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Programme of the RDG - Part 2 |
B. THE UNITED KINGDOM 4. The development of the UK state 61. The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is a Constitutional Monarchist state ruling the people of England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. This Union state exists to manage the affairs of British capitalism at home and abroad. It protects and advances the general interests of the capitalist class, giving particular support to the special interests of financial capitalists of the City of London, and the landowning and farming interests. 62. The British state has its origins in the English republican revolution of the 1640s, the constitutional settlement of 1688 and the Acts of Union. This established the constitutional monarchy on the basis of the union of England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales. Government passed into the hands of the Tory and Whig aristocracy serving the interests of the landowners, merchants and financiers of the City of London. During the 18th century the state promoted agricultural, financial and colonial policies which paved the way for the development of industrial capitalism and the working class. 63. At the end of the 18th century, new democratic forces began to emerge, inspired by the French republican revolution. At first the state was able to resist and suppress these struggles. But by the 1820s and 1830s the popular movement for constitutional change had become irresistible. In 1832 the government passed the Reform Act which enfranchised the middle class. A mass working class movement, organised around the demands of the People’s Charter, began to challenge the state. Chartism was the first revolutionary democratic movement of the working class. The defeat of Chartism in 1848, drew to a close a revolutionary period in early working class history. 64. By the middle of the 19th century, British capitalism dominated the world market. A new period of colonial expansion brought greater prosperity and stability. In 1875, Queen Victoria was crowned Empress of India, symbolising the new age of the Imperial Monarchy. The British Empire ruled nearly one third of the world’s people in India, Pakistan, Ireland, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, West Indies, parts of the Middle East, Africa, the Far East and China. 65. Under the Imperial Monarchy, profits from the colonies provided the basis for a new reformism within the United Kingdom. Skilled workers organised themselves into craft unions, such as the Amalgamated Society of Engineers (1851). In 1868 the TUC was founded. In 1867 and 1884 the franchise was extended to give working class men the right to vote. The trade union movement began to look increasingly to parliament for legislative and social reforms with the formation of the TUC Parliamentary Committee. 66. In the 1880s trade union organisation spread to previously unorganised unskilled workers. A new wave of militant struggles saw a rapid growth of union membership following the success of the women match workers strike at Bryant and May (1888) and the gas workers and dockers (1889). These struggles went in parallel with a growth in syndicalist ideas amongst militant workers. In 1900 the Labour Representation Committee was set up. By 1906 this became the Labour Party to represent the trade unions in parliament. 67. However in the decade before the first world war (1914-18) British imperialism was under increasing challenge from German and US capitalism, and from growing working class militancy at home. The Liberal government (1906) brought in a series of social reforms which led to the constitutional crisis of 1910-11 over the powers of the House of Lords and Irish home rule (1912). The first world war brought this internal crisis to a temporary end. 68. Workers from Britain, Australia, Canada, India, Ireland and the other colonies were mobilised to defend the Empire. In the United Kingdom the trade union bureaucracy and Labour Party leaders rallied to support the imperialist war effort. For the first time representatives of Labour were given positions in the cabinet and political influence in the state. This co-operation was vital to the ruling class, enabling it to protect its monopoly profits and seize new territories in Africa and the Middle East. 69. The British Empire emerged from the war significantly weakened but largely intact. In 1916 the Easter uprising in Dublin struck the first blow of democratic revolution against the Empire and the war. In 1917 the Russian democratic revolution struck another major blow. Growing discontent among the working class was reflected in a rising level of industrial unrest, reaching a peak in 1919 of over 35 million strike days. 70. During the war shop-stewards organisations spread through industry. Prominent among these new rank and file organisations were the Clyde Workers Committee and the Sheffield Workers Committee. In January 1918 a national delegate conference of Shop Stewards set up a National Administrative Council of the Shop Stewards and Workers Committee Movement to provide the rank and file movement with national leadership. 71. The crisis of the war and the example of the Russian revolution inspired militant workers and socialists to form a united communist party. In August 1920 the Communist Party of Great Britain was set up from the unification of the British Socialist Party and the Socialist Labour Party and other small socialist organisations. The CPGB attracted to its ranks a majority of the leading working class militants. 72. The Labour Party was reformed in 1918 to provide a safe parliamentary alternative to democratic revolution and communism. Having been granted cabinet posts during the war, Labour now sought to form a government independently. The party adopted a new constitution with political aims and a structure which included individual membership. This enabled sections of bourgeois liberals to defect to Labour. In 1924 the first minority government was formed. 73. The early 1920s was a period of mass struggle, which ended with the defeat of the miners in the general strike of 1926. The new CPGB played an important role in these struggles. It led protest action against unemployment through the National Unemployed Workers Movement. In 1924 the National Minority Movement was set up to organise the militant minority in the trade unions, on a united front basis. 74. During the slump of the 1930s the working class faced mass unemployment and the threat of fascism. In 1931 a second minority Labour government collapsed as Ramsey McDonald, became head of a coalition National government with the Tories and Liberals. In 1932 the Independent Labour Party (ILP) disaffiliated from the Labour Party. Despite over three million unemployed, the British Empire continued to provide a degree of economic protection from the world market. Part of the economic burden of the slump was shifted to the colonies. 75. The British ruling class, whilst initially sympathetic to Hitler and Mussolini, did not need fascism to destroy the working class movement. Nevertheless the state protected fascist rallies. The ILP and the CPGB played a leading role in organising working class opposition to Mosely’s British Union of Fascists. In 1936, the anti-fascist movement drove the fascists off the streets in a series of confrontations such as Cable Street in the East End of London. 