Can Trade Unions Change
Society?
The question posed by
this talk probably has a very simple answer for us as socialists.
That answer is no: Trade Unions in and of themselves do not have the
power to change society and bring about the revolution that we would
see as vital to the creation of a socialist system. And yet, we
cannot leave it there and go home because the SWP and its members
invest a lot of time and energy into building within unions. In order
to account for this commitment, we have to acknowledge and address
the problems inherent in trade unions and consider our role within
them carefully.
The first criticism of
unions is that they do not represent all those people who have the
power to bring about a change. There are many who share similar
politics to us or similar dissatisfaction with the status quo but who
are not part of the organised working class. Last year, for example,
we saw Russell Brand articulately express his views on the futility
of voting. He expressed his ideas in similar terms to those we use
ourselves, and yet, Brand is now far removed from the reality of life
for members of the working class, enjoying a huge deal of wealth and
fame. Even before becoming a celebrity, the drug addiction,
homelessness, squatting and poverty which he experienced certainly
made him a victim of capitalism but not part of the organised working
class, of which he has had no experience. Therefore his vision of
rebellion against the system is not consistent with our vision of how
to bring about revolution because it is not, I believe, rooted in
first-hand understanding and experience of class struggle.
Brand can be seen to
represent significant numbers of people who have limited or no
experience of working within unions to fight as a class and many of
these students, unemployed, self-employed or temporary workers,
including those often referred to as a ‘precariat’ may not
identify their interests as aligned to those within the organised
working class. For these people, movements and campaigning
organisations like the People’s Assembly and UK Uncut can hold
great appeal and are organisations that we seek to work with because
of their power to raise awareness of key political ideas, mobilise
people and bring people out onto the streets.
Equally, if we look at
employment, official statistics in June of this year seemed to
present a picture of unemployment falling in the country down from
7.2% to 6.5%, yet this still leaves a total of 2.34 million people
classified as unemployed, not counting the large numbers of people
who are underemployed, on temporary contracts, retired, studying,
self-employed, on zero hours contracts or not counted as unemployed
for other statistical reasons. Though the BBC sought to present this
as evidence of economic growth and recovery, this leaves a huge
proportion of the population who are not represented by unions and
who do not necessarily identify themselves as part of the working
class but with whom we would seek to work as they are similarly
exploited and disadvantaged by the capitalist system.
Equally, there are huge
proportions of the working class who are in employment but not in
unions at all. According to government statistics, UK rates of union
membership in 2013 were 6.5 million (only 25.6% of those in
employment), with numbers of union members in the private sector
increasing alongside the rate of increased employment but the
proportion of those in the public sector in unions falling. If the
unions represent such a small number of the working class it is
understandable that many feel they do not have the power to bring
about real change.
Therefore, many on the
left have recently argued for a shift away from union activity
towards creating a mass movement (or mass movements) to reflect the
vast proportion of the population who can be mobilised but who are
outside of unions.
In addition, many union
members have a lack of confidence in their own union leadership.
Experience has shown us that unions do not always act in the
interests of the class. They are, in themselves, bureaucratic
organisations whose function is to negotiate and therefore it is
unsurprising that so often unions can be seen to sell out their
members. This is a pattern that has been seen repeatedly in the
history of workers’ struggle.
In a recent article in
the ISJ, Dave Hayes pointed out that, in the miners’ strike, ‘the
trade union leadership did not match the bravery and determination of
the miners.’1
Those of us who have seen the film ‘Still the Enemy Within’ will
know that it acts as a timely reminder of this fact: that the defeat
of the miners was not just achieved through the malicious attacks
from the Tories but also as a result of betrayals by union
leadership, a failure on the part of NACODS to uphold its members’
decision to join the miners on strike, thus shutting down any
remaining open mines and strengthening the cause of the NUM.
Similarly, the TUC failed to call out other unions. Too often attacks
on individual sections of the working class are not met with whole
class resistance, the unions frequently fail to act collectively and
fail to see their own interests and demands within the context of the
class that they represent. Individual unions acting on individual
issues in isolation can always be divided from each other and
prevented from forcing through real change and the very intermediary
role which unions play means that their continued existence relies
upon negotiating and making deals rather than fighting, as we
tragically saw with the Grangemouth betrayal last year.
