(Honored to have writing like this posted to Green Mass Group. This is the type of conversation and self-evaluation the Green movement needs to be having. – promoted by eli_beckerman)
Very few people exercise power in our society. Its exercised by those with wealth, with prestige, with titles, with access to administrative and bureaucratic levers. The semblance of democracy, each person having equal voice and votes, is made naught by the hierarchies entrenched in all other spheres of social and political life.
The rights, freedoms, and powers everyday people have today involved a history of collective confrontation, conflict, and struggle. And just to say it, Massachusetts people and places have had great prominence in this country’s movements for independence, abolitionism, woman’s suffrage, civil reform, worker’s rights, environmentalism, and many more.
In the midst of this awful recession, its time for people to start exercising their power. And when people unite for a common and just purpose, its difficult for them to fail. I think the fist above can be seen to represent vibrant and diverse struggles for justice, democracy, and freedom, grounded in an understanding of ecology and the wider natural world our society inhabits. A Green-Rainbow.
More below…
Of course this stuff has been weighing on me for awhile. To provide some context for the rest of my spiel, here’s a sampling of views recently commenting on the non-existence of political or popular mobilization and action to combat the wreckage of this recession:
Eric Alterman, writer at The Nation
As the journalist Harold Meyerson rightly observes, thinking of both the New Deal and the civil rights reforms of Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society, “In America, major liberal reforms require not just liberal governments, but autonomous, vibrant mass movements, usually led by activists who stand at or beyond liberalism’s left fringe.” Many activists had great hopes for a partnership with the Obama administration after the election. Instead, as Michael Tomasky writes in the current issue of Democracy, “We’ve experienced the greatest economic crisis since the 1930s, and the only mass movement to emerge from that reality is a right-wing populist one.”
Brad Delong, Professor of Economics UC Berkley
Why aren’t there irresistible political demands for more government action to steer us toward a better economic recovery –or at least to hedge against a double-dip in what seems likely to be called not a “recession” but a “depression” when historians get around to writing about it?
I have my theories:
1. widening wealth inequality and an upgrading of the class position of reporters and pundits, who are no longer ink-stained wretches immersed in mainstream America;
2. the collapse of union power, which ensures that nobody who sees real workers on a daily basis sits at the table when the deals are made;
3. increasing job security for the powerful in Washington, aided by the growth of the lobbying apparatus that envelops the mixed-economy government;
4. the collapse of professional integrity among the Washington press corps, which no longer dares to call balls and strikes as it sees them, preferring to say only that the Democrats say it was a strike and the Republicans say it was a ball, and that opinions on the shape of the earth differ.
David Moberg, senior editor at In These Times
Unemployment in the United States currently hovers at 10 percent, and more than 17 percent if involuntary part-time and discouraged job-seekers are included. And according to most forecasts, it is likely to remain above pre-crisis levels for at least three years. In good times, the economy might generate 400,000 new jobs each month. Today, the United States needs about 15 million jobs to make up for recession losses, population growth and labor force drop-outs.
It may soon need more. Hundreds of thousands of teachers, and city and state workers could be out of a job as a result of budget crunches. The Euro zone crisis could spread to the United States, and a weaker Euro will hurt U.S. exports. The 2009 stimulus money will be largely spent by later this year, eliminating a source of jobs.
Despite record numbers of people being out of work for six months or more, the Obama administration and conservative Democrats in Congress-spooked by Republican hysteria about deficits and “big government”-are failing to address this crisis.
These guys agree on the political end that the Obama administration is not doing enough to end the suffering in this recession (Duh!). And similarly they see a huge gap in the potential and reality of social movement pressure.
To take a slight tangent, two of the writers specifically point to unions, either union’s loss of power over time or their failure to exercise what power they have. I know there are green-types who are not keen on unions, because 1) Sometimes some unions favor economic over environmental concerns 2) Sometimes some unions favor economic over community concerns.
The key here is “sometimes and some unions”. To me this is like blaming immigrants for the low wages, safety net costs, and bad working conditions employers impose on them with their greed and disrespect. The shared enemy is concentrated corporate and political power in the hands of a few.
In any case, what’s being pointed out here is that if unions do more worker organizing and internal capacity building they will be able to better fight for economic justice for everyone. And that kind of social unionism, rank-and-file and in solidarity with community, faith, and environmental groups, is what will win on all fronts.
To use the fist metaphor further, the fingers of the fist are different movements, identities, and communities. Social unionism would be a finger on that fist. Perhaps five fingers will not do justice for the broad potential movements and issues, but the message is conveyed very humanly. Working together, movements create solidarity, power, and vision. Very importantly, with the fist and fingers they form an organic and interconnected whole.