76. The world recession and the growing rivalry between the imperialist powers led to world war two. The rise of the Nazis in Germany and the destruction of the German working class movement paved the way for German rearmament and expansionism. In the Far East, Japan began to challenge both British and US imperialism. In the face of these threats to the British empire, the policy of appeasement was abandoned, and preparations began for a new world war. 5. The Social Monarchy 77. During and after world war two, the Imperial Monarchy was transformed into the Social Monarchy. The war significantly increased the involvement of the state bureaucracy in planning and directing economic and social life. The Labour government (1945-50) established new social welfare provisions. The National Health Service was set up and a number of industries were nationalised. In 1952 Elizabeth Windsor was crowned head of the “welfare state”, and became the official symbol of the new era. 78. The Social Monarchy was a product of class struggles brought to a head by the imperialist war. In Europe, popular armed resistance to the Nazis and the defeat of Germany had created a revolutionary crisis. Nationalist struggles in India, Vietnam and Palestine sounded the death knell of the British and French colonial empires. In the UK, the working class and the trade unions emerged in a much stronger position, reflected in Labour’s election victory of 1945. 79. The war economy laid the foundations of the Social Monarchy in the expansion of arms production and the development of a state capitalist sector. The Bank of England, and the gas, water, electricity, coal, railways and parts of the air and road transport industries were nationalised. Against the background of the “Cold War” and the Korean war (1952), state spending on armaments provided major support for the economy, through the aircraft, shipbuilding, engineering, electronics and communications industries. 80. World war two changed the relationship significantly between British and US imperialism. By the end of the war, the UK was heavily in debt to the US. Major US military bases were established. British capitalism became part of the new international trading system based on the dollar, and a major recipient of US foreign direct investment. 81. By 1947, British imperialism had been forced to abandon control of India, Pakistan and Palestine. In the same year the British ruling class acquired nuclear weapons, the new symbol of an independent British imperialism. But in reality the United Kingdom was becoming a sub-imperialist power, dependent on the United States and providing the main support for US foreign policy, for example during the Korean and Vietnam wars. 82. In 1956, the British and French governments sought to reassert their old colonial policies by intervening in Egypt to seize control of the Suez Canal. But the Tory government suffered a humiliating defeat, when the US government refused to support the Anglo-French intervention. The Suez crisis showed that the British ruling class could no longer act effectively without US support. 83. Suez forced the ruling class to recognise that the colonial era was coming to an end. But the real impetus for change came from the anti-colonial and revolutionary struggles of African workers and peasants. These struggles forced British imperialism to concede national independence in Kenya, Ghana, Aden ( Yemen) Nigeria and eventually Rhodesia ( Zimbabwe). 84. In the 1950s British capitalism entered a new period of economic growth. Conditions of near full employment enabled workers to strengthen workplace and trade union organisation. The accumulation of capital and rising real wages drew new groups of workers into employment. Women joined the workforce in increasing numbers. A new generation of workers arrived from India, Pakistan and the West Indies to fill low paid unskilled jobs. 85. The Social Monarchy was created out of the racist traditions of the British Empire. All senior positions in the Royal Household, civil service, and the armed forces remained the preserve of the white and largely protestant ruling class. The monarchy represented a white society, in which black people would serve as second class subjects, discriminated against in jobs and housing. 86. The Social Monarchy represented a new social contract between the ruling class and the working class organised through the institutions of British Labour. It symbolised post war Britain rebuilt on conservative foundations. The regime’s social base was broadened with the support of the Labour Party. But the aristocratic and elitist class system was preserved. The old public schools, the Oxbridge Universities and the honours system were protected. The traditions of the old Empire were maintained by the new Commonwealth, with the British monarchy as its head. The State bureaucracy 87. The Social Monarchy provided a new disguise for the bureaucratic-military state, which governed the United Kingdom. The state was controlled by the Whitehall Mandarins, Chiefs of the Armed Forces, heads of the Security Services (MI5, MI6), Police and Judiciary. Power is concentrated in the hands of this elite, conservative in its traditions and outlook, and dedicated to upholding the interests and prejudices of the ruling class. 88. The Whitehall Mandarins are a small tightly knit group of top civil servants. They have considerable power, protected by the conventions of the Crown and the laws of official secrecy. They control an extensive system of information gathering, including the secret network of spying and surveillance. 89. The Mandarins run the Ministries and Departments of State, such as the Foreign Office, the Treasury, the Department of Agriculture and the Ministry of Defence. These Departments serve the general interests of British capitalism and provide support for particular capitalists such as car manufacturers, oil companies, farmers and arms manufacturers. 90. At the centre of bureaucratic power is the Treasury. Its influence pervades the whole bureaucracy. Treasury officials plan and manage the taxation, spending and borrowing decisions for the huge state budget. In conjunction with the Bank of England, the Treasury ensures that the interests of the City bankers and financiers are of paramount importance in government policies. 91. The Treasury manages the accumulation of national capital in the UK. The system of taxation extracts vast sums of wealth from the working population. This is directed in support of the interests of the capitalists, landowners, bankers and the Windsor parasites. The real extent of this bureaucratic waste, corruption and mismanagement is hidden behind the veil of official secrecy. 92. The Whitehall bureaucracy extends its influence into many aspects of economic, social and cultural life through an extensive network of Quangoes (Quasi-autonomous non-governmental organisations) In the early 1980’s there were 489 such organisations, for example the Arts Council, the Atomic Energy Authority, the Countryside Commission, and the Commission for Racial Equality. 93. The bureaucracy also controls over 1,500 advisory bodies, such as the Parliamentary Boundary Commission and the Arbitration and Conciliation Service (ACAS) and 67 Tribunals including the Supplementary Benefits Appeal Tribunals and the Rent Tribunals. 