BBC - Owen Jones

[sihhi]

He answered this a few months back by unilaterally declaring that any outside labour party that came from the assembly movements would not be allowed to challenge labour candidates. Nice of him to sort that out for everyone prior to the assemblies.

Did he? I'm sorry for retreading ground.
In which case it would put the Labour Lefts on a pedestal over and above (effectively silencing) everyone else: Sinn Fein, Plaid, SNP, Greens, socialists, ex-Labour, local independent types, stop NHS service closure types - all of them would have to submit to Labour - it would become a Labour subs bench albeit without the rose and the TU link.

 

[sihhi]

How we transform the structural logic of the electoral space is a much more challenging question, and of course this entails questions of strategy at a level which goes way beyond the electoral (the production of a counter-hegemonic anti-austerity bloc) - I'm not talking about an electoral bloc in the first instance, but an ideological one.

How can non-Labour people assert their interests in this ideological bloc, if they know that it will lead to an electoral sidelining eventually?

 

[articul8]

How is it simple minded to ask what your anti-austerity vehicle actually is or will be? Will Greens have to stand aside for Labour Lefts?

How do you think the rest of Labour will view its Left that
1 is happy to set up beyond-Labour challengers in seats where it doesn't like the prospective MPs?
2 has ensured it will not receive any such challenges?

Sorry, wasn't aimed at you. You've asked perfectly reasonable questions, as I try to explain above, I don't see that any electoral vehicle is viable this side of a GE. The idea that the assemblies could stand candidates is bound to be divisive not just in terms of Labour but also the Greens, the union movement, the nationalist parties etc. I'd be willing to explore the possibility of cross-party co-operation on the electoral field (for example in Labour and Green standing down candidates in Sheffield Hallam for a single anti-cuts alternative - I think Owen Jones would be excellent in that role as it goes). But it will be difficult to co-ordinate.

If and when Labour get into power and try to impose austerity - that opens up a new dynamic and there'll be major battles and fractures internally and new possibilities are likely to emerge.

 

[butchersapron]

You seem incapable of registering the difference between small but important short-term incremental gains (which are all any electoral strategy can aim at in the present conditions), and long-term structural necessities. The point is not about "illusions" in Labour - it's about the structural inevitability of people turning to Labour if they want to kick out the coalition parties. *There is no other way to do it*. Given that we know this, why isn't it relevant to force concessions in the short term *to the extent that this is possible*?

How we transform the structural logic of the electoral space is a much more challenging question, and of course this entails questions of strategy at a level which goes way beyond the electoral (the production of a counter-hegemonic anti-austerity bloc) - I'm not talking about an electoral bloc in the first instance, but an ideological one.

In the medium term the deeper and more widespread the attempt to build the latter (and here is where the Peoples Assembly could play a role, although I'm certainly not saying it's fit for the purpose in terms of its organisation and structure) - together with the frustrations of a Labour government constrained by the demands of capital - is likely to raise opportunities which go beyond short term electoral lesser evilism.

Now, grandmaster of dialectics, how do you think the successful achievement of short term gains for the w/c through the labour party is going to impact upon the way that that party is viewed by the working class? Is it going to push it away from it and force it to reject it through your childs dialectic of disenchantment, or is going to draw it closer to it and lead it to in some way identify its needs with that of the party (and remember master, this is happening in the past is exactly what you base your current, hey it's all about labour approach on)?

Can you tell the difference between a social movement outside of labour imposing its needs on the state and capital and the capture of those interests by a neo-liberal party explicitly committed to the continuation of current social relations. I think you attempt to enclose the former within the latter and need a radical front to maintain your self-image. So we get the above confused guff wheeled out (with a different emphasis placed depending on which crowd you're talking to). Why does the development of that social movement have to go through labour as you alternately say/don't say? Are you waiting for people to catch up to your elevated position? Like some awful vanguardist passive aggressive christian socialist? Why does all your rhetoric of challenging labour through wanky critique fall at the first hurdle when reality comes knocking - why do you always retreat into don't stand against labour (but but but i'm not saying ideal conditions where such a challenge would be justifiable could exist blah blah)?

 

[butchersapron]

Sorry, wasn't aimed at you.

Note it was me, Louis Mac and maybe frogwoman he was calling simple-minded.

