The struggle
for an equitable and peaceful society
Arup Baisya
(Not to be
published)
Social order
The drive of
Neo-liberal economy and the rise of fascist forces worldwide are systematically
embedded twin evils that need to be combated for a new equitable and peaceful
society. Unlike the rise of Nazi Germany following Hitler’s Warmacht or ‘war
machine industrialization, the rise of fascism in India in its present phase is
in the backdrop of a ruling neoliberal ideology by which the Government has
assigned to themselves the role of a promoter, an agent of private
corporations, not one of regulating mediator between big business and poor
people. In the name of high growth, industrialization works ruthlessly against
the poor majority, denying them the real political options within the orbit of
our existing parliamentary democracy. The simmering discontent and popular
anger within the toiling masses have now become visible. The militant
resistance movement of the peasant masses against the large scale eviction or the
capitalist accumulation through displacement especially in the state like
Chattishgarh vis-a-vis central India, the peasant movement for MSP and for
implementation of Swaminathan Commission report is visible in large part of the
country. The curtailment of labour rights, the Dalit oppression, oppression of
the Tribal population, gender degradation, ecological degradation, curtailment
of minority rights, discrimination based on languages and nationality bring
forth passionate protests. But these movements are revolving around the idea of
reformism, not the overcoming of imperialism or the ushering of socialism. The
idea of laissez-faire capitalism is no longer valid; the global capitalism can
survive all its inherent contradictions in a dystopian world through genocide
and enslavement of populations. The attempt to go back to old form of
nation-state with certain control over economy is destined to fail in the face
of global movement of capital and neoliberal restructuring of capitalist
production and reproduction. Such social order can only exist on the basis of
fascistic mind control and the continuous exercise of daily police surveillance
and violence.
Nationalist struggle
The Experience of world-wide nationalist
struggle under the leadership of middle class in this neo-liberal phase teaches
us that such nationalism is destined to doom or degenerate into
intra-nationalists bickering. The revolutionary intellectuals in Gramscian
sense of the term will of course play a pedagogic role in instilling
nationalist world view which is directed against the hegemony of finance
capital post 1970s. The combined and uneven development is ingrained in
capitalism and as such nationalist struggle will prevail even if the drive for
homogenization of working class worldwide (Metropolis and Neo-colonies) is
visible due to structural adjustment of capitalist production (Combined
Development). Leninist principle which was formulated more than hundred years
back post-1905 teaches us that nationalism becomes reactionary if it is not led
by working class or from a working class perspective. This principle is more
relevant in today’s world where capitalist centers like America are facing the brunt
of capitalist restructuring. In colonial time, both capital and labour were
confined to national geographical space-time. Now industrial capital has fled
from place like Detroit and Pansylvania province to the destination of cheap
labour, and finance capital is flying with meteoric speed from one end of the
world to the other. The labour of capitalist metropolis is facing pressure of
decline of wages and the increasing reserve army of labour world-wide. But as
the movement of labour is somewhat restricted within the bounds of national geographical
space-time, the question of democratic struggle of nationalities (Communities
in general) is still the part of people’s movement. But this struggle must be
addressed from a working class and humanitarian perspective.
Workers’ status and struggle
When reserve army of labour crosses a
threshold, it creates downward pressure on wage and increases surplus which may
not be converted into profit due to realization problem arises out of limited
scope for capitalist expansion. It may be the fact that the reserve army of
labour has not yet crossed the threshold in US, but due to globalization of
capital, unlike colonial period, the US labour is facing the pressure of global
reserve army of labour. Globalisation of capital means globalization of
technology and that means globalization of skill of labour which is required
for production and reproduction of labour.
Every country is now witnessing the
phenomenal growth of the service sector along with the growing number of the
service sector workers. This holds good for India too. “The expansion of
capitalist service sector which typifies late capitalism thus in its own way
sums up all the principal contradictions of the capitalist mode of production.
It reflects the enormous expansion of socio-technical and scientific forces of
production and the corresponding growth in the cultural and civilizing needs of
the produces, just as it reflects the antagonistic form in which this expansion
is realized under capitalism : for it is accompanied by increasing
over-capitalisation (difficulties of valorization of capital), growing difficulties
of realization, increasing wastage of material values, and growing alienation
and deformation of workers in their productive activity and their sphere of
consumption.” (Working Class of India : New Situation – Problems and
Prospects : Sukomal Sen : P.547)
Whether this structural change of the
working class into the field of service connotes capitalist mode of production?
