The unprecedented results of the Greek elections in May 2012 that gave
SYRIZA the possibility of forming a government led by Alexis Tsipras bring to
light once more the debate around the position of revolutionaries regarding the
political forces to the “left of the left”. This is even more important taking
into account that SYRIZA is softening its discourse.
The outcome of the general elections
on May 6, with the defeat of PASOK and New Democracy – the main pillars of the
two-party system – and the large number of votes obtained by small parties
demonstrate the profound crisis of the regime established after the fall of the
dictatorship of the colonels in 1974. These elections also have converted
SYRIZA, the coalition of the "radical left", into one of the main
actors in Greek politics after obtaining a historic result, nearly 17% of the
vote, with the Greek left being offered a unique opportunity to form a
government.
In these elections, SYRIZA presented
a clearly reformist and vague “formula” of power: the formation of a
"government of the left". Despite its ambiguity, this
"formula" obtained the votes of many workers and young people who
were seeking an alternative to the austerity programme implemented by the
"traditional parties" of the regime. It represented in particular an
alternative to the left of the Greek Social Democracy, the PASOK. As for
SYRIZA’s current programme, firstly it is more conservative and right-wing than
the one defended by PASOK in 1981 when it first came to power. Secondly, since
its electoral success in May, SYRIZA has evolved towards the right. In fact,
although SYRIZA’s programme has always been reformist in its main points, the
elections in June have pushed it into making further changes.
The new elections on June 17 could
result in SYRIZA becoming the largest party which could lead to a coalition
government of the left forces. This forecast has had an impact on the leaders
of SYRIZA. They present themselves as a “responsible left” – one which would be
acceptable to the markets and the European partners. In this sense, it is not
an accident that Alexis Tsipras – the main leader of SYRIZA – during his recent
visit to Paris on May 21 stated that he was not a “leader of the extreme left”.
In an interview with Radio Europe 1 he said: “I would like to make clear that I
am not the leader of an extreme left party. I am the leader of a democratic
party of the left which has found itself at the centre of Greek political life
and its aspirations express the aspirations of the majority of Greek society”.
The Anticapitalist Left
(GA) supports Tsipras…
Undoubtedly, the electoral victory of
SYRIZA has been presented as the model to follow by a considerable number of
leaders within a wide range of political parties, from the Left Front in France
and even reformist academics, including anti-neoliberals who are looking for
electoral short cuts to reach the masses. But the SYRIZA electoral phenomenon
has also dazzled the leaders of the Anticapitalist Left (Gauche
Anticapitaliste, GA), the unitary current for eco-socialism in the New
Anticapitalist Party (NPA), which in a statement from May 24 declared: "Today, in
Greece as elsewhere, we must be part of the radical left forces that create
hope. We must take part in [this type of project]
if we want to contribute to the building of a
counter-power in order to have a say in key debates”. The National Political
Committee (CPN) of the NPA added in its draft project of resolution that “this
initiative shows how a modern revolutionary initiative could be.”
At the same time they offer a
lapidary criticism of ANTARSYA, the coalition of anticapitalist groups that are
on the extreme left in Greece, declaring that "since they are blinded by
the call for an exit from the euro, they do not represent a credible solution
to the suffering of the population. ANTARSYA has obtained a mere 1.2% of the
votes and it refuses to confront what is really at stake in this period, that
is the call for unity made by SYRIZA, with more than a vague ’we will see in
the struggle’”[1]. Besides, using a reformist method of assessing the
"value" of political currents according to their election results, the
leaders of the Gauche Anticapitaliste condemn ANTARSYA’s call for a withdrawal
from the euro, a policy which they deem as a "fixed idea", while they
are maintain silence about SYRIZA’s "fixed idea" to stay within the
euro, and more broadly, in the European Union. The right-wing criticisms of
ANTARSYA by the Gauche Anticapitalist, similar to those launched against
Philippe Poutou during his electoral campaign and against the NPA after the
first round of presidential elections[2], indicate to what extent the leaders of this
movement, impressed by the outcome of the elections, have decided to take a
path that will lead straight to reformism. This is one of the logical
consequences of projects that seek to build "broad anti-capitalist
parties" without strategic delimitation.
