At a recent election meeting at the University of Auckland, the prominent anarchist Omar Hamed of the Auckland Anarchist Network presented “an anarchist view on elections” but then admitted he would be voting for the Greens. This was a good example of how the left-wing friends of what is increasingly a party of the establishment must construct a false reality to justify their misfit between theory and practice. Like Christian obscurantists who, despite mounting evidence, continue to present their creationist themes, anti-capitalists who present the Greens as some form of progressive force not only obscure the facts but present an overwhelmingly deceptive image of reality.
The political nature of the Greens
To discover the truth of what the Green Party is all about, who better to go to than its fresh new leader. Russel Norman, a former anti-capitalist associated with the Democratic Socialist Party of Australia, has made explicit his desire not just to save the planet but to save the capitalist system. He has compared the role of the modern-day Greens to that of social democrats of the 1930s who introduced counter-measures against capitalism’s self-destructive tendencies.
In a revealing blog posting in 2007 on Frogblog, Russel Norman presented his thesis on the role of the Greens:
It’s a funny position we find ourselves in. Just as the social democrats (Europe), labourists (UK, Australia, NZ) and new dealers (US) of the 1930s and 1940s had to save capitalism from its own destructive tendencies by introducing a range of modifications and interventions on the market system, so now the Green Parties of the world find ourselves in possibly a similar position. The best of the old social democrats like Michael Cullen are too locked in the old paradigm to understand it, and the sectional interests like the business roundtable and Employers Federation are too narrow to see it, but we have to intervene in the market system to place a price on resource use and pollution so that we can save the planet. And in the process we will quite possibly save the market system from its natural tendency to destroy or consume all resources leading to its own demise as well as the demise of the planet and all of us living on it.
One thing the election and the days since have confirmed is the inability of many on the left to make a sober analysis based on reality and, in particular, the way in which bourgeois politics is related to the economy and how bourgeois politics is centrally concerned with the maintenance of conditions such as social stability which are necessary to the operations of the market. Instead much of the left has cried wolf about the new government, seeing it as a re-run of the 1984-1993 period of ‘new right’ dominance.
For instance, the headline on the Socialist Aotearoa blog is “RESISTING THE NAT-ACT JUNTA- What is to be done?” Does the author of that piece really believe that we are about to be ruled by a “junta”? Are they unable to distinguish between bourgeois democracy and military dictatorship? If they are able to make the distinction why use terminology that bears no relation to the reality and simply misleads and misorients people?
Although, in the context of a worsening economic situation, there would certainly have to be attacks on the working class, Key is not creating a junta of any kind. In fact, he appears to not even be creating a National-ACT coalition but opting for Clark’s own strategy - a minority government with ministers out of cabinet from what he sees as both the ‘left’ (Maori Party) and ‘right’ (ACT) and support on confidence and supply. The temptation for the Maori Party to go for this will likely be pretty substantial, as Key and co. well know. This was apparent before the election - and was reiterated by Key on Saturday night, by Matthew Hooton on ‘Eye to Eye’ on Sunday morning, by Key again on TV on Sunday night and Monday night. In fact, Key even wants to talk with the Greens. (Since this was written on Monday 11 November, things have moved along further with the Maori Party.) Read the rest of this entry »
With the financial turmoil dominating the news over the last two months, commentators are talking about the end of the free market. Some panicked commentators have even questioned the survival of capitalism itself. With capitalism in a state of panic and all sorts of people in the media suddenly talking about Marx, it does seem to be a good time to look at what Marx had to say about capitalism that made his ideas so resilient.
What concerned Marx was the fact that while there were a lot of critics of capitalism active in his day, there had been no scientific analysis of how capitalism worked, so socialist projects were idealist and unable to gain much traction. Marx decided to start at the most basic level of economic production, the commodity, to discover how and why capitalism seemed to be so productive yet also so prone to crisis.
Picking up where earlier political economists had left off, Marx showed that the key to understanding the economy was the production of commodities - goods or services produced for sale. The one thing that all commodities have in common is human labour. Assuming people work at an average pace (which Marx called “socially necessary labour time”), eight hours of shoemaking is equivalent to eight hours of farming or eight hours of weaving. If I work for eight hours making shoes, I can buy goods to the value of eight hours’ labour (using a special commodity - money). If those goods are enough to feed and clothe me, I will do that labour every day to replace my used-up labour power. Read the rest of this entry »
So-called ‘from the left’ political commentator Chris Trotter posed the following question to his post election column in the Sunday Star times:
“What led the majority of the New Zealand electorate to reject a government that has not only done it no great harm but might even be said to have done it some good?”
The answer according to Trotter is this:
Last night’s result was manufactured out of the besetting sin of the last 150 years of western history - the crisis of masculinity. What, exactly, is a man in a world of corporate and public bureaucracies?
It was these: the men who just couldn’t cope with the idea of being led by an intelligent, idealistic, free-spirited woman; the gutless, witless, passionless creatures of the barbecue-pit and the sports bar (and the feckless females who put up with them); who voted Helen Clark out of office
John Key - you’re welcome to them.
If the NZ public were so anti having a Labour woman prime minister for the reasons Trotter outlined, then why did they re elect her three times?
Left: Young workers, led by Unite union protesting against youth rates under Labour.