Quoting Marx and Braverman, Sukomol Sen in his book Working Class of India
wrote, “A service is nothing more than the useful effect of a use value, be it
a commodity, or be it labour. But the worker who is employed for producing
goods renders a service to the capitalist. And because of this service a
tangible and vendible object takes shape as commodity. But when the useful
effects of labour do not result in a vendible object then it creates a
different situation. Braverman’s explanation of these circumstances appears
quite logical. He states, ‘when this does not offer the labour directly to the
user of its effects, but instead sells it to capitalist, who re-sells it on the
commodity market, then we have the capitalist form of production in the field
of service.”
The resistance against the dismantling
of organized work force has failed. The drastic reduction of organized
workforce in the entire production centre is visible in all the Indian
industrial landscapes. The working class is fragmented spatially and temporally
in terms of work-status and social-status. The emergence of new class of
workforce in service sector is also characterized with fragmentation in terms
of their immediate demands of wage hike and social security. The disjointed
struggle of one section of workers or another are defeated with the shifting of
capital from one workplace to another and by nullifying the struggle through
the rapid centralization of capital. But the transformation of these new kinds
of industrial and informal working class and the transcendence of their
consciousness from fragmented one to class-in-itself to class-for-itself can
only be guaranteed through a united front of union struggle and the struggling
unity of worker-peasant movements.
An alienating consumerism is needed to
solve the dilemma of a sagging effective demand produced by wage repression and
technologically induced unemployment for the mass of the worker. After the
initial phase of neo-liberalism, the small section of upwardly mobile middle
class is alienated and subsumed into crass consumerism through high-technology-dependent
lifestyle. The rest of the large section of them is degraded into sub-human
status with long-hour monotonous jobs with below value earnings. Their need and
desire for a better life are modulated by the market values. The struggle with
an alternative vision from a working class perspective can only release their suppressed
ego and make this section a repository of revolutionary values for the entire
working class. But this section of the working class constitutes a small part
of the entire working class. The rest of the entire working class consists of
SC-ST-OBC-MINORITI AND WOMEN. The working class in India is divided in terms of
social status and differential wage and diverse working condition. But all are
exploited and expropriated and are crushed by the burden of crisis affecting
the entire capitalist system of the economy. This entire section of working
class has the potential to be transformed into revolutionary class provided the
trade union movement strike the right chord for the unity of fragmented working
class and become part of the politics of revolutionary transformation. The
demand for increased wage and the end of differential wage is an important
demand for the working class unity in the third world country like India. But
David Harvey in his book Seventeen Contradictions And The End of Capitalism rightly
explained why wage demand, in fact, do not undermine the rationality of the
economic system. He wrote, “Rational consumption – rational, that is, in
relation to perpetual capital accumulation – becomes an absolute necessity for
the survival of capital. Demands bearing on working hours, the intensity of
work, its organization and nature, are, on the other hand, pregnant with
subversive radicalism; they cannot be satisfied by money, they strike at
economic rationality in its substance, and through it at the power of capital.
The “market-based order” is fundamentally challenged when people find out that
not all values are quantifiable, that money cannot buy everything and that what
it cannot buy is something essential, or is even the essential thing.” (Page. 274).
Trade union movement in India should also incorporate this logic of going
beyond capital at least in certain long-hour monotonous jobs while
simultaneously fighting for wage hike, minimum wage and wage parity.
The Indian state, to some extent, maintained
its welfare character under pressure from unionized organized labour especially
of large sectors like Railways etc. These Railway workers have played vital
role in rejuvenating the left and anti-emergency movement in the 1970s. This
organized labour has already been dismantled in the neoliberal state of the
economy. The project to unite all the sections of ‘new proletariat’ or
‘precariat’ along with all the diverse social
movements may give rise to an effective force to transform the state or for transcendence
of capitalism. But this project does not catch the imagination of many for whom
this is a stupendous and long drawn out task, and the ruling class has the ample
space to play divisive game with fragmented workers. But one single key sector
of working class which holds the lifeline of the neo-liberal economy, if
organized for a democratic project, has the capacity to compel the state to act
in favour of the toiling masses, and this sector is the transport sector. The
transport workers travelling extensively and interacting with diverse people
imbibes somewhat secular values and develops necessary intelligence to become
bad or good, lumpen or rebel. Recent all India strikes of transport workers had
created ripple effect on the techno-managerial surface of the state.