Many actual movement coalitions are not organic or thoroughly interconnected. They are pragmatic and based on a small amount of overlapping interests between organizations. Its a recipe for small incremental steps forwards, backwards, and sideways. It can only temporarily or minimally challenge concentrated and centralized power in our society.
Making our social lives more just, democratic, and free means challenging the current constellation of power. And if you are in it to compromise, well you are going to compromise those values. So it stands to reason that in order to win and not compromise would require building power. Of course you’ll be pragmatic in this exercise, but by being realistic you would also be true to your values. Thus my title referring to grassroots organizing and militancy.
To return somewhat to the quotes, what exactly do they prescribe for building popular power? Some of it focuses on movement building, but a lot of it focuses on the Democratic Party.
In my opinion, the Democratic Party is a kind of cast or handcuff or other barrier on the fist. Its a false and hopeless strategy that actually weakens solidarity and vision. The victories attributed to Democrats historically are for most part compromises they made with independent popular movements whom had their own resources and electoral wings. Most of the progressive policy in existence came from and was campaigned on by Populists and Socialists long before alliances of progressive/moderate Republicans and Democrats passed it watered down.
Our two parties are not organic and interconnected wholes, they’re tools of power united and divided in our history by pure sectional interests. On the national level, a Democratic President and Democratic Congress have ground down and ridiculed every promise made in their campaigns and platforms. In Massachusetts, we have had a Democratic governor and 50 plus year controlled Democratic legislature largely favor those with wealth, those with power, and those largely unscathed by this recession.
It might be obvious that I am implying that the fist is in fact the Green-Rainbow Party. Well yeah. Or it could be. Electoral action must unite disparate interests (to form a majority or consensus) and the values and principles of the GRP do so in a way that recognizes and respects each movement’s, each identity’s, each community’s contribution and perspective.
There’s a lot of work here to make what I just said a reality. But the potential and the energy and the spirit, its all there. To have someone like Jill Stein, a lifelong public advocate and doctor who in her own life and work has thoughtfully connected issues like health, environment, and community, be our gubernatorial candidate, is an honor.
Rick Purcell, Nat Fortune, Scott Laugenour, Mark Miller. I would write out things for you as well (because they are all as deserving) but I do not want to sound too sentimental yet.
As others have said, we are in the middle of the second worst downturn since the Great Depression. If people today are to match their forebears, then much is still required. Even if all the GRP’s candidates were elected, there would still need to be a popular movement pushing for its agenda actively. The internal organizing would need to suggest that this start, no matter what November brings, is the beginning of far greater mobilization and electoral activity for the future.
Militancy, as in not being afraid to challenge authority and power, is required. Again, not militancy for its own sake, but militancy that wins people dignity, self-empowerment, and the respect and understanding of the wider community. Budget cuts, environmental disasters, union busting, foreclosures, and the rest, yeah there’s plenty of opportunities for some well placed militancy and broad community action.
I will end this post by saying I think the basic idea I am suggesting here does not require an elaborate theory or a complex understanding of today’s world (though I could provide it). Its commonsense and most people recognize its truth deep down. How can I be free whilst everyone else is in chains? How can I be happy while others suffer injustice? Am I not tied intimately to the fates of other people and the fate of the natural world?
#
My own theory: it’s the bread and circuses. It doesn’t matter that Obama “hasn’t done enough” to alleviate suffering. People can afford BigMacs and even the poor have, if nothing else a flat panel TV and cable; the rest of the population has iPhones and laptops and every other digial gizmo under teh sun to ensure that they never need have a moment of silence, a moment of reflection; and that they never feel angst or rage (oh, throw in mass dependence on psychotropic pharmaceuticals, since even “anger” is now pathologized!)–there’s always some form of amusement there to carry them away from the grim realities.
They have enough bread and they have non-stop fucking three-ring circus available to them at every moment with the click of button.
Yep, I blame the media. Not the news media per se, but the all-ecompassing media sphere in which we all live now, each is his or her own mediated reality, the society of the spectacle come to life.
Because THAT’s what we have to compete with. To ever win hearts and minds, being right isn’t enough. having integrity isn’t enough–we literally have to be MORE AMUSING AND ENTERTAINING than anything else. Otherwise? I’m off your Facebook page, I’m flipping from your YouTube ad, I’m clicking away from your “statement.” I can watch Oakland Raider games from the glory years of the late 60s, Mott the Hoople videos, or read Dickens at any given moment of every given day. Want my attention? Do better than that.
Who does it? Presidential candidates–because we’re wildly entertained by the Rev Wright, Hillary’s breakdown, Sarah Palin, and, of course, John-and-Reille-and Liz. Who doesn’t? Coakley and Capuano–what a dismal freaking turnout. Brown, on the other hand, was entertaining. Here’s Scott naked. Here’s Scott in a pick up.
