For a Workers' Occupation Movement!
Statement of the Central Committee of the Workers Party in America
NOW IN ITS THIRD WEEK, THE “Occupy Wall Street” movement has quickly become the focal point for all the pent-up anger and frustration that millions of Americans, regardless of their class, have been feeling as a result of austerity and the actions of the corporate welfare state.
What started as a few thousand protesters and a few hundred occupiers of Zucotti Park, near Wall Street, in New York City (with most of them being cranks and opportunists, such as Ron Paul supporters and “9/11 Truth” groupings) has grown into a national movement, with “Occupy” groups coming together across the country and organizing similar marches and occupations.
At the same time, this relatively small protest felt the full force of the state — the armed bodies of capitalism’s “law and order” — bear down on them. Since the occupation began on Sept. 17, nearly 1,000 participants in the associated marches have been arrested by the police, including over 700 during a march over the Brooklyn Bridge. We say:
Drop all charges against those arrested!
While the armed forces of the state were doing mass roundups of protesters, most of the corporatist media has treated the movement with contempt and condescension, while other elements have looked to co-opt it and steer it in the direction of the Democratic Party. Both of these approaches start from the same perspective, that this movement needs some “official” sanction to have any real value ... to the ruling classes, that is.
While the “Occupy” movement in New York has struck a chord among millions of people, it is vitally important to examine closely
what this movement is, what it aims to do and, most of all, whom it actually ends up serving.
WHEN THE “OCCUPY WALL STREET” movement began, it was thoroughly a creature of the “middle class” — the class of managers, professionals, small business people, the self-employed, artists and so on. However, as the occupation continued, it began attracting the support of workers, passively at first, but then actively.
Workers and young people from the working class not only began to show up at the protests and occupied area, but also brought with them their own slogans and ideas. They marched, they occupied, they fought. Most importantly, though, they began to change the class composition of the “Occupy Wall Street” movement.
It was at this point that the officials of various labor unions began to proclaim their support for the protests and occupation. They did this, not because they were “shamed” into participating, or out of any genuine desire to see a serious working-class resistance to austerity and corporatism emerge, but in order to
stop any such development — to prevent the movement from becoming more radicalized and stop the development of an independent working-class political movement.
This is also why liberal Democratic Party politicians and their media mouthpieces, such as MSNBC and
The Nation, have been parachuting into the various “Occupy” protests, both in New York City and nationally: to keep the protests from getting “out of control.”
But they are not alone in their efforts to keep this movement under control. Its very structure is designed to insure that the occupations and protests do not go too far. The idea of a “leaderless” movement that makes decisions solely on the basis of “consensus” and raises no specific demands or slogans is designed to allow an unelected (and unaccountable) group to control the politics and activity of the movement in the “general assemblies” that are meant to be decision-making bodies.
In the end, all this serves to do is keep the vision and activity of the “Occupy” movement confined to the narrowest channels. The most conservative and moderate minorities can dictate the political direction by blocking more radical and revolutionary proposals, while unelected, “unofficial” leaders can stage foolish and dangerous actions, without any check by the participants.
THE “OCCUPY” MOVEMENT MAY be thought by many to be a “good start,” but as we’ve seen throughout history, most recently in Egypt, Greece and Wisconsin, it is only the working class that has the power to put an end to the exploitation and oppression that dominates in capitalist society.
However, this power cannot be unleashed
as long as workers are bound hand-and-foot to those “middle-class” leaderships — either “official” or unofficial — and are prevented from organizing themselves to fight for their own interests, under their own banners and slogans, and with their own leadership and program of action.
More to the point:
We as workers must not allow these “middle class” democrats to use us as either a battering ram or a stepladder in their fight against their corporatist brethren in Washington and on Wall Street! Rather, we should be organizing ourselves, bringing out our brothers and sisters, holding our own mass assemblies and protests, and doing so on the basis of our own slogans and demands.
The working-class movement should certainly coordinate with the “middle class” occupiers and protesters wherever possible, but
we cannot allow ourselves to be subordinated to them, either politically or organizationally.
It has taken more than a decade for the “middle class” democrats to regroup and launch their fight to win back some of the power they lost in the rise of corporatism in 2000.
But we must not let them use workers as little more than a stepping stone for their return to power.
This is the perspective of the Workers Party. We fight for the overthrow of capitalism and capitalist rule, and the establishment of a workers’ republic as the transition to a classless, communist society. If you agree with this perspective or want to know more, contact us.
- The problem is not Wall Street alone! The problem is capitalism! Austerity and the rise of the corporate welfare state are part and parcel of capitalism in its decay and decomposition. Capitalism has to be defeated and overthrown in order to stop these attacks.
- Break with the “Middle Class” Reformers! For a Workers’ Occupation Movement! The “middle class” elements leading the occupations only want a capitalism that works for them — a capitalism where workers are still exploited, but bribed into passivity and silence.
- For accountability! “No leaders” allows the “middle class” minority to lead with impunity. Democratic elections and the right of immediate recall insure that those making decisions are fully accountable.
- For a revolutionary workers’ platform! The working class has no common interests with either the capitalists or the “middle class,” and we cannot share a common platform without subordinating ourselves to the other classes.
- For workers’ self-defense against police terror! The cops have made it clear that they will not let any serious challenge to the ruling classes take place without a violent response.
- Organize and occupy our workplaces! Workers’ power comes from our role in society and the mode of production. Exercising our power means shutting down production in addition to confronting the ruling classes and their state.
- For a workers’ republic! Real majority rule means workers’ control of industries and services, and of society — that is, a workers’ republic, based on workplace and neighborhood/city assemblies and councils.
