我译自CWI的如何应对经济危机（初稿）

如何应对经济危机

资本主义的危机，群众意识和社会主义刚要

彼得•塔菲，工人国际委员会

工人阶级能如何应对1930年以来最严重的经济危机的影响呢？大规模的裁员已经成为主要资本主义国家和整个世界面貌的一部分。老板和他们的政府都在进攻以便促使工人阶级和大部份的中产阶级来承担他们导致的灾难。
世界资本主义处在一条死胡同里而且它的严肃的代表们看不到迅速出离的前景。您可以选择各种预测;从英国财政大臣阿利斯泰尔•达林（Alistair Darling）对经济的60年来最糟糕的悲观预言到英国新工党政府的内阁大臣埃德•鲍尔斯的这是100年来最糟糕的说法！资本主义评论家现在同意我们的分析，至少认为这是1930年大萧条以来的最严重的经济危机，甚至还可能超过它。

从某种意义上说，这一危机有可能比那时更糟糕。资本主义全球化的扩展使得这次冲击比1929年前所谓的'镀金时代'时存在的冲击更广泛和更深远。出于这个原因，它已经成为历史上最国际化和最普遍的经济危机。美国，西欧，日本，东欧，俄罗斯，亚洲，大洋洲和拉丁美洲，全部卷入了经济下降的漩涡。它肯定以一定速度并且伴随着比1930年大萧条的最初阶段更甚的严重性发展着。
1929年的那场危机肇始于股票交易所，扩展到金融部门，并无情地扩展到所谓的“实体经济”。今天的危机是由金融垮台所引发的，进而到工业，现在又重新返回到金融部门。但是1929年危机的全面影响只有在一段时间后才能感觉到——在法国的情况下，两年或三年之后——而这一危机以其即使不算令人意志消沉但也是很吓人的速度和严重性击向世界资本主义的代表。1929年需要用三年时间而现在一年里就可能呈现出来。
这一危机的特点是生产过剩，供过于求的商品，老板正在努力通过使工人阶级大规模失业来解决这种生产过剩。但是，这甚至也导致中产阶级的'过剩'，他们和工人一起被逐出工作场所。换言之，中间阶层的无产阶级化，即使在资本主义繁荣期，这个特征就表现出来了，而现在这一趋势正以实质性的步伐推进着。这反过来又破坏了资本主义的社会基础。
工人组织的投降

资本家在将出现的进一步经济内爆的社会后果面前颤抖着。他们唯一值得安慰的是由于前工人组织在象英国首相布莱尔和他们的欧洲和其他地方的堂兄弟社会民主党这样的领导人手里政治上被枭除，他们没有面临来自工人阶级的有组织的挑战。斯大林主义崩溃以及接踵而至的意识形态上亲资本主义的海啸的冲击，他们全部靠向资产阶级一边。结果是，工人阶级中大量工人面对着所能记住的来之不易的权利和社会地位受到最大的挑战时在政治上解除了武装。
当资本家以危机为借口打击工人阶级的利益时，由于缺乏领导和组织，群众的怒火自发地涌向工厂和街头。 政府设法消除老人的保健福利，这发生在爱尔兰，紧接着是愤怒抗议，包括因为残酷的资本家象关闭火柴盒那样轻易地关闭整个工厂，在Waterford Crystal and Dell发生了占领公司或威胁这样做的举动。同样残暴场面出现在上周末结束时在考利、牛津的宝马迷你工厂的转变，这挑起了前所未有的抗议，出现了工人和主管人之间的拳头相向。然而，这一导致持续的运动的工人阶级基本的反抗所需要的是一个明确的刚要，其中包括战斗口号和组织。
这种投降，工会领导人同样有着这样的投降行为，实际上有助于强迫世界各地的工人阶级和穷人接受这个残酷的新自由主义政策。资产阶级不再需要照顾到一个有组织的工人阶级的要求或害怕工人运动的反抗，因此可以无节制地疯狂冲向无管制的资本主义。人们视工人组织的前领导人为新自由主义战车上的基本不发挥作用的第五个轮子。工会领导人完全的优柔寡断显然在向老板和他们的政府投降，因为后者试图推卸这一危机的责任到工人阶级和穷人的身上。

人民群众很清楚谁当为此负责。在意大利，作为底层正在发生什么的晴雨表，学生示威高喊： '我们不会为你们的危机而买单' 。形成鲜明对比的是当工厂在工人阶级的眼皮底下关闭的情况下，工会领导人展示出的趴在地上投降的态度以及所有我们从劳工运动高层那里听到的是需要'共渡时艰'的烂调 。20世纪30年代托洛茨基写道工人阶级，甚至人类面临的危机总而言之是工人组织领导能力的危机。然而，今天不同的是我们面临的不仅是领导能力的危机而且还是一个组织层面的或者缺乏工人阶级组织以及明确的刚要的危机。
历史上从来没有过这样的鸿沟——'剪刀差' ——资本主义危机的客观形势和工人阶级缺乏组织，特别是群众性政党的前景之间的已十分明显的鸿沟。由于无情的宣传屏障， 30多年来新自由主义政策的现实以及没有政治和经济的可选择性，尽管经济危机的冲击很严重，对'市场'的不可避免残留的默许依然存在着，即使在工人阶级之间。虽然许多人震惊于经济崩溃。许多工人中间甚至还有人依然有着根深蒂固的想法认为当前的危机是暂时的，到明年年底就将结束，迟早我们可以返回到晴朗的经济高地。
暗淡的经济前景

'大众'媒体和资产阶级经济学家和评论家中的一翼仍抱有这些幻想。但是，另一部分已经得出结论，这一次真的是盛宴不再。举例来说，无党派者肖恩•奥•格雷迪1月直言宣布： “高失业率逗留不去。 ”在美国大萧条期间，失业率并没有恢复到它的1929年的水平，直到1943年通过破坏性的第二次世界大战，美国经济才走出经济的泥潭。这就是奥巴马总统努力的前景，因为他正在设法与每月增加60万失业的雪崩般的裁员斗争。在未来一年左右，美国和英国的失业问题将达到劳动力的10 ％，现代背景下，其影响类似于大萧条。

在世界其他地方，特别反常的是在应该免遭影响的欧洲部分地区，形势反而更糟糕。欧洲央行的声明认为欧元区将躲过美国经济所产生的病毒的最恶劣影响的观点已化为泡影。这个大陆已经加入了资本主义世界的总内爆，日本也是这样。最新的预测，后者的国内生产总值可能下降近10 ％ 。作为巨大的出口导向机器的日本正减速后停止，2008年最后3个月里下降了3.3 ％ ，年率为12.7 ％ 。欧洲经济发动机的德国也已加入了这个行列，而大陆上较小的经济体——爱尔兰，西班牙，意大利，希腊，葡萄牙和英国——正冒着滑入冰岛那样的国家破产的风险。

