Category: Social Reformist Organizations

Class Harmony and Social Reformism: The United Way as a Reformist Organization, Part Two

This is the continuation of a previous post. In the first post, I looked critically at the web site of the United Way Centraide Canada. The following post looks critically at one of its branch publications, Rebalancing the Opportunity Equation (May, 2019), by United Way Greater Toronto.

The publication contains many implicit statements that illustrate its own view that employees and employers can, somehow, live in harmony. Such a view of class harmony, of course, has been persistently criticized on this blog from the start, when I created the page The Money Circuit of Capital.

The limitations of the publication–and hence the United Way–can be seen implicitly even in the Foreword. It says (page 5):

With the data available to us, this report begins with a look at how inequality is impacting certain groups.

The publication–typical of social-reformist or social-democratic publications–measures inequality and poverty in terms of level of income. Since I have already criticized this way of analyzing poverty, inequality and class (see School Rhetoric: Ideological Use of the Concept of Social Justice, Part One), I refer the reader to that post; its analysis applies equally to the limited implicit definition of poverty by the United Way.

The rhetoric of class harmony can be seen in the following (page 6):

The Greater Toronto Area (GTA) is a great place to live. It is one of the most diverse regions in the world, where we are held together by a collective identity that is fueled by a shared commitment and interest in one another despite our differences. This shared commitment is built on the trust and reciprocity that exists between community members and is an important reason the GTA is such a desirable place for people to live, raise their families, and grow their businesses.

But there are growing forces undermining that shared commitment to each other: the GTA labour market is increasingly characterized by precarious work; there is a lack of affordable places for people to live; and people continue to face systemic discrimination in the economy and everyday life.

The first paragraph merely asserts–without any proof or evidence–that there is such a thing as a “collective identity”–as if living in an area called Greater Toronto Area automatically creates a collective identity. This is pure rhetoric that hides the reality of class exploitation by some of the very donors to the United Way (see my previous post as well as the post A Short List of the Largest Employers in Toronto, Ontario, Canada).

What is the “shared commitment and interest” of employees of the Royal Bank of Canada and their employer? A real sharing involves relatively equal participation in both the decisions of an organization and the consequences of that organization (and organizations connected to it). Do the employees who work for the Royal Bank of Canada (or any of the largest corporations in Toronto) share relatively equally in participatory power with upper management and the Board of Directors of the Royal Bank of Canada? Of course not.

This “shared commitment and interest to each other,” although containing some truth (employees in the Royal Bank of Canada obviously need their job if they are to live, to enjoy and to fulfill some aspects of their lives–as long as employers exist), is riveted with its opposite–a shared antagonism of commitments and interests since it is also not in the interests of such employees to be used as things or means for the benefit of the Royal Bank of Canada and other corporations obtaining as much money as possible.

On page 7, we read:

Fairness and opportunity are core values that bind us together; they are at the heart of the community we all love and feel proud of. The promise of the opportunity equation must be available to everyone for this to remain true. Otherwise, divisions will grow and the GTA of the future will be a less desirable place to live, raise a family, or grow a business. This report helps us to better understand where to focus our resources to make the promise of the opportunity equation a reality for everyone.

Since working for an employer is necessarily unfair (see The Money Circuit of Capital), the United Way would have had to propose that we move forward by developing a movement that is dedicated to the elimination of the power of the class of employers and the economic, political and social structures that support that power. Of course, it would be very difficult to do so since part of the funding for the United Way comes from the very corporations whose interests are opposed to the creation of social relations that can be characterized by fairness.

The 152 page publication then goes on to show how inequality in income has increased–in many cases substantially–based on age, immigration status (born in Canada or not born here), race and gender.

The increase in income gaps along these diverse lines should not be ignored, of course. However, the publication completely ignores the impact of the economic structure on whether various categories can actually gain control over their lives–the real test of fairness. Consider the category of race. The data provided in the publication shows that (page 63):

Racialized groups experienced income gains from 2005 to 2015, after ten years of little movement. However, within each employment type, the income gap between racialized and white groups grew in Canada, Peel, Toronto, and York. This divide was more pronounced for those engaged in permanent, full-time employment, where the average incomes of  white groups in permanent, full-time jobs increased at a faster rate than the incomes of racialized groups. By 2015, the average income of white groups in permanent, full-time employment was 1.3 times greater than that of racialized groups in the same form of employment in Peel and York and 1.7 times greater in Toronto.

Employment relations may well be racialized (I have not researched the issue). Reducing income gaps between permanent (or even part-time) white employees and permanent racialized groups is certainly necessary (not by reducing the incomes of white employees but by raising the incomes of racialized employees), but such struggle, if successful, will eat into the profits of some of the funders of United Way. The United Way makes no mention of this–due to its class-harmony approach of referring to “collective identity” and “shared commitment and interest.”

Indeed, none of the solutions proposed by the United Way to the problems of growing income gaps based on various differences refer to the problem of the power of employers as a class. They offer three general recommendations (page 77):

  1. ensuring everyone can participate in society
  2. enabling people to get ahead
  3. making life more affordable.