94. The British monarchy is the head of the Civil Service, Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces, Police, Judiciary and Prison authorities. The British Crown employs over 516,000 civil servants, 233,000 armed forces, 152,000 police and 38,000 prison staff (1994) to maintain its authority over the people of England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. 95. This bureaucratic state is the major barrier to the real democratic control of society. It is the main enemy of the people in England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales, especially the working class and the millions living in poverty. To establish democratic control of the state, the bureaucracy and the repressive apparatus must be dismantled. The British Constitution 96. The unwritten constitution of the United Kingdom is the legal framework for the exercise of bureaucratic and political power under the Social Monarchy. The constitution is based on the traditions and laws of constitutional monarchy and unionism, set out in the Bill of Rights (1689), the Act of Settlement (1701), the Acts of Union, the Parliament Acts (1911 and 1949) and the Representation of the People Acts (1948 and 1949) 97. Authority vested in the Crown is exercised by ministers, civil servants, judges, police and secret service chiefs and the commanders of the armed forces. Under the Acts of Union (1535 and 1707) and the Government of Ireland Act 1922, the authority of the crown extends to Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. 98. The Union state is neither a centralised nor federal system of democracy. A central parliament exists along with separate national bureaucracies, the Northern Ireland Office, the Scottish Office and the Welsh Office. Scotland retains its own legal system, but not its own means of law-making. The people of Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales have no elected assembly to control their national bureaucrats. 99. The people of Northern Ireland have a unique position within the Union under the Government of Ireland Act 1922. They were separated from the majority of the Irish people by the forcible partition of Ireland in 1922. The division of Ireland was in violation of the right of the Irish people to self determination, expressed in the 1918 general election. Northern Ireland was founded on anti-democratic principles based on religious and political discrimination. 100. Whilst a majority of the protestant population of the Northern Ireland are loyal to the Union, a significant nationalist minority have never accepted the legitimacy of partition or the British crown. The Northern Ireland parliament at Stormont (1922 - 1975) was not a genuine democratic assembly. It was the instrument of protestant ascendancy, ensuring discrimination against the Catholic minority and the repression of Irish republicans. 101. Throughout the Union, Her Majesty’s Government is conducted by ministers and civil servants in the name of the Crown. Normally this is dependent on the support of a parliamentary majority. Political power is therefore divided amongst the bureaucratic, hereditary and elected parts of the constitution. As head of the government, the Prime Minister is in a powerful position as the lynch pin in the system, linking the monarchy and bureaucracy with the political parties as represented in parliament. 102. The Monarchy and the House of Lords are hereditary parts of the constitution. These institutions have an important influence, but limited power. The House of Lords can scrutinise and amend legislation. The monarch can appoint Prime Ministers and dissolve parliament. These powers are limited both by law and convention. Nevertheless in times of political crisis, the discretionary powers of the monarch would be of crucial importance. They provide the legal authority for the state to govern without recourse to parliament. 103. Under normal circumstances, the Royal Prerogative enables servants of the Crown to act outside parliamentary control. In the name of the Crown, ministers and civil servants can enter diplomatic relations with other states, conclude treaties, command the armed forces, declare war, make peace, appoint judges, initiate criminal prosecutions, pardon offenders, appoint ministers, including the Prime Minister, summon and dissolve parliament, confer honours, create peers and appoint bishops. 104. Privy Council advises the Monarch on the use of Royal powers. In normal times, it enables ministers and leading members of the Opposition, loyal to the Crown, to meet in private and agree common action in support of the state. This ensures that narrow party interests and rivalries do not undermine the fundamental interests of the state. 105. The real function of the Privy Council is to subvert parliamentary democracy, ensuring a united front between the leaders of the bourgeois parties, especially in time of war or civil crisis. It could, if necessary, override parliament and assume dictatorial powers. 106. The House of Commons, elected by universal suffrage, represents the democratic part of the constitution. The first past the post electoral system divides the majority of seats between the two main parties, which form Her Majesty’s Government and Loyal Opposition. 107. The distribution of seats is unrepresentative of the national electorate, and discriminates against small parties. Shifts in population and periodic changes in constituency boundaries leave the system open to gerrymandering by the ruling class. 108. Even in the most democratic bourgeois republic, parliamentary assemblies do not exercise real control over the state. But certain features of the British constitutional monarchy render the House of Commons even more supine and ineffective as a representative body. 109. Members of Parliament do not exercise any real control over ministers or civil servants. The House of Commons cannot convene itself, nor control its own agenda nor compel civil servants to reveal information which might embarrass the government. The system enables the executive to effectively control parliament and establish a near monopoly of political power. 110. The subordination of the House of Commons to the executive is further reinforced by its ancient traditions and rituals. It has more in common with a Victorian gentleman’s debating society than a real democratic assembly. The House of Commons is a political circus whose real function is to entertain the population with the illusion of democracy. 111. The central principle of the constitution is the sovereignty of the Queen in Parliament. Legal authority does not come from the people as citizens, but from the Monarchy, Lords and Commons. The people of the United Kingdom are subjects of Her Majesty and Her Majesty’s Government. This is often misleadingly called “parliamentary sovereignty” to perpetuate the illusion that the government of the people is carried on by the people and their representatives in parliament. In reality neither the British people nor the House of Commons are the sovereign authority either in theory or practice. 112. The British constitution is an obsolete facade, concealing the real nature of bureaucratic and political power. Government is conducted in the name of the crown with a substantial degree of independence from parliament. In conjunction with official secrecy, press censorship and news management, the constitution helps protect and conceal the activities of the corrupt and repressive state bureaucracy. The bourgeois monarchist parties 113. Traditionally the British constitution with its first past the post system has produced two major parties representing the conservative and liberal wings of the ruling class. Other parties have secured no more than minor representation in parliament. 