对群众来说，这好像是今天是暖和和晴朗的，明天就是寒冷和黑暗的冬夜，其中没有秋天的过渡。西班牙，以及爱尔兰的命运，比起大多数来，在狂欢的债务驱动的建筑和房地产市场的繁荣之路上走得更远，可以由萨拉戈萨（Zaragoza）的故事来总结，2月观察员如此描述其特征。建设热潮的崩溃意味着一年内城市失业率飙升75 ％。到今年年底，西班牙的失业率可能会从已经不能接受的14 ％ （ 330万工人） 猛增到20 ％。工人阶级愤怒了以至于义不容辞地和成千上万的走上街头抗议的人一起要求“罢工！罢工！罢工！”。
西班牙是一系列国家可能会发生什么的一个例子，包括英国，其将及时地挑起革命性的爆发。如果没有有意识地的领导，骚动将接着甚至可能引诱部分青年人走上可谓是一条完全没有出路的死胡同的恐怖主义的道路。希腊爆炸事件表明一小部分人中间的无政府主义和恐怖主义的情绪在某个特定阶段是显而易见的。摆脱机会主义领导人的令人瘫痪的影响的大规模的群众行动是唯一的出路。
英国炼油厂罢工：混乱和清晰

甚至从英国的发电站、炼油厂的建筑工人底层爆发的罢工中也有着这样的愤慨的表达。这是一个用来衡量工人阶级的意识和不同政治倾向如何面对这一点的实验室测试。鉴于新自由主义的黑夜，希望民族主义和种族主义不会出现在一些工人的当前意识中的想法是完全乌托邦的，在某些情况下也许是大多数。然而，这场争论中却并非如此，我们已经在我们的周报社会主义上论证了这一点。从本质上说，罢工是反对资本主义'竞相杀价'并由整个欧洲的老板通过反工人阶级的立法，欧盟指令(European Posted Workers Directive)，欧盟本身精心策划的强加的奴隶般劳动工资。
这在一些工人头脑中被扭曲成民族主义，并通过如下的表达反映出来：“英国的工作岗位应该给英国工人”。这最初由首相布朗在新的劳工大会的讲话中创造出来，企图包抄极右翼的英国国家党（BNP）。没有领导阶层的明确的指导，不仅在英国而且在其他地方，工人这样的初步反应也就不足为奇了。但是，这只是罢工不成熟的特点，通过为移民工人争取同样的权利，工资和条件的更为觉悟的社会主义者，特别是社会主义政党的介入，很快就能克服这一点。在俄国革命中，沙皇的一般工作人员害怕哪怕是一个布尔什维克在场，因为他可以象“饱和溶液中晶体化”那样活动，正如托洛茨基所说的那样，能够在激烈的气氛中把大多数人吸引过来。我们在有社会主义者和马克思主义者（其中一些来自社会主义政党）参与的这个罢工中看到类似的东西，完全克服了民族主义或种族主义的任何的内容。明确表示声援移民工人，包括在意大利印刷小册子，和坚决要求所有工作人员都能够同工同酬。
可以预见的是，一些既没有出现在工人罢工中又不愿意听取罢工中工人的真实情绪的极左派团体站在完全错误的立场上。例如，社会主义工人党(SWP) ，把注意力集中在批评上并强调“英国的工作岗位应该给英国工人”为罢工的主要特征。把如下的事实放在一边：工人驱赶了出现在警戒线上的英国国家党（BNP）的成员。此外，在分配的新的工作岗位上，罢工取得了辉煌成就，即导入了工人控制和工会参与要素。当然，正如一花独放不是春，但在这个行业和其他地方的工人现在有一个在复杂局面下捍卫工人的生活水平的同时克服民族或种族分裂的并在实际上能确保工人阶级胜利的如何斗争的活生生的例子。
罢工之后， '调解'服务的ACAS（（英国咨询调解和仲裁局）得出结论外国合同工人没有得到比英国工人低的工资。这是不正确的，完全忘记掉的是派遣劳工有时可能在其周工资或月工资上得到’国内“或全职工人相同的工资。但是，他们没有得到带薪休息或节假日和其他福利，这些都是全球范围内的老板们正在试图取消的东西以便作为一种手段提高其利润率。这同样适用于这一争端。这一直被ACAS掩盖着而且罢工时并不视之为荣誉的专职工会干部一直默许之，而且与可能属于违反英国严厉的反工会法的非官方的行动保持距离。这一争端主要强调了积极的成果，其次是通过工人斗争的经验和社会主义者和马克思主义者的介入的结合而见证了民族主义被扫地出门的特色。
大部分的极左派团体不理解群众运动将如何演变，特别是由于其最后阶段的性质。这不会是一个完美的全面的样式，正如奥利弗•克伦威尔毫无保留地形容自己那样（译者按：十七世纪英国护国公克伦威尔（Oliver Cromwell）请人给他画像，声明要绝对写实，连他面上的「粉刺、肉粒等等（pimples, warts and all）」都必须画出来，否则他就一个钱画费都不付）。如果置这些极左者于1905年俄国革命开始的当下，毫无疑问，他们的出发点将谴责Father Gapon神父，最初是由他带着向沙皇请愿的书带领群众在沙皇的旗帜下开始第一次游行。和敦促参与运动，革命初期阶段甚至和Gapon讨论和合作的列宁相对比，他们会要求从示威中逐出神父以作为他们参与的一个先决条件！他们将如何对1907年詹姆斯金为了共同与老板斗争而组织了天主教和新教的工人和Orange and Green bands一起大规模示威作出反应？
因为我们刚刚历经的阶段，由社会主义者以干练的方式面向现有的工人阶级的政治前景，没有对种族或民族偏见让步是必要的。我们没有通过回答说“如果我是你，我不会从这里出发 ”回答了“我怎么去莫斯科？”这个问题的俄罗斯圣人的乐事。工人阶级，特别是经过了一段时间的所谓的社会和平的工人阶级，从来没有出现过如来自朱庇特的智慧的非常现成的斗争。
满怀的阶级仇恨

工人阶级的愤怒日积，这由去年在希腊爆发的半起义和1月29日震动法国的反萨科齐大罢工表现出来了。不久前，萨科齐嘲讽道：尽管他攻击法国工人和青年，可哪里来罢工呢？ '回答他的就是这些罢工展示出来的基本反抗，示威在范围和人数上远远超出工会领导的组织者所预期的。超过200万工人涌上法国各城市的街道。罢工之前，萨科齐就感受到了这种潜在的具有爆炸性的情绪，并立即对学校的学生让步以作为一种手段来制止该运动。这并没有阻止罢工发生，这显示了一阵1968年本身的气息。

然而，即使在政治上仍然处在欧洲工人运动先锋地位的法国，1968年和现在的法国工人阶级在各自的情景上有着重要的区别。矛盾的是，今天的资本主义经济形势比1968年时更加糟糕，1968年时，历史上最大的总罢工是发生在一个持续的繁荣的背景下的。然后，在工人和学生中有一个广泛的社会主义甚至是革命性的意识。鉴于伴随着工人组织领导人向资本主义投降（正如我们已经指出的那样）而在最近的三十年里一同丧失的东西，状态必然要落后于1968年。当前有着混合的前景和确定的政治混乱。

因此，毫无疑问，整个先进的资本主义国家满怀着对那些被视为目前的经济灾难的主要肇事者，即金融家和银行家的阶级仇恨。英国议会和美国国会半公开的审判已经展现。在法国，群众的愤怒在街头表达着，但即使在法国，很明显最初是针对银行家和萨科齐之徒的，尽管他蛊惑人心地企图把自己和银行家划清界限。即使在法国，还没有一个广泛的反资本主义的意识，那么在其他欧洲国家，这种意识就可能更少了。