1. Ensuring Everyone Can Participate in Society

The first recommendation excludes democratic participation in companies, such as the Royal Bank of Canada, Air Canada, Canadian Natural Resources and so forth. What it does include is three sub-recommendations (page 77):

1. Undertake a national dialogue on social cohesion.
2. Develop and coordinate data-informed social cohesion strategies.
3. Support funding and innovation in the community services sector.

On page 78, the United Way then states:

When people are not connected to each other, everyone suffers the consequences. It wears on the foundations of our communities.

This is surely false. The foundations of an economy based on the power of the class of employers is precisely the initial lack of connection of people to each other. Brewery workers are not connected to other workers as workers directly but via the production of the things which they produce as social things with powers that are expressed in money. The initial disconnection of workers from each other, furthermore, then needs an external connection, represented by employers, who own what they produce disconnectedly (Thomas Hodgskin, Labour Defended Against the Claims of Capital, pages 71-72):

Betwixt him who produces food and him who produces clothing, betwixt him who makes instruments and him who uses them, in steps the capitalist, who neither makes nor uses them, and appropriates to himself the produce of both. With as niggard a hand as possible he transfers to each a part of the produce of the other, keeping to himself the large share. Gradually and successively has he insinuated himself betwixt them, expanding in bulk as he has been nourished by their increasingly productive labours, and separating them so widely from each other that neither can see whence that supply is drawn which each receives through the capitalist. While he despoils both, so completely does he exclude one from the view of the other that both believe they are indebted him for subsistence. He is the middleman of all labourers.

Connection must then occur, not through the voluntary will of workers, but through the force of the class of employers and through the force of the market. In other words, disconnection and connection are necessarily linked to each other. The United Way papers over the essential nature of the kind of society in which we live, which is characterized by the power of a class of employers. It offers platitudes about “connections between people” without ever asking what kinds of disconnections are indeed beneficial for employers and what kinds of connections are harmful to them (workers organizing themselves for the purpose of abolishing the power of employers). The world of the United Way cannot even deal with the basic fact of capitalist society–that disconnection and separation are necessary characteristics of this kind of society. It then claims that such disconnection is not beneficial to anyone–which is patently false.

Furthermore, how could competition between employers ever arise if there were no such thing as disconnection? Competition assumes both connection and disconnection. Different employers in the same industry are disconnected from each other and from consumers; however, the different employers compete on the market (and are thus connected).

The rhetoric of class harmony can be found repeatedly (page 79):

Ultimately, unless we address the discriminatory attitudes, like racism and xenophobia, that underlie the opportunity equation, the income and social inequality trends identified in this report will not improve. If anything, they will continue on their trajectory and get worse. We need to revisit our social foundations and lay out a new plan for who we want to be in the future. Building connected communities means emphasizing our civic likeness and the things that hold us together—common understanding, acceptance, inclusion, and active reliance on each other. Together, we can (re)define what it means to be Canadian in this increasingly polarized world.

It goes without saying that any “common understanding” must arise under the watchful eyes of the class of employers and their representatives. It is an illusion to refer to a community interest within the context of the power of a class of employers.

2. Enabling People to Get Ahead

The second general recommendation has much to do with making the “labour market” function more smoothly, enabling young people, immigrants, non-whites and women to be employed in better-paying and more secure jobs. Of course, better paying and more secure jobs is undoubtedly better than jobs that pay less and that are more insecure. However, that is the limit of this recommendation (page 83):

Even with the right mix of education and training, there is no guarantee of a good job as too few training programs are linked from the outset to employers’ needs.

I have on many occasions criticized the rhetoric of “good jobs” or “decent work.” The United Way does not question the existence of a market for workers in the first place; it proposes, rather, a better matching skills, education and credentials to jobs. By not questioning the market for workers in the first place, the United Way implicitly agrees with the existence of the power of employers over the class of employees.

The United Way also feeds into the ideology of the middle-class, about which I wrote in another post (see School Rhetoric: Ideological Use of the Concept of Social Justice, Part One) (page 86):

Stable, secure jobs were more common in the past than they are in today’s labour market. In the past, these kinds of jobs allowed many people to achieve a stable and secure lifestyle and to join the middle class. Today, these jobs make up a smaller proportion of the overall labour market, as precarious employment has become entrenched in the Toronto region.

The United Way, at best, opposes neoliberalism but not capitalism–like social reformists and social democrats of various stripes.

Furthermore, I have already criticized  one of the proposals in this general recommendation before (see What’s Left, Toronto? Part Five), namely Community Benefits Agreements (CBAs). The United Way has this to say about CBAs (page 84):

CBAs in the GTA, such as those used in the Eglinton Crosstown LRT construction and
the Hurontario Light Rail Transit project, have leveraged public infrastructure projects to offer training and employment opportunities to local people who are experiencing multiple barriers to the labour market, like youth and newcomers. Through these CBAs, workers from local communities have developed relevant and marketable skills and have gained access to jobs that pay decent wages and provide career pathways to other opportunities.

CBAs may help a minority obtain better paying and more secure jobs, but it is a minor tool that has little power to change the systemic biases of the labour market.