The disparity between the
union’s interests and the interests of the workers which it
represents is a well-established truth. Gramsci, writing in 1919
about the Italian labour union Confederazione del Lavoro, a
union which had been founded by socialists but which was, by now,
heavily dominated by reformists, comments that
‘The workers feel that the complex of ‘their’ organisation has become such an enormous apparatus, which has ended in obeying its own laws, intimate to its structure and to its complicated functioning, but extraneous to the mass which has acquired a consciousness of its historical mission as a revolutionary class. They feel that their will for power is not expressed, in a clear and precise sense, through the current institutional hierarchies. They feel that even at home, in the home they have tenaciously constructed, with patient efforts cementing it with blood and tears, the machine crushes the man, bureaucracy sterilises the creator spirit and banal and verbalistic dilettantism attempt in vain to hide the absence of precise concepts on the necessities of industrial production and the lack of understanding of the psychology of the proletarian masses. The workers are irritated by these real conditions, but they are individually powerless to change them; the words and wills of individual men are too small a thing compared to the iron laws inherent in the structure of the union apparatus.’2
This irritation with union leadership
is, perhaps, one that most of us will have experienced. Yet, as a
party we invest a lot of time and effort working within the unions.
So why? Gramsci’s criticisms of the bureaucracy of the union will
be very familiar to many of us but he also highlights the
powerlessness felt outside of organisations and perhaps implies the
power that can be felt as a result of membership within unions.
Individually we are unable to change society and so the need to work
within unions becomes vital. Indeed, unions play a central role in
much of our work.
Though unions only
represent a certain proportion of the working class, it is union
activity which is often able to have the greatest effect on
governments. It was, in the 70s, the NUM who were perhaps most able
to bring down Ted Heath’s Tory government, forcing the government
to bring in the three day working week to save fuel and prolong the
fight against the unions and finally, in a fit of undeserved
confidence that the public would turn on the miners, he called an
election as a vote of confidence in his government. As we all know,
this backfired spectacularly. He asked the public “Who governs
Britain?” and Britain responded that it was not him.
Those who argue for the
need to build a mass movement often overlook the fact that
demonstrations, sit-ins and protests, whilst having their place in
raising awareness, cannot force change because in a capitalist system
it is sustained damage to profit and capital which is best able to
force the capitalists to listen. If we look at the anti-Vietnam
campaigns, for example we can see that protest alone was not able to
bring about change. In fact, the earliest protests against the
Vietnam War were in 1965 and sprang out of the civil rights movement.
However, the American troops did not leave Vietnam until 1973 and the
war did not end as a result of demonstrations and anti-war rallies
alone, though these certainly played a part. In actual fact, mutiny
and refusal to fight amongst working class soldiers, many of whom had
developed a sense of their politics from the civil rights movement, a
large proportion of whom were black and increasingly saw the war as
in conflict with their class interests, played a much greater role.
This action within the
army was mirrored by increasing strikes in America. The impact of war
on the economy meant that the working classes were disproportionately
being affected through fighting in the war itself as well as being
affected through their wages and the increased cost of living at
home. Pressure from the working class to end the war, increasing
damage to the American economy as the war progressed and the growth
of the anti-war movement into a potentially revolutionary body forced
big business to back away from supporting the war, placing pressure
on Nixon to pull out from all sides. The role of rallies has, then
been overstated in our collective imaginations and the coverage which
is engrained in our minds when we think back to the war. As an
article from Socialist world points out:
‘The war also hit people in the pocket book. At first, increased war spending boosted the economy, but the cost of the war and increased social programs at home (to stem an uprising of African Americans) forced the government to print excess dollars to pay for it. This led to a spiral of price increases, inflation, a ballooning budget deficit, and the erosion of the purchasing power of workers’ wages – which triggered an increase in strikes and opposition to union leaders who refused to fight the bosses in order to win decent contracts.At this point, the anti-war movement developed into a truly mass movement, cleaving society in two… By 1972, one million blacks (sic) considered themselves revolutionary. Millions began to see clearly through the rhetoric of a "war against communism", and saw the naked aggression of the US ruling class in its pursuit of profits and imperialist domination.