Caste-community
and development
After a prolong phase of neo-liberal
policy drive and the shedding of welfare character of the state, the Dalit and
identity movements are resurfacing with a new dimension under the coercive
pressure from present NDA regime. More the working class of diverse oppressed
castes and communities is becoming assertive, more the section of organic
intellectuals are compelled to address the caste-community rights from a
working class perspective. The grass root pressure from below and the pressure
from the fascist concentration of power from above are giving rise to new
alignment and realignment of forces. The unity of SP and BSP in UP not only
indicates the electoral arithmetic, but also reveals the transformation of
feudal class division of labour between OBCs and SCs into the emergence of
homogenous working class across the caste groups. The more the caste-community and
class get woven seamlessly together, then the faster the fuse for revolution to
burn. The emergence of this new reality brings forth new issues for mass
struggle. The identity issue has primarily become intermingled with violation
of human and citizen rights issues. The resistance movement needs to be built
against state repression and caste-religious persecutions. The support to the
identity movement needs to be extended on the basis of the principle of equal
rights and dignity and right to self-determination. To develop the struggle for
the direct provisions through addition of use value in the area of housing,
health, education, food security instead of profit-maximising market driven
exchange value must be the revolutionary agenda against neo-liberal capitalism.
In addition to the worker’s-peasants issues of wage hike, social security and state
support for agricultural development, the resistance movement against land
acquisition and privatization and the movement for public and cooperative
ownership based production need to be the part of revolutionary agenda.
Amit Bhaduri in his book The Face You
Were Afraid To See cited some alternative desirable goal against growth-only
neo-liberal policy. He wrote “First, easy as it might sound, unemployment and
poverty can be eliminated within the foreseeable future. Second, by putting
purchasing power in the hands of hitherto destitute, the domestic market for
industrial products and basic needs can be developed, creating a fresh source
of healthy growth for industry and the macroeconomy. Third, through public
works programmes that the rural poor will execute, infrastructure (like roads,
irrigation etc) can be strengthened and expanded. Fourth, priority
environmental projects (such as watershed development, afforestation,
groundwater recharge and soil conservation) can be undertaken to stem and
reverse the worsening ecological crisis the country will face in the imminent
future. Finally, by generating employment in the countryside, the policy will
reverse the flow of distress migrants to the cities (saddled as they already
are with burdened infrastructure)” (Page. 174). This goal as public policy sounds
illuminating. This is somewhat a reversal of policy drive from neo-liberal to
welfare. But without severing the tie with global capitalist economy, reversing
to welfare state is not possible in this phase of neo-liberal economy when the
state is compelled to ensure the free movement of capital for annihilation of
space with time within the framework of combined and uneven development. Thus
the severing of tie with global capitalism necessitates the rise of working
class to the status of ruling class. So the rise of a revolutionary class with
democratic agenda and socialist development model can only ensure a paradigm
shift from neoliberal economy.
Fascism
This neo-liberal economic policy has
already set the stage for the rise of fascist forces. A constitutional
democratic state cannot survive when state takes the role of a promoter of
finance capital. The rise of fascism and the fascist takeover of the state are
dependent on the success of Hindutwa agenda of Sangh Parivar grasping the
masses and the electoral success of BJP in the forthcoming national hustings.
The immediate task to defeat fascism is to defeat BJP in electoral battle and
for which broad-based electoral unity of parliamentary parties is required. But
fascism of Sangh variety of Hindutwa has had a long gestation period; it emerges
as anti-liberal bourgeois mass-movement. So to defeat fascism in its entirety,
revolutionary unity and the unity of all democratic forces to build a mass
struggle on an alternative agenda of development beyond the growth oriented
neo-liberal development model and a people’s state with participatory democracy
is urgently needed.
Fascist ideology and patriarchy
The ideological struggle against rise of
fascism in India is basically a struggle against Hindutwa. This Hindutwa is a
transcendental variant of Hindu religion and as such it promotes patriarchy. As
the basic institutional unit that holds the value of Patriarchy is the family,
the transformation of family structure is an important aspect that hinders the
family to be repository of religious fascist values. This transformation of
family structure squarely depends on the nature of women’s domestic labour. The
term patriarchy was introduced by the feminist movement in 1970s. Socialist
feminists do not deny that the oppression of women is part of a system, but
they think the determinants of this system are to be found in capitalism. They
think that the system which oppresses women is at the base same as the one
which oppresses male workers. With the rise of fascist onslaught, the women’s assertions
are becoming more and more visible against patriarchal values. But it is still
confined in the ideological front and within the realm of enlightened educated
section of women. That this struggle against patriarchy has not yet percolated
down to the toiling masses is because of lack of materialist understanding of
the women’s movement and the all-pervasive misconception within the left.