114. This pattern of class representation continued under the Social Monarchy. Elections to the House of Commons were dominated by the main bourgeois monarchist parties, the Conservative Party and Labour Party. These two parties have been the main political support for the state. 115. Both parties were committed to the fundamentals of the Social Monarchy, including the Unionist constitution, state capitalism, the welfare state, the alliance with US imperialism and support for NATO. However they differed in their relationship to the working class, to social reform and the trade union bureaucracy. 116. The Conservative or Tory party is the largest conservative party in Europe. It serves the interests of the aristocracy, the landowners, the City and sections of industrial capital. Around this coalition of interests, the Tories have built support amongst the small business class and more conservatively minded sections of the middle and working class. 117. The Labour Party is the party of incorporation of the working class. It was forged from an alliance of the trade union bureaucracy, middle class socialists and liberals. The politics of the Labour Party are pro-capitalist policies mainly restricted to social reform. 118. The Liberal Party was the traditional party of the liberal bourgeoisie during the 19th century. Under the Social Monarchy this role was taken over by the Labour party. But it retains significant electoral support, appealing to the democratic aspirations of the middle class alienated from the major capitalist parties. In 1987 the Liberals merged with the Social Democrats to become the Liberal Democrats. 119. The Ulster Unionists governed Northern Ireland through the Stormont parliament until the 1970’s. They have represented the special interests of the protestant bourgeoisie of Ulster both in parliament and to the Whitehall bureaucracy. The Unionists have traditional links with the Tories and draw electoral support from the protestant middle class and working class in Northern Ireland. The Social Monarchy in crisis 120. The relative decline of British capitalism goes back to the period 1870-1914 and the emergence of competition from German and US capitalism. Over the next hundred years a significant productivity gap opened up between British capital and its main rivals. 121. By the 1960’s British capitalism had become uncompetitive, compared to its Japanese and European rivals. British industry performed poorly in world markets in terms of productivity, investment, innovation and exports. Foreign capital was increasingly able to penetrate domestic markets. 122. British capitalism had become a weak link among the advanced capitalist economies. Economic decline and low productivity were the result of years of mismanagement, under-investment, incompetence and corruption organised by the Treasury, the City and major monopolies. 123. The dismantling of the British Empire further exposed the weakness of British capitalism and reduced its share of world trade. The banks and multi-nationals began to see Europe as a new source of profits. In 1972 the UK joined the Common Market as a means to revive the ailing economy. The aim was to open up export markets and investment opportunities for the largest British capitalists. 124. From the 1960’s successive governments sought to rectify the productivity gap with an assortment of modernisation plans and anti-union laws, beginning with Wilson government (1964), Heath (1970), Callaghan (1976) and Thatcher (1979). Every attempt to reform the system failed to reverse the process of long term relative decline in any significant way. 125. The British Social Monarchy had become one of Europe’s ancien regimes, a barrier to economic, social and political progress. The bureaucracy, the Treasury and the vested interests in the City were a fetter on the development of the productive forces. The continuation of the bureaucratic Social Monarchy would inevitably lead to further long term economic decline and social decay. 126. The first serious crisis of the Social Monarchy arose between 1968-74. In 1968 the Civil Rights movement in Northern Ireland mobilised mass protests and met with police repression. New nationalist movements emerged in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. By the early 1970’s there was a growing wave of trade union militancy, including the occupation of Upper Clyde Shipbuilders and two national miners strikes. 127. In 1974 the world price of oil quadrupled, precipitating a major economic crisis. World capitalism entered a new phase of crisis and recession, which exposed more forcefully the inability of British capital to compete. With rising inflation, the threat of nationalism and trade union militancy, and the defeat of the Tory government, the old regime hovered on the brink of collapse. 128. The new Labour government began to restore stability and rebuild the confidence of the ruling class. By 1976, following the Common Market referendum, this had been largely achieved. The government, supported by the IMF and the trade union bureaucracy, began implementing wage controls, cuts in social welfare and raising unemployment. This enabled the employers to mount a new offensive against the working class. 129. By 1979 low paid workers began to fight back. During the “Winter of Discontent”, public sector workers took national strike action. Labour’s policy of attempting to buy off the nationalists in Scotland and Wales by Devolution failed to secure more than a small majority in the referendum. In parliament, the government was defeated over the Devolution Bill and Tories won the subsequent election. 130. The new Thatcher government began rebuilding the anti-working class offensive, which had stalled under Labour. The Tories cut public spending on social programmes, raising the level of unemployment to three million. New anti-union laws were brought in step by step. In 1984 the government carried out its plans to attack the miners and smash the NUM. A year long national strike ended in defeat for the miners. 131. The Tories were now able to push forward with the “Thatcher revolution”, whose aim was to bring about a massive transfer of wealth to the rich. The ideas of “free market” economics provided the justification for a wholesale attack on all the social gains won by the working class movement under the Social Monarchy. 132. The government began to undermine the economic and social foundations of the Social Monarchy. The state owned industries were privatised. Steps were taken to dismantle the welfare state. Full employment was abandoned. Reform of local government centralised more power into the hands of the Whitehall bureaucracy. 133. The Tories sought to reinforce these policies by the further integration of British capitalism into the European market. In 1987 the government signed the Single European Act. Under the Treaty of Maastricht, the Tories prevented British workers from obtaining the minimal social rights obtained by other European workers. The Tories guaranteed the multi-nationals a pool of cheap exploitable labour. 