Introduction
As I indicated in another post (see The Limitations of the Social-Reformist Left and Opposition to a United Front without an Independent Working-Class), I will outline how the social-reformist left have contributed to the rise of the far right.
This post is inspired by my attendance at a book launch, Confronting the Resurgent Right, an edited book. Four of the authors presented: Peter Smith, Tim McCaskell, Judy Rebick and John Cartwright.
None of the presenters took any responsibility for the rise of the far right. Their identification of the nature of this problem therefore suffered from a decided lack of self-criticism. But this lack of self-criticism of the social-reformist left should not surprise anyone; generally, they consider themselves beyond criticism and reproach.
How the Social-Reformist Left Have Contributed to the Rise of the Far Right: Failure to Identify the Nature of the Problem as Capitalist Accumulation
I did a bit of research on the issue of the rise of the far right and its relation to the social-reformist left. One article in particular stands out as most relevant, and I will be quoting extensively from it: Costas Panayotakis (2020, “Neoliberalism, the Left and the Rise of the Far Right: On the Political and Ideological Implications of Capitalism’s Subordination of Democracy,” in Democratic Theory ,Volume 7, Issue 1, pages 48–72.
Panavotakis speaks of two tendencies within the left with the emergence of the idealization of the market, often referred to as neoliberalism: one tendency moves to the right and addresses only the more well-to-do workers and citizens and embraces neoliberalism while the other tendency opposes it. I will not address the first tendency because it obviously leads to further erosion of any distinct left position. Rather, I wish to focus on the second tendency.
The second tendency claims to be able to make substantial reforms even though the economy is subject to the primary goal of obtaining a profit and accumulating it to obtain even more profit in a never-ending process. The implicit claim of such leftist reformists is that democracy can take precedence over capitalist accumulation. Page 59:
Consider the likely consequences when a left-wing party negotiates in this way the tension between capitalism and democracy. While the first way of navigating this tension implicitly accepts and adjusts to capitalism’s subordination of democracy, the second strategy wittingly or unwittingly instrumentalizes the immense human suffering this subordination generates for political benefit. The way it does so, moreover, is by obscuring, rather than exposing and challenging this subordination.
In the Greek case, for example, Syriza was able to gain power by making promises, which vastly overstated the ability of democracy to break through the constraints posed by the capitalist structure of the economy. From an electoral point of view, this was a brilliant strategy, which allowed a hitherto minuscule left-wing party to gain power and, even after getting voted out of office in 2019, to consolidate itself as the hegemonic center-left party in Greece.
The short-term advantage of this strategy leads, however, to the consequence of the long-term defeat and the further erosion of belief in democracy as capitalist accumulation (or lack thereof) forces social-reformist governments to backtrack. Pages 59-60:
But the coincidence of Syriza’s electoral success with its failure to deliver the end to austerity it had promised, could not but produce, in the eyes of the average voter, a sense that, ideological labels aside, democratic politics is a disreputable game for cynical ‘crooks and liars’ (Payiatsos 2017), whose only real goal is to capture political power and all its perks.
This is a remarkable outcome. Instead of capitalism’s subordination of democracy leading to the challenge of capitalism as undemocratic, this outcome instead discredits democracy. Moreover, the conversion of even
the ‘radical left’ to ‘radical neoliberal policies’ (Kouvelakis and Lapavitsas 2018) has a number of additional consequences. On the one hand, it lends credence to the belief that there is no alternative to economic policies that serve the interests of capital (Kouvelakis 2018). In other words, the path of navigating the tension between capitalism and democracy by voluntaristically denying its existence [the reference by Sid Ryan (former president of the Ontario Federation of Labour) to Canada being the fifth best country in the world is a case in point] has the equally misleading, if diametrically opposite, ideological effect of naturalizing capitalism. After all, pretending that capitalism’s constraints on democracy are not there makes the failure of a newly elected left-wing government appear not as the product of capital’s power within the existing social order but as proof that an alternative to the prevailing way of organizing economic life is simply not possible. After all, if an alternative was indeed possible, a left-wing government would surely have chosen to implement it! Moreover, the discrediting of democracy as a competition between cynical politicians for the perks of power cannot but add ammunition to neoliberal arguments regarding the superiority of markets over democratically-elected governments when it comes to serving people’s needs (Friedman and Friedman 1981: 57).
The social-reformist left here in Canada also create the illusion of being able to overcome the contradictions between capitalist accumulation and democracy. They use such cliches as “fair wages,” “fair contracts” (like Sid Ryan), “economic justice” “John Cartwright) and “corporations paying their fair share of taxes” (Marianne Cerilli) to paper over the real dictatorship which prevails due to the power of employers as a class (see for example Employers as Dictators, Part One).
Rather than challenging the social-reformist left, some radical leftists tend to indulge them or even are co-opted by them. Tim McCaskell, for example, argues that there needs to be a united or common front–but on what terms? Since the social-reformist left here in Toronto predominate, the terms will be mainly their terms–and the far right will be further reinforced as the promises of the social-reformist left ring hollow.