3. Making Life More Affordable

This general recommendation considers such problems as the affordability of housing, transport and child care. In all three cases, there is a mismatch of supply and demand, with demand outstripping supply or supply being inadequate to demand. The need is then to balance supply and demand (pages 90-91):

we focus on three social anchors—affordable housing, public transportation, and child care—because these areas are reaching a crisis point and require urgent attention in the GTA. Improvements to the accessibility of these social anchors will benefit the entire region but will disproportionately impact those groups whose incomes have stagnated—young adults, immigrants, racialized groups, and women—and create the conditions for these groups to take advantage of the opportunities presented in the preceding recommendations.

The balancing of supply and demand in these areas would probably increase the standard of living of the four targeted groups and is certainly, like other recommendations, not to be opposed just because they are reformist. Reformism, however, that limits itself to reformist measures only and assumes that this is the only game in town–as does the United Way–needs to be thoroughly criticized.

There are also a problem with this approach in relation to housing that United Way does not mention. As I argued in another post (What’s Left, Toronto? Part Three), some workers who own condominiums, duplexes, townhouses or detached houses may benefit from the mismatch between the supply and demand of housing as the price of their major asset increases. The United Way does not mention this problem at all.

Conclusion

The United Way limits its recommendations to proposals that would humanize capitalism–to make capitalism more tolerable. This is its real goal. Its whole approach assumes the legitimacy of capitalism as such.

In Toronto, I have not seen any criticisms of the United Way. Is this not a reflection of the impotence of the left? Should we not question its social-reformist or social-democratic assumptions?

Or should we accept (tolerate) such social reformism in the name of the need for compromise?

Critique of the View That the Government or State is Neutral: A Critical Look at the Assumptions of the Leader of the New Brunswick NDP (New Democratic Party) Mackenzie Thomason

Introduction 

On my Facebook page, I made some notes and comments on a post by Julius Arscott, a member of the supposedly radical organization here in Toronto called Socialist Action in relation to the public union strike in New Brunswick in the late fall of 2021. The poster referred to the following 49-minute podcast https://open.spotify.com/episode/45SB74uv1Hj0zRvQkPPa9z?fbclid=IwAR36H2KzFsopOUYcfwzkl5ocP1p3gNhdvIgLs-btRwZy4z_QtWEjpvWPJQw. The poster stated the following:

As striking CUPE [Canadian Union of Public Employees] NB SCFP [Le Syndicat canadien de la fonction publique] workers vote on a tentative agreement, check out the latest episode of The Red Review, brought to you by Socialist Action Canada, where Emily Steers and I [Julius Arscott] interview CUPE 1253 member, bus driver, and leader of the New Brunswick NDP Mackenzie Thomason!

Mackenzie talks picket line vibes, community support, demands of striking workers, taking on the Irving empire, government ban on land acknowledgements, and a surging New Brunswick NDP that puts people first, not profit!

I commented the following:

Fred Harris
Where is there evidence that the New Brunswick NDP “put people first, not profit?”
To answer that question, I did listen to the 49-minute interview, took some note an made a few comments. I will produce a more polished version in the future on my blog.

The following is a revised version of my notes and commentaries.

Mr. Arscott failed to respond to my commentaries.  The so-called radical political organization Socialist Action fails to engage critically with NDP views–which makes it in effect a social-democratic or social-reformist organization. Silence is golden for social-democrats or social reformers when their views are criticized, it would seem. 

A Fair Wage in a Society Dominated by a Class of Employers? 

An increase in wages was, initially, a sticking point during negotiations. Mr. Thomason had this to say: 

We were supposedly appreciated as heroes during the pandemic, but as the pandemic subsided, we were then undervalued and underappreciated. We no longer deserved a fair raise nor decent benefits.

It is undoubtedly true that the representatives of employer, seeing that essential services were indeed necessary to maintain, produce and reproduce our (and their) lives, referred to essential workers as heroes–until the pandemic crisis had been reduced, after which they then shifted to the typical attitude of treating essential workers as mere means for purposes defined by employers. Mr. Thomason is right to point out the hypocrisy of the representatives of employers in this instance. 

However, his reference to a “fair raise and benefits” implies that there is such a thing as a fair wage and benefits. The implication is that there is such a thing as “a fair raise and decent benefits.” Mr. Thomason does not question this assumption, but accepts it. The radical left should also reject it since the issue of exploitation is simply ignored. From Richard  Arneson (1981), “What’s Wrong with Exploitation? In pages 202-227, Ethics, Volume 91, Number2,
pages 205-206: 

,,, exploitation involves an exercise of power by some over others, to the disadvantage of the less powerful. Marx never tires of emphasizing that ownership of capital [and managers  in the hierarchical division of labour within the government or state]  confers power to command the labor of others. Within any class society wrongful exploitation will involve interactions between persons of markedly unequal social power, and the inequality will determine the distribution of benefits from the interaction. In market economies these inequalities of power assume the form of great disparities in bargaining strength between capitalists and workers.

Does Mr. Thomason take into account the necessary differences in bargaining power of unionized workers and management? Not at all. He addresses the issue completely in terms of the amount of raise which he and others consider fair “under the circumstances”–and those circumstances include the economic dependence of workers on employers and the general economic coercion that that involves. 