134. Nevertheless the “Thatcher revolution” failed to transform the competitive position of capitalism in the UK, despite its anti-working class policies. British capital became increasingly dependent on financial markets and investment abroad for its profits. Working class organisation was weakened by means of mass unemployment. Thatcherism succeeded in producing a massive transfer of wealth to the rich, and poverty for a growing and destitute section of the working class. But the problems of low social productivity remained unresolved, threatening a further collapse of the manufacturing base of British capitalism. The degeneration of the Social Monarchy 135. The “Thatcher revolution” sounded the death knell of the Social Monarchy. Far from solving the problems of low productivity, Tory policies prepared the ground for a much deeper crisis. The process of decay and degeneration, far from being halted, began to accelerate. 136. The situation in Northern Ireland shows where the degeneration of the Social Monarchy can lead. Prolonged economic decline and a divided working class has produced greater poverty, unemployment and worse housing conditions. It is the working class that suffers most from this and from state violence, which is necessary to maintain the status quo. 137. The decay and degeneration of the Social Monarchy provides a breeding ground for chauvinism, racism and fascism. The State has promoted racism with its immigration controls, discrimination, and police harassment. As social conditions continue to deteriorate, racism becomes an increasingly important weapon to divide the working class and bolster support for the state. The stench of chauvinism and racism rises from the rotting corpse of the old regime. 138. The British Social Monarchy is now in its final period of crisis and decay. This is reflected in a deep crisis within the two main parties, the Tories and Labour. There is a growing loss of confidence in the political system, among broader layers of the population. In Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales large sections of the population reject Unionism and are alienated from the state. A similar process is taking place in the inner cities as a result of poverty and state racism. 139. The situation facing the working class is now particularly acute. The long term decline and decay of the Social Monarchy has had disastrous consequences. The world recession and the Thatcher “revolution” accelerated the process. British capitalism has become a low productivity and low wage economy. Mass unemployment, poverty and poor housing blight the lives of millions of working people. 140. The decay and degeneration of the Social Monarchy now threatens the democratic rights and civil liberties of the entire people. The long term failure to solve the economic and social problems has created a more fertile ground for the growth of the most backward racist and anti-working class forces. Without revolutionary force to break up the old bureaucratic regime, real economic and social progress will prove impossible and further decline is inevitable. 6. Labourism and the Social Monarchy (1945-79) 141. During and after world war two, the leaders of the Labour Party, TUC and the trade unions forged a new relationship with the state bureaucracy. Labour became a party of government at both national and local level. The TUC and the trade union bureaucracy were brought into partnership with the government and the employers. 142. The Labour government (1945-50) had a major role in creating the Social Monarchy. With its roots in the trade unions and working class communities, Labour won the support of millions of workers for the new welfare state. 143. The Labour party became the left wing of the Social Monarchy. Labour governments 1964-70 and 1974-79 came to power committed to managing “welfare” state capitalism with the support of the trade union bureaucracy. 144. With the expansion of the public sector, the membership of trade unions grew steadily reaching a peak of 12 million organised workers in the 1970’s. The Trades Union Congress (TUC), the official leadership of the British trade union movement, was dominated by the bloc votes of the major unions, such as the Transport and General Workers (T&GWU) and the Amalgamated Union of Engineering Workers (AUEW) exercised with the minimum of accountability to their membership. 145. The TUC and the trade union movement was controlled by the trade union bureaucracy. These full time officials formed a privileged social strata in terms of income and status, dependent on both the employers and the working class. Their role was to mediate between the employers and workers, extracting minor concessions, whilst guaranteeing the stability and continuation of the system of exploitation. 146. During the 1950’s there was a growth of working class organisation in the workplace. Shop stewards and joint shop stewards committees spread across industry and the public sector. Between 1953-64 over 43 million working days were lost through strike action. These strikes were typically unofficial, short in duration and reflected a new confidence in rank and file organisation at the workplace. 147. In the early 1970’s there was a significant rise in the level of working class struggle, beginning with the workers occupation of Upper Clyde Shipbuilders. This culminated in the victories won by the miners strikes of 1972 and 1974, and the defeat of the Tory government. 148. In 1974, against a background of a rising level of working class struggle and political crisis, a Labour government was returned to office. The new pro-capitalist Wilson government had to concede cabinet posts to prominent Labour lefts, such as Tony Benn. Labour’s aim was to pacify the working class and restore the confidence of the capitalist class. 149. In 1975 the Common Market referendum enabled the Labour leadership to begin a counter attack against the left. In 1976 the economic crisis forced Labour to sign an agreement with the IMF cutting public expenditure, raising unemployment and restricting wage increases. By 1979, low paid workers in the public sector, began to fight back. They took strike action, and indirectly this led to the defeat of the government. 150. The experience of Labour governments showed that in reality they represented the interests of liberal capitalism. This was in contrast to the ideology of Labourism, which stressed that the party was a workers party, representing the interests of the working class. 151. Labourism was the main ideology within the British working class in the post war period. It legitimised the role in society for the trade union bureaucracy. It provided an answer to the desire of the working class for change, by promising liberal reforms within the constitutional framework of the Social Monarchy. 152. Syndicalism was the main alternative to Labourism. These ideas saw trade union action rather than political action as the means to advance working class interests. In this tradition, economic reforms were to be won by militant trade union action, rather than through parliamentary struggle, which was a diversion. 153. The ideas of both Labourism and syndicalism are based on the liberal theory of economism or economic reformism. This theory suggests that workers can achieve socialism by economic reforms rather than political revolution. The difference between Labourism and syndicalism is whether such reforms are best achieved by parliamentary or trade union methods. 154. Economism is a conservative ideology. In the post war period, it supported the Social Monarchy. The material basis for economism has been the vast wealth accumulated by British imperialism. This enabled the ruling class to concede reforms and bribe sections of workers, whenever it was necessary, in order to keep them tied into the system. The British left and the Social Monarchy. 