在希腊，情况有所不同，有着显著的前革命形势已经存在的内容。这反映在希腊资产阶级和它的国家彻底破产上，大规模的工人阶级和青年对他们的贫困状况的绝望以及他们准备斗争，这一点由到现在为止的三次总罢工所表明。这也反映在资本主义执政党——新民主党和前社会主义帕索克（PASOK） ——的完全的无能上以及相应的新的工人政党SYRIZA的上升上。这伴随着希腊面临的暗淡的经济前景。经济形势是如此的绝望，以至于评级机构穆迪已把它的经济降级，这可能预示着资本主义投资者将拒绝购买政府债券。这可能会导致经济崩溃，反过来，可以看到希腊离开或将被逐出欧元区。
它也可能预示着一系列的部分甚至彻底的国家破产，如在20世纪30年代在欧洲和新殖民主义的地区，如拉丁美洲那样。如果债券交易商开始进行罢商并拒绝购买政府债券，西班牙、葡萄牙甚至爱尔兰将轻而易举地加入希腊的行列。面对这种情况，统治阶级将毫不犹豫地诉诸措施更野蛮地攻击工人阶级的工资和生存条件。在这种腐朽的资本主义情况下工人阶级的生存条件就像一个人处在只是为了保持它的位置而疯狂地向下运行的自动扶梯上。
名誉扫地的资本主义

资本主义的理论家相当平静和'冷静'地辩称通货紧缩（与价格上升的通货膨胀相对，价格下降，消减生产和大规模失业）的优点为维护自己的地位的最佳途径。通货紧缩和通货膨胀是资本主义硬币的两面，而且往往要工人阶级为此付出。金融时报的一位作家道出了这个秘密，他冷静宣称公司将受益于通货膨胀，因为部分债务将消失，那些有着固定利息之债务的公司将受益。另一方面： “更高的通货膨胀比其他情况更能让越来越多的公司和工人同意削减实际工资。这既对目前缺乏竞争力的公司有益，而且是[资本主义]社会所热衷的，因为减薪比失业更公平“ 。换言之，工人阶级必须付出，即使牺牲工人阶级的利益为代价，利润如果不增加也必须保持。
显然，资本主义和它一起的工人阶级已进入了一个残酷的新时代。极其重要的问题是如何缩小潜在的资本主义旷日持久的危机的客观形势（实际上是一系列的危机）和如何使得意大利青年的口号：'我们不会承担你们的危机'更为具体化之间的鸿沟。这里涉及的是——正如最近的英国炼油厂的罢工和在Cowley用一个小时看完的通知解雇850名工人而爆发出来的愤怒——需要形成一个战斗的纲领。显然，从过时的资本主义向社会主义新社会的总的改变必须完成。

这场危机是卡尔马克思所描述并被过去一段时间的压倒性多数的'明智'的洞见所嘲弄的经济繁荣和萧条的资本主义的经济周期的准确性的证明。在资本主义框架内不平等更是无法克服的，连克努特（Canute）也不能扭转乾坤。不平等是资本主义的实质内容并清楚地显示了工人和资本家之间的关系。正如马克思指出的那样，资本家购买工人阶级的劳动力，以便剥削它。工人阶级只取回了他们新创造的价值的一部分，其余是无酬劳动，即被资本家所攫取的利润。正如托洛茨基指出的，阶级斗争仅仅是分配剩余产品的斗争。这种剩余产品越是被剥夺——尤其是当利润停滞或下降时，如目前的情况——阶级斗争就越加激烈。在这种情况下工人阶级在取得新的胜利之前首先要做的是必须有决心抵制资本的冲击，捍卫所有过去斗争取得的成果。
与资产阶级辩护士所认为的相反，资本主义，特别是在其新自由主义的阶段，即不是最好的也不是最有效的最大限度地提高生产和有效地向世界各国人民分配产品的手段。尤其在柏林墙倒塌后，资本主义是个无懈可击的而且不易于突然崩坏的系统的想法很是普遍，现在却是完全不足为信。不用只看拥有工人阶级自己'品质'的期刊，连捍卫资本主义的辩护士们也承认了这一点： “保守派...其实相信资本主义制度。任何了解资本主义的人都知道，资本主义不时地失败。保守的经济学教义认为经济衰退更象天气。有可能减轻其影响，但不可能改变其性质。 “ （Peter Oborne, ，每日邮报的右翼政治专栏作家。 ）
过渡办法

没有提到美好未来：如果资本主义崩溃，我们工人阶级必须为此埋单。这是Oborne的暴风雨天气情况的本质，在这个世界中，国家是资本主义的保护伞，而工人以大规模失业的形式溺沉下去。我们不打算埋单，我们需要完全更人道的制度。社会主义必须是工人阶级的政策。新闻周刊甚至宣布： “我们现在都是社会主义者” 。不幸的是，这还不是绝大多数这一制度受害者的工人阶级和穷人的情况。因此，在社会主义者和马克思主义者的纲领中要求把民主、社会主义计划经济作为至高无上的理念，有必要在目前的情况下提出战斗的过渡性要求。

在1914年前的社会民主主义中，人们认为这种做法是不必要的。它的纲领被划分成社会主义思想的最高纲领和最低的日常刚要。这决定性的变化发生在导致在俄罗斯革命爆发和由1917年革命引爆的整个世界和欧洲的群众斗争和革命的浪潮的第一次世界大战开始后。在这种变化的形势下，争取基本的改革，甚至捍卫过去的成果都以直接对抗资本主义制度本身的有限性的形式提出来。布尔什维克因此制定了一项过渡纲领作为桥梁——考虑到工人阶级日常的要求——从现有的意识到社会主义革命的思想。即使在俄国革命时期，这也是必要的，因为工人阶级不同部分的不同的和不断变化的观点。这在列宁的出色的小册子《大难临头，出路何在？》中得到了总结。
追随列宁的脚步，托洛茨基为革命的第四次国际制定了过渡纲领：垂死的资本主义和第四次国际的任务。这在1938年托洛茨基正确预计将发生毁灭性的世界大战前夕被采用。灾难中将爆发革命性的浪潮而且在这一进程中过渡纲领以及它的诉求可以发挥关键作用。一股革命性浪潮的确到来了，但社会民主党和斯大林主义在战后的局势下介入并拯救了资本主义。反过来，这为发达国家1950年至1975年的繁荣或者说壮观的经济烟花奠定了政治前提条件。因此，托洛茨基的思想由革命性的时代塑造出来，但在这一时期从来没有实现。
有些组织，例如，社会主义工人党(SWP)，因此放弃了过渡纲领和过渡办法。我们捍卫托洛茨基的方法，但认识到，有必要因繁荣所代表的不同的条件而修改一些具体的要求。然而，世界各地，欧洲和英国工人运动当前所面临的形势意味着这种做法，如果不是1938年所有的要求，在目前的斗争中是至关重要的。事实上，现在，这比1938年撰写时更具有现实性，因为发展着的条件与预期的阶段是类似的。托洛茨基要求，例如，面对着风行的大规模失业，需要“工作或所有的生活费用”。我们今天需求，“有益的工作，或者生活收入”。工人阶级拒绝承担这一危机。让老板支付！如果他们不能保证工人阶级最大限度的存在，我们供养不起他们的制度！
国有化