Armistice Day in 2004 saw the Return of the Unknown Soldier
SQUIRE HELEN
(From The Spark, November 2004)
The Dominion Post (November 2004) reminded us that Prime Minister Helen Clark is also minister for arts, culture and heritage. Under that subhead, the paper carried an article by the multi-minister; “reflecting on our maturing sense of national identity”. To Helen Clark,” our maturing sense ” is a preoccupation with selectively remembered mass murder.
The first half of her article was a gushing sentimental rehash of the Unknown Warrior commemorations, concluding:
“More than 80 years elapsed from the time Prime Minister William Massey first explored the idea of a New Zealand Tomb of the Unknown Warrior to the day we welcomed home a young man whose life was cut short by war.”
Helen Clark writes as though the poor bastard had somehow been resurrected. No young man “was welcomed home” last November the 11th. The youth and prospects of the anonymous victim died the day imperialism butchered him in the mud of France.
The only thing Helen Clark welcomed in Wellington last Armistice day was a whitewash of capitalist history.
Right: Laura Bush greets NZ troops in Afghanistan June 2008
An Israeli film where most of the characters are Egyptian is something other than ordinary.
When an Egyptian police band gets stuck in a small Israeli town there are all the ingredients for a comedy of errors. Stranded, with little money the eight men who are more musicans than police, spend a night with the locals. The closeness of strangers is evident as the quaint and old fashioned band members interact with their Israeli hosts.
The politics are thankfully understated allowing the humanity of the characters to take centre stage.
The Band’s Visit has been collecting a string of film festival awards. Worthy of everyone of them.
For the Workers Party - this was the first time a socialist party was on the party list. A red flag on the ballot paper was an achievement - and one that took a bit of work to get the numbers to satisfy the electoral commission that we qualified. We were the last party to get registered, making it just a few days out from writ day.
It was a last minute campaign for the party vote but the campaigning was good for our organisation. Members got active, our website has been constantly updated and a lot of new contacts have been made. We got our name out across the country so there are now thousands of people who know there is a far left option. We got votes in every electorate of the country.
In New Zealand as far as I’m aware the far left has not yet ever got more than 200 votes in an electorate and this was reflected again in our vote. With 824 on the first count it is possible we’ll get over 900 once the special votes are counted.
MMP is a funny system. It engenders a lot of the first past the post mentality. Not just in the electorate seats where it is FPP, but in general people still tend to see things in terms of National and Labour. That was reflected in the 80 per cent of votes cast for those two parties.
A really proportional system would be better. It’s hardly democratic that NZ First gets 4.2 per cent of the vote and no seats, while Progressives and United Future each have a seat but a tiny overall vote. And Act gets five seats on 3.72 per cent of the vote.
Low turnout and 10,700 votes for the Bill and Ben Party indicate a lack of public confidence in the options on offer.
Racism is a product of class oppression; the two are fundamentally connected. The Workers Party acknowledges the history of African American struggle which has resulted in the election of Barack Obama.
The vast majority of African Americans remain wage earners. Obama is considering Lawrence Summers as head of Treasury. Former head of the World Bank, Summers supported dumping toxic waste on Africa.
November 7, 1917 is the day the working class in the Soviet Union seized power. It marked a turning point in world history, and despite the reversals nothing can diminish the significance of that day.
There are a number of people who identify as socialist but will tomorrow vote for capitalist parties because they see that as the only realistic thing to do. Of course, if you vote for the status quo you’ll be stuck with it.
This election, for the first time in NZ, there is a socialist party on every ballot paper.
Why not vote for something you actually believe in.
Yesterday after the march to the McDonald’s bosses conference at the Hyatt Hotel we returned to the Queen Street store. I was the last union official there with about 30 workers (the numbers had dropped-off by this stage). Workers were blocking-off the entrance. The strikers were fired-up.
I noticed Russel Norman, Green Party co-leader, amongst the gathered spectators. On some other business, he had bumped into the strike.
He was watching for about 5 minutes.
Politically I oppose the Green Party because they are a pro-capitalism party but A) They have had some connection to Unite through the Youth Rates campaign, and B) in hard struggles workers draw strength from almost any source of support. So in my capacity as an organiser I approached Russel Norman and asked him if he would speak to the strikers. First he said he didn’t know the issues. So I told him the issues. He still said no. I pressed him again but ‘No it’s ok’.
But it’s not ok. All the ‘left commentators’ are saying vote Green.
But the Green leader, obviously a developed public speaker, couldn’t spare 5 minutes for the lowest paid. We need a party that is shoulder to shoulder with the lowest paid.
The Spark, paper of the Workers Party of New Zealand, is published every month (except January).
Subscriptions are just $15 for 1 year (11 issues) or $30 for 2 years (22 issues).
Overseas subscription rates available on request.
Write to:
PO Box 10 282
Dominion Road
Auckland
Or email wpnz(at)clear.net.nz
Please make all cheques payable to "The Spark"
Comments Policy
Readers are strongly encouraged to give us their feedback on the articles posted on this site via the comments form.
Comments from first-time posters will be vetted to ensure they do not contain spam, otherwise commenting is unmoderated although comments containing racist or abusive language will be deleted.
Please use either your own name or at least a consistent alias when commenting.
Posted by WP Admin
Posted by WP Admin
Posted by WP Admin
en who are more musicans than police, spend a night with the locals. The closeness of strangers is evident as the quaint and old fashioned band members interact with their Israeli hosts.
