Nathan Newman wrote:
>Many activists are doing all these things.
-Nathan, you frequently paint this portrait of innumerable activists
-tirelessly doing excellent things. I admire them for doing so. But if
-there are so many of them working so busily, why is America so fucked
-up?
1) Because life is unfair and no matter how many people you have fighting, if you are outgunned, you lose. There is a tipping point in political reality where the balance of forces changes and many losses turn into dramatic victories. Many lefties mistake that tipping point for a singular event where consciousness radically changes for the whole population. In many cases, it is merely a final change in consciousness and alignment among the swing group that held the balance of power.
2) while lots of people are fighting, there is a problem of coordination and strategic deployment. If we could focus all our activist energies at one issue target all at once, we might be more successful at strategic points, rather than dividing our energies into different battles in parallel. That issue of leadership is one the Left could address if it was better embedded in the movements and was not so divided itself.
3) the global economy has put competitive pressure on welfare states and even working class voters have made somewhat rational calculations (possibly mistaken on the empirical reality but not irrational) that they had to trade concessions to international capital to maintain jobs-- the old Singer END OF SOCIALISM thesis
4) I also take seriously the victories that have been won and defended-- the Reagan-Gingrich goals were to destroy Social Security and Medicare. Instead, federal funds have been extended to expand health care for children and a number of state programs have expanded access for poorer Americans beyond Medicaid. Prescription drug benefits are broadly supported. We have not won socialism but I take seriously the power we have exercised as more than some kind of shell game-- the balance of power is against us but that activist energy has mattered.
To take my perennial favorite example-- the Bankruptcy Bill still is not law and will probably not become law this year. The fact that it was passed in both houses due to corporate pressure shows that working class forces are not in control of the agenda, but the fact that we have been able to block its final passage shows we exercise useful and concrete power.
The key is to expand that power-- and the only place our power comes from is expanded troops at the grassroots. Each door knock helps identify additional support and may help to convince new people to see the world our way. This is supplemented by the cultural work and varieties of ideological struggle we promote intellectually, but that only matters ultimately if someone sits down one-on-one to move people along. It may be through blitz organizing or "each one, teach one" chains of debate and contact, but it has to happen.
-- Nathan Newman