30.08.2000

Fighting Blairism and left unity

Chris Bambery, national secretary of the Socialist Workers Party, addressed the CPGB's Communist University on the crucial issues of anti-capitalism and building socialist alliances

This is a most interesting and challenging time for socialists. There are two processes going on, both internationally and here in Britain: first, the growth of the anti-capitalist movement; second, the erosion of the working class's traditional adherence to social democracy - in this country to the Labour Party.

The first represents a new radicalisation, involving new forces; the second is a process which began around the time of the Balkans war, of a realignment of the left. The two things are simultaneous, and there is no Chinese wall between them. There is a clear overlap between discontent with Blair, and a growing perception that capitalism is creating damage globally and locally. The defining moment of the anti-capitalist movement was the victory in Seattle last November. But that did not just spring from nowhere.

Seattle flowed from the success of the UPS strike in the USA, the one-day general strikes in Canadian cities and the 1995 public sector strikes in France. The presence of 35,000 trade unionists in Seattle was crucial to shutting down the WTO, the decisive moment being when groups of trade unionists refused to heed their officials' instructions to leave the city centre and attend a rally in the park. Instead, they joined the protest.

Since then, we have seen the effects of Seattle, in terms of working class politics in North America. The decision of Ralph Nader to run as an independent for the US presidency with the backing of the American Green Party, represents a continuation of the politics of Seattle. Nader is standing on a 'blue-green ticket' - green for green politics, but blue for blue collar. At the convention which endorsed his candidacy, calls for a living wage and union rights won some of the loudest cheers.

Another indication of what is moving across the Atlantic is the decision of both the AFL-CIO and the United Steel Workers to endorse an appeal for a protest across the United States of America, in solidarity with the September 26 debt protests in Prague against the IMF/World Bank summit. The idea of the AFL-CIO calling people to join in an anti-capitalist protest is remarkable. This is the same union federation which slavishly supported the war in Vietnam, which has been continuingly loyal to various Democratic presidents.

In the country which is at the ideological centre of Europe, France, the 1995 public sector strikes heralded a mass sea change in the popular mood. Since then we have seen further strikes; protests in solidarity with the sans papiers, and against unemployment; the demonstration called by the Communist Party and the left against the socialist government. Another indication of the shift in France was, of course, the success of the joint Lutte Ouvrière/LCR slate in the European elections.

To look further internationally, a number of strikes took place in May and June. In June, a general strike in Nigeria against a 50% hike in oil prices, after the IMF demanded that the government axe fuel subsidies. In May, a general strike in South Korea, for a 40-hour working week. Also in May, a one-day general strike in South Africa caused by an IMF restructuring programme, with over four million workers taking part. On May11, a general strike in India saw 20 million workers paralyse road and rail transport, in a protest against the opening up of the Indian economy at the behest of the IMF/WTO. On June 8, a one-day strike in Uruguay against 12% unemployment, caused by massive cuts in state spending. The next day, 12 million workers struck in Argentina against fresh cuts demanded by the IMF in return for a loan. Added to this must be the fantastic victory in Bolivia, achieved in April after a nationwide general strike. American and British multinational corporations, who had bought up the nation's privatised water supply and hiked up prices, were actually booted out by a Bolivian government, which had previously been held up by the IMF as a model.

In Britain, needless to say, we see nothing so exciting. But I would argue that the success of the London Socialist Alliance in both the GLA elections and the Tottenham by-election, and of the SSP in Scotland, flows from a similar mood. There is a growing rejection of the free-market consensus, upheld by Blair, and a feeling among traditional Labour supporters that Blairites have hijacked their political home. For the first time in any of our political lifetimes, we are seeing a real debate opening up over whether or not the trade unions in this country should continue to finance Labour.

So what is the challenge facing the left? First, to engage with the developing anti-capitalist movement, to try to help its development and shape it. Take France. Nature abhors a vacuum. The politics of attack in France today, at leadership level at least, are those associated with left reformist politics. If the revolutionary left is not going to intervene in the anti-capitalist movement, other politics will fill this niche.

