Socialist Progressives
Related: About this forumGreek election thread.
I was talking about it with my partner at breakfast this morning and still can't make up my mind on the best outcome. I want to root for KKE for sheer bravado and Red solidarity, but all month I haven't been able to figure out their game plan quite frankly.
With Greece 80% for staying in the EU, I don't think the KKE anti-EU policy is really going to change things much as far as shifting people to some revolutionary socialist stance. Things could change swiftly, but I'm not seeing the roadmap.
Syriza might not be perfect but they have some plans to help people out, and (perhaps) put the workers on a better footing. What do you all think?
BOG PERSON
(2,916 posts)a greek default is inevitable. this 80% of the greek public is like wile e. coyote after running off the edge of a cliff and being afraid to look down. it is only a matter of time before they are compelled to leave the eurozone. whichever party/movement realizes this and is prepared for this - is prepared for the worst case scenario - and doesn't pander to the public will probably fare badly in the elections, but its fortunes will also improve in the aftermath.
Starry Messenger
(32,342 posts)It must be interesting to operate in way that gives you expanded flexibility.
I know that the default is inevitable, I'm torn on what constitutes best-prepared for worst case scenario I guess.
BOG PERSON
(2,916 posts)in order to enjoy success as greek political party, at this particular juncture, your mouth is writing checks your ass can't cash, and you will discredit yourself at the same pace of events. this goes whether you're New Democracy or SYRIZA. so the best strategy, if you're serious about seizing power in the long run, is to not sweat over getting a bigger share in parliament right now. imho.
Starry Messenger
(32,342 posts)Looks like ND got elected as future spokes-goat.
BOG PERSON
(2,916 posts)what the hell greece.
Starry Messenger
(32,342 posts)I used to wish we had a multi-party parliamentary system, but I'm beginning to see some downsides.
socialist_n_TN
(11,481 posts)???
BOG PERSON
(2,916 posts)but wikipedia tells me i'm wrong.
all i can say is it's disappointing the fascists did better electorally than the communists (4%).
socialist_n_TN
(11,481 posts)It actually ties in to what I said in another post about the KKE a few weeks ago though. They are LOSING support (probably to Syriza) because they won't take a stand on revolution or coalition. They have to shit or get off the pot about what they want to do. Either call for a indefinte general strike and an overthrow of the capitalist system or join in a coalition with Syriza and other left parties (excluding the bankrupt PASOK of course) to govern.
BOG PERSON
(2,916 posts)and nobody listens except their affiliated trade unions and front orgs? we know that at least 80% of the country obv. has no interest in carrying out communist revolution. if the objective conditions are absent (as they apparently are), the communists will be left standing there, exposed, looking like jerks.
socialist_n_TN
(11,481 posts)In which case they need to seriously consider forming an anti-austerity coalition with Syriza and other left groupings.
My complaint with KKE is not that they're not going whole hog into revolution, it's that they're stuck in this middle ground between revolution and electoral politics, not jumping one way or another. It makes them look indecisive to the people, which is why they've lost voter share. IMO of course.
BOG PERSON
(2,916 posts)when the objective conditions refuse to emerge, and things are sort of stuck in a holding pattern.
what do you do when the bourgeoisie has basically foreclosed history, sealed off the future, mired the world in an eternal present? i doubt there is any party theoretically advanced enough to know what to do in such circumstances.
edit. besides compromising the kke's political independence/initiative, i think forming a coalition w/ the pro-eu zombie social democrats (syriza) would make them look a tad desperate and unprincipled
socialist_n_TN
(11,481 posts)It's not that Syriza is revolutionary, it's that Syriza has the POTENTIAL to be revolutionary AND has the largest support base on the left in Greece. KKE, Antarzyia and even the left of PASOK hold the anti-austerity majority along with Syriza. A coalition against austerity could push Greece into socialist revolution.
Left parties are influenced by parties FARTHER to the left than they are. If KKE IS farther to the left than Syriza, a united front with Syriza could hold Syriza accountable. And it could also help the revolutionary parts of Syrizia to set up worker's councils, factory and workplace occupations and the restarting of closed factories and workplaces under worker's control and the arming of worker's militias. IOW, it could further the revolutionary agenda by following the fundamental Bolshevik model for setting up a dual power dynamic. This dual power setup is the next step in revolutionary politics. We would then see who the majority of the people of Greece followed. Would they follow the cobbled together government of austerity (cobbled together with the assistance of 50 extra parliamentary seats because of election rules) or the worker's councils?