Christine Delphy delved into this misconception in her book Close to Home : A
materialist Analysis Of Women’s Oppression, and she wrote, “For a long time
they refused any legitimacy to women’s struggle in the name of the supreme and
absolute pre-eminence of the economic over the super-structural, it being taken
for granted that the oppression of women belonged in the latter sphere and in
no way to the first, which was privately owned by the ‘working class’. It seems
that they have radically changed their battleground. Because women have invaded
the economic sphere, not in traditional Leninist fashion by becoming employed
more in the waged sector or by stressing their super-exploitation as ‘workers’,
but, on the contrary, by refusing any longer to accept that certain kinds of
labour and certain production – by a strange coincidence, theirs – are neither
labour nor producing. They have redefined the economic in such a way as to
include their exploitation. They say in the same breadth that they work and
that their work is exploited. The ‘discovery’ of housework cannot be
dissociated from the denunciation of its being unpaid. It could not be
discovered first as work and then as unpaid work. It had to be seen
simultaneously as work and unpaid work, i.e. exploitation…. Leftists can no
longer pretend to restrict women’s oppression to the super-structural, to
‘backward thinking’.”
Anti-imperialist struggle and ecology
A united protest movement of all
revolutionary and democratic forces against every form of imperialist
aggression and in support of anti-imperialist people’s struggles for
self-determination like Palestine needs to be built nation-wide. While opposing
and building resistance movement against ecologically destructive and
anti-people development through mass-displacement, we must build worldwide solidarity
movement to create pressure on developed nations to adhere to the spirit of
Kyoto protocol. We have only few short years to dramatically lower our
emissions to save our planet from climate change, global warming and resultant
all-out devastation. The global climate movement must up the ante of their only
rational demand – “polluter must pay”. The fossil fuel companies which are some
of the most profitable corporations in history, with the top five oil companies
pulling in $900 billion in profits from 2001 to 2010, are rich simply because
they have dumped the cost of cleaning up their mess onto regular people around
the world. The climate movement needs to be spearheaded against those
oligopolists to stop their misdeeds for making super-profit. The revolutionary
pedagogic task to enlighten the working class to stand for diverse
anti-neoliberal social movements and to build united action with all such
social forces needs to be undertaken.
Conclusion
For the left radicals, politics must be
the art of making the impossible possible and we have to overcome the old and
deep rooted error attempting to build political force without building the
social force, because this form of conceiving politics ignores the people and
their struggles. The debate on all strategic issues related to the radical
change of social relation of production should not be confined to small
revolutionary group(s), rather it should be made open to the public for wide
participation.
The left radicals must have a vision for
transcending capitalism. But emphasizing Rosa Luxemburg’s vision for the
future, Martha Harnecker wrote in her book A World To Build, “Rosa Luxemberg
never tired of repeating that the path to socialism was not laid down in
advance, since the “modern proletarian class does not conduct its struggle
according to any blueprint reproduced in a book or a theory; the modern
workers’ struggle is a part of history, a part of evolution, and we learn how
we should fight in the midst of history, in the midst of evolution, in the midst
of struggle” (Page. 177)
Reference :
(1) Harvey David :
2014 : Seventeen Contradictions And The End of Capitalism :Profile Books.
(2) Patnaik Prabhat
: 2012 : Re-Envisioning Socialism : Tulika Books.
(3) Sen Sukomol :
1997 : Working Class of India, History of Emergence And Movement 1830-1990
(With an overview upto 1995) : K.P.Bagchi & Company, Calcutta.
(4) Bhaduri Amit :
2009 : The Face You Were Afraid To See, Essays on Indian Economy : Penguin
Books
(5) Delphy Christine
: 2016 : Close to Home, A Materialist Analysis of Women’s Oppression : Verso
Books.
(6) Klein Naomi :
2015 : This Changes Everything : Penguin Books.
(7) Harnecker Marta
: 2015 : A World To Build, New Paths toward Twenty-First Century Socialism,
Monthly Review Press.
