For a New Labour Movement

Proposal of New Left Current (NAR) for a New Labour Movement.

A proposal for change the balance of forces in favour of the working class and open the way for radical social change, a new socialist and communist future.

To start with, here is some information on the trade union movement in Greece. Its structure is the following: primary level (trade union of the factory or the enterprise), secondary level (branch federations and trade union centers of a city or province) and on the top level two panhellenic confederations (one for the public and one for the private sector of economy). A very small number of working people participate in trade unions especially in the private sector. The official trade union policy is characterised by:

a) consensus to the neo-liberal policy of the government and the European Union, which dictate constant austerity, mass dismissals, privatizations, abolition of social benefits (social security, health services, education), flexible labour relations.

b) antidemocratic structure and function of the trade union movement, blocking all opposing voices, dependence on the state (through financing). In Greece it is very common for a professional trade unionist to become a politician, a member of the parliament or even a minister. The leaders of the big official trade unions are characterized by bureaucracy, basically due to the fact that they are far away from the places of work and production and also they haven’t’ work for a lot of years.

c) blackmailing and dividing policy whenever there is a strike or a struggle that starts from the working basis, with goals that exceed the line of the official trade union movement, a struggle which questions important aspects of the policy of the government and the capital. We have had such examples over the past few years during the strike of the public buses’ drivers, of the workers in the shipyards, of the high school teachers, of the doctors who work in public hospitals and of the municipality workers.

 

The biggest confederations and federations are “controlled” by the social-democrats (PASOK) and the conservative-right (New Democracy) and in some cases they function under the co-operation of them both with SYNASPISMOS (Reformist Left Party of the European Left). The Communist Party (K.K.E.) is also relatively strong in some big unions. The syndicates “controlled” by the Communist Party or those where the Commmunist Party majors have formed a Front (PAME) few years ago. However, this Front (PAME) functions and “accepts” only syndicates that implement and forward the policy of the Party. It keeps distances with any other union that does not agree with the Party and its policy and it does not forward a logic of class unity, which results into sectarianism.

 

N.A.R. that exists for 20 years, has managed to have a good access to places of work. Today it has representatives in dozens of trade unions all over Greece, mostly in the construction workers and technicians, accountants, teachers, municipality workers, shop assistants, telecommunication systems personnel, Airport staff, metal industry, bank clerks, book and paper workers, doctors and personnel in public hospitals, etc. We try to help set up left unities in places of work, together with other left revolutionary forces, to find active ways of common struggle with foreign workers, who come up to 1.000.000 in our country.

Our main purpose is the promotion of the unity of the radical left currents in every working place as well as the creation of permanent left unities that will intervene inside the unions. During the last year we try to establish a permanent nation-wide co-ordination among these left unities. Over the last years these steps that exceed the official institutions of the bureaucratic trade union movement have also led to successful independent rallies on the 1st of May, as well as successful strikes.

At the same time we try to establish a permanent center for the co-ordination of the unions and struggle committees that will organize the struggles, the initiatives and the conversations of the working people separate from the bureaucratic trade union movement. Based on that, since January of 2010, a co-ordination of base unions was created in Athens and later in other Greek cities, which is a significant power that was even able to organize strikes. This co-ordination of base unions was formed during the great struggles of the working people against the EU, the IMF, and all the barbaric measures imposed by the government, in the name of the capitalistic crisis. This co-ordination has managed during this strikes to gather a major part of the working people that wanted to resist, in contradiction to the bureaucratic unions, which – consenting to the governmental policy – wanted to de-escalate the struggles/strikes.


Despite all that, the general situation of the trade union movement is of course negative. The need for a New Labour Movement is not only dictated by our experience in Greece but also by what is happening in Europe, of which a very striking example is the recent struggle of the working classes of France, Germany, Italy, etc.
 
1. THE NEW LABOUR MOVEMENΤ VERSUS THE “OFFICIAL” TRADE UNION MOVEMENT
 
A basic question that has to be answered is the following: Why do we need a New Labour Movement? Why is a radical reconstruction of the labour movement necessary? We believe this is so for two reasons:

To start with, the current movement does not correspond to the demands of the struggle of the working people against the restructuring of the capitalist mechanism and social relations from all points of view (especially in the field of production), against the changes in the terms of class struggle, in the behaviour and the ways  the working class becomes radical nowadays. It does not correspond to the new features that the struggle of the working people should have, to the relation needed between economical and political struggle, on the grounds of the modern social contrasts, particularly of the conflict between labour and capital. It does not correspond to the crisis of the dominant political system and the new forms of political manipulation. All this forms a new background for class struggle. Not only from capitalism’ s point of view, as these changes also form a new labour class. This weakness of the official trade union movement is structural and does not only have to do with negative political balances. Therefore, it cannot be overcome without radically overcoming the current form of trade unionism.  