在此爆发性期间，有必要在工资水平和条件上而且还涉及政府的作为或不作为上争取工人阶级的部分要求。一个恰当的例子是针对银行的冒火的愤怒，而不只是针对卷入其中的骗子，如Bernard Madoff 和 Allen Stanford，而是针对使自己的工业破产并威胁把整个社会包括工人阶级推向深渊的整个资产阶级。他们允许国家介入以通过大规模的救助来拯救他们。然而，失败的右翼共和党总统候选人参议员麦凯恩远为不感激。他把国家债务的增加描述为“窃子孙财者” 。但是，那不是他的法宝，前右翼副总统切尼宣称， “里根[美国政府]证明赤字没有问题” ？但它仍未阻止麦凯恩，连同其他共和党人，考虑全面国有化银行。
资本主义的政客可以接受国家救援，只要它是完全沿着资本主义的路线并带有今后归还'国有化'行业到完全相同的起初破坏它们的私人口袋里的前景。英国的一些评论家设想，银行国有化并继续留在国有部门估计九年。
虚伪的麦凯恩和他的动人的对后代的关心掩盖了伊拉克战争的巨大的开支，可能总计3万亿美元，他是完全支持这个军事开支的。麦道夫（Madoff）的腐败和通过'私有化'建筑业'来提取政府现金用于重建伊拉克一样无关紧要。帕特里克•科伯恩独立评论说： “入侵之后真正掠夺伊拉克的是美国官员而不是巴格达的贫民窟” 。在一个案例中，为政府审计的工作人员说， “五千七百八十万美元以'一袋一袋的百元美钞'送往把自己拍摄在成堆的钱旁边的伊拉克中南部监查官手里” 。虽然抢劫的程度可能永远不会为人所知了，多达一千二百五十亿美元（八百八拾亿英镑）已经消失。这只是不仅在美国而且在世界各地的资本家利用国家作为一个巨大的摇钱树的方式的一个例子。
特别是在英国和美国，所需要的不是救助银行家，而是救助工人阶级和中产阶级。甚至国有化的要求也不似过去阶段那样受欢迎——因为它针对的是应该为混乱负责的银行家 奥巴马和布朗政府可能被迫实施之，尽管这并不合他们的胃口。这是因为迄今在英国和事实上在美国的部分国有化的经验已经与大众的意见疏远。这些部分国有企业的董事会仍然保留着未变守旧的资本主义性质。目前还没有类似于1948年由工党政府接管煤矿时的悬挂红旗和工人阶级对未来满怀希望的庆祝活动。这是因为，例如， 北岩银行的国家收购的特点是增加收回房屋，解雇4000名工人，后来，负责这家银行的资本价们依然保有巨额的奖金。这是国家资本主义的一种形式，而不是步向过去工党中改革派社会主义者所鼓吹的社会主义方向，当时工党基本上是一个工人政党。
需要民主计划

另一方面，'市场'别无选择。在英国， 1999年，例如，有三分之二的就业机会并不是非常自诩的私营企业而是国有部门创造的。这本身就是资本主义破产的一种承认。此外，私营工业的结构根本不是市场的支持者所爱的'知识界精华'的例子。危机的影响是如此具有痉挛性以至于越来越多的作者揭示了资本主义条件和管理的真正性质，这是新自由主义的一个内在组成部分。例如，观察者中的Simon Caulkin把大型企业的结构——包括英国电信，已透露政府有可能计划在它发生崩溃的情况下重新国有化——比作带有很多斯大林主义镜像而不象一个理想的资本主义企业的东西。据他的说法，它们 “结构上是僵尸般的特征和战略性上和斯大林主义具有相似性”。

他宣称这种管理相当粗暴： “他们热脸对主要的行政长官而把冷屁股对着客户”，很多管理者更关心的是利润指标而不是生产有价值的产品。世界上最有效的按照惯例管理的公司通用电气用40 ％的收入 ——也就是说，六百亿美元——于管理层的收入和福利...西方大公司的管理层和命令经济的政治组织比人们所承认的有更多的共同点 。接管这些公司并建立一个工人控制管理并实施社会主义计划经济的制度将是多么地便宜和有效率！

Caulkin的文章即是对马克思的论点的让步，即即使资本主义工厂的内部管理——马克思讲的是19世纪的状况——是计划的一个例子。马克思说，工厂体系应用于整个经济和世界，将描绘出通过消除市场实现民主的社会主义计划的样态。现在，具有讽刺意味的是，大公司——垄断——有着前苏联路线中头重脚轻的官僚作风。解决方法不在于斯大林主义或资本主义'市场' ，而是民主的社会主义的计划。这就需要工会和工人阶级组织，小商人等的代表参与监督，以便告知劳动者实际情况并相应地筹备实现这样一个计划。
为鸿沟搭起桥梁

由工人阶级群众混合意识构成的时代，需要一个过渡纲领。随着事件的推进，这种意识将动摇和改变。但是，过渡办法和过渡纲领——通过与时俱进的并充满着工人阶级本身的斗争经验的托洛茨基的方法可以首先在政治上最先进的阶层，然后是工人阶级群众中发展出完整的社会主义意识方面起到极大地促进作用。这为今天劳动者的意识和社会主义变革思想架起了桥梁。 宗派主义不需要这样一个桥梁，因为他们不打算通过学习，扶助或兼职同工人阶级连接起来并和她一起用社会主义帮助改变意识和增强阶级认同。

对世界，欧洲和英国的工人阶级而言，我们已经进入一个全新的时期。即使奥巴马设法通过刺激方案在世界和美国的资本主义底部放置部分缓冲垫——可是这根本是不确定的——这一危机激起的情势将完全不同于开始之前的情势。世界经济充其量将经历顽固地维持着大规模失业的贫血般的增长。这就像身体中的脂肪组织，是一种衰退的有机体症状。但资本主义不会自动地从历史舞台上消失。有必要建立一个强有力的群众武备，该武备将帮助提高工人阶级群众的理解水平——在过渡纲领的帮助下——从这个衰败的制度上为社会主义开辟道路提供帮助。
如果没有这样一种做法，即使面对目前的经济灾难，有一个对劳动人民来说不会立即明朗化的危险，什么是可行的替代办法。例如，在汽车行业，由于大规模裁员，工资被大幅削减，工人们有一种本能的想法，即他们目前的产品“没有市场”。但是，由于高级技术和技能的存在，将能够花很少的力气来转换汽车产业，由面临着巨大的生产过剩和供过于求的市场转向生产有用的产品，包括绿色，环保车辆。这些都是世界人口的迫切需要，即需要一个可持续的，环保化的运输系统。第二次世界大战爆发时出现了生产上的这种转变，但鉴于今天资本主义的混乱，这完全是不可能的。这样就提出了一个社会主义社会替代的要求。

