Class Methods, Means and Objectives:

What Is It Actually About?

(«Proletarian»; Nr. 21; Spring-Summer 2024)

Back Sumary

 

 

In the present situation, after decades of counter-revolution, the classical weapons and methods of struggle are ignored by the proletariat, even when it is driven by the material force of social conflicts to take them up spontaneously. The collaborationist political and trade union organisations, including even the so-called “combative” ones, that “play at social dialogue”, do everything they can to prevent this, sometimes in the name of supposed efficiency, often in the name of legality that must be respected to avoid repression, always in the name of the sacrosanct principle of democracy: demonstrations must remain peaceful in order to attract as many participants as possible, “excesses” must be avoided so as not to create the possibility of repression, strikes must not disturb users, pickets must only be a deterrent means or a kind of filter (preferably, however, if there are none), decisions at general assemblies (hereinafter referred to as GAs) must be taken by secret ballot and as fragmented as possible (it is even more “democratic” if proletarians are content to obey their union representatives!). Finally, the last weapon is the referendum, through which the “citizens”, i.e. all classes thrown together, could impose their will on the “rulers” and the state on the basis of ballot papers.

The facts show that these means and methods actually weaken the struggle, and indeed sterilise it and condemn it to impotence. The impetus of the struggle is all the stronger, its vigour all the greater, its force and ability to attain solidarity and to encounter it among other proletarians all the more powerful, and consequently, its chances of success all the more serious, the more it concentrates on the defence of proletarian interests and only on them, i.e. interests common to the entire class of those “without reserve” who possess nothing but their own labour-power, which, in order to earn the wages indispensable to living, are obliged to sell it to a boss who extracts his profit from its exploitation. As an exploited class, the proletarians have interests that are distinct and opposed to those of the exploiting capitalist class and its servants, as well as to those of the middle and lower classes. In order to defend their interests, the proletarians must not allow themselves to be stopped and diverted by so-called “superior interests” or “general interests”, such as the interests of the enterprise, the local, regional or national economy: these are only the interests of capital, i.e. the interests of the enemy class, the exploiting class; they cannot be defended or taken into account except to the detriment of the exploited class, to the detriment of the proletarian interests.

Wage against profit, class against class! This must be the perspective of the proletarians if they do not want to remain eternally subjugated to the capitalists, if they want to have a chance to emancipate themselves from wage slavery. Before  even beginning to think about the final objective, which implies the revolutionary overthrow of capitalist power and the establishment of the dictatorial power of the proletariat on the ruins of the bourgeois state, it necessarily implies that the daily struggles of resistance, even the elementary ones, are guided by the corresponding methods, means and objectives: so that they thus strengthen the proletarians and weaken the capitalist bosses and their state. A struggle that does not threaten profits or disrupt the smooth running of the economy and the functioning of the state, a struggle whose aim is to appeal to “public opinion” or to be “listened to” by the government, is not a classist struggle; it is not a struggle at all, but a mere procession, like the absurd religious processions organised to intercede with a saint.

On the contrary, it is only the exercise of the class power of the proletariat that can establish a favourable balance of forces against the bosses, the bourgeois class as a whole and its state. To this end, it is essential to point out the methods and means which will enable the organisation and mobilisation of the proletariat to achieve such a favourable balance of forces:

 

•  creation of a platform of demands as unifying as possible.

•  strike without a predetermined duration, without prior notice and without observance of the so-called “minimum service”.

•  direction of the strike by a strike committee elected by and responsible to a general assembly, not set up by union bureaucrats, and independent of the influence of collaborationist organisations; participation of all workers in the organisation and conduct of the strike.

•  organisation of effective and massive pickets to prevent the entry of scabs and thus actually block all the activity, and to enable to resist police intervention.

•  striving for the active solidarity of other proletarians (and not “the public” or “users” or all classes thrown together), particularly against police and judicial repression, and for the widest possible extension of the strike.

 

The general class demands must comply with the following principles:

 

DEFENCE OF WAGES

•  General increase in wages and pensions for all workers, with the biggest for the lowest paid categories, so that they are not forced to work overtime!

•  Increase of the minimum wage and all social minima! No payouts below the minimum wage!

•  Full wages for the unemployed and laid off!

•  Drastic reduction of working hours for all at the same wage regardless of category, sector or work tasks!

•  Reduction of the retirement age, the lower one for the arduous workers and for the proletarian women!

•  Against precarious work, transformation of fixed-term contracts into open-ended contracts!

 

AGAINST IMMIGRATION REGULATION

•  No competition between domestic proletarians and immigrants!

•  For equal work, equal pay for domestic and foreign proletarians!

•  Freedom of movement for all workers and their families!

•  Regularization of all undocumented immigrants!

•  No to criminalizing helping “illegal immigrants”!

•  No to deportations!

•  Closure of all detention centres, release of all migrants and the undocumented!

 

DEFENCE OF LIVING AND WORKING CONDITIONS

•  No to increase in the intensity and the length of the working day!

•  Against the harmful working environment, no to increase the pace of work!

•  Against all discrimination based on age, gender, nationality!

•  Against all forms of despotism and bullying in the workplace and in society!

•  For class solidarity of all proletarians beyond the limits of categories and enterprises!

•  Against all measures restricting the use of strikes!

•  No to subordination of proletarian interests to the demands of the enterprise and the market!

•  For the rebirth of proletarian organisations of struggle independent of the apparatuses and practices of inter-class collaborationism!

•  Against all forms of inter-class collaboration between proletarians and bosses, between the exploited and the exploiters!

•  For the reconstitution of the class union!

 

This is not a detailed catalogue of demands (we have not quantified the demands), but a non-exhaustive set of general points defining the line of the class struggle on which basis an overall movement of the proletariat is possible. It is clear that it is still only a defensive struggle against capitalist exploitation, but this defensive struggle is necessary before we can gain the strength to go on the offensive, i.e., the revolutionary struggle against capitalism: for it is in this struggle, which will become the “war school of communism” (Engels), that the proletariat will discover its class weapons and forge its unity of struggle for the revolution.

 

 Juni, 6th 2024