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A Look @ Socialist Action's 20 Years
By Michael Schreiber
Following is the presentation by Socialist Action Editor Michael
Schreiber
to the Jan. 31 rally marking the 20th anniversary of this newspaper.
The
speech has been slightly edited for publication.
I am honored to represent Socialist Action at this important milestone
of
our history. I would like to thank the speakers and each one of you for
participating—and for your dedication in enduring these hard seats at
this
late hour of the evening!
It is a privilege for me to be at the podium with Lynne Stewart and the
many
other activists that you have heard. It’s good that despite any
differences
we may have in our political perspectives, we can still unite in order
to
win the goals that we share.
This is an important occasion. It was 20 years ago—to be specific,
December
1983—that the first issue of Socialist Action entered the arena as a
revolutionary working-class newspaper written by and for activists in
the
struggle.
For younger people in this room, 20 years may seem like a very long
time;
for some of you, it is a lifetime. But as you get on in years (at
least, I
have found), 20 years has a knack of going by very quickly. It is only
in
rare commemorations such as this that it is possible to take a moment
to
look backwards, and to reflect fully upon what was accomplished.
In this way, we can appreciate that every month without fail, Socialist
Action newspaper has been produced and read by activists in this
country and
around the world. To date, we have put out 241 monthly editions of
Socialist
Action. That doesn’t count the occasions, such as during both Gulf
wars,
when we produced two separate editions a month—in effect, converting
our
paper into a biweekly. And during these 20 years, we have sold well
over
half a million single copies.
Socialism dead?
Despite this, we all know that this accomplishment will provide an
occasion
for smirks and chuckles from people in some quarters: "What? They are
celebrating socialism, of all things? Don’t those people know that
socialism
is dead?"
That’s the kind of commentary we might read, I am sure, in the pages of
our
commercial competitor, the San Francisco Chronicle, if they had
bothered to
send a correspondent to tonight’s rally.
Twenty years ago, to be sure, these pundits (and even more the
ruling-class
circles that their publishers represent) considered the idea of
socialism
more of a threat than what they have had to contend with recently. The
Stalinist leadership of the Soviet Union, although they had long ago
converted the country into a bureaucratic police state, still
masqueraded
under the guise of being the inheritors of the program of the 1917
socialist
revolution.
But flash forward a mere decade later, the Soviet Union had fallen. And
China’s Communist Party leadership—having recently slaughtered workers
and
students demonstrating for socialist democracy—embarked on a program to
privatize the country’s economy while, under the slogan of "enrich
yourself," building a system of sweatshops in which workers received
mere
pennies a day.
Under those international circumstances, the White House let it be
known
that they had finally vanquished the Soviet Evil Empire. At the same
moment,
this country’s core of housebroken professors, historians, and
economists
were given the stage in order to interpret their glorious deed. And,
thus
encouraged, these intellectuals pronounced the verdict that socialism
itself
had been given a mortal blow, rather than admitting the fact that it
was
merely the Stalinist mockery of socialism that had died.
They proclaimed the eternal supremacy of capitalism in general and
American
capitalism in particular—and with the same finality with which the
White
House had announced at the time I was born that the 20th century was
henceforth to be renamed "the American Century."
But there was a problem that the current apologists for U.S. capitalism
chose to neglect. The "century" of unchallenged American economic
dominance
(short lived as it was; lasting perhaps 30 years) had been proclaimed
in
1945 when Europe lay in ruins and Japan, already prostrate, had been
nuked
into ashes—and U.S. capital was ready and willing to build those
countries’
infrastructures once again. In the 1990s, on the other hand, the
picture for
capitalism was not quite so rosy, either in the United States or
elsewhere.
And today, now that the speculative bubble of the last decade has
turned
into a bust, the structural deficiencies of capitalism have become far
more
evident. As the bosses find it difficult to make a profit in the
current
arena of saturated markets and worldwide competition, they must either
scramble to outdo the competition by retooling their industries with
more
efficient equipment (thus laying off workers) or close their doors
altogether.
The bosses’ constant campaign for more "productivity" in manufacturing
can
be glimpsed in the fact that from 1979 to 2000, U.S. factory output
nearly
doubled while the number of manufacturing jobs fell by 2.3 million. In
the
current three-year recession, another 2.8 million factory jobs have
been
lost.
General Motors makes about the same number of cars today as it did 25
years
ago. But then it employed 454,000 workers; today merely 118,000 are on
the
payroll. During the same period, GM has cut the amount of human labor
required to assemble a vehicle by 30 percent.
Whether or not GM can sell all the cars it produces, of course, is
another
question. American consumers are buying more and more commodities that
have
been imported from abroad (such as almost 40 percent of automobiles
sold in
the U.S. last year). These foreign products are often better and
cheaper
than domestic products, because they are produced with even more
advanced
machinery. Today over one fourth of goods consumed in this country are
made
abroad—about twice the share of the early 1980s.
In fact, the United States is falling behind its capitalist rivals,
taken as
a whole, in most all economic comparisons. The U.S. accounted for 25
percent
of the world’s manufacturing production in 1999, compared with 60
percent in
1950. The U.S. supplied half the world’s gross product in 1950 compared
with
only 21 percent today.