It is precisely the strategic
ambiguity of these currents that in the end leads to liquidating any reference
to Marxism, merging with the reformists of the Front de Gauche (Left Front)
type.
The USFI is
enthusiastic about SYRIZA
Unfortunately this stance is not
limited to the Gauche Anticapitaliste. SYRIZA has also received the support of
the United Secretariat of the Fourth International (USFI), the international
current of which the former LCR was a member. Some of its main leaders are
within the majority current inside the NPA. In a statement issued on May 24,
the Executive Bureau (EB) wrote: "Confronted by the policy imposed by the Troika, the Greek
radical Left, and in particular Syriza, which today occupies a central place in
the Greek political situation, defends a 5-point emergency plan:
1. Abolition of the memoranda, of all measures
of austerity and of the counter-reforms of the labour laws which are destroying
the country.
2. Nationalization of the banks which have
been largely paid by government aid.
3. A moratorium on payment of the debt and an
audit which will make it possible to denounce and abolish the illegitimate
debt.
4. Abolition of immunity of ministers from
prosecution.
5. Modification of the electoral law which
allowed PASOK and New Democracy to govern to the detriment of the Greek
population and to plunge the country into crisis.
The
Fourth International calls on the whole of the international workers’ movement,
on all the indignant, on all those who defend the ideals of the Left, to
support such an emergency programme" (our emphasis).
This statement, incidentally, was
published without any attempt to consult the Greek section of the Fourth
International – OKDE-Spartakos – which is in ANTARSYA and that is standing its
own candidate in the elections on June 17[4]. But with this statement, the
Executive Bureau of the Fourth International takes a shortcut that leads right
to a reformist impasse. In fact, SYRIZA’s emergency programme, which the EB
asks us to support, is totally insufficient to provide a solution to the
workers and the masses facing the crisis of the country. Let’s look at this in
more detail.
Does the cancellation of the memorandum mean the end
of austerity measures?
The demand for the cancellation of
the memorandum and all austerity measures which have been imposed onto the
Greek people since the beginning of the crisis is without doubt a key demand in
the present situation. But, does the cancellation of the memorandum represent
the end of the austerity and all the sacrifices imposed to the Greek workers
and urban poor? The leaders of SYRIZA let the doubt be installed. When a
journalist from Europe 1 asked Alex Tsipras if SYRIZA will also ask the Greek
people to tight their belts, he replied very clearly: “yes, we will ask people
to do sacrifices, but sacrifices which are worth something, because so far all
the sacrifices were worthless”[5].
We can also quote Rena Dourou, MP for SYRIZA, which declared in an interview to
Le Monde that “without being against restructuring
the finances, we
vindicate the renegotiation with a different logic, completely different to the
current one.”[6]
At the same time, SYRIZA in its “new
economic program”[7]
insists on this idea of "cleaning up the
finances" of the state: "SYRIZA will present a legislation to
parliament with a national plan for economic and social development, rebuilding
of production, equitable redistribution of income and balanced consolidation of
public finances "( underlined by us). So, once again we
face the old talk about "sharing the sacrifices" that in times of
crisis is useful for the trade union bureaucracy and reformist leaders.
Who spoke of the “nationalization of
the banks”?
Even if the austerity measures were abandoned
completely and the memorandum were annulled, in order for this to have an
effect, it would have to be accompanied by other measures that want more than
just “a return to the situation before the crisis”. In this sense, it is
imperative to question the interests of finance capital. Nevertheless, even
though we were told that SYRIZA defended the nationalization of the banks under
workers’ control, the “five-point emergency program” that the USFI presented
only offer the perspective to nationalize those banks who received public money
(without saying under what conditions – through purchase or expropriation – or
under what forms – under workers' control or not). So, if this measure was
applied, there would be coexistence and competition between a “public bank
pole” and another private pole, with all this would imply. Even more, this
“public bank pole” would be unable to ensure cheap credits for the workers and
small merchants who are crushed by the debt and the horrendous interests' rates
of the private sector. Moreover, it is an illusion to think that even a simple
audit of the debt would be possible without the nationalization under workers'
control of the entire bank sector, a sector who is involved in thousands of
scandals of corruption and tax evasion in these last years.
