B. Iorwerth Cook
(Chicago Socialist Party)
A general malaise has fallen over the parties of the left. There's a widespread feeling of uncertainty, of lack of direction or inspiration. All over the world the left has been forced on the defensive, with neoliberalism successfully pushing its agenda over the four corners of the earth. It is as well, at a time like this, to try and define a Socialist strategy for the present day and beyond.
It seems to me, the first duty of the Socialist Party must be to strengthen and energize the working class, both blue-collar and white-collar: to awaken the sleeping spirit of assertiveness and resistance to injustice. In order to do that, we must raise people's awareness of social issues, and also provide an avenue for their involvement in political and economic action. In this way the Socialist Party can directly aid in democratizing the institutions of society, both political and economic: without a vibrant, organized people's movement making its needs known, and exerting its constant sway upon elected officials, any democracy is destined to be a sham. Only through mass participation in political and economic action, can society become in any meaningful sense democratic.
The ways Socialists can help build a new radical mainstream -- and, in it, the embryo of a new society -- are many and varied. First is by lending assistance and solidarity to organized labor: establishing a constant, and hopefully beneficent, presence among striking workers and workers in the process of unionizing. In so doing we can hopefully lend a radical voice to their struggles, and rekindle once again the popular demand for industrial democracy.
A second important strategy is by actively propagandizing and fielding candidates for election, particularly at the local level, so as to make the Socialist voice heard at the grass roots: to make people realize that social change is possible -- that meaningful change, redistribution of wealth, guaranteed income, workers' ownership of the places of employment (in a word, socialist change) is a viable option. I've long been convinced that electoral activity is not an end in itself, but primarily important in getting the word out about what Socialism is, what it means, and what Socialists stand for.
A third way is by actively and visibly participating in community-based popular movements to clean up the environment, insist upon governmental regulations on factories, protest unsafe products or services, or any of the thousands of issues that any self-respecting community should concern itself with. The most important among these, of course, is poverty: addressing the inequity and maldistribution of wealth in this, the richest country in the world. I'm thinking the Socialist Party should put into practise what it preaches, and set up, under its own auspices, free medical services in low-income areas, perhaps with especial emphasis on birth control, drug rehab, needle exchange; set up soup kitchens and shelters for the homeless; organize job creation rallies for the unemployed and for those whose jobs are insecure; outreach programs for urban youth; community protests on gang activity; demonstrations for state subsidies for rebuilding, renewing, and making safe low-income communities. It's not giving some people a free ride, it's just catering to the needs of the community. That's what any self-respecting democratic society must do -- it's what society is there for. Above all, Socialists must be visible; they must be out there, in society, performing socially meaningful labor and showing that it can be done -- demonstrating the possibilities for self-organization and co-operation.
There are so many ways a Socialist movement can get started; and, if we do, there's every chance we will find a very real niche in American society. Through the inspiration of groups like the Socialist Party, the new society can slowly begin to grow and to assert itself -- a society founded on the simple principle of social responsibility, which is the basis for all social relationships: the common welfare, the good of all. Without this basic principle no social relationship would be conceivable; and yet the hierarchies of authority and privilege, in seeking to maintain a society, destroy the basic fundamental principle -- maximizing the potential of every member of society -- that justify that society's existence. It is time to start building a non-authoritarian, non-exploitative society, where all will have a voice, and where the needs of all are met and addressed. The wellbeing of the individual members, shall be the measure for the wellbeing of the group.
According to this measure, our society is sick. Just ask any of the countless millions of Americans shut up in prisons, or in the urban death camps we call the inner cities.
The roots of such injustices lie deep. Capitalism is chiefly concerned with the accumulation of profit -- individually or among companies. And so, by having no ethic of social responsibility to people, capitalism is anti-social. Socialism, with its ethic of responsibility to people, and not necessarily to the entrenched structures and hierarchies of the established society that often claim to 'represent' the people, approaches 'civic' duty at the simplest and purest level: the human level. For the Socialist Party to truly achieve its potential, and the potential of American society, it must devote itself to building a new society, founded on the basis of individual co-operation, mutual responsibility, and human concern, within the shell of this decrepit and uncaring social order.
What specific characteristics should characterize such a society? I have a few ideas:
Once we have agreed on such basic principles and platforms as the characteristics of a true, democratic, socialist society, we can start drawing up specific plans and programs for implementing and building that society. The details will and must vary somewhat with time, in response to changing circumstances, but the basic vision of our goal can remain more or less the same. Under no circumstances must the Party assume it needs political power to begin the process of building socialism -- otherwise we would go the way of the gradual reformists in the DSA and SDUSA. Not that their method is bad, but it has its priorities out of line -- there's an immense amount of work that can be done in the community and in the workplace, just as pressing as, and probably in the long run more effective than, their platform of "building a progressive coalition" for the sole sake of gaining power, in the name of social justice. (Lenin would have approved.) Rather, our duty is to do what we can -- all we can -- to build the new society within the shell of the old. If that means electoral action, so be it; but if it means mobilizing the unions, putting political pressure on the state, organizing protests and rallies, or (best yet) engaging in positive social service and organizing the people -- then that, too, is where we belong. Electoral power is irrelevant. All power rightly belongs to the people; so, that is where we belong -- with the people.