By this point, important sections of big business concluded that it was better to end the war rather than suffer further social explosions at home. They feared the civil rights movement, the growing threat of ordinary workers going out on wildcat strikes, and the youth movement all coalescing into one giant movement against the government and the capitalist system.’3
It is, therefore, a
combination of factors far beyond the demonstrations and the left
anti-war movement which can be seen to have finally forced an end to
the war.
Even in the run up to the
Iraq war, with a huge anti-war movement and significant protests and
demonstrations, the anti-war message did not succeed in preventing
the invasion of Iraq by British and American forces, however strongly
and compellingly the arguments were made and however popular the
sentiment. Movements are limited to raising awareness and protesting
but cannot change the systems in place, whereas union activity is
able to force through reform and place pressure on governments which
can hold back the worst excesses of capitalist exploitation.
It is significant that
the first factory in the world, here in Derby, should also be the
sight of the first strike and lock out. As capitalism has developed
there has been a constant conflict between the workers and the
capitalists and from the silk mill workers winning the right to form
a union through to the winning of the 40 hour week, minimum wage,
paid holidays, maternity and paternity leave and health and safety at
work at amongst many others, the unions have seen off the worst
excesses of capitalist exploitation and protected workers safety and
conditions of work, union activity has achieved a huge deal, in many
ways changing significant aspects of society and doing away with some
of the most draconian aspects of capitalist exploitation.
Yet equally, and perhaps
more importantly, industrial action is often the first stage in
revolutionary activity. Those of us who have been on picket lines or
participated in strikes, marches and rallies know how much confidence
and enthusiasm these instil within the working class. Strikes are
also an ongoing part of any revolution. Rosa Luxemburg, in ‘The
Mass Strike’ challenges the idea of a clear separation of the
politically motivated ‘mass strike’ and the economically
motivated general strike. It becomes clear that she sees a continuous
and reciprocal relationship between economically motivated and
politically motivated class struggle. Yet more importantly she
identifies wider political motivations as holding equal import in
terms of the motivations for action and sees the general strike of
1896 as a politicising action:
‘Here already we see all the fundamental characteristics of the later mass strikes. The next occasion of the movement was wholly accidental, even unimportant, its outbreak elementary; but in the success of the movement the fruits of the agitation, extending over several years, of the social democracy, were seen and in the course of the general strike the social democratic agitators stood at the head of the movement, directed it, and used it to stir up revolutionary agitation. Further the strike was outwardly a mere economic struggle for wages, but the attitude of the government and the agitation of the social democracy made it a political phenomenon of the first rank. And lastly, the strike was suppressed: the workers suffered a ‘defeat’. But in January of the following year the textile workers of St Petersburg repeated the general strike once more and achieved this time a remarkable success: the legal introduction of a working day of eleven hours throughout the whole of Russia. What was nevertheless a much more important result was this: since that first general strike of 1896 which was entered upon without a trace of organisation or of strike funds, an intensive trade union fight began in Russia proper which spread from St Petersburg to the other parts of the country and opened up entirely new vistas to Social Democratic agitation and organisation, and by which in the apparently death like peace of the following period the revolution was prepared by underground work.’4
Luxemburg highlights
quite clearly the power of strike action as workers from one industry
to another came out in strike ‘growing like an avalanche’ in
1905.5
Yet she stresses that it is when these strikes become spontaneous
that they begin to intersect with revolutionary activity and cease to
be a means for the proletariat to protect themselves within the
confines of a parliamentary and capitalist system.
At this year’s Marxism
Anne Alexander and Moustafa Bassiouny’s talk as part of the series
on the Arab Spring: Three years on, focused on Workers’ Movements
in Egypt. Many of the talks at Marxism had illustrated the role that
unions can play in building towards revolution and whilst there were
clear examples of union leadership betraying its members, in Egypt as
much as in South Africa in the lead up towards the Marikana massacre,
it was inspirational to hear how workers in both Egypt and South
Africa had refused and still refuse to be limited by their union
leadership. In a range of talks we were presented with numerous
examples of workers acting without the support of their leadership or
creating new unions which will act in their interests. Even now in
the midst of the counter revolution in Egypt with severe penalties
being imposed on striking workers or protestors, strike action
continues in Egypt and the miners in South Africa have achieved
incredible successes in the aftermath of the massacre, spreading to
other workers in other parts of the country.