Just think of why you do not express your real opinions at work in front of management. Or why, when you or others are expressing yourselves freely in the lunchroom, when a manager comes in, the talk changes. 

Economic coercion involves oppression and exploitation despite the exchange between employers and workers

From Arneson, page 219:

It appears that the worker exchanges a day’s labor for a day’s wage, but according to Marx it is really labor power that is exchanged for the subsistence cost of its reproduction; and furthermore, according to Marx this latter exchange is only apparently an exchange,
whereas in reality the capitalist coerces the worker who has no genuine choice in the matter. The appearance of exchange conceals the worker’s “economical bondage”; “In reality, the labourer belongs to capital before he has sold himself to capital.” [or the government or state]

Rather than criticizing an economic form such as the wage and the economic coercion that arises with that economic form, Mr. Thomason assumes its legitimacy. What is illegitimate for him is not the qualitative question of whether wages are legitimate or illegitimate because they involve the lack of freedom of the workers, at the level of classes (since there is indeed some freedom of choice at the individual level of trying to find a particular employer), but the quantitative question of the level of wages.

To be sure, the level of wages is indeed of concern for workers–in order to be able to live–and live with at least a variety of choices as consumer and to provide for one’s family. To deny the importance of the quantitative level of wages for workers is absurd, but to focus on this aspect of the employer-worker relation without looking at what the wage relation involves in terms of the lack of freedom of workers is to be blind to a large part of what life involves in a society dominated by a class of employers. 

A fair raise or wage in the context of the class power of employers is social democratic—not socialist. Exploitation and oppression constitute necessary features of such a society, and to refer to fair raises or wages in that kind of society is reformist and does nothing to enlighten workers about how to address this inherent exploitation and oppression and to seek to solve them once and for all.

A Social-Democratic or Social-Reformist Justification for Defined Pensions

Although wages were a sticking point for negotiations, the union decreased its wage demands and management increased its wage offer, so some kind of meeting of minds took place over wages. 

However, the sticking point has been the government’s insistence that workers’ pensions should be in the form of a shared-risk model rather than the current defined benefit model for the locals 1253 and 2745: bus drivers, custodians, maintenance workers, payroll clerks, administrative assistants, educational assistants, and administrative workers broadly.

A defined benefit pension provides a stable and steady income for pensioners regardless of the economic conditions of particular employers, and in this instance it is the government as employer which is burdened with variability in economic conditions of the stock market.

A shared-risk pension, on the other hand, shifts the variability of stock markets onto the pensioners. 

Mr. Thomason’s justification for defined pensions reflects a social-democratic or social-reformist point of view: “you have worked hard, you have done what you have been asked to do by society and by the economy.”

This fails to even question the present class power at work and the class and alienated structure of the economy. Workers allegedly deserve a defined pension because they have kowtowed to their employers and to the general oppressive and exploitative economic, political and social conditions (what else does “you have done what you have been asked to do by society and by the economy” mean?)

Note the complete identification of “society” and “economy” with the present class society and class economy. By identifying the two, Mr. Thomason forfeits any opportunity to oppose the class nature of “society” and “economy” in general and the particular kind of class society and economy in particular–a society and economy dominated by a class of employers. (In other periods and places, serfs were subject to the power of lords, or slaves were subject to the power of slave owners, or peasants formed part of a village economy and so forth). Mr. Thomason performs the trick of identifying the present specific class structure, with its class of employers, with “society” and the “economy” in general. 

What he could have said to justify defined pensions is something like: the government as employer uses workers as things to achieve the government’s goals without permitting the workers the right to participate in the formulation of purposes of the government. Given this lack of freedom at work, workers should struggle to abolish such a situation, but they lack the power to do so for now. For those who retire from this situation, they deserve to experience a stable income if not a stable life (unlikely in a society dominated by a class of employers), and defined pensions provide a more stable form of income than a shared-risk pension.

Not only did Mr. Thomason fail to use the situation as an opportunity to expose both the historical nature of modern class society but, by referring to the “economy” and “society” without qualification he becomes an ideologue of present economic, political and social relations of power. He undoubtedly does not intend on being such an ideologue, but objectively he does in fact serve as such an ideologue. 

The New Brunswick Billionaire Family the Irvings and the Social-Democratic Cliché of Having the Rich Pay Their Fair Share of Taxes

The social-democratic or social-reformist left are full of clichés. I have already criticized the cliché above of “fair wages.” Another social-democratic cliché is the idea of having the rich “pay their fair share of taxes.” Mr. Thomason continues with his cliché-ridden talk by claiming that the New Brunswick billionaire family the Irvings should somehow pay their fair share of taxes. He says:

They [the Irving family] will have to play ball with us and help us to invest in public services by paying their fair share in taxes and their fair share in property taxes, or they can leave.

If we take a look at the money circuit of capital (The Money Circuit of Capital), we can see that workers are used as mere means for obtaining more profit (or, in the case of the government, for purposes undefined by workers). For Mr. Thomason, as long as the Irvings pay “their fair share of taxes”–they can continue to exploit workers. Such is the logic of the social-democratic left. How do these social democrats represent the general interests of workers (the class interests of workers)? 

