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"Ideal" electoral opposition?
Damn, I almost put pieces together until a board glitch.
What is the "ideal" electoral opposition to go alongside mass ballot spoilage campaigns?
I had such a scenario positioned against "just a tactic" tokens, reform coalitions, "municipal socialism," parliamentary cretinism, minority governments, ignorance of constitutional overhaul issues, and of course the conflation of electoral support with political support, not to mention the issues of majorities vs. pluralities.
"A new centrist project does not have to repeat these mistakes. Nobody in this topic is advocating a carbon copy of the Second International (which again was only partly centrist)." (Tjis, class-struggle anarchist)
"A centrist strategy is based on patience, and building a movement or party or party-movement through deploying various instruments, which I think should include: workplace organising, housing struggles [...] and social services [...] and a range of other activities such as sports and culture. These are recruitment and retention tools that allow for a platform for political education." (Tim Cornelis, left-communist)
Small, fat, shifty looking with massive thick framed, circular glasses. Also has the mind and personality of nick griffin.
Segui il tuo corso e lascia dir le genti.
Socialism resides entirely in the revolutionary negation of the capitalist ENTERPRISE, not in granting the enterprise to the factory workers.
- Bordiga
Anarchist sailors with guns?
Or have I misunderstood the question?
Critique of the Gotha Programme, Pt IV: http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1875/gotha/ch04.htm
No War but the Class War
Destroy All Nations
Lucius Accius (170 BC - 86 BC): "A man whose life has been dishonorable is not entitled to escape disgrace in death."
oh dnz, you and your spoilage fetish.
nothing, since "mass ballot spoilage campaigns" dont and wont exist and if you have the money, media and man power to make "mass ballot spoilage campaigns" work you really should make other more usefull things with these recources.
All i want is a Marxist Hunk.
It is true that labor produces for the rich wonderful things – but for the worker it produces privation. It produces palaces – but for the worker, hovels. It produces beauty – but for the worker, deformity. It replaces labor by machines, but it throws one section of the workers back into barbarous types of labor and it turns the other section into a machine. It produces intelligence – but for the worker, stupidity, cretinism.
Wer hat uns verraten? Sozialdemokraten!
It's not a fetish. It's at least within the realm of political activity, and participants retain "the right to complain" in the eyes of others. If you don't "show up at the polling station" (abstentionism), you have no right to complain.
Yes. I wrote something much longer and systematic before a board glitch got rid of what I wrote.
While he was still around here, comrade Miles derided the usual stance of "parliamentary activity as a tactic" because it leads only to token commitment in the first place, even in the best of circumstances. The comrade was by no means a parliamentary cretin, but something in between tactics and strategy has to be considered. I'll try to rewrite what was glitched out in my suggestion, but the basis can be found earlier and may or may not be dependent on the voting system employed:
http://www.revleft.com/vb/workers-go...html?p=2476823
1) At the local/municipal level, there should be an electoral campaign to organize just enough candidates to hold the "balance of power" in the city council. This is definitely beyond token commitment, but this is also a stance against certain r-r-r-revolutionaries' support of "municipal socialism" by organizing enough candidates for a council majority. It doesn't help that the likes of Rosa Luxemburg herself supported local opportunism:
http://www.icl-fi.org/english/esp/61/electoral.html
In this scenario, the aim is to have class opposition in the city council that would be outnumbered only by the combined forces of the other councillors. However, there would be the temptation to enter a reform coalition or to form an outright minority government, so party-recallable discipline and other sticks need to be employed.Originally Posted by Luxemburg
2) At all other levels below the federal, there should be an electoral campaign to organize just enough candidates to hold the "balance of power" in the respective legislatures. Again, there should be no organizing for a legislative majority. At these levels, constitutional overhaul needs to be a disciplinary issue for those who might entertain "provincial socialism" or "regional socialism" fantasies; there is the imperative to not assume provincial or regional governance when said overhaul isn't on the horizon.
Again, the aim is to have class opposition in the legislature that would be outnumbered only by the combined forces of the other benchwarmers. This makes it much easier to discredit the other side as tweedle-dum, tweedle-dee, like with the perpetual governmental dance in Austria between the Christian Democrats and the Social-Democrats. However, again there would be the temptation to enter a reform coalition or to form an outright minority government, so again party-recallable discipline and other sticks need to be employed.
3) At the federal level, there should be an electoral campaign to organize just enough candidates to hold the "balance of power" in the legislature. There should definitely be no organizing for a legislative majority. Constitutional overhaul is a very real issue when faced with the imperative to not assume federal governance when said overhaul isn't on the horizon.
Like with lower levels, the aim is to have class opposition in the legislature that would be outnumbered only the combined forces of the other legislators. This makes it much easier to discredit the other side as tweedle-dum, tweedle-dee, like with the Grand Coalition in Germany. However, there would be the greatest temptation to enter a reform coalition or to form an outright minority government, so again party-recallable discipline and other sticks need to be employed.
4) It should be maintained that electoral support /= political support, and that popular support /= worker-class support. Majority political support from the non-management workforce in developed countries is outside the scenarios above, but is all that should be required.
