{"id":71,"date":"2020-03-26T13:25:56","date_gmt":"2020-03-26T13:25:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.protectthepeople.co.uk\/?p=71"},"modified":"2020-03-26T13:25:56","modified_gmt":"2020-03-26T13:25:56","slug":"the-pandemic-the-working-class-and-the-left","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.protectthepeople.co.uk\/the-pandemic-the-working-class-and-the-left\/","title":{"rendered":"The pandemic, the working class and the Left"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Andrew Burgin writes:<\/strong> The Coronavirus pandemic is accelerating across the world. Every few days the scope and scale of the disease is increasing. Hundreds of thousands of people are being infected, many thousands have already died and many tens of thousands will die.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In China where the \noutbreak was first identified, it has been brought under control but \nelsewhere it is spreading rapidly. In its wake the virus is transforming\n everyday life. The main way to fight it is self-isolation and social \ndistancing. No longer can people socialise as they did. Grandparents \ncannot help look after their grandkids. The schools are shut. The \nsupermarket shelves are often empty. Bars, clubs restaurants and all \nsocial amenities are closed and will remain so possibly for many months.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The world is turned upside down and everyday life is changed in a way that nobody was expecting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Swift\n action in China against the virus gave the rest of the world a \nbreathing space. It gave other countries a few weeks in which to make \npreparations but few heeded the warning signs. In the US and Europe, few\n if any preparations were made by governments. Trump called the virus a \nhoax. He had already closed the White House pandemic office and last \nJuly had withdrawn the only US medical epidemiologist embedded in \nChina\u2019s disease control agency in Beijing. This was a \u2018Chinese\u2019 virus \nand would not infect US citizens. But Europe not China is now the \nepicentre of the virus and many thousands more will die here than there.\n In the US itself there has been precious little testing and the disease\n is running rampant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As governments flounder and \nstruggle to stop the spread of the pandemic, ordinary people are coming \ntogether in self-help groups, in streets and on estates and throughout \nthe community, to make sure the vulnerable and the elderly are not \nabandoned. In the UK, thousands of these groups sprang to life almost \nspontaneously. They are social solidarity in action and are taking some \nof the strain off local councils who have seen services decimated \nthrough central government cutbacks. This is not only heart warming but \nis a cause for hope and optimism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Society is \ncreaking under the weight of the tasks necessary to protect people in \nthis outbreak. It is ill-prepared. The health service is poorly \nresourced and short of staff and basic equipment. The medical staff \nstruggle to find protective masks. There are insufficient beds and not \nenough ventilators. The doctors will have to decide who lives and who \ndies. More morgues are being prepared. All this stems from years of \nausterity cutbacks which followed the bailout of the banks in 2008. Over\n that period there has been a massive transfer of wealth from working \npeople to a small elite in society.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When the \ngovernment says not to panic few believe it. When the supermarkets say \nthere is enough food for all even fewer believe it. The supermarket \nshelves are emptying. The just-in-time food supply chain is fragile and \ncould easily collapse.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The pandemic has detonated \nan enormous crisis. It is a crisis not just of health care but of the \neconomy, of our political structures and of society as a whole. It is a \nglobal existential crisis of the entire system, it presents a real \nthreat to the continuation of capitalism. Is this an exaggeration?  Some\n argue that the old routines of society will return once a vaccine is \nfound. People will go back to work, production will resume and things \nwill pretty much return to \u2018normal\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of course it \nis possible for the ruling class to recover its position, even from such\n a deep crisis. But is it also possible now to see an alternative path \nto a new kind of society. A struggle is now engaged over the future \u2013 \ncan this rotten system be ended?  For many years this has seemed an \nunattainable prospect for those on the left. But in the midst of this \ncrisis the possibility of fundamental social change is posed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\n virus has stripped the ideological mask away from society. Every thing \nthat was hidden is now illuminated for all to see. The pandemic \nunleashes the same social and political dynamic that the world wars did.\n It accelerates class divisions and class struggle and reveals the real \nrelations of things in society. We can see clearly the social power of \nthe working class. The bankers, the Richard Bransons, the hedge fund \nmanagers and the speculators are exposed as the drain on society that \nthey actually are. They add nothing of value.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The \nreal value in society is to be found in those who constitute the actual \nsubject of production, that is in labour itself. It is an ideological \nsleight of hand that makes the capitalist rather than the worker appear \nas the motor of production. For those of us on the left this is a truism\n that we learnt in our early time in the movement. But the change that \nthe virus creates is that this now becomes apparent to all, as clear as \nday. Everyone now not only sees it but they come out on their balconies \nand shout it and make noise with pots and pans about it and whatever \nelse they have to hand. And in Edinburgh they sing it in the form of \nProclaimers\u2019 songs dedicated to the \u2018unsung heroes\u2019 of this crisis \u2013 the\n nurses, the doctors and all those who are keeping society going during \nthis crisis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Society as a whole recognises the \ntruth that it can dispense quite happily with the bankers but nurses are\n essential. Even the ruling class understands this and sees its own \nimpotence in the crisis. The virus illuminates this essential truth: \nthat working people embody the common decency of humanity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Millions\n of people now recognise the uselessness of this system and of those who\n rule us. \u2018Don\u2019t we need a new form of society?