 

[butchersapron]

Did he? I'm sorry for retreading ground.
In which case it would put the Labour Lefts on a pedestal over and above (effectively silencing) everyone else: Sinn Fein, Plaid, SNP, Greens, socialists, ex-Labour, local independent types, stop NHS service closure types - all of them would have to submit to Labour - it would become a Labour subs bench albeit without the rose and the TU link.

Only pointing it out to compare with whatever he scrabbles around to come up with this time around.

 

[Streathamite]

My brain is actually beginning to hurt from trying to detangle what articul8 is trying to say

 

[sihhi]

A8 please note: no one on this thread is being simple-minded, just trying to nail down your positions, you needn't aim it at anyone.

The idea that the assemblies could stand candidates is bound to be divisive not just in terms of Labour but also the Greens, the union movement, the nationalist parties etc. I'd be willing to explore the possibility of cross-party co-operation on the electoral field (for example in Labour and Green standing down candidates in Sheffield Hallam for a single anti-cuts alternative - I think Owen Jones would be excellent in that role as it goes). But it will be difficult to co-ordinate.

If and when Labour get into power and try to impose austerity - that opens up a new dynamic and there'll be major battles and fractures internally and new possibilities are likely to emerge.

This changes the game somewhat - slowly prepare an ideological block up to and beyond 2015.

When Labour wins and does a Hollande or a Gillard, you want the same bloc electoralised so that Labour rights will be challenged, but Labour Lefts remaining unchallenged or just changing their clothes to become independent (eg Owen Jones) remaining unchallenged.

Again, how do you think the Labour centre and Labour right will respond to this kind of behaviour from Labour Lefts?

 

[articul8]

How can non-Labour people assert their interests in this ideological bloc, if they know that it will lead to an electoral sidelining eventually?

As I see it, there's an inevitable gap between what is possible/necessary electorally and what can be achieved in terms of building an extra-electoral coalition/ideological bloc. Surely everyone involved in the anti-austerity movement accepts that it would be no bad thing to kick out the coalition parties from government? Beyond that, electoral tactics will be determined by what is possible and desirable locally. If it means contesting certain Labour seats where the MP is particularly useless, I don't have a problem with that - but don't think it's possible or advisable to over-generalise this to the point where you stand candidates against most Labour MPs and the effect exactly the reverse of what you want.

But there is so much more that can be done in terms of building a movement than standing in elections: co-ordinating direct action and civil disobedience, helping to stop evictions, helping people to access legal advice, etc.etc. Not just abstract "pressure".

 

[ViolentPanda]

Everyone went home hours ago you cloth-brained twat btw. They don't need you shouting after them that they come back. The class has moved on, yet articul8 insists the voice of the 20 000- are what count.

Even as late as the early '00s, NEC candidates used to poll much larger numbers. 20,000 is a pretty sad comment on just how residual Labour party membership per se is nowadays, hovering just under the quarter of a million mark - the lowest it's been for more than 70 years, IIRC.
Could that be related to the fact that even the "Labour left" have de facto accepted neoliberalism?

 

[butchersapron]

As I see it, there's an inevitable gap between what is possible/necessary electorally and what can be achieved in terms of building an extra-electoral coalition/ideological bloc. Surely everyone involved in the anti-austerity movement accepts that it would be no bad thing to kick out the coalition parties from government? Beyond that, electoral tactics will be determined by what is possible and desirable locally. If it means contesting certain Labour seats where the MP is particularly useless, I don't have a problem with that - but don't think it's possible or advisable to over-generalise this to the point where you stand candidates against most Labour MPs and the effect exactly the reverse of what you want.

But there is so much more that can be done in terms of building a movement than standing in elections: co-ordinating direct action and civil disobedience, helping to stop evictions, helping people to access legal advice, etc.etc. Not just abstract "pressure".

So, i guess this is where you outline the strategy that you said that you have - right?

 

[sihhi]

Surely everyone involved in the anti-austerity movement accepts that it would be no bad thing to kick out the coalition parties from government? Beyond that, electoral tactics will be determined by what is possible and desirable locally. If it means contesting certain Labour seats where the MP is particularly useless, I don't have a problem with that - but don't think it's possible or advisable to over-generalise this to the point where you stand candidates against most Labour MPs and the effect exactly the reverse of what you want.