Furthermore, although looking at “billionaires” may be useful in some circumstances, it completely overlooks the structural logic characteristic of a society dominated by the class power of employers; this structural logic needs to be criticized and abolished. This structural logic, in part, is expressed in The Money Circuit of Capital (other aspects of this logic include, but are not limited to, the productive circuit of capital and the commodity circuit of capital as outlined in volume two of Marx’s Capital). 

A Brief Look at the Issue of Taxes

Mr. Thomason not only uses the cliché of employers “paying their fair share of taxes” but does not even bother to inquire into how taxes hide the exploitative nature of the “economy.” Surplus value, which has its unitary source in the first instance in value (and  expressed in money–see    Economics for Social Democrats–but Not for the Working Class, Part One: Critique of Jim Stanford’s One-Sided View of Job Creation in a Capitalist Society) and in the second instance in surplus value derived from directly exploited workers in the private sphere–appears as separate–as profits, interest and rent on land. Since profits, interest and rent on land (natural resources) is related to wages as the rate of surplus value (surplus value as a whole in the form of profits, interest and rent added together) divided by wages, salaries and benefits), the treatment of each category of surplus as a form of income on the same level as wages (and as taxable income) makes it appear as if there is no connection between the level of wages, salaries and benefits on the one hand, and the level of profits, interest and rent on the other. Marx’s theory of the dual nature of labour (concrete and abstract labour), this theory of money and his theory of surplus value are meant to expose the internal or intrinsic relation between the level of wages and profit, interest and rent.

As John Passant (2015) says, in “Some Basic Marxist Concepts to Help Understand Income Tax,” pages 263-312, The Journal Jurisprudence, page 287: 

It [the income tax system] not only hides the exploitation of workers, it mislocates the creation of profit, interest, rent and dividends – specific examples of the general category of surplus value – in the hands of capital rather than labour. It views workers as being rewarded for their labour rather than the reality of the reward being for their ability to labour and taxes them accordingly.

What the tax system deals with is the phenomena arising in the distribution of
surplus value, not its production.

Taxes can be derived from a variety of sources, and can be direct (such as an income tax) or indirect tax (such as government taxes on commodities that we purchase, such as gas, alcohol and cigarettes). In either case, the source of the taxes is hidden since all sources are aggregated or summed up in the general form of “taxes.” There is a corresponding subject who pays taxes–the “taxpayer.” The division of income into wages on the one hand and and profits, interest and rent is dissolved in the form of taxes. 

Or, as Passant writes in another article, “Income Tax in Australia: From Appearance to Reality,” page 1: 

This idealization of the tax system is typical of social democrats or social reformers.

The income tax system reflects the idea and the surface reality that businesses earn their income in the form of profits or rents or dividends or interest rather than extracting that income (what Marxists call surplus value) from the value that workers create in the process of production which is then realised or monetised in exchange. Income tax also applies to the wages workers receive. Wages are the surface expression, the price, of the value of workers’ labour power or ability to work, not a payment for the work they do or reward for the value they create.

The Political Implications of the Social-Democratic or Social-Reformist Position: The Iron Fist of Social Democracy

The view that there is such a thing as employers paying their fair share of taxes implies that workers, too, ought to pay their fair share of taxes. After all, workers also are obliged to pay income tax.  Therefore, since the government or state forces corporations and workers to pay taxes, if corporations are said to pay their fair share of taxes, then workers who do not “voluntarily” pay their fair share of taxes should, according to this reformist reading and logic, be forced to pay their “fair share of taxes.” 

Is there really any wonder why some workers have turned to the right, when the social-democratic or social-reformist left adopt clichés whose implications involve the legitimation of political coercion by the government or state? 

According to the federal government website (currently a Liberal government):

What are the consequences of tax evasion?
Tax evasion is a crime. Whether you’re cheating on your taxes here in Canada or hiding assets or money in foreign jurisdictions, the consequences are serious. Tax evasion has a financial cost. Being convicted of tax evasion can also lead to fingerprinting, court imposed fines, jail time, and a criminal record.

When taxpayers are convicted of tax evasion, they must still repay the full amount of taxes owing, plus interest and any civil penalties assessed by the CRA. In addition, the courts may fine them up to 200% of the taxes evaded and impose a jail term of up to five years.

The only current social-democratic provincial government is in British Columbia, where the New Democratic Party (NDP) holds power. On its government website (https://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/taxes/report-tax-tip), it has a webpage for reporting tax evasion:  

Report a tip on suspected non-compliance with B.C. tax laws

Tax revenues help fund important government programs and services such as healthcare, infrastructure and education. You can play an important role to ensure there is tax compliance in B.C. With your help, people in B.C. can continue to access programs and services and support a fair tax system in the province.

If you know or suspect an individual or business isn’t complying with B.C. tax laws, you can anonymously report them by using the online tip form 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. 