Nonetheless, like we mentioned above, SYRIZA is
“updating” and “adapting” its program while its polls and votes are rising. In
this manner, we can read in the “new economic program” which was presented on
1st June that “SYRIZA is not opposed to the
program of bank recapitalization even though it gives it a different character
to the direction of their nationalization.
[…] Nevertheless, this program
cannot be interrupted during this phase of bank recapitalization without a bank
collapse. SYRIZA is not, therefore,
opposed to bank recapitalization in accordance with the specific loan agreement
that supports this recapitalization, the only difference being that this
must happen with ordinary shares after a vote (and not without a vote as
decided by PASOK and ND as part of their coalition government under L.
Papademos). The
recapitalization of the banks with ordinary shares after a vote will result in
banks going under national state ownership. […] A government of the Left will
not only nationalize banks but will also socialize then, meaning that it will
put them under state and social control” (underlined by us). To avoid a “bank collapse”, SYRIZA is prepared
to accept the “specific loan agreement” for the recapitalization of the bank,
in other words the money of the Troika, which is an obvious contradiction of
its proclaimed rejection of the memorandum. Later, we discover that the
“nationalizations” wouldn't be more than the purchase of some banks via
ordinary shares and not the expropriation of the banks without indemnification.
In regard to the workers' control, SYRIZA defends a very ambiguous “social and state control”. While “social
control” would still have to be defined, we already know very well what “state
control” means: the administration by bureaucrats of the bourgeois State
(because SYRIZA right now doesn't question the bourgeois States) designated by
the political power.
The question of the nationalization
of the strategic enterprises
In the five points on which the EC of the USFI bases its support for
SYRIZA, there isn't even the mention of the nationalization of the strategic
sectors of the economy (to not even talk about workers' control). But without
nationalization under workers' control of the fundamental industries, it is
impossible to give an answer to one of the most urgent problems of the workers
in Greece like the unemployment. Only a distribution of the working hours could
stop the unemployment which affects more than one million people in the
country, i.e. 21% of the active population. But about this point, the new
economic program of SYRIZA also has something to say: “A fundamental strategic direction of SYRIZA will be
the state control of strategic areas
of the economy (e.g. energy, telecommunications, railways, ports, airports
etc.) In this context, strategic enterprises will gradually go under state
control, ones that are either in the process of privatization or have been
privatized (DEH, OTE, OSE, ELTA, EYDAP, public transportation etc.)
The timeline, manner, speed and means by which the
above fundamental and non-negotiable strategic course will materialize, will be
specifically determined by the government of the Left based on the specific
circumstances, capabilities and problems it will be faced with.” First of all, we can see that we're not even dealing with the vague
“social control” but plain and simple with “state control” - capitalist state
control without a doubt, even with a leftist government. Afterwards, there is
no mention of the modalities or the rhythm of these nationalizations, except
that the “government of the left” will decide later on. Lastly, if this plan
would be put into practice one day, in the best case scenario we would see the
coexistence of a public sector, limited to some sectors of the industry
(communication, transport, energy) with some large state companies (or joint
ventures) who are led by high functionaries and where the workers would have no
right to decide and control, side by side with a private sector that is
dominated by large Greek or foreign multinational companies.
Pay the “legitimate debt”?
While the demand of payment of the Greek state debt, which is led by the
banks of the imperialist powers of the EU, first of all by France and Germany,
is being used b them as a pretext to apply the terrible attacks against the masses
in Greece, the EC of the USFI joins the calls of the reformists who ask for a
moratorium on the payment of the debt and an audit to pay the “legitimate
debt”. Because when they say they want to “abolish the illegitimate part of the
debt”, that doesn't mean anything other than to be in favour of the payment of
the “legitimate part of the debt”. However, we have to ask since when do the
workers should have to pay the debts, even partial ones, of the capitalist
State, i.e. the State of the bourgeoisie and the bankers who exploit and
oppress the workers and who are leading us into barbarism right now? They talk
to us about illegitimate and legitimate debt as if the workers and the masses
could decide and control where the bourgeois State invests and under which
conditions it gets into debt! Even if we considered, only for a second, the
payment of the money that was used to finance the health-care or the
educational budget, in reality this money was already paid a long time ago with
the payment of the interest rates of the debt.