The Inability of the Social-Reformist Left to Identify the Problem Correctly Promotes the Rise of the Far Right
As people become disaffected with the inadequate responses of social-reformist governments in power, the conditions are more favourable for the erosion of the liberal-democratic rights that workers, citizens, immigrants and migrant workers have obtained through struggle. Page 61:
Thus, the major parties of the left, which one would expect to expose and challenge democracy’s subordination to capitalism, can unwittingly become complicit to the perpetuation and intensification of this undemocratic state of affairs. While obviously beneficial to capitalism, this dynamic also benefits the racist, sexist, and xenophobic forces of the far right. First of all, by facilitating neoliberal restructuring, this dynamic also contributes to the inequality, unemployment, popular deprivation and social problems that neoliberal policies generate (Federici 2011: 105; Milios 2005: 208; Steger and Roy 2010: 110; Thompson 2011: 190). In a context where capitalism’s subordination of democracy ironically prevents the political left from responding effectively to people’s discontent, the far right is only too willing to step into the breach.
In particular, the far right can capitalize on this discontent by adopting an anti-systemic rhetoric, which “is not aimed against capitalism, . . . but against the system of liberal representative democracy” (Baier 2016: 51). This narrative, focusing on the corruption and treacherousness of mainstream politicians (Boadle and Stargardter 2018; Margaronis 2012), gains credibility not just because of the above-mentioned effects of the way left-wing parties negotiate the tension between capitalism and democracy but also from the fact that neoliberalism’s generation of greater inequalities does heighten the influence of money over politics (Munck 2005: 66).
The social-reformist left, which often claims that it can lead to justice, freedom and equality for all if only it is elected or, in the case of unions, only if its collective-bargaining rights are respected, generates disillusion and discontent when they cannot be realized given the class structure, and this disillusionment and discontent can then be used to redefine the problem away from capitalist accumulation and towards scapegoating immigrants, leftist feminists and so forth. Page 62:
With the natural candidate for channeling people’s discontent into anti-capitalist class struggle neutralized, the road is open to channel people’s discontent in ways that perpetuate and capitalize on the divisive effects of labor market competition. Here the far right can ‘excel’ by supplementing its denunciation of democracy and politicians with attacks on scapegoats, such as racialized groups, immigrants and women (Offe 2013: 215-216; Watkins 2016: 20).
The social-reformist left, by not defining the problem as the existence of capital and capitalist accumulation and by not proposing the corresponding solution as the overcoming of capitalist relations of production and exchange and the corresponding economic, political and social relations, feed into the frenzy of the far right. Page 63:
A related development is the proliferation within the far right of fears of ‘replacement.’ Replacement theory, which has been spreading rapidly enough to alarm the experts tracking this phenomenon, ties together racism and xenophobia with a sexist backlash against women’s participation in the paid labor force and their right to vote. Defining low birth rates in Western societies as an existential threat to the white race and attributing these low birth rates to the growing participation of women in the paid labor force, replacement theory has not just inspired far right violence and terrorist attacks from Charlottesville in the U. S. to New Zealand (Bowles 2019). It also illustrates the far right’s ability to turn the harsh impact of neoliberal policies on the employment and life prospects of many young people to an ideological message that mobilizes discontent in a way that does not unify working people and ordinary citizens against capital but instead divides them even further. It is significant, in this respect, that, according to Renaud Camus (2018: 55), the ideological progenitor of replacement theory, the ‘Great Replacement’ of white Europeans and North Americans by immigrants from the global South began at the end of capitalism’s post-war golden age. In other words, Camus’ (2018: 41) implicit explanation of the social problems and general insecurity that neoliberal capitalism has inflicted on working people and ordinary citizens in the global North is that “[a]s soon as [Africans] are present in sufficient numbers, Europe is lost for Europeans, because they are replaced, and lost for the Africans, because it becomes just another Africa, plagued with the same kinds of problems”.
Conclusion
By treating capitalism as a given rather than a system to be overcome, the social-reformist left tends to reduce criticism to demands for “fair wages,” “decent work,” “economic justice,” or corporations “paying their fair share.” Similarly, symbolic acknowledgements of colonial injustice often leave untouched the monopoly control of the means of production by employers and the capitalist state. The result is a displacement of discontent: instead of directing criticism at capitalism itself, those who experience its oppressive effects are encouraged to blame other members of their own class, deepening working-class divisions and strengthening the far right.
Ultimately, the social-reformist left define the problem away by ignoring the essential nature of capitalist exploitation and oppressing and by substituting an illusory form of modern capitalist society as democratic by pointing to gains that have been made, such as Sid Ryan’s idealized version of the great Canadian dream: ” This “hell hole” of a country that we live in has consistently been in the top 5 most liveable countries in the world …thanks to social democracy.” This idealization of Canadian capitalist society simply ignores the daily oppression and exploitation of millions of Canadian workers and billions worldwide.
Since the social-reformist left fail to define adequately the nature of the problem, their solution is bound to generate further dissatisfaction and feed into the far right.
Radical socialists, on the other hand, who define the nature of the problem as capitalist oppression, exploitation and capital accumulation, are in a better position to stem the rise of the far right by not seeking to reform capitalist relations of production and exchange but need to also take into account that workers do indeed experience some po
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