You can use the tip form to report concerns, such as individuals or businesses:

  • Only accepting cash for payment (for instance, they don’t take credit cards, cheques or e-transfers)
  • Not providing receipts or invoices when you pay
  • Not collecting tax on products or services that are taxable
  • Collecting tax but not reporting or paying it to the provincial government
  • Not reporting all sales or income
  • Importing products or possessions into B.C. but not paying tax on them
  • Not paying or avoiding tax on real estate (such as houses, condos, property taxes) 
  • Reporting incorrect values on vehicle transfer papers (such as reporting only $1 to pay lower taxes on a second-hand car or boat)
  • Not collecting or paying tax on tobacco sales (such as singles or packs of cigarettes, cigars, loose tobacco)
  • Receiving a benefit they’re not entitled to

Helpful information you can provide us includes:

  • Details about the individual or business (such as names, contact information, names of shareholders or related companies if it’s a business)
  • Details about the allegations (such as what, where, when, who and how)
  • Supporting documents (such as invoices, contracts, financial statements)

You can also report a tip over the phone 24 hours a day, 7 days a week at 1-877-977-0858.

We will work with the reported individuals or businesses to educate them on how to file and pay taxes correctly. 

We take tip submissions seriously. We may follow up with you for additional information if you choose to disclose your contact information. However, we will not update you on the results of your tip. We can’t disclose any personal information, including details about our contact with anyone or potential outcomes of tip investigations.

Submit your tip now

Given the assumption that employers who pay “their fair share of the taxes” can legitimately obtain profits by hiring workers and using them to obtain more money (see my reference to the money circuit of capital above), then workers who fail to pay “their fair share of the taxes” would, according to the social-democratic or social-reformist way, force workers to pay their taxes–with the threat of fining or jailing them, or both. Such is the nature of a government that allegedly “puts people before profits.” 

A government that is indeed a government that expresses the interests of workers could legitimately force particular workers to comply with laws established by that government in order to ensure that the struggle against employers achieved its maximum effectiveness. (The anarchist view that that discipline and force would not be necessary simply ignores the probable organized resistance of employers to a workers’ government.) 

However, the implicit illegitimate assumption made by Mr. Thomason is that a government or state that does not question the legitimacy of the existence of employers as a class–and the economic, political and social structures associated with the class power of employers–is somehow neutral rather than a class state. Such a  class state treats workers’ exploitation and oppression as legitimate (as Mr. Thomason himself evidently does–even if he is unaware of it). Such exploitation is a consequence of economic coercion as well as political coercion (by ensuring that workers comply with the conditions for their continued economic coercion). 

Behind Mr. Thomason’s rhetoric of putting people before profits is the opposite–putting profits before people–backed up by the iron first of the government or state. 

Consequently, as I argued in another post, the social-democratic or social-reformist left are themselves partly responsible for the continued oppressive situation in which we live in general and the continued exploitation of workers in particular (see for example Ontario Election of Conservatives: Will the Social-Reformist Left Learn?). 

Overestimation of the Ease of Controlling the Class of Employers In the Neoliberal Epoch

We need to enter briefly into the nature of capitalism in the neoliberal epoch. Mr. Thomason vastly underestimates the power of employers and overestimates the power of the government or state in the face of the economic and political changes that have occurred over the past four decades. He indicates that, if the Irving family resists paying its “fair share of taxes,” the government will simply take over their companies and put the workers to work as the Irvings had done before. He says: 

I am willing to take on any billionaire who thinks that he deserves services that the rest of don’t.  If the Irvings do not do what the future NDP government requires them to do and threatens to move, then they can try, and we will nationalize their corporations, employ everybody as they did before, and use the revenue to move into a sustainable, green economy.

I have already criticized the view that it is an illusion to develop a sustainable, green economy without the elimination of the class power of employers and transferring that power to the workers themselves (see The British Labour Party’s 2019 Manifesto: More Social Democracy and More Social Reformism, Part One). This irresponsible, utopian view of the environmental crisis in its various facets (climate change, the destruction of biodiversity and so forth) is coupled with the irresponsible, utopian view that the power of employers is somehow magically eliminated through nationalizations (for a critique of the view that nationalization is the same as socialism, see my post The Poverty of Academic Leftism, Part Seven: The Idealization of the Nation State or the National Government and Nationalization in the Wake of the Coronavirus Pandemic, Part Two).

Moritz Muller (2019),  in his article”Of (Anti-)Capitalism, Countermovements, and Social-democratic Bedtime Stories. A Review of Recent Literature on Polanyi,” pages 135-148, Culture, Practice & Europeanization, Volume 4, Number 1, page 136, accurately characterizes the social-democratic attitude that Mr. Thomason expressed: 

… social democracy’s concept of socialism centers around the idea that private ownership should be replaced by public and/or cooperative ownership, together with the state’s acceptance of its role as the responsible institution for social welfare.

Furthermore, Mr.Thomason ignores some earlier historical efforts to nationalize industries by more powerful governments than the New Brunswick provincial government–such as France under President Francois Mitterrand in the early 1980s. 

President Mitterrand had more power than any premier (head) of an NDP premier would have if elected. Firstly, Mitterrand was the president of an entire country and not merely a region (equivalent to a Canadian province administratively). 

