways they have. In UC and its various pock-marked iterations over the last eight years, successive Tory and Tory-led governments have completed a cultural shift in how benefits are ‘delivered’.

In the Tory imagination, even if less often in reality, UC is the ethical lubricant of a fibre-optic-broadband labour exchange. Its function is to tie together the loose ends of the gig economy’s worst deficits by speed dating un(der)employed workers with a rotating offer of insecure work or technocratic punishment. It’s an up-and-running system of workfare, and the £20 cut is not an aberration, but a reversion to type. If it helps to depress wages in an era of unprecedented labour shortages, then the Tories will have more of it and more often.

Communists don’t believe that fixing UC fixes the problem. There are surely a few simple tweaks that can be made to take some of the sting out of things for a very great many people, but we should go further. The principle of social security has been all but defeated in this society that turns toward barbarism over and over again.

But neither is it enough to simply call for the abolition of UC - anti-politics can win votes, but it won’t change society. To radically address the problems of social security requires looking radically at the causes of its need: the wage system in all of its incoherence and irrationality, and the foul attitudes that society takes toward those with different needs like the disabled and their carers.

Marx’s Critique of the Gotha programme famously ran the line, “From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs!” It’s well overdue that communists make concerted efforts to explain what this would mean in the 21st century, so that one day that phrase can finally be realised.

Alastair Thomas
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