Starry Messenger
(32,342 posts)From what I've read from KKE they have a stance about not campaigning very hard because they don't want to be co-opted by the system. But if they are in the government, they are already participating. This aspect puzzles me very much. But I can't pretend to know much about conditions there the way they do. But I'd think you'd want to beat the fucking Nazis if just for not letting them win shit.
white_wolf
(6,238 posts)I think Syirza would make some great reforms, but I don't think they would be willing to go far enough. Though, that could have it's own use in showing the limitations of reforms under capitalism. Honestly, I really don't know which I think would be best.
Starry Messenger
(32,342 posts)But it is so hard to gauge these things.
socialist_n_TN
(11,481 posts)Because the people (both in Wisconsin and in Greece) still have faith in bourgeois "democracy", it doesn't matter particularly who wins this round. Whoever wins they'll fail because they will still be trying to fit the Greek people into the shoehorn of the Merkel austerity policy. And the only thing that austerity will bring is more misery for the people. That's not good of course, but it probably IS the only way to get the masses of the people over the idea that anything will change within the context of electoral politics.
Now, the more revolutionary parties (Syriza, KKE, Antasya [sp?] and yes, Golden Dawn) can battle it out for the hearts and minds of the anti-austerians in OPPOSITION to the austerity parties. IOW, this isn't over by a long shot.
BTW, I saw in Late Breaking News that PASOK is now saying that they won't coalesce with ND without Syriza. THAT'S an interesting development in and of itself. Now it could be (and probably is) just a ploy to gain more powerful posts in the coalition government, BUT even so, it DOES prove to me what kind of influence a farther left party will have on a centrist left one. It pulls the debate to the left when the centrist left has to account for their left flank and not just triangulate and constantly move right.
Starry Messenger
(32,342 posts)Watching this all unfold is incredible. I've been biting my nails all month. This will be a hard slog for Greece. We were also talking at breakfast about what happens if there is a revolution--what happens next? Greece is out there surrounded by unsympathetic forces. How will the rest of the Eurozone react to Greece withdrawing when that happens no matter what else happens in the country politically?
white_wolf
(6,238 posts)supporting them, but it would be nice to have allies in Europe.
Starry Messenger
(32,342 posts)Lots of NATO forces over there, etc.
TBF
(32,088 posts)and I believe KKE believes the same and that is why they are holding back. They know this is just starting and this election doesn't mean crap for ordinary people in Greece (and they couldn't really care less about the fuckheads worldwide worrying about their portfolios - which is kind where I have to agree with them).
Starry Messenger
(32,342 posts)Everything I've read makes their campaigns look like a three-ring circus. I just worry about the strength of people to resist in the face of further austerity. There can be a tipping point where the fighting forces become to weak to put up a proper battle. Unemployment is second only to Spain and news reports talk of soup kitchens and dumpster diving. You have to have something you want to save in order to fight for it, you know? But things could also shift very quickly.
TBF
(32,088 posts)when there is nothing left to hold on to that is when you fight. You have nothing to lose.
The fascist element really worries me - both there and here.
Starry Messenger
(32,342 posts)Especially with the police forces aligning themselves with the fascists. That could go all kinds of bad.
socialist_n_TN
(11,481 posts)Yet anyway. I think it's more likely that there'll be a military coup before the fascists take control. I believe they actually even LOST voter share since May, so they're still not in a position to gain the attention and support of the capitalists.
However, fascists are ALWAYS worth worrying about. The party of the anti-christ if there ever was one.
white_wolf
(6,238 posts)From what I've read from some people, which could be totally wrong, is that fascism actually transfers power from the larger capitalists to the smaller capitalists and that is why it is a last resort for the big capitalists, because they have to give up some of their power to maintain it all.
TBF
(32,088 posts)Definitely closer in Greece than here as well.
Starry Messenger
(32,342 posts)I've read things about fascism, but mostly on the political repercussions and oppression that takes place once it is fait accompli. The objective conditions and pre-fascist economic developments that lead to the rise of fascism like this are less developed, or I'm not looking in the right place.
white_wolf
(6,238 posts)"What it is and how to fight it" I think is the title. I'm sure other Marxist writers have written on it as well, but that's the one that comes to mind. Here is a quote from it on what classes actually make up the base of fascism:
"The fascist movement in Italy was a spontaneous movement of large masses, with new leaders from the rank and file. It is a plebian movement in origin, directed and financed by big capitalist powers. It issued forth from the petty bourgeoisie, the slum proletariat, and even to a certain extent from the proletarian masses; Mussolini, a former socialist, is a "self-made" man arising from this movement.