\u2019 \u2018Why are things like \nthis?\u2019 This goes beyond leftist propaganda and becomes the talk of \neveryday life. In the solidarity networks these questions and these \ndiscussions are taking place. \u2018What sort of society do we want?\u2019. And \nwhen the answer to that question is \u2018Not This One\u2019, then something is in\n the air. A profound change in mass social consciousness is taking \nplace.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The questions keep coming. Why are there no\n medical masks, no ventilators, no hand sanitizer? Where do we get these\n things? The answer is simple. Requisition the resources from the \nprivate health care system, instruct manufacturers to produce for human \nneed. Society can be organised on radically different lines and can \nserve the interests of the vast majority and not those of a small \nminority.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is a potentially explosive \nsituation in class relations. The economic compulsion on the backs of \nthe working class is undermined. Everyone remembers Theresa May saying \nin the 2017 general election that there was no magic money tree to pay \nfor an increase in nurses\u2019 wages. Now it seems they have found a whole \nmagic money forest to try and preserve their dominance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So\n what will happen next? The ruling class senses the danger and is \nprepared to move quickly and to give ground in order to maintain class \nrule. They are trying various strategies to preserve their position. At \nthe beginning Johnson and his chief adviser Cummings were both keen on \nthe \u2018herd immunity\u2019 strategy which proposed letting the virus rip \nthrough society. However after a public outcry and the publication of a \nstudy by epidemiologist Professor Neil Ferguson and others from Imperial\n College which suggested the strategy could lead to the deaths of 2<\/a>50,000\n in the UK and up to 1.2m in the US, \u2018herd immunity\u2019 was shelved. The \ngovernment withdrew it declaring that it had never been its strategy in \nthe first place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The pandemic has driven the world\n economy into recession to be followed by slump outstripping both the \ncrisis of the 1930s and that of 2008. All the accumulated contradictions\n within the system that drove previous crises are once again brought to \nthe surface in an even more powerful and destructive way. The measures \ntaken to try and revive capitalist economies over the last ten years \nhave built a massive burden of indebtedness into the system which now \nthreatens its collapse. In its wake it reveals the fragility of all the \nexisting political and social structures in society.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\n Tories do not have a clear strategy to extricate themselves from this \nagglomeration of crises. A class truce is proposed by both Tories and \nLabour Party to deal with a national emergency.The Tories are \nprepared to temporarily suspend some of their sectional interests. The \nLabour Party, deeply wounded by its election defeat, is keen to present \nitself as a loyal, constructive and responsible opposition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jeremy\n Corbyn, whom the Conservative Party has attacked as a threat to the \nnation and as an \u2018anti-semite\u2019, now becomes an important elder statesman\n with whom one can work. You will hear little about the anti-semitism \ncrisis in the Labour Party in the coming period. And Corbyn will be \nreplaced by Keir Starmer who is very much a politician that leading \nTories believe they can do business with. Some argue that Starmer should\n be brought into a national unity government. They believe that they \nwill need Labour\u2019s help in order to survive this crisis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This\n political truce has its dangers for both parties. Both parties risk \nbeing outflanked and surpassed as the catastrophe gathers pace. In this \nsituation the Labour Party is in a potentially powerful position, but \ndoesn\u2019t yet realise it \u2013 or more accurately wants to avoid the \nresponsibilities that now rest on its shoulders. It welcomes being asked\n into the establishment\u2019s inner circles and warns workers to accept and \nnot go beyond what the Tories propose.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the \nreality is that labour itself \u2013 the working class \u2013 is able at this \npoint to exert its social, economic and political power. The Labour \nParty must represesent the interests of the working class in this \ncontext. It must lead, because what we are seeing is a shift in the \nbalance of class forces in society, a change that few of us could have \nimagined only a few weeks ago. Working people are becoming aware of \ntheir power and the possibility of uniting with others across borders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There\n is a sense that something must really change and a recognition that \nsociety must not return to how things were before the pandemic. Another,\n better world will have to be made.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The question for the radical left is how are we to respond? Do we have anything to say in this situation?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We\n cannot just repeat the old formulas. We have to reawaken our historical\n perspectives of socialist transformation. The answers do not lie in \nmirroring the strategies of the revolutions of the twentieth century. We\n must grasp the interplay of the social forces which are presented to us\n today, historically conditioned as those are, and which form the \nterrain on which we must fight. Previous revolutionary struggles cannot \njust be repeated. They left a legacy of positive and negative aspects \nwhich will shape our actions now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lenin and the \nBolsheviks were the product of a specific constellation of historical \nand social forces. We must fight with the comrades we have and the \nsocial forces which exist in our time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many \nmillions of people are beginning to understand the need for real social \nchange and are preparing to fight for the new society they want to see. \nThe initial skirmishes in this battle will take many forms and \nsocialists should engage creatively with the new forms of organisation \nthat are emerging and not impose preconceived ideas as to how the \nstruggles should unfold.