下一阶段，日益恶化的客观形势和工人阶级意识之间的鸿沟将缩小。事件——而且是爆炸性的事件——将有助于确保这一点。在深渊的边缘，工人大众将面对这个资本主义制度——有时没有明确的什么可以替代它的想法。然而，如果工人阶级信奉那社会主义理念和日常斗争连接起来的过渡方式和过渡纲领，走向社会主义和革命意识之路将大大地缩短，而且痛苦少得多。

向资本主义危机置于工人们肩上的负担说不！向大规模的失业特别是新的一代要永远接受失业救济金的可怕的前景说不。用由工人阶级，工会，小商人等代表参与的民主的和社会主义的组织方式把银行国有化，民主的社会主义国家部门本身将提出进一步国有化的问题，其中包括掌握经济命脉的国有化。在这条道路上，将提供给工人阶级群众以抵抗没有出路的停滞的腐朽的资本主义世界的希望。

23 February 2009
CWI Analysis
From March edition of Socialism Today, magazine of the Socialist Party (CWI in England and Wales)
pdf version
How to fight the economic crisis
Capitalist crisis, mass consciousness and a socialist programme
Peter Taaffe, CWI
How can working-class people fight the effects of the worst economic crisis since the 1930s? Mass lay-offs are already a feature in the major capitalist countries and around the world. The bosses and their governments are on the offensive to make the working class, and large sections of the middle classes, pay for the catastrophe they have created.
World capitalism is in a blind alley and its serious representatives see no quick exit. Take your pick; from the gloomy prognostications for the economy from Alistair Darling, British Chancellor of the Exchequer – ‘the worst for 60 years’ – to Ed Balls, schools cabinet minister in the New Labour government, who says it is the worst in 100 years! Most capitalist commentators now agree with our analysis, that at the very least, this is the worst economic crisis since the great depression of the 1930s and may yet exceed it.
In a sense, this crisis is potentially even worse than then. The extent of capitalist globalisation, which led to this crash,, is much wider and deeper than existed in the so-called ‘gilded age’ before 1929. For this reason, it is already the most internationalised, generalised economic crisis in history. The US, western Europe, Japan, eastern Europe, Russia, Asia, Australasia and Latin America; all have been caught up in the downward economic whirlpool. It has certainly developed at a speed and with a severity that exceeds even the initial phases of the 1930s depression.
The crisis then began in the stock exchanges, spreading to the financial sector and inexorably into the so-called ‘real economy’. Today’s crisis was triggered by the financial meltdown, fed into industry, and now has fed back into the financial sector. But 1929’s full effects were only felt over time – in the case of France, two or three years after – whereas this crisis has struck with a speed and severity that has terrified, if not demoralized, the representatives of world capitalism. What took three years in 1929 could now unfold in a year.
This crisis is marked by overproduction; a glut of goods, which the bosses are trying to solve through mass unemployment of the working class. But it is also leading to ‘overproduction’ even amongst sections of the middle class, who are being ejected from workplaces alongside workers. In other words, the proletarianisation of the intermediate layers, a feature of capitalism even during the boom, is taking a qualitative step forward. This in turn undermines the social reserves of capitalism.
Capitulation by workers’ organisations
The capitalists are trembling at the social consequences of further economic implosions to come. Their only consolation is that they face no organised challenge from the working class, because of the political beheading of the former workers’ organisations, at the hands of leaders like Tony Blair in Britain and their social-democratic cousins in Europe and elsewhere. They went over lock, stock and barrel to the side of the bourgeoisie in the aftermath of the collapse of Stalinism and the ideological, pro-capitalist tsunami that ensued. The result is that the mass of working-class people are politically disarmed in the teeth of the greatest challenge to their hard-won rights and conditions in living memory.
Without leadership and organisation when the capitalists have used the cover of the crisis to put the boot in, mass anger has poured out spontaneously both in the factories and onto the streets. This happened in Ireland as the government sought to eliminate health benefits for the elderly. It was followed by angry protests including occupations or threats to do so at Waterford Crystal and Dell, as brutal capital shut down whole factories with as little difficulty as shutting a matchbox. The same outrageous scenes were seen in the ending of the weekend shift at BMW’s Mini plant in Cowley, Oxford, which provoked unprecedented protests including fist fights between workers and supervisors. However, for this elemental revolt of the working class to lead to a sustained movement, what is required is a clear programme, including fighting slogans, and organisation.
The capitulation, also shared by the trade union leaders, actually helped to reinforce the brutal imposition of neo-liberal policies on the working class and the poor worldwide. The bourgeoisie, no longer forced to look over its shoulder at an organised working class or fearful of a labour movement revolt, was therefore unrestrained in the mad dash towards unregulated capitalism. The former leaders of the workers’ organisations proved to be a fifth wheel in the chariot of neo-liberalism. The complete pusillanimity of the union leaders is evident in the capitulation to the bosses and their governments as the latter seek to unload responsibility for this crisis on to the shoulders of the working class and poor.
The masses are quite clear who are responsible. In Italy, the students, a barometer of what is developing from below, have chanted on demonstrations: ‘We will not pay for your crisis’. What a contrast to the belly-crawling attitude of the trade union leaders as factories close down around the ears of the working class and all that we hear from the summits of the labour movement is the need for ‘shared sacrifices’. Leon Trotsky wrote in the 1930s that the crisis facing the working class, indeed humanity, was summed up in the crisis of leadership of the workers’ organisations. The difference today, however, is that we face not just a crisis of leadership but also of organisation, or the lack of it, for the working class as well as a clear programme.
Never in history has the gap – the ‘scissors’ – between the objective situation of capitalism in crisis and the outlook of the working class, its absence of organisation, particularly political mass parties, been so evident. Given the relentless propaganda barrage, the reality of neo-liberal policies over 30 years and the absence of a political and economic alternative, it is inevitable that there is still, despite the severity of the crash, a residual acquiescence to the ‘market’, even amongst the working class. Many are stunned by the economic collapse. There is even a lingering view amongst many workers that the present crisis is temporary, that it will all be over by the end of next year, at the latest, and we can then return to the sunny, economic uplands.
Bleak economic outlook
These illusions are fostered by the ‘popular’ press and one wing of bourgeois economists and commentators. However, another section has drawn the conclusion that this time the party is really over. For instance, Sean O’Grady of The Independent declared bluntly in January: “High unemployment is here to stay”. In America’s great depression, unemployment did not regain its level of 1929 until 1943 when the US economy was being dragged out of the economic mire by the devastating second world war. This puts in perspective the efforts of the Obama presidency as it seeks to wrestle with the avalanche of job cuts and redundancies which are rising by 600,000 a month. Unemployment in the US and Britain could touch 10% of the workforce in the next year or so, the effects of which in the modern context are akin to a depression.
If anything, the position is even worse in other parts of the world, paradoxically particularly in parts of Europe which were supposed to be immune. The pronouncements of the European Central Bank that the eurozone would escape the worst effects of the virus emanating from the US economy have turned to ashes. The continent has joined the general implosion of world capitalism, as has Japan. The latest forecasts for the latter are that gross domestic product could plunge by almost 10%. The great export-orientated machine of Japan is grinding to a halt, dropping by 3.3% in the last three months of 2008, an annualised rate of 12.7%. It has been joined by Germany, the economic powerhouse of Europe, while the lesser powers of the continent – Ireland, Spain, Italy, Greece, Portugal and Britain – risk following Iceland into national bankruptcy.