Secondly, the office of president in France has centralized powers that a premier would unlikely have in New Brunswick. From James Bond (2012), “French Elections and the Euro: What the Candidates Are Not telling the Electors,” in Sens Publique: 

France’s current presidential system, introduced by General de Gaulle in 1958, confers widerpowers on the country’s President than in almost any other developed country. … Today, these powers mean that the President and his team for the most part define
economic policy, with few checks and balances from parliament or the judiciary, and dramatic changes in direction are possible.

Despite the centralized power, the Mitterrand government was forced to retreat when it tried to implement Keynesian (not socialist) measures of nationalization: 

For example, at the start of the first term of Socialist President François Mitterrand in 1981, the government nationalized broad swathes of the economy which were the electoral promises outlined in the Socialist/Communist coalition’s “Programme Commun”. Massive capital flight ensued, and the value of the French franc plummeted. President Mitterrand had to backtrack, but not before significant damage had been done to the economy.

Undoubtedly the nationalization of the Irving property would not have the same effect on the Canadian dollar as nationalization of industries in France on the franc, but there would undoubtedly be pressures to backtrack, from other employers in New Brunswick and other employers within Canada (if not internationally), as well as from both from other provinces and from the federal government 

Even if there were no such pressure, the nonchalant manner in which Mr. Thomason expresses the supposed ease with which nationalization would occur–because it is vague. Mr. Thomason does not even address the issue of whether the nationalization would involve compensation or not. If it did involve compensation, then the New Brunswick government would have to borrow money for such compensation, raise taxes or reduce services. All of these involve their own problems, but Mr. Thomason simply ignores them–in a typical politician-style fashion of making vague promises that may not be able to be realized. 

Conclusions to Be Drawn from the Above

Those who claim to represent the interests of workers, such as unions and leftist political parties (such as the New Democratic Party (NDP) and Socialist Action here in Canada( have a lot to answer for. Their rhetoric is often just that–rhetoric. When analyzed, their own contradictory political position becomes evident.

That perhaps explains why no one on Facebook engaged with my comments. Given the lack of engagement, it can be inferred that the left here in Toronto simply want to cling to their views regardless of what anyone says or writes. The workers of course, need to learn who really represents their interests and how to critically look at the rhetoric expressed by the social-democratic or social-reformist left (sometimes parading as the radical left). 

Mr. Thomason’s view that there is such a thing as a “fair raise” and, by implication, a “fair wage or salary” gives away his social-democratic or social-reformist views. Since there is no such thing as a fair wage in a society dominated by the class power of employers, his views ultimately lead to an apology for the continued exploitation and oppression of workers. 

Similarly, although it is certainly necessary to defend defined pensions as opposed to shared-risk pensions, Mr. Thomason’s justification of why workers deserve a defined pension as opposed to a shared-risk pension assumes not only the legitimacy of the existence of the class of employers but the legitimacy of workers having to subordinate their lives to that class power. 

The issue of billionaires (and corporations) paying their “fair share of taxes” raises the issue of how the government, by treating wages and various forms of surplus value (profit, interest and rent) on the same level as different forms of taxable revenue hides the exploitative and oppressive nature of working for employers. It also raises the issue of whether workers should be legitimately be forced to pay taxes–and how the far right have captured workers’ dissatisfactions with the coercive nature of government in order to restructure the government by reducing benefits to workers (reduction of unemployment insurance benefits for example) and reducing the benefits to non-workers (social assistance recipients, for example). 

Mr. Thomason’s underestimation of the difficulty of nationalizing industries, his silence over whether the nationalization would involve compensation or not and his silence over whether nationalized industries would still involve exploitation and oppression express the typical idealization of “public services” characteristic of social democrats or social reformers. 

Mr. Thomason’s conception of socialism is really just humanized capitalism. 

Turning to the Mr. Thomason’s implicit conception of socialism, his conception reminds me of a Winnipeg teacher. I was working as a casual library clerk in the school where she worked in Winnipeg. She was the teacher librarian, and she claimed to be a socialist. She instructed me to label some of the books with labels and a felt marker according to the Dewey Decimal library classification system. She then left for a few days (I forget why). 

My printing abilities (as well as my writing abilities in terms of legibility) leave much to be desired; my typing accuracy and speed, on the other hand, are much better. I already had been a bilingual library technician in Prince George, British Columbia for over two years. I had been used to the labels for library material to be printed by a printer and did not have to worry about the legibility of my printing and writing.

I did the best that I could. When she returned, she was shocked for two reasons. She thought that I would have progressed much more quickly (quantitative critique), and she was very critical of the quality of the printing on the call number labels (qualitative critique). I was never called back to that library or school–with no explanation. She did not even inquire into why her quantitative and qualitative concerns had not been met. 

The teacher’s “socialism” was restricted to supporting public welfare services–welfare capitalism, if you will. She obviously believed in some form of hierarchical command system at work and not humanized forms of work; she showed little understanding of my own limitations in a given context and my own capacities in another context. This is likely Mr. Thomason’s view as well as well.