When we say that the capitalists have to pay their own crisis, this also
means that the debts of the capitalist states belong to the bourgeoisie. This
doesn't seem to be the orientation of Tsipras. “SYRIZA intends to annul the Loan Agreements, in order
to replace their onerous terms and renegotiate the process of cancelling of the
largest part of the total public debt, in order for the remainder to be
repayable, under terms and conditions that will not place in doubt the national
sovereignty and economic viability of our country”,
we can read in the new economic program. But attention: for those who think
this is already too “radical”, Tsipras' “comrades” didn't forget a small
“clause”: “The manner, timing, as well as
the entire political and legal aspect of this condemnation and the
renegotiation of the Loan Agreements will be decided and implemented by a
government of the Left depending on its capability and the particular
circumstances.”
Are the revolutionaries indifferent towards the question of the Euro and
the EU?
Another central element which doesn't appear in the
famous “5 points of emergency” is the question of the relationship between a
hypothetical “government of the left” formed after the elections of 17th June,
and the imperialist institutions of the EU and the Eurozone. And we can
perfectly understand that because the leaders of SYRIZA don't stop proclaiming
to whoever wants to listen that they want to keep the country within the
Eurozone and the EU. In this sense, in the declaration of the EC of the USFI we
can read that “The crisis is not Greece’s crisis,
but the crisis of the European Union subjected to the will of capital and
of the governments in its service. It is the crisis
of the capitalist mode of production in the whole world. It is not up to the
Troika, but to the Greek people to decide on the policy to be followed in that
country. [...] It is not the euro, but the diktats of the Troika that
have to be combated today” (underlined by
us).Here we can see that the EC of the USFI, in order not to enter into
contradiction with the official line of the “champion of the radical left” , presents us the EU not as an
instrument of the “will of the capital” but as a “victim” of capital and its
governments. Later, they intent to lull us in with sweet illusions about how
the workers of Greece could fight consequently against the “dictates of the
Troika” without fundamentally questioning the participation of the country in
the Eurozone, or that this is at least “not a struggle that is on the agenda
today”, as if we would be faced with two different struggles or phases.
However, this question is not superfluous and without
implications. This is true for all the countries of the Eurozone and the EU,
but the question is posed in a particular form in Greece, due to the
relationship between its participation in this inter-imperialist alliance and
the privileges which the Greek imperialist bourgeoisie obtains from it. In this
sense, “Membership of the EU and the Eurozone constitutes a strategic choice of
the Greek capitalists. It is the concrete way that Greek capitalism is
integrated in the global imperialist chain. It is the concrete process through
which the Greek capitalism is taking part in the international capitalist
competition and the global sharing of the surplus values and the profits.
Therefore, it cannot exist a contemporary revolutionary program and an actual
revolutionary perspective without analysing this particular way of
participation and function of the Greek capitalism in the international
capitalist division of labour [...] Without any doubt, participation in
the EU and the Eurozone is the new “Great Idea” of the Greek capitalism; in the
name of which they call –especially now, during the crisis– the subordinate
classes to suffer terrible sacrifices, which are imposed through the
Memorandums and the Programs of Stability. This involvement with the EU
empowered Greek capitalism to play the role of a peripheral force –a local
imperialism– in the Balkan and Eastern Mediterranean region. Participation in
the EU made Greek capital the necessary partner of the big European imperialist
forces alongside with the US to their interventions in the Balkans and in
Eastern Europe (an example is the fact that the expansion of Coca-Cola in the
above regions through the Greek company 3E). [...] The introduction of the Euro
enriched the Greek ruling class with the necessary hard currency and the needed
low interests rates in order for them to obtain the appropriate capital funds
and be able to take part in the theft of public property of the countries of
Eastern Europe, thus making Greece an exporter of capital all the last decade.