155. In the post war period the socialist movement provided the main political opposition to Tory and Labour governments. It comprised of the Labour left, the Communist Party, the Trotskyists and the anarchists. The British left played a major role campaigning for nuclear disarmament (CND), opposing the Vietnam war and in supporting the struggles of trade unions such as the National Union of Mineworkers. 156. The Labour left was the petty bourgeois socialist wing of the Labour party, led in the 1950s by Aneurin Bevan. Their programme for national socialism envisaged a Labour government extending the welfare state with nationalisation and planning. 157. In the 1970s a new leadership emerged around Tony Benn, Eric Heffer and Dennis Skinner. The Labour left had a base amongst Labour party and trade union activists, and amongst left wing union officials such as Arthur Scargill, the President of the National Union of Mineworkers. 158. The Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB) was the largest and most influential party to the left of the Labour party. Its support reached its peak in the early period of the Social Monarchy (1945-56). The party was based on Stalinist ideas of national socialism reflected in its programme - “The British Road to Socialism.” 159. British Stalinism incorporated both the traditions of Labourism and syndicalism. The party believed that socialism would be introduced by a left Labour government in alliance with the Communist Party and other democratic forces. At the same time in the 1960’s and early 1970’s the party was the main organisation of trade union militants and shop stewards engaged in industrial action. 160. During the 1950s and 60s new organisations emerged on the fringes of the working class movement based on the ideas of Trotskyism. By the early 1970’s the three most important of these, the Workers Revolutionary Party, the Militant Tendency and the International Socialists had between them a few thousand supporters. 161. The theory and practice of the British left was based on economism. The Labour left, the CPGB and the Militant Tendency represented reformist and centrist trends tied to Labourism. The Workers Revolutionary Party (WRP) and the International Socialists, renamed the SWP in 1977, were ultra left trends combining abstract socialism with syndicalist practice. 162. During the 1980s the weaknesses in the theory and practice of the British left were increasingly exposed. The miners strike (1984-5) and the resistance of Lambeth and Liverpool Councils (1985) were led by the Labour left. Despite the determination of the miners and council workers, both struggles ended in defeat. 163. These struggles were sabotaged by the leadership of the Labour Party. But the failure of the Labour left, the Communist party and the Militant to act independently of the Labour and TUC leadership was a major factor contributing to those defeats. 164. The WRP and the SWP provided no theoretical or practical alternative to the leadership of the miners and council workers. Both organisations related to these struggles from a propagandist and syndicalist perspective. The WRP demanded a general strike. In 1982 the SWP dropped its “rank and filist” perspective with propaganda for the maximum programme, under the slogan “socialism is the only answer”. 165. All the programmes and strategies of the main organisations of the British left, failed during the 1980’s. The “Alternative Economic Strategy” (Labour left/CPGB), the “ British Road to Socialism” (CPGB), “Labour to power on a socialist programme” (Militant) and “Rank and Filism” (SWP) were all abandoned. 166. None of these organisations sought to win the working class to a programme of democratic political revolution. The influence of the Labour left declined. The CPGB and the WRP broke up. The Militant was witch-hunted out of the Labour Party and split. The SWP abandoned any serious intervention in the trade unions and became a propaganda sect. The break up of the Soviet Union added to the growing ideological and political vacuum on the left. To-day the British left has no credible programme and hence no political direction. 7. Democratic revolution 167. The degeneration of the Social Monarchy means that there are no solutions to the crisis within the existing constitution. Whichever government remains in power or comes to power will face a deteriorating situation. The whole system of government is obsolete and a barrier to solving the basic problems of productivity and social welfare. 168. The British constitution provides democratic legitimacy for a corrupt bureaucratic state. Maintaining the old constitution protects the state bureaucracy, and strengthens its centralising and anti-democratic tendencies. It bolsters the power of the bureaucracy and prolongs the death agony of the old regime. 169. The British system of “democracy” is an empty shell. Institutions such as the monarchy and the House of Lords are obsolete and parasitic. The House of Commons is unreformable and largely powerless to check the government. The right of the Irish, Scottish, and Welsh to self determination is denied. Democratic rights and civil liberties have been steadily eroded. 170. Democratic illusions in the old constitution are particularly dangerous at a time when the bureaucracy and police are concentrating more power into their own hands. But the depth of the crisis is destroying all democratic illusions. The British constitution will prove unsustainable. It will come under mounting pressure from the fascists, the nationalists, the liberal reformers and from the democratic demands of the working class. 171. The economic and political integration of the UK into the European Union also undermines the constitution. Since the Single European Act of 1986 and the Maastricht Treaty of 1992 the central principle of the sovereignty of the Queen-in-Parliament has been abandoned. Laws passed by the European Union can now take precedence over British law. This creates an even wider gap between the constitution and how the people are actually governed in practice. 172. Constitutional change is inevitable. This affects the vital interests of all social classes and strata under the Social Monarchy. Classes with a vested interest in the status quo are resisting democratic change and even seeking to remove democratic rights. Demands for democratic constitutional change arise from those classes and strata, which seek more political power. Liberal reform 173. Liberal reform is the option favoured by the left wing of the bourgeoisie. To-day it is a prominent part of the programmes of the Labour Party, and the Liberal Democrats. Their aim is to preserve the Monarchy and the Union. Campaigns like Charter 88, and the Scottish Constitutional Convention reflect a growing recognition of the need to reform the system of government. 174. Liberal reform will not solve the terminal crisis of the Social Monarchy. Reforming the constitution will speed up the process of disintegration. Moderate reform will be resisted by the bureaucracy. But preventing reform and removing democratic rights leads slowly but inevitably to a growing constitutional crisis. 175. The approaching constitutional crisis prepares the ground for a democratic revolution. Whilst liberal reformers seek to patch up the existing constitution, democratic revolution destroys it by means of mass mobilisation and struggle “from below”. 