However, the
inspirational stories of union success and workers’ success is not
limited to other parts of the world. We have recently seen successes
in unions in this country, from the Hovis workers to individual
schools to the impact of ongoing national strike by several of the
larger unions.
Yet it is the role that
we, as revolutionaries, play in the unions which is most important,
as was stressed by Anne Alexandra’s talk. It is the challenges of
trying to lead unions which do not have socialists within them which
is one of the most concerning aspects of the Egyptian
counter-revolution. Without the presence of the party as a vanguard,
politicising the workers and maintaining that focus on class
politics, the momentum for revolution is more difficult to maintain.
Therefore, we act within
the unions as this is where we are able to lead the class forward,
build its confidence and politicise other members of the class.
Building solidarity between workers creates a sense of shared
interest; July 10th showed us that unions coming together
can force change as well as building that confidence. It is true that
the shake up within the cabinet was carried out for a combination of
the usual reasons – to hoodwink the public into feeling that the
government is listening, to change the way they are perceived and as
part of their build up to the election. It does not represent a
change of policy; however, we should not underestimate the
significance of the fact that, after prolonged, repeated action and
consistently stressing the arguments against Gove’s policies, his
popularity was historically low. Three days after industrial action,
he was removed from his job along with the architect of the attacks
on the NHS, similarly despised by the general public.
In terms of the question
posed by the title, then no, this particular union activity has not
changed society. However, it has built confidence, brought workers
together in solidarity and consistently enabled the conversations
which politicise those we work with in the unions. This is not
revolution, but it does build confidence for further reform and to
continue to sow the seeds of revolutionary ideas.
It is revolutionaries
acting within unions who are able to push the arguments for
collective action across unions and, in a significant way, were able
to bring about the joint action of July 10th. As a small
organisation we are able, nevertheless, to influence the policies of
our union leadership. However, the unions themselves will only take
the fight so far, and whilst we organise within the unions because
this is where workers are most powerful and effective, part of the
message we must consistently make within the unions is that they are
a tool for the workers to bring about change in their interests and
that the members must push their unions hard to act with them but
must not feel restricted by their union leadership and should not
feel limited through loyalty to their union. It is workers acting in
their own interests who have the power to change society but the
unions provide a context from within which we can fight against
exploitation, redress the power balance between the workers and the
capitalist and build confidence within the class to fight back.
It must not be forgotten
that the function of the union is, in many ways, dependent on a
continuation of the present system and can only win reform and an
improvement in the conditions of workers’ lives. However, these are
improvements which can be rolled back, as we are currently witnessing
with the attacks on the NHS, on trade union activity itself, on
education, welfare and other key achievements in terms of working
conditions. The difference between unions and soviets or workers
councils means that whilst the soviet would place the workers in
control of the means of production and enable them to determine for
themselves the conditions of their own work, the union as it exists
now acts merely as a buffer, at best protecting workers from the
worst excesses of capitalist exploitation and, as Gramsci points out,
they represent the organisation of the workers into a body which
mirrors the competitive structures of capitalism rather than
communism. Yet this does not mean that all is hopeless because where
the workers come together to make decisions about the utilisation of
their own labour power Gramsci sees workers bringing into their
unions the consciousness of their own power as a result of ‘the
simple activity of class struggle.’6
In fact, he observed the potential of unions in the early days after
the Russian revolution.