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The left in the country \nhas been riven by deep divisions over Brexit but in other countries too \nsocialist organisations have been confined to a small political space; \nand comrades have been isolated from each other in separate \norganisations, often battling over the minutiae of political \ndifferences. I believe it is time to try and unite those socialist \nforces which understand both the gravity of the crisis and the tasks \nnecessary in the coming period.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There will \ncontinue to be political differences and I am not suggesting the \nabandonment of principles. Instead I am suggesting the abandonment of \nsubjectivity because that is required of us. It is our duty as \nsocialists. We must try and rise to the level necessary to play the \nhistorical role that the left has always claimed for itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\n virus has disrupted the ability of the ruling class to subordinate \nworking people in line with its overall class interest. The virus stops \ncapital reproduction dead in its tracks. The Tories are prepared to give\n ground because they understand the weakness of their own position. They\n speculate that this ground can be recouped from labour once everything \ngets back to \u2018normal\u2019. In this belief they have some willing allies in \nthe labour movement. These people are so imbued with the ideology of the\n ruling class that they cannot imagine the world being any different.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But there is movement now at the base of society. There is anger, a desire for change and there needs to be organisation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\n working class is faced with the possibility, no more than that at this \nmoment, of resolving \u2013 in its own interests \u2013 some of the problems it \nhas faced for many decades. It begins to recognise the impossibility of \ncontinuing to live in a world dominated by capital. A question is posed.\n How do we create a society based on human need and not profit?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For\n the radical left there is a new mass audience. Ideas that would have \nseemed outlandish a few weeks ago now make perfect common sense. Who \nwill now justify the billions or even trillions of dollars being spent \non nuclear weapons and other military hardware? Why do we not distribute\n food to the poor and vulnerable? Why are there food banks? Surely food \nshould be distributed to everyone? Increasingly production and \ndistribution are being brought under state control in the interests of \nthe population as a whole. This cannot be only necessary and desirable \nduring a national emergency. It has to be the bedrock of our society.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There\n must be no going back and we need to be organised, becoming hegemonic \nwith a new narrative that centres planning, public ownership and \nsolidarity at the heart of our society. The desire for \u2018normality\u2019 after\n the crisis will play into the Tories\u2019 hands, We must resist this and \nwin the case for social, economic and political transformation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There\n is a lot more to say on the question of internationalism and on the \nquestion of climate change.  During the crisis the decline in industrial\n production, the reduction of air travel and exhaust emissions reduces \npollution and leads to better air quality. There are once again fish and\n dolphins in the canals of Venice. The fight against the pandemic has to\n be accompanied by a complete re-thinking about the organisation of \nsociety and its relation to the natural world. In the future society \nmust be organised in such a way that the natural world is protected and \nnot destroyed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We all need to write about and \ndiscuss these crucial matters. I will try and write some more on them \nmyself, especially about why building the international movement is a \nprimary task at this moment, and about the dangers we face from the far \nright should we fail.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let us recognise the scale \nof the tasks we face and bring together those forces that have a common \nunderstanding of the necessity of ending this system, not saving it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Time\n is not on our side. Rosa Luxemburg\u2019s understanding that in her \nhistorical period humanity stood on the crossroads between \u2018socialism or\n barbarism\u2019 has never been more true than in ours.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Andrew Burgin writes: The Coronavirus pandemic is accelerating across the world. Every few days the scope and scale of the disease is increasing. Hundreds of thousands of people are being infected, many thousands have already died and many tens of thousands will die. In China where the outbreak was first identified, it has been brought […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":72,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.protectthepeople.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.protectthepeople.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.protectthepeople.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.protectthepeople.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.protectthepeople.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=71"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.protectthepeople.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.protectthepeople.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/72"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.protectthepeople.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=71"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.protectthepeople.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=71"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.protectthepeople.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=71"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}