Without its participation in the EU and in the Eurozone, Greece could not play
this role in the region.”[8].
We can thus see all the superficiality in wanting to
separate the question of the Euro and the EU from the “dictates of the Troika”
and the interest of the Greek bourgeoisie. The participation of Greece in the
Eurozone and the EU is an instrument which the Greek periferic
imperialism possesses to participate in the oppression of the semicolonies of
the region. Thus, we understand better “why for the time being the bourgeois
think tanks have not produced an alternative strategy on how to control the
crisis; a strategy that could include the exit from the Euro and the return to
the national currency of the drachmas, in order for the Greek capitalism to
obtain some instruments for implementing a currency policy”[9]. In this sense, the wish to want to stay in the Eurozone
and the EU at all costs, which SYRIZA defends, is not only no contradiction to
the interests of the Greek bourgeoisie but it is functional to them.
But the belief in the “European
values” and the “European partners” that SYRIZA expresses seems to be “firm”,
to the point that they consider the expulsion of Greece from the Eurozone as
practically impossible: “The possibility of a country’s exit from the euro is
used as the primary blackmail on the road to these elections. For us this
possibility cannot be the choice of our partners, unless they have decided on
the destruction of the euro and the dismantling of the Eurozone”, we can read
in the new economic program. The reason for this is that SYRIZA shares one
fundamental point of its program with Nea Dimokratia and PASOK: to maintain
Greece as a “viable capitalism” within the Euro. While the Right wants to show
itself as more efficient in achieving this, Tsipras and the leaders of his
coalition bet that the fear of a sector of the European imperialist bourgeoisie
of the perspective of another catastrophe like “Lehman Brothers” (or worse) in
the EU makes a SYRIZA government look like something acceptable in the
framework of the crisis. In this sense, Tsipras' “gestures” towards François
Hollande, presenting his election in France as a “first step towards a
political change in the EU”, are not innocent.
This doesn't mean – like some leftist
parties like the Stalinist Greek Communist Party (KKE) and other
nationalist-bourgeois currents do – that revolutionary Marxists should advocate
a rupture with the EU and the Euro in the name of a “national sovereignty”. No.
We defend the rupture with the international imperialist institutions in the
name of the socialist revolution and in the perspective of the conquest of
power by the workers. In other words, for the proletariat, the only progressive
rupture with the Euro and the EU is that one that will be the consequence of
its fight to end capitalism and for the construction of its own power. Such a
rupture with the EU, the euro and other structures of imperialism like the NATO
or the UNO, which only a workers' government brought to power by a victorious
socialist revolution could carry out, could constitute a first step towards the
extension of the revolutionary struggle of the workers and the masses on the
continent in the perspective of the construction of the United Socialist States
of Europe. Evidently, the struggle of the European proletariat would also have
an impact on the workers south of the Mediterranean who already find themselves
in a full-on revolutionary process. This is the most efficient way to fight
against imperialism and its international institutions, as well as against
reactionary nationalist tendencies.
The illusions about a
“government of the left” that reconciles with imperialism
In the framework of this scandalous programmatic
support, the EC of the United Secretariat of the Fourth International proposes
the following demand: “We want the Greek people to succeed in imposing, by its votes and its mobilizations, a government of all the
social and political Left
which refuses austerity, a government capable of imposing the cancellation of
the debt. It is in this perspective that we call for the coming together of all
the forces which are fighting against austerity in Greece — Syriza, Antarsya,
the KKE, the trade unions and the other social movements — around an emergency
plan” (underlined by us). But this call to form a possible “government of the
left” headed by SYRIZA is far away from contributing to sectors of workers and
the youth advancing in reaching the conclusion that the only program to
confront the austerity measures is an anticapitalist and revolutionary program.
Instead it nourishes the illusions that a parliamentary and pacifical way out of this crisis is possible, without
confronting the imperialist institutions like the EU or attacks the interests
of the capitalists. This policy is particularly opportunist in light of the
probable perspective that the deepening of the crisis and a leap in the class
struggle develop openly counterrevolutionary tendencies that are supported by
sectors of the bourgeoisie and the scared middle classes, which is already
anticipated in the rise of the neo-Nazi party Chrissy Avghi (Golden Dawn).