176. A democratic revolution in the United Kingdom will necessarily be republican and involve the reconstruction of relations between England Ireland, Scotland and Wales on a democratic basis. The demand for a democratic republic distinguishes liberal reformers, whose aim is to preserve the crown, from those prepared to fight for a popular democratic revolution. Republicanism 177. The growth of republican sentiment and the emergence of a republican movement is a measure of the proximity of the democratic revolution. Northern Ireland is the only part of the United Kingdom with an organised and militant republican movement. Republicanism has a mass base amongst the working class of West Belfast and Derry. 178. Between 1968-70 the mass movement for civil rights was transformed into a new republican movement led by the Provisional IRA. In 1981 the deaths of Bobby Sands and other Irish hunger strikers brought a wave of support for the IRA and led to the election of the first Sinn Fein MP’s. 179. Republicanism has played an important part of the struggles of the Irish people. But it is also part of the revolutionary history of England, Scotland and Wales. There have been two distinct traditions, bourgeois republicanism and republican marxism (i.e. working class republicanism). 180. The bourgeois republican tradition began in the English revolution, with Cromwell and the Levellers. Later it was inspired by the French revolution, Tom Paine, Wolfe Tone, and the Fenians. Bourgeois republicanism aims to establish a parliamentary republic. Both Cromwell’s new model army and to-day’s IRA represent a revolutionary form of bourgeois republicanism. 181. The second tradition, republican marxism, arose with the left Chartists and was developed by Marx, Engels, Connolly and MacLean. Republican marxism fights for a workers republic, but recognises that a bourgeois republic is a step forward, especially if won by the most militant and revolutionary class struggle. 182. In Dublin 1916, these two traditions, represented by Sinn Fein and the IRA, and James Connolly’s Citizens Army, formed a republican united front and began an armed insurrection. This uprising was crushed. But the popular sympathy won by the revolutionaries triggered the Irish democratic revolution, ending with the partition of Ireland in 1922. 183. Since the 1920s and the death of the Scottish republican marxist John MacLean, British marxism has avoided the republican question. The Communist Party of Great Britain was not based on republican marxist ideas. The aim of a workers republic was abandoned in the “ British Road to Socialism”. The party adopted a passive form of bourgeois republicanism. 184. Neither was the Trotskyist movement based on republican marxism. The centrist wing, such as the Militant Tendency inside the Labour party, took a similar passive and abstentionist position to the Labour left. The ultra lefts, such as the SWP, were equally passive and abstentionist, on the grounds that anything less than a workers republic was not worth fighting for. 185. Between 1950-1979 the Social Monarchy enjoyed broad class support. No class sought to build or support a republican movement. The British Labour party provided the main support for the Social Monarchy within the working class movement. The Labour leadership were committed to the monarchy. The Labour left sought reforms within the Social Monarchy and considered republicanism to be irrelevant. 186. During the 1980s the Thatcher government began creating the circumstances for a growth of republicanism. In Scotland Tory policies brought growing hostility to Unionism and demands for democratic change. Between 1988-91 a mass democratic movement emerged in opposition to the poll tax. In Scotland and England, republicans were active in the movement. 187. In the 1990s the Royal Family became involved in controversy over the Royal Marriages and the Queen’s non-payment of taxes. As a result of this, debate opened up about the future role of the monarchy in the United Kingdom. For the first time since the 1950’s the permanence of the monarchy was called into question. 188. Republican arguments were expressed more openly and more widely. Opinion polls suggested that 20% of the electorate were republican. New republican tendencies began to emerge amongst left Scottish and Welsh nationalists, the Bennites, and left radicals from the Greens and Liberal Democrats. 189. Working class republicanism had no party to represent its aspirations. The SWP, now the largest organisation to the left of the Labour party, is at present, incapable of filling the republican vacuum because of its attachment to Labourism and syndicalism. The party does not adopt republican slogans. It either abstains or is passive on the republican question. 190. The crisis of the Social Monarchy creates the objective basis for a new republican movement. But without republican parties this potential will remain latent. At present neither the middle class nor the working class have moved decisively to reject the constitutional monarchy. The middle class retains its illusions in the monarchy and its fear of republicanism. The working class is still dominated by Labourism. Nevertheless republicanism is now on the political agenda. As the crisis deepens it could become the rallying point for all opposition to the old regime. The bourgeoisie and the democratic revolution 191. The British ruling class has been the main support for the Social Monarchy. They are a most conservative ruling class. They have gained most from the existing system, and have most to preserve. They know that democratic reform and especially popular democratic revolution could pose a serious threat to their class power. 192. The bourgeoisie are a counter-revolutionary class. Their aim is to avoid a democratic revolution or if necessary suppress it. If democratic reform is the only alternative, it should be as minimal as possible. It should be implemented as slowly as possible, and as much of the old system patched up and maintained as far as possible. However the ruling class are divided as to how these aims are best achieved. 193. The conservative wing, mainly represented through the Tory party, is opposed to constitutional change, fearing that it will open the door to more revolutionary changes. The conservatives defend the existing constitution, especially the monarchy and the union. They consider that democratic reform should be avoided because it represents a real threat to the stability of the old order. 194. The liberal wing of the bourgeoisie, normally represented by the leaders of the Labour and Liberal Democrats, believe that democratic reform is unavoidable. The existing constitution must be reformed in order to safeguard capitalism and preserve the fundamentals of the old order. Far from democratic reform weakening the system, they believe it is essential to save it. Reform carried out from above, without mass struggle, is the best means to avoid democratic revolution from below. The middle class and the democratic revolution 195. The Social Monarchy was supported by a broader middle layer of society, comprising the middle class and the upper layer of the working class, the professional and skilled workers. This strata has been vital in maintaining the stability of the Social Monarchy. 