But again how will a local Labour Left that considers eg Glenda Jackson useless and puts it energy into fighting against her for a real Labour/anti-asuterity vehicle candidate (perhaps Green perhaps Labour Left perhaps non-party) be viewed by other Labour members [193,961 - 200 or - 20,000 (depending on how large the Labour Left is, Nigel Irritable or articul8) members]

 

[ViolentPanda]

Ok, not jackboots along Whitehall, permanent neoliberalism.



a) When people rally to "save the NHS", "defend the welfare state", "renationalise the railways" - this all points to the popular memory of Labour achievements, even if it also illustrates the inadequacy of the present leadership.

It doesn't, though. It points to a popular memory of peoples' achievements. People with an interest in politics and/or history might grasp the wider narrative - that Attlee's government legislated the creation of the welfare state - but most of them don't attribute the social gains to Labour, but to themselves; their grandparents and great-grandparents, and 100+ years of momentum behind several social movements, not just Labour and the unions.
And they're right. It was demands from "the people" that gave shape to the legislation, not the whim of party bureaucrats.

b) I'm not arguing that the Labour party leadership can be won to militant pro w/c politics. It can't and won't. But concessions can be wrought in the short term, and it can provide some platform for allowing a minority to demonstrate what fighting class represenatives would look like (and I don't mean Eric Joyce).

Because indulging in a bit of tokenism isn't at all like giving a balky child a biscuit and patting it on the head!

 

[articul8]

What I am not saying - if that's what you;re inferring - is that this activity is about re-mobilising disaffected sections of the w/c back into the Labour party to start changing it. There is a role in the short-term for this, if they choose it, but I can well understand why they wouldn't and am certainly not going about exhorting people to join Labour on this basis.

 

[ViolentPanda]

Who is the real sick man in this so called society?

Jim Bowen.

 

[frogwoman]

I'm looking forward to the film version of this thread with Jack Nicholson and Ben Stiller in it

 

[butchersapron]

What I am not saying - if that's what you;re inferring - is that this activity is about re-mobilising disaffected sections of the w/c back into the Labour party to start changing it. There is a role in the short-term for this, if they choose it, but I can well understand why they wouldn't and am certainly not going about exhorting people to join Labour on this basis.

Why have you avoided the point again? I asked you the question below - a question based on you identifying the possibility of short-term gains for the w/c through the labour party - this is a key question that your strategy need to meet head on rather than avoid, because it puts all your other claims into serious doubt:

how do you think the successful achievement of short term gains for the w/c through the labour party is going to impact upon the way that that party is viewed by the working class? Is it going to push it away from it and force it to reject it through your childs dialectic of disenchantment, or is going to draw it closer to it and lead it to in some way identify its needs with that of the party (and remember master, this is happening in the past is exactly what you base your current, hey it's all about labour approach on)?

 

[treelover]

Sorry, wasn't aimed at you. You've asked perfectly reasonable questions, as I try to explain above, I don't see that any electoral vehicle is viable this side of a GE. The idea that the assemblies could stand candidates is bound to be divisive not just in terms of Labour but also the Greens, the union movement, the nationalist parties etc. I'd be willing to explore the possibility of cross-party co-operation on the electoral field (for example in Labour and Green standing down candidates in Sheffield Hallam for a single anti-cuts alternative - I think Owen Jones would be excellent in that role as it goes). But it will be difficult to co-ordinate.

If and when Labour get into power and try to impose austerity - that opens up a new dynamic and there'll be major battles and fractures internally and new possibilities are likely to emerge.

like 97?

 

[butchersapron]

like 97?

And 66. And 74.

 

[butchersapron]

Ok, not jackboots along Whitehall, permanent neoliberalism.

Found any evidence of me arguing this anywhere yet?

 

[articul8]

Now, grandmaster of dialectics, how do you think the successful achievement of short term gains for the w/c through the labour party is going to impact upon the way that that party is viewed by the working class? Is it going to push it away from it and force it to reject it through your childs dialectic of disenchantment, or is going to draw it closer to it and lead it to in some way identify its needs with that of the party (and remember master, this is happening in the past is exactly what you base your current, hey it's all about labour approach on)?

