The Dorothy Syndrome

Why Breaking With the Two Corporate Parties and Forming a Labor Party is the Next, Best Step

 
As demonstrated in The Problem is Capitalism, the primary cause of economic, social, political and environmental crises facing the world today is capitalism.  The capitalist economic system—which puts production for private profit and private ownership of major industries above all other considerations—is wracked by internal, systemic contradictions which are inexorably hurling it toward the abyss, dragging all of us along in its wake.

We identified several essential features of economic wealth and their relation to the capitalist system:

• For the past twelve thousand years, the average human has been able to produce more value in a day, a month or a year than they can possibly consume in that time.  And, labor productivity has increased steadily over the years.
• All value is produced by labor.  There is no other source of value.
• Profit is the value produced by workers above and beyond what they are paid for their labor.
• Under capitalism, the average rate of profit declines over time.
• When society measures success by what is profitable for private corporations, human needs and the environment necessarily suffer.

Facts have logical consequences.  Unless one can disprove these axioms, we are led inescapably to the conclusion that capitalism is doomed.

Still, the final chapter is far from written.  Capitalism could drag on for centuries, or its end could be hastened by conscious, organized opposition.  It could end in a fiery crash that takes most of humanity with it, or working people, working farmers and their allies—the overwhelming majority—could assert our democratic right to take charge and change course before that happens.

How do we take control of this process?

With Friends like These…

To succeed in any competition, such as a race or a sporting event, you have to be clear about the goal, who’s on your team and exactly who it is that you’re competing against.  Get any of these three things wrong and it isn’t much of a contest.

In the struggle for control of society’s collective wealth, it’s producers vs. exploiters.  Generally speaking, it’s those closest to production—workers and working farmers—vs. those furthest from it—corporate owners, bosses, investment bankers, the so-called “captains of finance and industry”.  Those are the teams.  All who aren’t sure where they fall on this continuum must either sit it out, or choose one of these two teams with which to ally themselves.

The struggle for control of society’s collective wealth is sometimes called the class struggle because each of the different sides is led by a different socioeconomic class.

What is not generally understood, even though it’s obvious when you think it through, is that groups, collectives and organizations of all types are also in the game.  Any entity that has anything to do with politics or economics is playing for one team or another in the class struggle.  In some cases this is readily apparent.  Labor unions are clearly working class organizations.  Chambers of commerce are clearly business organizations.  An organization can abstain from politics completely, but joining in means choosing sides.

People often get confused when it comes to political parties, believing these are somehow neutral or separate from the class struggle.  This is no accident.  The Democratic and Republican parties go to great lengths to foster this confusion.  They pretend there is one united America and that they represent everyone equally.  Representatives of both parties deny there are any such things as classes with opposing interests, let alone any sort of class struggle.

But since we know that there are different economic classes, that there is a class struggle based on the opposing interests of workers and capitalists, and that individuals and organizations cannot play for both teams any more than could a football quarterback, a basketball forward or a soccer goal keeper, it isn’t too difficult to figure out which side the Democratic and Republican parties are on.

Even if you’re not yet convinced that an institution like a major political party must be beholden to either workers or big business and cannot serve both, consider this:

• Together, the Democrats and Republicans have been running the country for roughly 200 years.  In that time, who has benefited most, working people or big business? 
• Who finances the multi-million dollar campaigns of both major parties?  Who funds the lobbyists who guide the policy of both major parties?

• While productivity has increased over the years, the gap between rich and poor has steadily increased under the leadership of the two major parties.  More US citizens live in poverty today (1 in 6) than at any time since the 1959.  Who benefits?
• Under the leadership of the Democratic and Republican parties, racism, sexism, and other forms of discrimination persist.  Who benefits?
• Both major parties have staunchly supported imperial wars and military spending which comprise more than half of the federal budget.  Who benefits?

The scoreboard doesn’t look very good for our team.  But perhaps you’re still not convinced that both parties are in the other camp.  Maybe you believe that the Democrats have always been on the side of the common people, trying their best to resist the policies of the evil, corporate-loving Republicans.  But in that case, the scoreboard shows the Democrats have been hopelessly incompetent as our protectors and advocates.  When your quarterback scores more points for the other team than your own, it’s reasonable to ask: “Which side are you on?”

No matter how you slice it, even allowing for some differences in how they operate and project themselves, the only way to make sense out of the policies of the of the two major parties which have enriched the top few percent at the expense of the overwhelming majority is to accept that both the Democratic and Republican parties are capitalist parties whose first loyalty is to big business.  At present, working people in the US have no party of their own.