For the masses, it is as if it is warm and sunny one day and bleak, dark winter the next, without the transition of autumn. The fate of Spain which, along with Ireland, went further than most in an orgy of a debt-fuelled construction and housing boom, is summed up by the story of Zaragoza, featured in the Observer in February. The collapse of the building boom means that unemployment has rocketed in the city by 75% in a year. Spain could see unemployment shooting up from an already unacceptable 14% (3.3 million workers) to 20% by the end of this year. The working class is furious that it will bear the burden, with protesters coming out onto the streets in tens of thousands demanding ‘Strike! Strike! Strike!’
Spain is just one example of what could happen to a series of countries, including Britain, which in time will provoke revolutionary explosions. If a conscious lead is not given then riots will ensue with a section of young people even possibly seduced into taking to the road of terrorism, which is a complete blind alley. The explosive events in Greece revealed that anarchistic and terroristic moods amongst a small section would be evident at a certain stage. Mass action, freed from the paralysing influence of opportunist leaders, is the only way forward.
British oil refinery strikes: confusion and clarity
An expression of the indignation was contained even in the eruption of strikes from below of the construction workers in the oil refineries and power stations in Britain. This was a laboratory test in measuring the consciousness of the working class and how different political trends faced up to this. Given the dark night of neo-liberalism, it would be entirely utopian not to expect that elements of nationalism and even racism would be present in the consciousness of some workers, in some instances perhaps the majority. This, however, was not the case in this dispute as we have demonstrated in our weekly paper, The Socialist. It was, in essence, a strike against the capitalist ‘race to the bottom’ to impose slave labour rates, orchestrated by the bosses on a European scale through the anti-working class legislation, the European Posted Workers Directive, and the EU itself.
This was skewed in the minds of some workers towards nationalism, expressed through ‘British jobs for British workers’. This was coined originally by prime minister Gordon Brown in a New Labour conference speech, in an attempt to outflank the far-right British National Party (BNP). Without clear guidance from the leadership, such an initial reaction of the workers, not just in Britain but elsewhere, is no surprise. But this was a minor feature of the strike, and was soon cut across by the intervention of more conscious socialists, particularly from the Socialist Party, who fought for the same rights, wages and conditions for migrant workers. In the Russian revolution, the tsarist general staff feared the presence of one Bolshevik who could act as a ‘crystal in a saturated solution’, as Trotsky put it, capable in a heated atmosphere of drawing the majority to its side. We witnessed something similar in this strike with socialists and Marxists, some from the Socialist Party, completely cutting across any elements of nationalism or racism. Clear solidarity was expressed with the migrant workers including the printing of a leaflet in Italian and a resolute demand for all workers to receive the rate for the job.
Predictably, some far-left groups without a real presence or even an ear to the real moods of the workers in this strike took a completely false position. The Socialist Workers Party (SWP), for instance, concentrated on criticism and emphasised ‘British jobs for British workers’ as the main feature of the strike. Pushed aside was the fact that the BNP members who turned up on the picket line were driven off by the workers. Moreover, the strike magnificently achieved an element of workers’ control and trade union involvement in the allocation of new jobs. Of course, one swallow does not make a summer but the workers in this industry and elsewhere now have a living example of how to fight in defence of workers’ living standards and, at the same time, overcome national or racial divisions in a complicated situation and actually secure a victory for the working class.
In the aftermath of the strike, the ‘conciliation’ service has concluded that the foreign-contracted workers did not receive lower rates than the British workers. This is not true, but what is entirely forgotten is that agency workers formally may sometimes receive the same as ‘domestic’ or permanent workers in their weekly or monthly wage rates. But they do not receive payments for breaks, holidays or the overheads which the bosses worldwide are trying to wipe out as a means of boosting their profitability. The same applies in this dispute. This has been covered over by ACAS and acquiesced to by the full-time trade union officials who did not exactly cover themselves in glory while the strike was on, being concerned to distance themselves from unofficial action which might fall foul of Britain’s draconian anti-union laws. This dispute primarily emphasised the positive outcome and saw the secondary features of nationalism swept aside by a combination of the experience of the workers in struggle and the intervention of socialists and Marxists.
Most of the far-left groups have no perception of how a mass movement will evolve, particularly given the character of the last period. This will not be in a perfectly rounded-out fashion but, as Oliver Cromwell described himself, with ‘warts and all’. If these ultra-lefts had been present at the beginning of the 1905 Russian revolution, their starting point would have been, no doubt, to condemn Father Gapon, the priest who initially led the masses in the first demonstration under the tsarist flag, with a petition to the ‘Little Father’, the tsar. In contradistinction to Vladimir Lenin who urged participation in the movement and even discussed and collaborated in the initial phases of the revolution with Gapon, they would have demanded that the priest be removed from the demonstration as a precondition for their participation! How would they have reacted to James Larkin organising mass demonstrations of Catholic and Protestant workers in 1907 with Orange and Green bands in the common struggle against the bosses?
While making no concessions to racial or national prejudices, it is necessary, above all because of the period we have just passed through, for socialists to approach the existing political outlook of the working class in a skilful fashion. We do not have the luxury of the Russian sage who answered the question, ‘How do I get to Moscow?’ by answering, ‘I would not start from here if I was you’. The working class, particularly after a period of alleged social peace, never emerges into struggle fully formed, like Minerva from the head of Jupiter.
Bitter class hatred
There is a gathering rage within the working class, signified by the semi-insurrectionary mood in Greece last year and the colossal anti-Sarkozy strikes which convulsed France on 29 January. Not so long ago, Nicolas Sarkozy jeered that, despite his attacks on the French workers and the youth, ‘where are the strikes?’ He was given his answer in the elemental revolt indicated by these strikes, which far exceeded in scope and turnout on demonstrations what was anticipated even by the organisers in the trade union leadership. Over two million workers flooded the streets of the cities of France. Sarkozy, sensing the underlying explosive mood before the strikes, immediately gave concessions to the school students as a means of heading off the movement. This did not prevent the strikes taking place, which indicated a whiff of 1968 itself.
There are, however, even in France, which is still politically in the vanguard of the workers’ movement in Europe, important differences in the outlook of the French working class between 1968 and now. Paradoxically, the economic situation is far worse for capitalism today than it was in 1968 when the greatest general strike in history took place against the background of a continuing boom. Then, there was a broad socialist and even a revolutionary consciousness amongst workers and students. Given what has transpired in the last three decades combined, as we have pointed out, with the capitulation of the leaders of the workers’ organisations to capitalism, the mood is bound to lag behind that of 1968. There is a mixed outlook and a certain political confusion.
There is, undoubtedly, generalized bitter class hatred throughout the advanced capitalist countries for those who are seen as the main authors of the present economic catastrophe, namely the financiers and bankers. Semi-public trials have unfolded in the British parliament and US Congress. The ire of the masses was expressed in France on the streets but, noticeably even here, was initially directed against the bankers and the figure of Sarkozy, despite his demagogic attempts to separate himself from the bankers. If even in France there is not yet a broad anti-capitalist consciousness, then it is perhaps even less the case in other European countries.