I think what has changed this time is that "short term gains" can be misleading, what I'm really talking about is amelioration of the neoliberal programme Labour would otherwise be able to implement. It's not that there'll be much in the sense of positive gains (although I hope I'm wrong about this) but of important defencive holding off from aspects of an assault. This is not nothing - it's necessary. But the overall balance of forces and state of global capitalism means that in government Labour will find itself pushing back on this. The level of struggle inside and outside will amplify.

Can you tell the difference between a social movement outside of labour imposing its needs on the state and capital and the capture of those interests by a neo-liberal party explicitly committed to the continuation of current social relations.

It's precisely this distinction which I find simple-minded. The Labour party has always been committed at one level to "the continuation of current social relations". But it has also dependend on its claim to represent the interests of ordinary people. Not since 1931 has there been such a diversion between these two ambitions, and therefore it is precisely the nature of this contradiction that makes Labour other than "just another neoliberal party". The role of the unions is a vital mediating factor here too. The organised working class is both part of your "social movement outside" but it is also a real strucutral limit and presence within the party itself - disguised and weakened under Blair et al because cushioned by the relative prosperity and low industrial struggle of the period. The unions are not just entirely co-opted elements of a neoliberal formation. There are stresses and tensions in this relationship that mean they are sites of struggle.

 

[ViolentPanda]

You seem incapable of registering the difference between small but important short-term incremental gains (which are all any electoral strategy can aim at in the present conditions)...

It's all any electoral strategy that your position allows can aim at. Don't mistake positioning as being anything more than a rhetorical limitation.

...and long-term structural necessities. The point is not about "illusions" in Labour - it's about the structural inevitability of people turning to Labour if they want to kick out the coalition parties.

No, it's about an attempt at the creation of a dominant narrative that says "the only way out is to vote Labour". That's somewhat different to a structural inevitability. "Structural inevitability" only resides within the inconvenience of a system that requires money in order to participate in a way that could sweep aside those representatives of neoliberalism that currently supposedly represent "our" interests.

*There is no other way to do it*. Given that we know this, why isn't it relevant to force concessions in the short term *to the extent that this is possible*?

Because what you're preaching is the sort of gradualist reformism (Fabianism incarnate!) that has already been shown to not work, and the "concessions" it wins are partial sops, not substantive social gains.

How we transform the structural logic of the electoral space is a much more challenging question, and of course this entails questions of strategy at a level which goes way beyond the electoral (the production of a counter-hegemonic anti-austerity bloc) - I'm not talking about an electoral bloc in the first instance, but an ideological one.

"The structural logic of the electoral space" is already being transformed - arguably has already been transformed, but in such a way as to obviate the application of your strategy. Convince enough people for long enough that party democracy doesn't require internal democracy, and that carries through into everyday political life too, which makes the production of your "counter hegemonic anti-austerity bloc" problematic at best, impossible at worst, because those changes in structural logic have minimised your support base down to a residuum of activists.
BTW, "counter-hegemonic" is better stated using the words "anti-establishment".

In the medium term the deeper and more widespread the attempt to build the latter (and here is where the Peoples Assembly could play a role, although I'm certainly not saying it's fit for the purpose in terms of its organisation and structure) - together with the frustrations of a Labour government constrained by the demands of capital - is likely to raise opportunities which go beyond short term electoral lesser evilism.

It's no more likely to do so than it is to be realised.

 

[ViolentPanda]

How can non-Labour people assert their interests in this ideological bloc, if they know that it will lead to an electoral sidelining eventually?

By "voting Labour with no illusions" and/or joining the party!

 

[ViolentPanda]

My brain is actually beginning to hurt from trying to detangle what articul8 is trying to say

Just keep in mind that it always comes back to voting for Labour, and you'll be okay!

 

[sihhi]

The role of the unions is a vital mediating factor here too. The organised working class is both part of your "social movement outside" but it is also a real strucutral limit and presence within the party itself - disguised and weakened under Blair et al because cushioned by the relative prosperity and low industrial struggle of the period.

1 In what way will Miliband not behave like Blair when it comes to trade unions - 'keep sweet when they do what we say, isolate and attack if they don't'?

2 In what way will trade union behaviour be improved - in so far as TU-ism can block or put an obstacle against neoliberalism - by the anti-austerity vehicle you strategised as very important?

3 Will tying the anti-austerity vehicle to Labour as providing gains for the trade union movement, help or hinder that movement in acting against Labour beyond 2015?