Misleaders

But the heads of the major unions and labor federations disagree.  They have proclaimed various Democratic and Republican politicians to be “friends of labor.”  In the 2008 election cycle, the AFL-CIO funneled $400 million to Democratic Party candidates.  For many decades, these same labor bosses have counseled workers to throw their lot in with the two major parties, while at the same time trying to lobby Democratic and Republican politicians to be more sympathetic to labor’s concerns.  According to the labor officials, the way forward is to double down, lobby harder and funnel more money to the so-called Democratic and Republican friends of labor.

Meanwhile, unions and working people in general have been taking it on the chin.  Wages today, adjusted for inflation, are barely equivalent to 1981 levels.  The buying power of a minimum wage worker is the lowest it’s been in over 50 years.  Pensions, health care and other benefits are under attack, as are the unions themselves.  Unionized workers make up less than 11.9 % of the workforce today, compared to 13.4 % in 2000 and 20 % in 1983.

The union bosses will say we’ve been doing everything right; it’s just that times are tough.  They’ll say we need to keep doing what we’ve been doing, only fight harder.  This is like your quarterback, after a long brutal losing streak, saying his strategy of handing the ball to the other team has nothing to do with your side’s dismal performance.

There’s a more sensible way to explain the decline of the labor movement and workers’ standard of living over the past several decades.  Labor misleaders have bought into the “all for one, one for all” myth and urged cooperation with the employers for the “common good”.  And contrary to what they claim, labor’s subservience to the Democratic Party does not coincide benignly with labor’s decline.  Rather, this misguided dependence is among the chief causes of labor’s weakened condition.

For too long, the labor movement has largely abstained from politics, seeing its role as limited to fighting economic battles.  The only labor involvement in politics has been to knock on doors and donate money to Democratic and Republican party candidates—a strategy that, given the class to which the two major parties are beholden, makes about as much sense as voting for your foreman for shop steward or the company CEO for union president.  By shunning direct involvement in politics, the labor movement has been fighting with one hand tied behind its back.

There’s No Place Like Home

In the film, The Wizard of Oz, Dorothy always had the power to go home but she didn’t know it.  Similarly, the American working class has tremendous power, they just don’t realize it.

Workers have the ability to end any war over night by refusing to provide troops or to produce and transport war material.  Since all of society’s wealth originates from the labor, workers can have the final say on any political or social policy by exercising their right to withhold their labor, turning off the spigot, as it were, that supplies the capitalists’ profits.  As the overwhelming majority, the working class has the power of numbers as well.  By using their collective power, workers act democratically, in the interests of the vast majority.  But with this kind of democracy, you vote with your feet instead of a ballot.

As Progressive as it Gets

Moreover, the working class is inherently progressive.  Why?  Because the working class is the overwhelming majority, so its class interests coincide with the interests of the majority of Americans.  Because, as a class, workers exploit no one.  Because in order to build a rational society, the working class must join with its natural allies and embrace the struggles against racism, sexism and all forms of discrimination and exploitation which serve to divide and weaken the working class.  Unlike other classes, the working class must champion all struggles against oppression and injustice in order to further its own cause.  In other words, unlike any other socioeconomic class, it is in its own selfish interest for the working class to be progressive.

This does not mean that the working class is without prejudice, or that every position, action or activity sponsored by working class organizations is good.  Only that for the working class, there is a built-in corrective mechanism which dictates that workers can advance their own cause only by championing the causes of the oppressed.  The same cannot be said of the capitalist class.  (For a wonderful historical depiction of this principle, see John Sayles film Matewan.)

The Road May be Rough, but the Way is Clear

When you recognize that the power to fundamentally change things rests with the working class and its allies, choosing strategies and tactics to fight for a better world is easier than it might first appear.  The goal is to get the working class to understand the power it has and how to use it.  But to wield their power workers need:

• To know they have it.  To be conscious of their role in production and society.
• To unite.  To know who their friends and enemies are.
• To organize.  To fight for political power in their own name.

Anything that helps working people become conscious of their power and ability to change society for the better; anything that helps them organize and act as a class to challenge corporate America for political and economic control is good.  Anything that hinders the class consciousness, organization and involvement of large numbers of workers in fighting for their interests is bad.

Party On

Looked at through this lens, it becomes apparent why workers’ support for the Democratic or Republican parties is such a deadly diversion.

First, the two corporate parties make it their business to obfuscate and muddle class distinctions.  “We’re all in this together,” they disingenuously assert.  The point of that message is to confuse workers about their role and their separate interests; to hoodwink you into “hating your friends and loving your enemies,” as Malcolm X put it.