196. The middle class has no economic power independent of the bourgeoisie or the working class. They are a dependent class, which must ally itself with the bourgeoisie or the working class. Consequently the middle class tends to produce ideologies of both right and left. The more conservative sections identify their interests with the bourgeoisie and the more progressive sections identify with and seek to influence the working class. 197. Middle class ideology has its roots in the economic activity of the small business entrepreneur and the managerial strata. A variety of political ideologies promote individualism or bureaucracy as the best means of organising society. These ideas are expressed through anarchism, Thatcherism, fascism, Stalinism and radical bourgeois democracy. 198. Nationalism is a common theme of middle class ideology whether from the right or left. It is the means by which the middle class seeks to present its own interests as representing the interests of the society or nation. Middle class nationalism appears in the form of simple patriotism, fascism, radical nationalism and national socialism. 199. Traditionally the middle strata voted overwhelmingly for the Tory or Labour parties. The interests of the small business, the managerial strata and the skilled and professional workers have been represented within the main bourgeois parties, by the Tory right and the Labour left. 200. Middle class interests are also represented by a variety of small parties, which reject the constitution as the means of advancing the interests of the middle class. The anti-constitutional parties have included the British National Party (BNP), the National Front (NF), the Scottish National Party, Plaid Cymru, Sinn Fein, and the Green Party. 201. The deepening crisis of the Social Monarchy will radicalise the middle strata. It will drive many to abandon the pro-monarchist parties for more radical solutions to the political and constitutional crisis. This will be reflected in growing support for small radical parties. 202. Sections of the middle class threatened by the economic crisis will seek “revolutionary” solutions. They will turn eventually to fascism or democratic revolution in the hope of securing a better bargaining position within a “new” nation state. 203. The fascist parties, such as the British National Party and the National Front, represent a radical petty bourgeois reaction to the crisis. They aim to replace the Constitutional Monarchy with a fascist dictatorship, which can smash the organised working class. The fascists seek to mobilise a popular nationalist movement on the streets, using racism to unite a mass movement under middle class leadership. 204. The Green Party 205. The nationalist parties, Plaid Cymru, the Scottish National Party and Sinn Fein have a common aim of ending the Union between England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales. The programme of the most advanced and left wing of these parties, Sinn Fein, does not go beyond state capitalism and a parliamentary republic. 206. Sinn Fein is distinct amongst the middle class parties in the UK. It is a revolutionary republican party supporting armed struggle to achieve its aim of a united Ireland. Its armed wing, the Provisional IRA is engaged in a war against the British Army and the British occupation of Ireland. 207. The interests of the working class are served by supporting every revolutionary bourgeois democratic movement, directed against the existing social and political order. We therefore give unconditional support for revolutionary republicanism in Ireland, without abandoning in any way our criticism of the middle class, its programme and methods. 208. The crisis will draw left or progressive sections of the middle class towards republicanism. It is one means to gain greater political leverage over the bourgeoisie. But as a class of small business and management, they cannot carry the democratic revolution into the workplace without losing power to the working class. The democratic interests of the middle class are therefore limited to creating a parliamentary republic. The working class and the democratic revolution 209. The democratic revolution cannot provide any complete or final solution to the economic and social problems of the working class under capitalism. Nevertheless the democratic revolution serves workers interests, by extending democratic rights, and raising the working class into the position of a democratic ruling class. 210. Far from being indifferent to democracy, it is in the interests of the working class that all democratic issues are solved as radically as possible, as quickly as possible, and by mass revolutionary action. In the struggle to advance democracy, the working class is the only consistently democratic class. 211. Unlike the bourgeoisie, workers have no interest in preserving the rotten, putrefying and noxious monarchist constitution. On the contrary, they have every interest in destroying it as quickly as possible. Under the impact of the crisis, the most advanced sections of the working class will not only support a new republican movement, but become its most militant supporters. 212. The republican working class is the vanguard of the democratic revolution. The working class suffers more than any other class from oppression, discrimination and lack of economic, social and political rights. The democratic revolution is the means by which workers win back and extend their rights and eradicate all forms of oppression and discrimination. 213. The working class is the only class that can carry the democratic revolution into the workplace. Democratising the workplace is the foundation of the democratic revolution. It is the means by which workers can begin to rest control from the capitalists, bringing the whole economy under democratic control. 214. The working class will either lead the democratic revolution or be relegated to supporting the political parties of the middle class. To become the leadership of the revolution, the working class must create its own party with its own independent class aims and programme. 215. The aim of the working class must be to carry the revolution beyond a parliamentary republic and establish a workers republic, based on Workers Councils, defended by the armed working class. Such a republic would represent the first major step towards international socialism. 216. The working class cannot lead the revolution without its own independent democratic rank and file organisations. Workers must build their own forms of democracy within the workplace, such as elected Workplace Councils and Joint Shop-Stewards Committees. The aim of these Committees must be to fight for and establish workers control over management. 217. The struggle to democratise the trade union movement, that is the TUC, trades councils and trade unions is also essential for workers control over current struggles, and to strengthen workers democracy in the democratic revolution. All trade union officials and delegates must be regularly elected, subject to immediate recall. All officials must be paid no more than the average wage of the workers they represent. 218. Workplace councils must build links at local, regional and national level through elected and accountable delegates subject to recall. This movement for workers control must become the rank and file movement of the working class. A national rank and file movement for workers control is an essential foundation for working class leadership of the democratic revolution. REVOLUTIONARY DEMOCRATIC GROUP 1996 |
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