Politics has been trivialized beyond belief because we’ve flattened everything out–in the media stream, the oil spill and Iron Chef, Lady Gaga and Nancy Pelosi, Deval Patrick and LeBron James all swim together, and we move from emotion to emotion–we want to be appalled by the oil covered ducks, but not for too long, so it’s off to be shocked and titallated by Lada Gaga; but nothing is more important than anything else, because it’s al mediated, all packaged and canned by experts who know what people REALLY want.
So being ardent and sensible and dedicated and sincere and right only gets you so far. It will attract people who watch “Greater Boston,” who read the Globe cover to cover, who already give a shit. But to reach the others, you have some serious competition.
I don’t know what the answer is. My fear is it’s only going to get worse.
On the plus side, the more apathetic the masses grow and the smaller the really interested people are, the more a small but committed group can slip in the back door–especially in lower key, lesser publicized mid term type races that no one’s paying much attention to.
Whic is, admittedly, not exactly what we mean by participatory democracy. But you exploit what you can, I guess. The deck isn’t simply stacked against the GRP or any other third party–these days, reality itself holds the dead man’s hand.
#
Now that you brought up cultural studies, I can start throwing down some names. Assume we are stuck in Weber’s “cage” or in yucky power/knowledge thing Foucault talks about, or Althusser’s ideological state apparatuses, or Adorno’s dialectic of enlightenment, blah blah blah (I am badly twisting the meanings but follow along). You need some kind of impulse, mechanism, or motivation that can counter or transform those types of all consuming processes.
IMHO, social solidarity and a commitment to democracy, freedom, and justice will do the trick. (Going into this further would require a longer philosophical tangent, but I think they can be arrived at by different means. They are a part of an overlapping consensus which can be reached in various philosophical, religious, and cultural traditions. Thus I say at the end of my post that they’re commonsense, and can be expressed simply, “Are you actually free whilst everyone else is in chains?” or perhaps even as the golden rule)
Something that cannot be recuperated, commercialized, or co-opted in its essence. Non-market values. Bringing together movements that oppose segments of the hierarchy of power in our society together into a counter-power whole.
Amusements, psychotropics, and escapism do not mean there is no suffering. Being able to buy junk and waste time with it does not make up for the loss of dignity, meaning, love, and creativity in our society. And yeah, your income, skin color, ethnicity, gender identity, language, sexual orientation, age, and all other categories of social stratification affect the extent of that suffering and how it is dealt with. That mutual anguish is channeled, blocked, projected through all our means of mediated reality.
I suggest it be channeled elsewhere, like into that fist.
My post did not talk about execution or how to accomplish my set of suggestions. Your bread and circuses is a means and process, not a core of political principles. I could be an anarchist, fascist, or technocrat and still succeed in this environment by discovering the right kind of levers and messaging. Even Lady Gaga intermixes her spectacle with pro-sexuality and pro-gay politics. So I do not take it as a substantial objection, its a set of conditions one needs to take into account when proposing an actionable strategy.
So let me say that every public relations tool, every stupid commercial platform, every means of brand building, every means of securing funding, and every blueprint for building popular involvement and loyalty, is on the table in my mind. As long as it fits into whole which is against, counter, or contrary to the existing constellation of power.
And there are differences between compromises from weakness and retreat, and compromises that build strength and momentum. Differences between relying on tactics used by our opponents to play their game, and mixing some of their tactics with counter-tactics on our part to mess the game up.
And it depends on the context of the challenge. Winning electoral races requires a different set of tactics and strategies than building membership or winning on an issue campaign. Because there are like 200 years of history concerning third parties, reform movements, revolutions, and popular agitation and resistance, I believe you need a pretty strong core of values to sustain something that will not get easily recuperated, commercialized, or co-opted.
Here by the way are some tactical examples which if executed together might lead to some movement building:
Fund-raising: Door-to-Door, dues based membership, merchandising, public financing, in-kind trading of resources with allies, blah blah
Membership building: Street canvassing, presentations to issue groups, college organizing, event sponsorship, street art, social network coordination, blah blah
Electoral races: large numbers of small donations, volunteers, making use of free and cheap media, “blanket the Commmonwealth”, town meeting and city council races, municipal platforms and ordinances connecting issue group allies, blah blah
Issue activism: press releases and public support for actions, championing a few pieces of legislation and asking members to push for its adoption, publicly identifying at actions and coalition meetings, blah blah
Now most of this is either not actionable or is being done already in some capacity. And the consideration of the stuff that is not being done, needs to wait at least until the end of signature collection. That’s how crucial it is at this moment. Signature collection may not be glamorous but it certainly involves enough coordination and mobilization of people to be the basis for further organizing. You have to play with the hand your dealt and make the best of it. Reality has had a way of bending in the face of political and social organizing anyhow.