Of course, at this juncture, Japan and most other countries of Western
Europe are in as bad or worse economic shape than the United States,
with
unemployment at record post-World War II levels. And so each of the
wounded
imperialist rivals must seek to recoup their economic health by
strangling
the so-called Third World countries, which more and more are reduced to
penury as cheap sources of raw materials or semi-finished products put
together by virtual slave labor.
The U.S. recolonialization of Iraq has been factored into this
situation.
Viceroy Paul Bremmer and his cohorts have instituted shock therapy for
their
new colony. At first they asked for the privatization of at least 150
Iraqi
state industries; under pressure, this was later scaled back to the
privatization of 30, with the others (including the country’s oil
assets)
slated for privatization at a later time.
By the same token, the capitalists here at home have gone on the
offensive
against working people, who find their standard of living slashed—as
they
work longer hours just to make ends meet. Now even the hard-won right
for
overtime compensation is liable to be dismantled while some two million
workers are apt to lose their Medicare benefits during the next six
months.
Working people in this country are angry—and looking for a change. Is
it any
wonder that the Democratic Party candidates have retooled their oratory
so
that it rings out with indignation against the "special interests," the
"Washington lobbyists," and even the "war profiteers"? Is it any wonder
that
they stress the importance of "affordable health care" or of the fight
to
end poverty—as if their Democratic Party did anything significant to
deal
with those issues in the days when Clinton held the White House and
they had
a majority in Congress!
A new generation
Today, we can see that a new generation—which has been stirred by the
huge
antiwar movement of last spring or through the environmental or other
movements, is becoming convinced that the capitalist economic system
and
society needs to be fundamentally changed.
It is unfortunate, however, that many of these new activists, when they
search out strategies to move forward, find themselves confronting a
leadership that is itself a bit confused. This leadership, with few
exceptions, has resigned itself to hanging onto the Democratic Party,
which
when it was in power did nothing for them.
The "dump Bush" campaign (that is, the register to vote and push
doorbells
for a Democrat campaign) now extends into every major movement for
social
change, including organizations and entire coalitions from United for
Peace
and Justice to the National Organization for Women.
Many prominent left and liberal commentators and intellectuals have
also
been taken in. Take a look at filmmaker Michael Moore, a man who has
taken
many courageous positions in his work and is seen as a spokesman for
many
critics of our political system. Moore, who says he is not really a
Democrat, insists that the stakes in 2004 election are so high that he
must
back the Democrats and former general Wesley Clark for president.
Clark, of course, was the one who led the U.S. and its allies in their
murderous air war on Yugoslavia. Clark authorized artillery barrages
using
30,000 rounds of depleted uranium shells, and the unleashing of 13,000
cluster bombs—some of which continue to maim and kill children and
farmers
working in the fields. In one incident, 75 fleeing Albanians—whom the
U.S.
was ostensibly in the war in order to protect—were mowed down and
killed by
U.S. cluster bombs.
A least 12 civilians in a passenger train were killed by a U.S.
aircraft, 16
in the Radio Serbia television studio, and 16 doing their morning
shopping
in a market place in Nis. In regard to the slaughter of innocent people
in
Nis, Clark told a Pacifica radio reporter: "Unfortunately, we were at
war,
and terrible things happen."
Terrible things? Amnesty International said that the bombing of the TV
studio was a war crime. One must question Michael Moore: How far is he
prepared to go to "dump Bush," if he is willing to support and speak on
behalf of a war criminal as Bush’s replacement?
But of course General Clark isn’t the only Democratic Party candidate.
Even
so-called antiwar candidate Howard Dean brags that he supported the
first
Gulf War as well as President Bush’s war in Afghanistan.
A radical social movement can be effective only if it remains
independent of
the parties of the oppressors—or in this country the one oppressive
party
with two quite similar factions, Republican and Democrat. The idea of
political independence is not really new. It was a matter of course to
politicized workers several generations ago—in the early years of the
20th
century. It was proven again by the Vietnam antiwar movement, and it
will be
crucial in the big battles that lie ahead.
What big battles am I speaking of? We in Socialist Action firmly
believe
that in the not too distant future capitalism will enter a profound
crisis—much more severe than the economic recession we have just seen.
At
that point, working people, out of desperate need, will be searching
for
real answers to their social problems, and the capitalists and their
parties
will find it difficult to present a political platform that will
satisfy
them.
Working people will be open to all sorts of ideas, all sorts of
political
platforms, all sorts of parties, and they will gravitate to those that
show
promise of speaking to their interests and providing the direction for
them
to go to in order to solve their problems.
At that point, revolutionary socialism—which now finds its immediate
audience only among an utter minority—will gain great appeal for
millions,
even the majority, of people. Any lingering commentary to the effect
that
"socialism is dead" will seem quaint and laughable to people who are
fighting together in a mass movement to build a new society, one that
puts
the social needs of all far above the narrow profits of a wealthy
handful.
This is the future that Socialist Action is striving for—a future in
which
the great majority of people, working people and the oppressed, at last
can
determine their own destiny.
I don’t know if the struggle for that future will take another 20
years.
(When the workers take power, I’d love to be around to see it, and
still
spry enough to enjoy it!)
But the next few years, I promise, will be heroic ones. For this is the
time
when we must work hard, in order to lay the foundations of the party
that
will lead the American revolution. We in Socialist Action are dedicated
to
this task, and if you are not already a member of Socialist Action, we
invite you to join us!
[Socialist Action's 20th Anniversary Page]
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