While these are exciting times, reformism is not on the way out. It is clear that there is growing discontent with Blair and that working class people are beginning the process of breaking with New Labour. But this is only the beginning. We must work alongside such workers constantly, and conduct an ongoing debate with them. Ultimately I believe that it will be the experience of mass struggle which will finally demonstrate the correctness of revolutionary strategy and tactics to millions of working class people. Among thousands of workers, maybe tens of thousands, we are beginning to find an echo, through things like the LSA. Unlike in, say, the upsurge of the 1970s, this time we must ensure the left has the clarity, the size and the muscle to guarantee that, at such a decisive moment, the argument comes down on the side of revolution rather than reform.

It is far too simplistic to say that reformism flows from the ability of imperialism to give western workers higher living standards from the profits they accrue in the third world. That argument is a fallacy. I would argue that reformist ideas flow from the position of workers under capitalism. Workers want real change, but because the dominant ideas are those of the ruling class, and the working class itself was created within the confines of capitalism, the same workers accept the argument that this change must come through bourgeois democracy: ie, reformism.

Labour has existed for 100 years, the trade union bureaucracy for longer. The majority of people who voted for the LSA have essentially left reformist ideas. I believe we can win them through working alongside them, but it would be wrong to dismiss workers who continue to cling to their loyalty to Labour. That would be a mistake. There are those on the left who argue that the Labour Party is essentially no different from the Tory Party, and therefore that anyone who remains in the Labour Party is simply rubbish that we shouldn't be concerned with.

I want to see hundreds of thousands of people break from Labour, who are still continuing for all sorts of reasons to hang on in there, in the desperate belief that somehow Gordon Brown might be better. Without having illusions, we must remember that a third of Labour Party members are still trade unionists; every survey shows huge support for the unions, extra spending for the NHS and wealth redistribution from the rich to the poor.

Many Labour members went on strike during the GLA election, refusing to campaign for Dobson, or voted at the CWU conference to cut union funding to Labour. It shows the contradictions inside the process. Any successful revolutionary party is going to have to win the allegiance of tens of thousands of Labour Party members and hundreds of thousands of Labour voters.

Our electoral success is a start, but it is just that. The good news in my opinion is that the Labour Party, and the trade union bureaucracy, are in a much weaker position to act as a barrier to working class struggle than, say, in 1975. There is nothing comparable to Jack Jones and Hugh Scanlon. The current trade union leadership are simply bureaucrats, like dwarfs compared to them. In any industrial dispute what strikes me is the mixture: the youth, the number of women, the number of blacks, of Asians. I think it is a fantastically volatile situation.

What about the far left? As I say, I think it is vital that we throw ourselves into building and shaping the anti-capitalist movement. We also need to begin building an organisation which can eventually replace social democracy, because social democracy has to be supplanted at the end of the day. There is both a desire for unity and a realignment of the left which the LSA tapped. The most impressive thing in the LSA campaign was how we were able to go from being just an alliance of the far left - no mean feat in itself - to beginning to draw in wider forces from the labour movement. The broad mass campaigning-type approach is vindicated. Those comrades who resisted this were guilty of a sectarianism which doesn't just blight the left, but also can repel people who are beginning to look for new alternatives.

I think it was absolutely right for the Socialist Workers Party to decide, for the final three or four weeks of the campaign to stop meeting as the SWP, and function as the LSA in an absolute effort to maximise the vote. Not because I believe particularly that votes change society, but in recognition that people judge things by how we performed.

Everybody remembers the attempts of the far left to stand in the 1970s - it was really derisory vote stuff. This time round, it is different. This time round it is different psychologically for people who are still in the Labour Party, who now look at us and say, this isn't just a bunch of three Trots and a dog getting the Monster Raving Loony Party vote. This is a real force, which is actually winning things, saving its deposit, beating the Greens, which hopefully can begin to emulate the SSP in beating the established parties and encourage people to start breaking with New Labour.

For the SWP, the LSA is something to be built on, with the general election in mind. We should learn from Arthur Scargill, who tried to proclaim an alternative organisation to Labour in advance, and as a result has been left stranded on the beach. The SLP experience, if it had been the only experience on offer, would have reinforced the argument that if you leave Labour you are doomed to be sidelined.

We must learn the lesson that just proclaiming yourself as 'the alternative' and refusing to enter into any agreements is an absolute sectarian dead end. I want to make one thing very clear: I am not interested in a 'unity' in which the SWP dominates, or is just interested in grabbing a few hundred extra members. While the SWP believes we have a crucial role to play in building a socialist alternative, we don't believe that we are that alternative.