Second, labor support for the capitalist parties occurs at the expense of workers organizing in their own name to fight for their own interests.  Energy and resources directed to the big business parties is robbed from movements and efforts by working people to fight for political and economic power in their own right—power which must be wrestled away from the industrialists, bankers and Wall St. tycoons.

By contrast, consider the effect of rank and file workers, farmers, youth and others promoting and building a labor party based on the unions.  A labor party, democratically run and open to all working people and their supporters, would completely shift the national debate.  A labor party would emphasize that there are two Americas: the America of Wall St, the DuPonts, the GMs, the Exxons, and the American of the honest folks who work for a living.  The advent of a labor party would mark the first time in modern American history that working people carried their just struggle directly into the political arena.  Blacks, Latinos, women, students and others who have gotten a rotten deal from the current setup would flock to a labor party as something truly new and inherently progressive.

Is This Practical?

US politics today is a lot like a swamp, infested with snakes, alligators and all manner of nasty threats.  Within that swamp there’s an island called Dem which doesn’t have too many alligators but is constantly threatened by poisonous snakes.  There’s another island, Rep, that has fewer snakes but lots of alligators.  Some people see Dem as less inhospitable than Rep; others see Rep as the least worst of the two.  But folks on both islands live in a swamp under constant hostile threat.  The only way forward is to leave the swamp altogether.  But that requires leaving the relative comfort of the two islands and wading through hostile waters; it’s that or live in the swamp forever.

So often people raise the “lesser evil” argument.  “A labor party would be a great idea,” they say, “but not right now.  We have to support big business candidate X because big business candidate Y is so much worse.”  The trouble with this argument is that the evil that’s avoided by promoting X over Y is much, much less than the evil that’s enabled by delaying the real fight and obfuscating the more fundamental problem. 

Look at it this way: Both X and Y are going to whip you.  Let’s say it’s well known that Y will give 20 lashes per year.  X, meanwhile, promises to give only 15.  By backing X over Y, you hope to spare yourself 5 lashes.  But for every year you delay the real fight—the fight to abolish whipping completely—you’re subjecting yourself to 15 additional lashes!

There is another way.  The labor movement has the financial and human resources to field viable candidates in local, state and national races now.  If the $400 million spent by labor on the Democrats, and the door-to-door labor foot soldiers placed at the disposal of the Democrats in 2008 were directed toward launching a labor party, there’s no telling what would be possible.

Forming a labor party would only be a step in the right direction, not end in itself.  Within a labor party there would be much to debate and discuss regarding how best to move forward.  But such a step would empower workers, help them to be more conscious of their separate class interests, and give them another tool with which to organize and challenge the capitalists for political power.

When 2 + 1 Does Not Equal 3

Note that a labor party is not just a “third party”.  Most third parties and third party candidates in American history have been additional capitalist parties.  Only a party based in the working class would actually represent something new and would actually present a challenge to the Wall St. barons, the corporate rules and their class which has been running the country for over 200 years.

Building a labor party is just one good example of a step that could and should be taken now to fight for a better world, against the poisonous influence of the current corporate rulers.  But there is much more that can and should be done.  Building a rational world means ending capitalism.  Ending capitalism requires that working people in their vast majority consciously educate, organize, agitate and mobilize toward that end.  As issues arise—from opposition to the many US imperial wars of aggression, to defense of immigrant rights, to the fight for economic justice, to the battle to stop the poisoning of our planet—each issue and the tactics chosen should be viewed in terms of how to best involve massive numbers of working people in the struggle.  And each incremental fight must also be used to educate and train working people for the bigger fight: the battle to replace the minority rule of the capitalist elites with the majority rule of the working class; to replace an irrational system based on production for private profit with a just system that serves human needs.

Working people have the power to make this change a reality.  We must support all things which contribute to the realization of that power and discard all things that get in the way.

* * * *

For those who cling to hope of reforming the Democratic Party, consider this:  Even though you may personally know several sincere, honest, dedicated, progressive-minded Democratic Party activists or officials, what matters is the essential nature of the organization, not the exceptional nature of a few individuals.  A thimble full of clean water will not purify a poisoned well. 

To transform the Democratic Party from an organization with a multi-century record of being beholden to the super rich into a party whose first loyalty is to working people would be like trying to change a dog into a cat.  You might think that if you changed enough parts, you’d eventually get there.  But in the end, you’d have to destroy the thing in order to “save it”.