Seconly, the long-term domination on the labour and trade union movement (but also on the conscience of the working people) of the tendency of co-existence with capital (in its various forms- overt bourgeois, socialdemocrat, reformist-communist, false autonomist) has turned this movement into a political mechanism which is hostile to the working majority, has led it to a historical crisis and bankrupsy. The “help” that trade unions offer to the working people today has to do only with secondary issues.

As a result, what we need is not how to improve today’s trade union movement, nor how to change political balances, or balances between the parties within it. On the contrary what we need is a proposal for a radical reestablishment of this movement with criterio the new genuine interests of labour, a proposal which will help overcome the bourgeois-friendly trade unionism.

Therefore, what we need is a proposal for a new “campaign” of the tendency of emuncipation from capital, the rediscovery of terms such as labour needs and rights, the conflicting character of the interests of labour and bourgeois classes, the common uncompromising struggle, the unity of theory and practice, strategy and tactics.

Without such a proposal it is impossible to fight conservative and neoconservative politics and capitalist power successfully. Only with  such a proposal is it possible to intervene in the existing institutions of the trade union movement, as well. We must always keep in mind that intervening and working among the working people and on the basis of any militant moods really means being an opponent of the current official trade unionism. The fight to change negative political balances takes place first of all in the conscience of working people and not within the mechanisms and institutions.

When we talk about the “new labour movement” we must keep in mind an important truth: that its construction will be a process of co-existence and confrontation, unity and contrast of old and new elements of the labour movement. In every case, the precondition for the concept of a New Labour Movement to dominate is organising the independent presence of such an approach in the movement on the levels of activism, politics and ideology, starting today. For us it is not merely a matter of acting within the existing trade union movement or outside it. We combine our work within it, outside it and against it, with criterio the quest for a New Labour Movement (with its political content) and how it can dominate both within and outside it, that is in the conscience of the working people.

 This unity and confrontation (“within” and “outside”) is not a political trick. It is based on the way society moves, on the historical development of the working class. It is based on the fact that in every conscience both the tendency of emuncipation and revolution and the tendency of submission coexist at the same time. The proposal for a New Labour  Movement wants to reinforce the former tendency, to make it dominant on political and economical struggle, on the level of trade unionism and politics, for people who are within and outside the official trade union and political system. We hope to bring to light the immediate labour goals and work for a quality transformation of these goals and struggle, to make them conscious confrontation with capital. This means today uncompromising resistance to the conservative policy of the employers, of the governments, of the European Union, of NAFTA and so on, but it also means fighting back successfully in the perspective of social liberation.

 
2.  POLITICS AND UNITY IN THE NEW LABOUR MOVEMENT
 
Our attempts for the creation of a New Labour Movement are based on our general concept for the need of a “Anticapitalist Labour Front ” in society and on the immediate political goal we have set, that is the creation of a left radical political current, which will be confronting the bourgeois political domination, creating delays, cancellations of basic options of the capitalists and the EU. This political current will also have to be hostile to the compromised “left” forces and bring to light the need of anticapitalist revolution today.
As a result, we do not believe “the party is responsible for the political struggle and the trade unions for the economic struggle”. On the contrary we claim that the left radical front is the political struggle for economic and social problems, the needs and rights of the working majority and their link to the general political movement for the demolition of capitalist domination. We also believe that the struggle for the problems is the centre and not the wrapping paper of our political action, it is the basic direction and not the precondition for the conscience of working people to mature politically. By using the term “economical struggle” we refer to the struggle for immediate goals (which contradict the philosophy of neoconservatism). By using the term “political struggle” we refer to the struggle which exceeds the limits of the isolated place of work and goal and confronts the bourgeois order, claiming measures of general social value in the prospect of clashing with the existing social relations which are based on exploitation. So, our way of thinking is completely different both from the logic of the traditional Left (the communist party or the front organisations in which it participates exercise politics) and from the logic that politics is a matter for “spontaneous autonomous action of the working people” (we refer to the supposedly non-political autonomy).

