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On 11/30/14 10:45 AM, Marv Gandall wrote:
The problem, of course, is that whenever left-wing parties have neared power - and especially once they’ve have formed governments (Labour, European social democrats) or participated in them (Communists, Greens) - these parties quickly become beholden to the bourgeoisie and the international capital markets. Even modest efforts at reform are met by capital flight and sabotage, and the resulting economic difficulties turn the masses against these governments, which are then forced to retreat rather than face certain defeat in an early election.
This is economic determinism bordering on fatalism but what might be expected from a supporter of Democratic Party presidential bids for the time he has been on Marxmail.
Our job as Marxists is simply to form the left wing of new formations like Syriza or Podemos to keep them honest. As I said to someone on FB complaining about Podemos moving to the right, there are 900 constituent local organizations of Podemos. If only a third were ready to break with the group because of such compromises, that would be a much more significant opposition to the neoliberal state than the sects.
In 1971 Sam Brown launched the Moratorium to End the War in Vietnam with the obvious intention to form something roughly equivalent to Moveon.org. The SWP jumped in with both feet and helped to transform the Moratorium into a militant Out Now movement. Politics is about struggle. If you are determined to be protected from reformist germs, the best thing to do is declare yourself as a vanguard party and hand out leaflets denouncing the existing movement.
Basically Podemos offers an unprecedented opportunity for Spanish Marxists to challenge the two-party system. From everything I have heard from Marvin over the past decade or so, he would be oriented to the PSOE. No thanks.
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