Primo de Rivera was an aristocrat. He occupied a high military and bureaucratic post and was chief governor of Catalonia. he accomplished his overthrow with the aid of state and military forces. The dictatorships of Spain and Italy are two totally different forms of dictatorship. It is necessary to distinguish between them. Mussolini had difficulty in reconciling many old military institutions with the fascist militia. This problem did not exist for Primo de Rivera.
The movement in Germany is analogous mostly to the Italian. It is a mass movement, with its leaders employing a great deal of socialist demagogy. This is necessary for the creation of the mass movement.
The genuine basis (for fascism) is the petty bourgeoisie. In italy, it has a very large base -- the petty bourgeoisie of the towns and cities, and the peasantry. In Germany, likewise, there is a large base for fascism..."
Starry Messenger
(32,342 posts)There are some articles by R. Palme Dutt that talk about the economic conditions present before the rise of fascism too. There is a book he wrote also Fascism and Social Revolution, but I haven't had a chance to look through it yet. Here's an excerpt from a counter-review of his book:
http://www.marxists.org/archive/dutt/articles/1935/question_of_fascism.htm
The Question of Fascism and Capitalist Decay
Both tendencies can be traced in particular phases and situation; but the tendencies to decay, the retrograde tendencies continually grow stronger than before, and the tendencies to advance grow weaker than before. (The monopolist form of capital increasingly develops the elements of parasitical degeneration, decay and decline of capitalismC. I. Program.)[1] And fascism is precisely a sharp and intensified expression of this process, and a direct factor in carrying it forward.
In order to see more clearly the character and significance of this process, compare the elements of decay noted by Lenin twenty years ago, on the basis of the facts of imperialism before the World War, and the enormous further development of these elements of decay today. Lenin noted as particular evidence of decay:
1. Parasitism and the growth of the rentier and rentier-State;
2. The beginning of the economic possibility of slowing down technical progress, as instanced in trusts buying up inventions in order to suppress them.
Today after twenty years we are able to note as further features carrying this process forward:
1. Large-scale state-organized destruction of the productive forces and restriction of production;
2. Increased resistance to technical development and non-utilization of inventions, except in the military sphere, developing even into a widespread ideological hostility to inventions beginning to find expression in governmental, scientific, business and economic circles;
3. Development of the anti-scientific and anti-cultural campaign, cutting down of education, burning of booksalso a form of destruction of the productive forces;
4. Chronic large-scale mass unemployment of a type previously unknownagain a deterioration and destruction of the productive forces;
5. Devotion of an increasing proportion of the productive forces to non-productive purposes connected with war preparation.
All these phenomena of present day capitalism, which receive their sharpest expression in fascism, are of the greatest significance for the process of increasing decay that is taking place.
Against this picture of present day capitalism in increasing decay, with fascism as at once an expression of this process and an accelerating factor, {...}
BOG PERSON
(2,916 posts)frantz fanon defined fascism as when europeans apply colonial procedures on fellow europeans, instead of other nations.
white_wolf
(6,238 posts)Was Imperial Japan a Fascist state at the time? I don't think so, but I've heard some people argue they were.
BOG PERSON
(2,916 posts)then its probably better to leave them out, since being fascist wasn't anything to be ashamed of back then.
socialist_n_TN
(11,481 posts)Which is why I said in the above post that they're not ready to throw in with the fascists yet. Make no mistake though, they'll support the fascists before they'll allow a worker's democracy to develop.
I'm still thinking that KKE needs to join in with the more revolutionary parts of Syriza in a united front (NOT a popular front- KKE would still have the responsibility to criticize the bourgeois elements of Syriza including the leadership if it was warrented) in order to assist in the setting up of an anti-austerity dual power setup of workplace and neighborhood councils and worker's militias for self defense AGAINST the fascists (and any other groups that needed to be defended against), and workplace occupations and siezures of closed factories, foreclosed farms, and stores to be run BY the worker's councils.
Without the USSR in existance to back them up, KKE has to remember fundamental Bolshevism.