#
and the party needs to practice movement building. It’s happening. I saw it in Detroit with my own eyes. I saw it on the streets of Boston with my own eyes.
Anyone who went to the US Social Forum and then the Green Party national meeting could see the difference. The former might be short on coherent, overarching platform statements that have the backing of all participants… but you couldn’t help but notice an emerging movement to build a compassionate and sane world. My first Green national meeting, on the other hand, felt quite the opposite. Don’t get me wrong — there were signs of vitality there, but no evidence of movement building, no evidence of an open, welcoming, or nurturing institution that could be a vehicle for movement building.
It was an interesting experience — disheartening and clarifying, paralyzing and mobilizing. I saw the reality of the Green Party in the United States in 2010 and it looked bleak. But when it comes down to it, the Green Party is still there, despite a playing field that is kicking its ass and making it no difficult chore for our actual opponents to beat us further into the muck.
And there were dozens of dedicated people who were plugging forward with the best intentions, trying to keep a dying party alive because it was important to them. There were signs of hope literally juxtaposed with signs of severe dysfunction and hypocrisy. The Black Caucus walked out just as the party was showing off its new organizing kit. The organizing kit is a nice leap forward. But it’s almost as if the party insiders didn’t care that the only organized group of people of color at its national meeting were blatantly disrespected and rightfully feeling aggrieved.
But the party’s still there, and the woman most visibly offended by her caucus’ mistreatment was elected to be one of the national co-chairs. That the party is still here, and not dependent on a celebrity for its existence, is a strong sign. There are a million reasons for the party to be D-U-N DUN. Not the least of which are the “200 years of history concerning third parties, reform movements, revolutions, and popular agitation and resistance” that you mention.
It’s very clear to me that party infighting over the Naders, Cobbs, Benjamins and McKinneys of the Green Party’s attempts at being relevant nationally –not just these 4 individuals and their personalities, but all of the various strategies and priorities and values that shake out differently among the various efforts behind them — have done great harm to the party’s ability to work together to build a growing AND strengthening political movement. There’s a shit-ton of mistrust, and bad experiences, and power grabs, and insiders speaking on behalf of the party as a whole. But a whole bunch more of good people who hope to build common ground and agreed upon strategy to thoughtfully take the Green Party to the next level. It’s just hard for that silent super-majority to build party-wide coherence, when the party culture is so insular and uninviting. The yawning gap between the party’s values and its practices will be its undoing if there will be one. Maybe a generational repackaging of its values is needed. There’s a smell of “old” when reading the 10 key values. 20th century ahead of their time but not 21st century ahead of their time. Should they be unchanging dogma or living thoughts that can be improved upon and updated as needed?
But more simply, I’ll repeat here something that I say maybe a little too much… that it all comes down to Rosa Clemente’s point… that the Green Party is not just an alternative, it’s the imperative. Personally I think that’s WHY the Green Party is still here. I think that’s why a bunch of us fought through an ugly period to see that our state party here did not descend into dysfunction, insularity, and infighting. The infrastructure isn’t there, but neither is the crap that made it so hard… truly embarrassing… to invite people to a meeting.
With that said, the movement building that I saw on the streets of Boston recently was being led by various social movement organizations as well as some Marxist political organizations. Now is our time for relevance. The oil is hitting the fan. If we don’t learn how to organize now, to movement-build now, when will we?
#
Ok, so I will go out and get some apolitical young people I know to fill up all our committees…
That cannot be what you mean. You are talking about getting young people to vote and identify Green.
And I certainly do not mean “I only want the .00001 percent of the young population who knows the difference between libertarian Marxisms and orthodox Trotskyism to join this cadre…”
My original post is addressed to organizers and activists, people who know the score already. But by addressing that group I am not ignoring or blowing out of existence the regular voters and youth “leaders” who have influence opinion but are not all that politically involved. Non-voters, voters, and people who hold sway over others’ opinions. Bringing them aboard is the only way to affect social change.
There is strategy and reflection on practice, and then there is execution. Like with sig gathering or ordinary youth organizing I do not give a set of unassailable reasons and anecdotes, I listen, I give a concise and simple pitch, and am just down to earth.
Different strokes for different folks. Legalize weed, make college more affordable, be good on the environment, have some credible ideas on job creation, don’t be racist/sexist/homophobic. Great we already agree on that crap, we just need to get the message out. Perhaps my rainbow fist is not eye grabber you would like, well there’s enough design and illustrative talent to be tapped to make something snazzy and flashy enough to get youth attention.
And yes, having some youth activists/organizers would help with building a network of young people who want to vote GRP. You want to use old activists/organizers to build a youth network?