Date: Thu, 20 Feb 1997 00:34:58 +0200 (SST)
From: RICHARD PITHOUSE <pithouse-AT-pixie.udw.ac.za>
Subject: Re: M-G: Re: M-I: Marxists in unions (fwd)



Hi

I sent this through 12 hours ago and it didn't get through so I'm 
resending it. Apologies if anyone gets subjected to it twice. Its nothing 
profound but this issue is important and it would be very interesting 
to see more debate and discussion on this theme.

Richard

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Wed, 19 Feb 1997 12:38:54 +0200 (SST)
From: RICHARD PITHOUSE <pithouse-AT-pixie.udw.ac.za>
To: marxism-general-AT-jefferson.village.Virginia.EDU
Cc: marxism-international-AT-jefferson.village.Virginia.EDU,
    marxism-general-AT-jefferson.village.Virginia.EDU
Subject: Re: M-G: Re: M-I: Marxists in unions


> >Godena wrote: 
> > I wrote in this forum last fall that unions,  *as such*,  were wholly
> > incompatible with a Marxian revolutionary program,  but were, on the
> > contrary,  indispensable to strengthening capitalism in its twilight era.

In the West yes. In the South perhaps not.

> > It is not that workers are docile or counter-revolutionary

>From an African perspective Western workers generally do appear to be
counter-revolutionary. Aside from a few isolated moments (like international
solidarity against apartheid) the Western worker appears very happy to
defend his/her position of relative privilege in the new world order. The
Western working class was always happy to defend colonialism militarily
and now appears to be happy to defend the new world order by taking a
a conservative stance toward immigration, demanding protection of Western
jobs etc, etc. 

> > I am struck by how little,  fundamentally,  has changed.    The occasional
> > "Leftist" or "Socialist" is tolerated,  even, good naturedly,  celebrated on
> > the lower rungs of the trade union leadership ("Communists" are still
> > outside the pale).    But the basic union program -- embraced by virtually
> > all workers,  whether service or manufacturing -- is still,  and will remain
> > so,  solidly right-wing social democratic.   

and supportive of global apartheid and of their position of relative 
privilege in the new world order. (aka global apartheid)

Workers in Russia or China may
> > have had nothing to lose but their chains.     Western workers -- whatever
> > their exogenous situation -- have a good deal more than that to lose,  and
> > they don't want to lose it.  

I know that others on this list disagree with this position but this is 
also the way that things strike me.

> > Those who prefer a reality grounded in the here in now will demur to other
> > types of activity.

What might these be?

DAVE WROTE:

>  Speak for yourself and for the priviledged layer of US labor 
> aristocrats. Do not speak for the workers of the world. 

The workers and peasants of the world have no voice. Western workers use
their (small) voice to defend their relative privilege. I still don't know
where we should be going from here but I do know that "workers of the
world" is a problematic concept. In the eyes of third world workers
western workers live lives of unimaginable privilge. Similarly third world
workers live very different lives to the vast numbers of third world
unemployed (60% in some cities) and to the millions of peasants. Even in 
South Africa there is growing talk of how the "labour aristocracy" are 
selfishly preventing job creation by keeping wages "artifically high".
A South African worker is much worse off than a Western worker but even a 
South African worker appears privileged, even rich, to the army of 
unemployed. I don't know how we go forward but I strongly suspect that 
fetishising the myth of a global working class who are uniquely 
oppressed and who share a common interest in change is not the way forward.

Richard Pithouse
Durban



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