In Greece, the situation is somewhat different, with pronounced elements of a pre-revolutionary situation already present. This is reflected in the utter bankruptcy of the Greek bourgeoisie and its state, the desperation of the mass of the working class and the youth at their poverty-stricken condition and their preparedness to struggle, as shown in three general strikes to now. It is also reflected in the complete incapacity of the official parties of capitalism – New Democracy and the ex-socialist PASOK – and the corresponding rise of a new workers’ party, SYRIZA. This is combined with the bleak economic future facing Greece. So desperate is the economic situation that its economy has been downgraded by ratings agency Moody’s, which could presage a refusal to buy government debt by capitalist investors. This could lead to economic collapse and, in turn, could see Greece leave or be evicted from the eurozone.
It could also herald a series of partial or even outright national bankruptcies, as witnessed in the 1930s in Europe and neo-colonial regions such as Latin America. Greece could be joined very easily by Spain, Portugal and even Ireland if bond traders go on strike and refuse to buy government debt. Faced with this situation, the ruling class would unhesitatingly resort to even more savage measures attacking the wages and conditions of the working class. The conditions of the working class in this situation of decaying capitalism is like a man on a downward escalator frantically running just to maintain his position.
Discrediting capitalism
Quite calmly and ‘soberly’, the ideologues of capitalism debate the merits of deflation – falling prices, cuts in production and mass unemployment – versus inflation – an increase in prices – as the best means of preserving their position. Deflation and inflation are heads and tails of the same capitalist coin, and the working class is called on to pay. This was shown by one writer in the Financial Times who calmly declared that companies will benefit from inflation because a portion of the debt will disappear, benefitting those companies with fixed-interest debts. On the other hand: “Higher inflation allows more companies and workers to agree to real wage cuts than would otherwise be the case. This is both useful for those firms that are currently uncompetitive, and preferable for [capitalist] society, because wage cuts are more equitable than unemployment”. In other words, the working class must pay, profits must be maintained, if not increased, at the expense of the working class.
Clearly, capitalism and with it the working class have entered a brutal new era. The burning question is how to close the gap between the underlying objective situation, of the drawn-out crisis of capitalism, indeed a series of crises, and how to make concrete the slogan of the Italian youth: ‘We will not pay for your crisis’. What is involved here – as the recent strikes at the British refineries and the outburst of anger at at the summary dismissal of 850 workers with an hour’s notice show – is the need for a fighting programme. Obviously, the case for a general change from outmoded capitalism to a new socialist society has to be made.
This crisis is proof, if any were needed, that boom and bust, the economic cycle of capitalism described by Karl Marx and so derided by the overwhelming majority of ‘intellectual’ opinion in the past period, has reasserted its validity. Inequality can no more be overcome within the framework of capitalism than could Canute turn back the waves. Inequality is the essence of capitalism, revealed clearly in the relationship between the workers and the capitalists. As Marx pointed out, the capitalists buy the labour power of the working class in order to exploit it. The working class only receives back a portion of the new value it has created, the rest being unpaid labour, the profit that is garnered by the capitalists. The class struggle, as Trotsky pointed out, is nothing else but the struggle over the division of the surplus product. The more that this surplus product is fought over – particularly when profits stagnate or decline, as is the case now – the more intense the class struggle. The starting point of the working class in this situation must be a determination to resist the onslaught of capital, to defend all past gains, before going on to make new conquests.
Contrary to what the bourgeois ideologists argue, capitalism, particularly in its neo-liberal phase, is not the best nor the most efficient vehicle to maximise production and distribute products efficiently to the peoples of the world. The idea that capitalism was a seamless system, not subject to abrupt breakdowns, which was prevalent particularly following the collapse of the Berlin wall, is now utterly discredited. Tucked away from the gaze of the working class in their ‘quality’ journals, the defenders of capitalism admit this: “Conservatives… actually believe in the capitalist system. Anyone who understands capitalism knows that it is programmed to fail from time to time. Conservative economic teachings hold that recessions are much like the weather. It may be possible to mitigate its effects, but impossible to change its nature”. (Peter Oborne, right-wing political columnist for the Daily Mail.)
A transitional approach
No mention of a rosy future: if capitalism breaks down we, the working class, must pay. This is the essence of Oborne’s stormy weather scenario, a world in which the state is the umbrella for capitalism while the workers receive a soaking in the form of mass unemployment. We are not going to pay and we must demand an entirely more humane system. Socialism must be the policy of the working class. Even Newsweek declared: “We are all socialists now”. Unfortunately, this is not yet the case for the overwhelming majority of the victims of this system, the working class and the poor. Therefore, while demanding a democratic, socialist planned economy, as a crowning idea in the programme of socialists and Marxists, it is necessary to put forward fighting transitional demands in the current situation.