In the best case, we can consider
that the call for a “government of the left” by the EC of the USFI would be an
aberrant deformation of the tactic of the “workers' and peasants' government”
that is expressed in the Transitional Program, as a demand towards reformist or
petit-bourgeois leaderships of the workers in struggle (and not of electoral
movements like in Greece today), in the framework of revolutionary situations
(something that is not yet the case in Greece). For Trotsky, this demand has
the objective that the masses break with the bourgeoisie and take over the
power, which is insolubly connected to the audacious impulse of the development
of organisms of double power of the “Soviet” type.
In the “Transitional Program”,
Trotsky explains the experience of the October Revolution where “From April to September 1917, the Bolsheviks demanded that the SRs and
Mensheviks break with the liberal bourgeoisie and take power into their own
hands. Under this provision the Bolshevik Party promised the Mensheviks and the
SRs, as the petty bourgeois representatives of the worker and peasants, its
revolutionary aid against the bourgeoisie categorically
refusing, however, either to enter into the government of the Mensheviks and
SRs or to carry political responsibility for it. (...) the demand of the
Bolsheviks, addressed to the Mensheviks and the SRs: ‘Break with the
bourgeoisie, take the power into your own hands!’ had for the masses tremendous
educational significance. The
obstinate unwillingness of the Mensheviks and SRs to take power, so
dramatically exposed during the July Days, definitely doomed them before mass
opinion and prepared the victory of the Bolsheviks.”[10] (underlined by us). As
we can see, the objective of this tactic was above all to accelerate the
experience of the masses with the reformists and attract them towards the
revolutionaries. In this sense, while the Bolshevists proposed their support to
a government of the reformists in view of the attacks of reactions, at the same
time they categorically denied to enter this government. The USFI does the opposite thing
when they give their programmatic support to an openly reformist government. An
that is not a “detail”. It is a central question, above all in a moment where “former members of the
bureaucracy of PASOK governments (like Katseli, minister of national economy
and later of labour in the memorandum government of Papandreou, or Kotsakas,
also a former minister and close partner of Tsohatzopoulos, currently
imprisoned for corruption)”[12]. This indicates that SYRIZA could
even transform itself into a “popularfrontist” force that is a force of
collaboration with a fraction or elements of the bourgeoisie that until
yesterday applied the plans of austerity that SYRIZA pretends to combat[13].
In this way, the USFI transforms a
tactic to accelerate the experience of the masses with the reformist
leaderships, in acute situations of class struggle, in an electoral support to
class-collaborationist candidates and programs.
For an actual revolutionary policy
The Greek workers and youth have
shown a strong will to resist and a great fighting spirit to confront the plans
of austerity in the streets. Some advanced sectors, althougha minority, have
even had experiences of work-place occupations. However, until now, these
actions and energies of struggle were canalized by a trade union bureaucracy
that sold out to the bourgeois parties which prevented the development of a
tendency towards an unlimited general strike by calling for isolated days of
strikes. This has also been a big responsibility of the KKE (Greek Communist
Party) who has been an obstacle for the development of a workers' united front
by combining selfproclamatory and sectarian policies with a reformist and electoralist program[14].
Without a doubt, in order to defeat the plans of the
EU and the Greek bourgeoisie, a revolutionary program is necessary which is at
the height of the offensive of the capitalists who want the workers to carry
the weight of the crisis, a program which combines emergency measures like the cancellation
of the debt and the austerity programs with transitional measures like the
nationalization of the bank system under workers' control, the expropriation of
the grand capitalists in the perspective to impose a government of the workers
and the masses based on organisms of workers' democracy, which would be a first
step in the struggle for the United Socialist States of Europe.
June 8, 2012
Philippe
Alcoy is member of the CCR (Courant Communiste Révolutionnaire -http://www.ccr4.org) in the NPA and of the
FT-CI. For further documents and publications please visit the website: http://www.ft-ci.org/?lang=es (Spanish) and http://www.ft-ci.org/?lang=en (English).
