>But some leftists do create phantoms to scapegoat--just usually not
>ethno-identified ones. That is still a problem. When leftists start to use
>the language of scapegoating and conspiracism, (talking about the world run
>by a handful of secret elites or the CIA using radio control to fly planes
>into the twin towers), in their criticism of elite power and corporate
>globalization, it opens the door to scapegoating of ethnic groups by
>denizens of the fascist right.
The classic version of this-- right populist and left -- is to identify some institution whose members happen to be powerful and then target that institution as the source of their power-- the Council on Foreign Relations, the Carlyle Group, and so on. In most cases, such institutions look for people who already have power and invite them as members, so the organization has no real power unto itself. Such institutions may facilitate strategic cooperation among such elites, but then so do any other social clubs.
But the key issue that often divides left analysis is whether elite capitalist power acts in a purposeful manner-- ie. is a self-conscious organization of power that thrawts what would be a good society if only the conspiracy of capitalists had not outmaneuvered them -- or whether capitalist elite power is largely passive, a function of shared interests and parallel actions done without much coordination but with largely consistent results
This difference in view of capital power lays at the base of a lot of disagreements on the Left, since for those with the more coordinated view of capital power, anyone who takes action that is in the interest of capitalists is seen as an active conscious agent of oppression, while those who take the more passive view of capitalist power see many people taking such actions because of the logic of capital power and the lack of obvious alternatives given that power.
Are unions collaborators with management (active capital agents finding willing pawns) or are they uncreative opponents of capital seizing on the best deal they think available to benefit their members out of fear of runaway shops? Are Dems active collaborators with capitalists or are they progressive-minded people whose lack of creativity and lack of mass mobilizing ability make them think that compromise with capital is the only way to avoid capital flight and even worse policies by the GOP?
Note that those with the active view of capital power tend to see malevolence in the motives of unsure allies, while those leftists (like myself obviously) tend to see incompetence, lack of organizing ability and lack of creativity as the cause of compromise by such allies.
I remember when I was first interviewed for a union organizing job by the late Vinnie Serabella, the HERE Organizing Director who revived the whole union's organizing program and originally brought current President John Wilhelm into the union. He looked at me back in 1988 and asked why unions were getting destroyed across the country. The wrong answer was to say Reagan policies or corporate strategy, but rather that unions themselves just forgot how to organize. He noted that for decades, even after unions no longer knew how to organize like they once did, Sheraton would call up the union and tell them to get their organizers in a few weeks before a new hotel was opening. All that happened in the 1970s is that business wised up and just stopped making that call-- nothing that dramatic, they just did what was in their self-interest and called the unions bluff.
In the same terms, globalization is not a strategy but the natural result of thousands of companies looking for the cheapest deal and supporting policies that fit their interests on those policies. And the IMF and the World Bank are not agents of that coordinated strategy (an active executive committee of the ruling class), but merely befuddled development liberals enacting policies they think will serve economic growth under the threat of constant capital flight. More creative policies with active mobilization by working class allies would allow far different, more humane policies but such wavering liberals don't believe they will work or their is the working class power to implement them.
Now what is implied by this difference in the active or passive view of capitalist power?
If you see capital as an active conspiracy, where people are either its agents or its opponents, the first order of business is to clarify the oppositional strategic centers and expel the compromising agents of capital from alliances. Strategic clarity even at the expense of fewer numbers is the premium goal in order to outmaneuver the strategic intelligence of the capitalist conspiracy.
On the other hand, if you see capital power as more passive, you assume that there is a large middle ground of good-hearted folks compromising out of fear of that capital power, yet not part of any organized agency of that power. The first order of business is then to recruit that middle to your side by demonstrating that working class power and creative policies can be a more effective alternative to desperate compromising policies. The passive power of capital depends on division and weakness of working class forces, in this view, so the main goal is strengthening unified power, which will then open up further recruitment since greater working class power then convinces wavering liberals that there are viable alternatives to compromises with capital.
Now the reality is that capital power has both active and passive elements, so there is a reasonable logic in both responses by the Left, even where they are sometimes contradictory, so the real debate is emphasis and finding creative ways to both increase strategic clarity by left forces while still expanding numbers into the wavering middle.
Where people despair of that clarity or feel isolated in their numbers, scapegoating some group, either below them or among the elite, becomes very attractive as an explanation of their failure to organize.
And that emphasizes another difference between active and passive views of capital power. An active view of capital power sees any shift to the right in policies as the result of betrayal by some group that needs to be identified and attacked.
A passive view of capital power sees such capital power as relatively constant, so any rightward shift in policy must be explained by changes in the political economy (easier capital flight due to globalization) that has convinced wavering liberals that compromise is needed or in failures of left organizing that lead wavering liberals to be skeptical that there is the necessary working class power to implement alternative solutions that defy capital power.
The more mixed view sees certain policies accellerating the changes in political economy that in turn make the logical compromises with capital more imperative-- but even these are sometimes inadvertently supported by some progressive groups for their own short-term reasons, even as the long-term results benefit capital power; see deregulation policies in the 70s, notably supported by Nader and consumerist progressives, against the desire of conservative unionists who knew their power would be undermined in favor of capital power. Again the disunity of progressives allows the active elements of capital to pick off allies through short-term enticements to this or that constituency.
So my view ends up being that while I grant the active elements of capital power, they are best defeated not by sectarian retreat into purist strategic organizational centers on the Left, but by maximum unity of alliances among progressive groups such that short-term policy offers by capital will be less attractive. And this is best accomplished by hard organizing to make an alliance with the left and through them firm alliances with other progressives attractive because we bring some real measure of power to the table.
-- Nathan Newman