In pre-1914 social democracy, such an approach was considered unnecessary. Its programme was divided between a maximum programme, the idea of socialism, and a minimum day-to-day programme. That decisively changed with the onset of the first world war which led to the revolutionary explosions in Russia and the mass struggles and revolutionary waves which detonated in the aftermath of the 1917 revolution throughout Europe and the world. In this changed situation, the struggle for basic reforms and even the defence of past gains, came up directly against the limits of the system of capitalism itself. The Bolsheviks therefore formulated a transitional programme as a bridge – taking into account the day-to-day demands of the working class – from the existing level of consciousness to the idea of the socialist revolution. This was necessary even during the Russian revolution because of the differing and changing outlooks of the different sections of the working class. This was summed up in Lenin’s wonderful pamphlet, The Threatening Catastrophe and How to Avoid It.
Following in Lenin’s footsteps, Trotsky formulated for the revolutionary Fourth International the Transitional Programme: The Death Agony of Capitalism and the Tasks of the Fourth International. This was adopted in 1938 on the eve of what Trotsky correctly anticipated would be a devastating world war. Out of this conflagration would come a revolutionary wave and the transitional programme and its demands could play a key role in this process. A revolutionary wave did ensue but social democracy and Stalinism stepped in to save capitalism in the post-war situation. This in turn laid the political preconditions for the boom, the spectacular economic fireworks, which developed between 1950 and 1975. Consequently, Trotsky’s ideas, which were fashion ed for a revolutionary epoch, were never fully implemented in this period.
Some, like the SWP, therefore jettisoned both the transitional programme and the transitional approach. We defended Trotsky’s method but recognised that it was necessary to modify some of the demands for different conditions, which the boom represented. The current situation facing the workers’ movement in Britain, Europe and across the globe, however, means that this approach, if not all the demands of 1938, is now vital in the present struggle. In fact, it is more relevant now than when it was written in 1938 because the conditions which are developing are akin to the period anticipated. Trotsky demanded, for instance, ‘work or full maintenance’ in the teeth of endemic mass unemployment. We demand today, ‘useful work, or a living income’. The working class refuses to shoulder the burden of this crisis. Let the bosses pay! If they cannot guarantee a maximum existence for the working class, we can’t afford their system!
Nationalisation
It is also necessary in this explosive period to take up the partial demands of the working class both at the level of wages and conditions but also involving governmental action or inaction. A case in point is the burning anger directed against the banks, not just the crooks who have been caught, like Bernard Madoff and Allen Stanford, but the whole fraternity who have bankrupted their own industry and threaten to drag the whole of society, including the working class, into the abyss. They have allowed the state to step in to rescue them through massive bailouts. Yet the defeated, right-wing Republican presidential candidate, John McCain, is far from grateful. He has described the increase in state debt as “generational theft”. But was it not his talisman, previous right-wing vice-president, Dick Cheney, who declared that “Reagan proved [US government] deficits don’t matter”? It has still not stopped McCain, along with other Republicans, from considering full nationalisation of the banks.
Capitalist politicians can accept state rescue, so long as it is then run completely along capitalist lines and with the prospect of returning the ‘nationalised’ industries in the future to the very same private interests which ruined them in the first place. Some commentators in Britain envisage that banks could be nationalised and remain in the state sector for an estimated nine years.
The hypocrisy of McCain and his touching concern for future generations is belied by the colossal expenditure on the Iraq war, probably $3 trillion in total, which he supported to the hilt. The corruption of Madoff is as nothing to the creaming off of government cash by the ‘privatised’ construction industry to ‘reconstruct Iraq’. Patrick Cockburn in the Independent commented: “The real looting of Iraq after the invasion was by US officials and not by the slums of Baghdad”. In one case, auditors working for the government said “that $57.8 million was sent in ‘pallet upon pallet of hundred-dollar bills’ to the US comptroller for south-central Iraq… who had himself photographed standing with the mound of money”. Although the extent of the robbery will probably never be known, up to $125 billion (£88bn) has simply disappeared. This is just one example of the way that the capitalists, not just in the US but world wide, use the state as a colossal milch cow.
The demand, in Britain and in the US in particular, is not for bailouts for the bankers but for the working and middle classes. Even the demand for nationalisation – because it is aimed at the bankers who are seen as responsible for the mess and which both Obama and the Brown government may be compelled to carry through despite its un palatability to them – is not as popular as in previous periods. This is because the experience of the partial nationalisation so far in Britain and de facto in the US has alienated mass public opinion. The boards of these partially nationalised companies remain unreconstructed capitalist in character. There were no celebrations similar to those which greeted the taking over of the mines in 1948 by the Labour government of the time, with the flying of red flags and big hopes for the future of the working class. This is because, for instance, Northern Rock’s state takeover was marked with increased repossessions of homes, the sacking of 4,000 workers and, latterly, lavish bonuses for some of the capitalist crew who remain in charge of this bank. This is a form of state capitalism, not a step in the direction of socialism, as advocated by even reformist socialists in the Labour Party in the past, when it was a workers’ party at bottom.
The need for democratic planning
On the other hand, the ‘market’ offers no alternative. In Britain in 1999, for instance, two thirds of jobs created were not in the much-vaunted ‘entrepreneurial’ private sector but were in the state sector. This itself is a confession of bankruptcy by capitalism. Moreover, the structures in private industry are not at all an example of the ‘meritocracy’ beloved of the upholders of the market. Indeed, so convulsive have been the effects of the crisis that more and more capitalist writers have revealed the real character of the conditions and management which are such an intrinsic part of neo-liberalism. For instance, Simon Caulkin in the Observer compares the structure of big business – including British Telecom, which the government, it has been leaked, has contingency plans to renationalise in the event of its collapse – as more of a mirror image of Stalinism than a prettified picture of an ideal capitalist firm. They are, according to him, “zombie-like in their structural and strategic similarity” with Stalinism.
Rather rudely, he declares of management: “With their faces towards the [chief executive officer] and their arses towards the customer” most managers are more concerned with earnings targets than producing a worthwhile product. The world’s most efficient, conventionally managed corporation, General Electric, “spends 40% – that is, $60 billion – of its revenues on administration and overheads… The managers of large western corporations have much more in common with the apparatchiks of the command economies than is recognised”. How much cheaper and efficient it would be to take over these firms, establish a system of workers’ control and management, and install a socialist planned economy!
Caulkin’s article is both a concession to Marx’s argument that the internal management of even a capitalist factory – Marx was speaking about the conditions of the nineteenth century – was an example of planning. The factory system, Marx said, applied to the economy and the world as a whole, would represent democratic socialist planning through the elimination of the market. Now, ironically, giant corporations – monopolies – have a top-heavy bureaucracy on the lines of the former Soviet Union. The solution lies not with Stalinism or with the capitalist ‘market’ but with democratic socialist planning. This requires the opening of the books for inspection by representatives of the unions and working-class organisations, small businesspeople, etc, in order to inform working people of what is the real situation as a preparatory step for realising such a plan.
Bridging the gap
The need for a transitional programme in this era arises from the mixed consciousness of working-class people. This consciousness will be shaken and changed by the march of events. But the development of a rounded-out socialist consciousness, firstly of the most politically developed layers and then of the mass of the working class, can also be enormously facilitated by a transitional approach and a transitional programme – by adopting the method of Leon Trotsky brought up to date and filled out by the experience of the working class itself in struggle. This provides the bridge from the consciousness of working people today to the idea of socialist change. Sectarians have no need for such a bridge because they have no intention of passing over from the study, armchair or sideline to engage with the working class and, together with it, helping to change consciousness and increasing identification with socialism.

We have entered an entirely new period for the working class of Britain, Europe and the world. Even if Obama manages to put a partial cushion under US capitalism and thereby the world through stimulus programmes – and this is not at all certain – the situation that will arise from this crisis will be entirely different than the one before its onset. At best, the world economy will experience anaemic growth with the stubborn maintenance of mass unemployment. This, like fatty tissue in the body, is a symptom of a declining organism. Capitalism, however, will not disappear from the scene of history automatically. It is necessary to forge a powerful mass weapon which will be assisted by raising the level of understanding of working-class people – helped by a transitional programme – which can provide the helping hand for this failed system to make way for socialism.
Without such an approach, there is the danger that it will not be immediately evident to working people, even faced with the present economic catastrophe, what is the viable alternative. In the car industry, for instance, where wages have been slashed due to mass layoffs, there is an instinctive understanding by workers that there is ‘no market’ for their present products. But, given the high technique and skill that exists, it would take very little to convert the car industry, with a market faced with massive overproduction and a glut, to the production of useful goods, including green, environmentally-friendly vehicles. These are urgently needed for the world’s population, in the context of a sustainable, environmentally-friendly transport system. Such a switch in production was achieved at the outbreak of the second world war but is frankly impossible given the chaos of capitalism today. This does, however, pose the demand for an alternative socialist society.
The gap between the increasingly worsening objective situation and the consciousness of the working class will close in the next period. Events – and explosive events at that – will help to ensure this. On the edge of an abyss, the mass of workers will confront the capitalist system – sometimes without a clear idea of what can be put in its place. The journey to a socialist and revolutionary consciousness will, however, be shortened considerably, the pain much less, if the working class embraces the transitional method and a transitional programme linking day-to-day struggles with the idea of socialism.
No to any burdens of the crisis of capitalism being placed on the backs of workers! No to mass unemployment, particularly the frightening prospect of a new generation being permanently on the dole. Nationalise the banks but with democratic, socialist forms of organisation, including the involvement of representatives of the working class, unions, small businesspeople, etc. A democratic socialist state sector will itself pose the issue of going further towards more nationalisation, encompassing the commanding heights of the economy. On this road, hope is offered to working-class people against the dead-end of stagnating, decaying world capitalism.