In his article ‘Unions
and Councils’, Gramsci leaves us with a hopeful image of unions
which are centred on individual trades and industries:
‘In Russia, this is what the industrial unions do. They have become the organisms in which all the individual enterprises of a certain industry amalgamate, connect, act, forming a great industrial unity. Wasteful competition is eliminated, the great services of administration, of resupply, of distribution and of accumulation, are unified in large centres. The systems of work, the secrets of fabrication, the new applications immediately become common to the whole industry. The multiplicity of bureaucratic and disciplinary functions inherent to relations of private property and individual enterprise, is reduced to pure industrial necessities.’7
So, unions cannot in
themselves change society because they are too firmly tied to the
current system and operate as reformist organisations only. However,
with socialists working within unions, unions have the capacity to
politicise the class, triggering wider political activity, and
possibly mass strike and revolution. As Rosa Luxemburg said of the
1905 revolution in Russia ‘this general direct action reacted
inwardly all the more powerfully as it for the first time awoke
feeling and class consciousness in millions upon millions as if by
electric shock … Thereupon there began a spontaneous general
shaking of and tugging at these chains [of capitalism].’8
As Luxemburg argues throughout the mass strike, class action and
struggle is a central tool for effectively educating the class
(though there appears to be some disagreement between her and Lenin
over the equivalence of the role of pamphlets and literature in
raising class consciousness and I can’t help but feel, along with
Lenin, that it must be a combination of literature, discussion and
activity which will instil and spread this education and prepare the
way for revolutionary activity).
Trades unions are a key
theatre upon which that class struggle can be enacted but, rather
than seeing mass strike and revolution as spontaneous, we must differ
from Luxemburg and insist that we work within those unions rather
than relying upon them in order to truly change society. If we are to
learn the lessons from Luxemburg’s example, we must focus on the
central role of the party rather than spontaneity. Yes, working class
action politicises and gives confidence to the class. But, there must
be a driving force to maintain the focus on politics and give a class
explanation for the economic concerns which become the focus of
individual groups within the class and which detract from the wider
class antagonism. It is essential to any revolution that both the
capitalists and the unions themselves, through which we mediate with
them, must eventually both be overthrown in place of genuine soviets
and workers councils if those economic issues are to be permanently
addressed.
As Lenin put it:
‘Recently, the overwhelming majority of Russian Social-Democrats were almost wholly engaged in this work of organising the exposure of factory conditions. It is sufficient to refer to the columns of Rabochay Mysl to judge to what extent they were engaged in it. So much so, indeed, that they lost sight of the fact that this, taken by itself, is not in essence Social-Democratic work, but merely trade union work. As a matter of fact, these exposures merely dealt with the relations between the workers in a given trade and their immediate employers, and all that they achieved was that the vendors of labour power learned to sell their “commodity” on better terms and to fight the purchasers of labour power over a purely commercial deal. These exposures could have served (if properly utilised by revolutionaries) as a beginning and a constituent part of Social-Democratic activity, but they could also have led (and with subservience to spontaneity inevitably had to lead) to a “pure and simple” trade union struggle and to a non-Social-Democratic labour movement. Social-Democrats lead the struggle of the working class not only for better terms for the sale of labour power, but also for the abolition of the social system which compels the propertyless to sell themselves to the rich. Social-Democracy represents the working class, not in relation to a given group of employers, but in its relation to all classes in modern society, to the state as an organised political force.’9
I suppose it makes sense
to conclude by stressing the fact that it continues to be the work of
the party to work within the unions, guiding trade union struggle
towards more generalised class struggle. As revolutionaries acting
within unions we are well positioned to lead the class towards
revolution and to push trade union activity further but, as Lenin
stressed, we cannot be satisfied with simply negotiating the best
terms for the sale of our labour power but must strive instead to
bring the means of production into the hands of the workers.
1
Hayes, D., Thirty years on: the Socialist Workers Party and the
Great Miners’ Strike, ISJ: 142, p. 27
2
Gramsci, A., Unions and Councils, L’Ordine Nuovo, 11
October, 1919
3 Lessons
from the anti-Vietnam war movement, 2002 Tony
Wilsdon and Philip Locker, Socialistworld.net
4
Luxemburg, R., The Mass Strike, pp. 25-6
5
Luxemburg, R., p.26
6
Gramsci, A., 1919
7
Gramsci, A., 1919
8
Luxemburg, p.33
9
Lenin, Essential Works: What is to be done? p. 95
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