 

[butchersapron]

I think what has changed this time is that "short term gains" can be misleading, what I'm really talking about is amelioration of the neoliberal programme Labour would otherwise be able to implement. It's not that there'll be much in the sense of positive gains (although I hope I'm wrong about this) but of important defencive holding off from aspects of an assault. This is not nothing - it's necessary. But the overall balance of forces and state of global capitalism means that in government Labour will find itself pushing back on this. The level of struggle inside and outside will amplify.


It's precisely this distinction which I find simple-minded. The Labour party has always been committed at one level to "the continuation of current social relations". But it has also dependend on its claim to represent the interests of ordinary people. Not since 1931 has there been such a diversion between these two ambitions, and therefore it is precisely the nature of this contradiction that makes Labour other than "just another neoliberal party". The role of the unions is a vital mediating factor here too. The organised working class is both part of your "social movement outside" but it is also a real strucutral limit and presence within the party itself - disguised and weakened under Blair et al because cushioned by the relative prosperity and low industrial struggle of the period. The unions are not just entirely co-opted elements of a neoliberal formation. There are stresses and tensions in this relationship that mean they are sites of struggle.

And he accuses me of believing in permanent "neoliberalism". You start off by saying that the party in govt can provide "small but important short-term incremental gains" - now you say that it can't. Is this to avoid the hole that you've dug for yourself with your previous assertion that past popular initiatives such as the NHS has created a measure of identification between the needs of the party and the class and the the possibility of "small but important short-term incremental gains" re-establishing or re-enforcing that identification contra your claim that all the w/c will find in labour is shattered illusions forcing it to go beyond them?

"But the overall balance of forces and state of global capitalism means that in government Labour will find itself pushing back on this." - so what you're saying is that once in power the labour party will impose neo-liberalism again. So the obvious answer is to help them into power and make a commitment to fight them when they do. I think one part of this plan isn't necessary and in fact hampers the other part. Can you tell which is which?

And no, that's not what you find simple-minded, it's that people can spot your confusion as you've sold it to yourself as sophistication, as strategy. This lat para, it repeats the same things that were said in 1951, in 64 and 66, in 74 and 83. This time its different. Its different each time isn't it. Yet the results are always always the same. Maybe there's some sort of structural reason for that, what do you think?

 

[butchersapron]

It's bonkers, it's like joining a pro-gravity party and arguing others should too.

 

[sihhi]

It's bonkers, it's like joining a pro-gravity party and arguing others should too.

Is there some connection with Hilary Wainwright's support of trade unions who tow the line like Newcastle?

Newcastle is another case in point. There, the workers’ and the community’s commitment to council services has been the basis for successful struggles to keep those services public and improve them in the process.

One of the trade unionists driving this process was Kenny Bell, who died this summer of cancer. His work as a highly effective and practical trade union leader with a radical strategic vision exemplifies how it is possible to bring together community and workplace organising.

In doing so he created with others – and he would be the first to stress the ‘with others’ – a newly political trade unionism, which Labour politicians came to respect and to support, not as the ‘industrial wing’ of the party but as a form of politics beyond their reach and yet essential to improve the lives and build the power of working people.

...

The point, though, is that Labour was supporting not a narrowly industrial agenda of the unions but an alternative rooted in the politics of public services. This was based on a level and kind of knowledge that was beyond the reach of the Labour Party on its own but whose implications it was willing to represent.

Labour in Newcastle are driving through very severe cuts backed by police body-searching the public as they do it.

 

[butchersapron]

a newly political trade unionism, which Labour politicians came to respect and to support, not as the ‘industrial wing’ of the party but as a form of politics beyond their reach and yet essential to improve the lives and build the power of working people.

Ugh, not-labour labour. This is Glasman's civic society stuff but firmly under the control and watchful eyes of those who need to be in control at all times.

 

[Louis MacNeice]

How can non-Labour people assert their interests in this ideological bloc, if they know that it will lead to an electoral sidelining eventually?

They can't . It is the Labour electoral tail trying to wag the working class dog; a situation that articul8 says can't be (and therefore shouldn't be?) challenged in the next couple of years. So its keep your heads down, get Labour back in and then we'll see the real work begin...neither inspring nor realistic.

Cheers - Louis MacNeice