Last edited by Die Neue Zeit; 7th May 2013 at 14:04.
"A new centrist project does not have to repeat these mistakes. Nobody in this topic is advocating a carbon copy of the Second International (which again was only partly centrist)." (Tjis, class-struggle anarchist)
"A centrist strategy is based on patience, and building a movement or party or party-movement through deploying various instruments, which I think should include: workplace organising, housing struggles [...] and social services [...] and a range of other activities such as sports and culture. These are recruitment and retention tools that allow for a platform for political education." (Tim Cornelis, left-communist)
sorry to say this but you have a wrong view on this matter, if you go to the elections to spoil your vote you still legitimizing the elections and you have no right to complain since you legitimize the outcome. if i on the other hand dont go to the elections i wont legitimize the elections and can complain all day and night.
All i want is a Marxist Hunk.
It is true that labor produces for the rich wonderful things – but for the worker it produces privation. It produces palaces – but for the worker, hovels. It produces beauty – but for the worker, deformity. It replaces labor by machines, but it throws one section of the workers back into barbarous types of labor and it turns the other section into a machine. It produces intelligence – but for the worker, stupidity, cretinism.
Wer hat uns verraten? Sozialdemokraten!
what would 'ballot spoilage' accomplish, anyway? you sound like someone from the green party.
Yes but you're not talking to a revolutionary, you're talking to someone who, if I understand correctly, is a Post-Keynesian of the Minsky, Kalecki et al. tradition. Hardly seeking to break the mould, just want to mould the current system into something a bit different.
Come to think of it, I remember reading a few cases in which revolutionaries sabotaged elections by burning all the ballots before they could be counted, so you might be onto something.(
)
Isn't there a risk that logic itself acts as a legitimatisation of the bourgeois electoral process, because you're accepting that it has the power to impose some sort of binding contract upon the voter? Better, I think, to take a more fully cynical view of the process, and say that the moral consequences of voting extend no further than its practical consequences- and that, consequently, whatever criticism are to be made of spoilage campaigns are just that, practical.
The argument is completely the other way around. Abstention legitimizes the elections and doesn't delegitimize the electoral system.
Successful campaigns of such undermine the credibility of the electoral system.
This quite-a-revolutionary just understands the value of applying Post-Keynesianism towards minimum economic policies, as in a part of minimum programs.
"A new centrist project does not have to repeat these mistakes. Nobody in this topic is advocating a carbon copy of the Second International (which again was only partly centrist)." (Tjis, class-struggle anarchist)
"A centrist strategy is based on patience, and building a movement or party or party-movement through deploying various instruments, which I think should include: workplace organising, housing struggles [...] and social services [...] and a range of other activities such as sports and culture. These are recruitment and retention tools that allow for a platform for political education." (Tim Cornelis, left-communist)
Could you translate "mass ballot spoilage" into U.S. speak? Is it like voting for Ralph Nader as a protest vote? What specific UK or European example could you give?
In most electoral systems, if you return a blank or defaced ballot, it will be counted, and the total number of such ballots listed as part of the official results. This is usually intended as a vote for "none of the above", and a high rate of spoilage is usually taken to indicate a sign of popular discontent. The contention arises between those who think that such a result can be used to indicate discontent with the entire political system, and those who think that it merely expresses discontent with the current political establishment, while affirms the fundamental structure.
In the US, most ballots included a "none of the above" option or the option of a write-in candidate, and spoiled ballots are discarded without counting, so ballot-spoilage isn't very common as a method of protest.
I've never understood your insistence on mass spoilage campaigns to be honest DNZ. I mean I guess one could make the argument that a strategic vote is sometimes, better then abstaining (something I don't really agree with) but for the most part I take the view of fuck their elections. In Canada the turnout rate tends to hover around 55-60%, I think Marxists would better spend their time attempting to convince that 6-11% of the population that voting is useless, rather then convince the majority of people to spoil their ballots (which is itself illegal in Canada, for example). I think when less then 50% of the population doesn't show up for election day, that will be a much bigger testament to popular discontent, then a party organizing a mass spoilage campaign.
In past US elections, right? The write-in candidate option affirms the fundamental structure.
Although it seems you and I are on different sides strategically, the bigger the spoilage, the greater the case can be made of indicating discontent with the entire political system, not just discontent with the current political establishment.
Define "spoil." Defacing a ballot (burning it, eating it, tearing it, etc.) is quite different from returning a blank ballot or one with x-marks in every spot. One is illegal spoilage, while the other isn't.
Besides (and abstentionists should take note of this cold, hard fact), only a third of US voters vote for Congressional elections, and there isn't much signal of popular discontent on that front.
"A new centrist project does not have to repeat these mistakes. Nobody in this topic is advocating a carbon copy of the Second International (which again was only partly centrist)." (Tjis, class-struggle anarchist)
"A centrist strategy is based on patience, and building a movement or party or party-movement through deploying various instruments, which I think should include: workplace organising, housing struggles [...] and social services [...] and a range of other activities such as sports and culture. These are recruitment and retention tools that allow for a platform for political education." (Tim Cornelis, left-communist)