Another important issue that is related to the new labour movement is that of the unity of the working class. This problem is extremely important, especially today, because of the fact the class has been divided in the field of production to such an extent that the terms of labour relations are different for every worker and many various new sections have been created. We believe that the new unity of the working people will be a unity not of uniform sections but of differentiated sections of the class. So, it can only be based on the strategic elements that unify the class in its conflict with the capital (its relation to the means of production, paid labour, its position in labour allocation, who is in power, etc). This unity will be based on long-term political goals rather on immediate economic goals. It will be a genuine political unity of the class itself and not of the parties which would like to “represent” it.

Therefore, our proposal is one of unity and confrontation. Unity of the class with a radical, liberating content, unity of the conscious sections of the class between them and with the working class in general, unity of economic, political, ideological struggle, unity of the different and isolated struggles, unity of the national and international elements, unity of today’s situation with tomorrow’s liberating prospect. Confrontation  and segregation on a political, ideological and structural level of a minority perhaps but visible pole in the labour movement and the society, which will act in the prospect of a New Labour Movement.

 
3. WHAT WILL DETERMINE OUR ATTEMPTS
a)  Goals :
We promote goals that confront the policy of the capitalists, the EU and the government, that combine resistance to the social war (that is, not to allow things to get any worse) with the demand for a change in the relation of exploitation (that is, to improve the position of the class economically and socially), with the need for a clash with central or secondary issues and all that in the perspective of internationality and communist horizon (liberation from paid slavery nationally and internationally).
·    Economical goals : The central idea is the struggle for one salary that will meet the demands of a decent modern life, one salary that a worker will be able to live on.  ( without overtime, second job, productivity bonuses, etc). Secondly, we fight for the abolition of all kinds of taxation (direct or indirect). Only the capitalists and their state must be burdened with the cost of reproducing labour (free social welfare). We fight against increases in prices and services, against austerity and neoliberalism.

·    Goals that have to do with labour relations : We believe in the establishment of the workers’ control over the type of products-services produced, over the type of production and its rythms, over labour relations (relations with the capitalists and between the workers themselves). All that in the context of resistance to flexible labour relations, to intensification, to individual negotiations and submission.

·   Goals that have to do with working hours : We promote the idea of 30 working hours a week ( in the prospect of a further decrease of this number) with an increase in salaries, 5 days a week and 6 compact working hours a day. We demand that the real free time increases, as well as the periods of vacations and that maximum retirement age should be 55.

·  Goals that have to do with unemployment : The central idea is “less work-work for everyone” (in the way described above). Creation of an unemployment fund financed exclusively by capitalists and taxation of the profits of the capitalists. Abolition of dismissals, and for those who are already unemployed full medical and social security and unemployment allowance which will equal a salary, without prerequisites.

·    Privatisations : Struggle against all forms of privatisations (directly and indirectly) and against the application of criteria of profit on the public sector of economy. Radical reconstruction of the public sector not according to the plans of the state but in the interest of the social majority.

·   Goals that have to do with the life of the working people after work : Health, social security, education, culture and environment cannot be guided by the laws of free market. We fight against the tight control over these sectors of the capitalists, the EU and the governments.

·   About the foreign workers (financial immigration) : We promote the demand for full equal social, political and cultural rights against their double and triple exploitation, against discriminations, racism, xenophobia and limitations.

·   About democratic liberties : We fight against the complex economical, politcal, ideological and cultural mechanisms of control, oppression and manipulation of human conscience, thought and activity, against authoritarianism and supression of the state, the EU and the employers.

 
b) Other basic prerequisites except for the goals are :
·    The ideological equipment for answering back the myths of bourgeois ideology (the myths of “national economy”, “development”, “modernisation”, priority of economical facts and figures over people, “the free market is the only way”)
·    The forms of the struggle must activate and unify the working class basis, they must fight  bureaucracy, they must fight the logic of “representatives” and “foremen”, they must last and be uncompromising till the end.

·    The structure of the trade union movement: emphasis should be given  to the places of work and workers’ unities in the basis, which will unify the workers and not the executives or managers. A matter of strategic importance is the coordination of these unities of the workers and of their struggles. The centre of the trade union movement must be the worker himself and we must limit the  authorities of the trade union boards and parties.

·    The prerequisite for a New Labour Movement is its independence. To start with, political independence, which ,means that the labour movement exercises politics from, for and with working people, which after all means that the working class “must become a class for itself”. Secondly, economical and structural independence. So we must abolish all laws and measures that link the trade unions with the state or the EU and the employers. We are against all institutions of class reconciliation and “common responsibility”. All allowances to the trade unions from the state and the employers must be banned as well as any judicial right and intervention in the functions of the trade unions and the strikes.