This socialism is really aiming to reestablish a social-democratic government that arose after the Second World War. Such a social-democratic government is unlikely now that globalization has arisen. The Second World War saw a massive destruction of means of production (and workers) so that the proportion of what Marx called constant capital (machinery, plant, raw material, auxiliary material and so forth) was lower than before the War. The reduction of constant capital improved the rate of profit for a time, but as the accumulation of capital proceeded, economic crises were bound to arise, and with such crises, crises in the relatively temporary truce between workers and employers via collective bargaining and collective agreements. The attack by the class of employers, and the capitalist government or state through a retrenchment of real wages, reductions in welfare measures and in many cases increased in expenditures in government bodies dedicated to increased oppressions of workers, citizens, immigrants and migrant workers was hardly surprising. 

Another example also comes to mind. When I was working at the brewery, there was a lab assistant who tested the beer for quality control. We talked in the lunch room occasionally, and he indicated that he was somewhat of a socialist. He later became a foreman–and oppressed us just as much as other foremen. His socialism was similar to the socialism of the teacher; both conceived of socialism in terms of welfare capitalism and not in terms of the elimination of the class power of employers. 

Socialist Action, at least as represented by Mackenzie Thomason, conceives of socialism in a similar manner to the teacher and the lab assistant/foreman–welfare capitalism. It is hardly what I would call socialism (for my conception of socialism, see for example Socialism, Part One: What It May Look Like and the subsequent posts in that series). 

Exposing the Intolerance and Censorship of Social Democracy, Part Four: Critique of the Idealization of Publicly Owned Infrastructure, Etc.

Introduction

This is the final post of a four-part series of posts. For the context of where the following fits into my participation and withdrawal from the organization Social Housing Green Deal, see the first part Exposing the Intolerance and Censorship of Social Democracy, Part One: The Working Class, Housing and the Police.

People’s Pandemic Shutdown

I sent the following email to Ms. Jessup at 816 a.m. (Toronto time), May 23, 2021, the same day that we were to have a general zoom meeting:

Hello Anna,
 
Attached are some questions I have about the Draft Action outline of the People’s Pandemic Shutdown. I would appreciate it if you would circultate it to others.
 
Thanks.
 
Fred

No one, as far as I am aware, ever discussed my questions and concerns. Such is the nature of the “progressive left” here in Toronto, Ontario, Canada (and undoubtedly in many other parts of the world).

The following is my inquiry and critique:

People’s Pandemic Shutdown

We Demand Everything

(Draft Action Outline)

Long Term Objective

Politically compel a wealth transfer, from police, military, and big business, into stabilizing, publicly owned infrastructure, capable of responsibly managing disease, and ensuring genuinely healthy and safe living conditions for all on Turtle Island.

Immediate Objective

Embolden communities in Tkaronto, with the moral imperative, to occupy public space, and interrupt commerce, to achieve this long term objective.

Build solidarity, by highlighting the connections among peoples’ struggles.

 

  1. Questions about “Long Term Objective”:

    a. To what are they referring when they speak of Turtle Island?

  2. What do they mean by “publicly owned infrastructure?” Current public infrastructure, such as schools and welfare services, are oppressive in many ways. Should the left be demanding the transfer of power to such oppressive structures? Or should it be demanding the simultaneous transfer to and restructuring of public infrastructure? Will this need to restructure oppressive publicly owned infrastructure be addressed?

  3. For safe living conditions for all, it would be necessary to abolish the power of employers, would it not? Is there any such demand in this document? Could such an objective be immediately achieved? Or would it require years if not decades of organization, discussion and critique?

Strategy

  • Meet with abolitionist and anti-capitalist allies to develop comprehensive demands and an outline of what our social infrastructure must look like.
  • Mutually supportive promotion of the event and of each others struggles
  • Emphasise our commitment to publicly gather, with distancing and masks, to get the infrastructure we need, for all of us to be really and truly safe.

Infrastructure/programs to Consider in our Demands

  • Health care
  • Long Term Care Homes
  • Public Education 
  • Harm Reduction 
  • Food Security
  • Social Housing
  • Disability support programs
  • Paid sick days 
  • Free Transit
  • Recreation, parks
  • Equity Based Social Work 

Questions for the “Strategy”:

  1. Who are these abolitionist allies? Anti-capitalist allies?

  2. Would not the formulation of comprehensive demands require a critique of current demands that not only fall short of comprehensive demands but include arguments or references to less comprehensive demands as fair or just, such as the phrase “$15 and Fairness?” Or “fair” contracts or collective agreements? Or “decent work” and other such phrases? Will the need to engage in critique of other, reformist positions form part of the discussion?

  3. “To get the infrastructure that we need, for all of us to be really and truly safe,” will require years and indeed decades of struggle, discussion and critique for all of us to be really and truly safe. For example, I was diagnosed twice with cancer (invasive bladder cancer, and then a few years later rectal cancer—with subsequent metastatic liver cancer). When I asked the doctor why I had cancer again despite taking measures (such as healthier eating habits), his response was: “Bad luck.” Furthermore, as the documentary “Pink Ribbons Inc.” indicates, funding for most cancer research focuses on treating cancers once they arise rather than preventing cancer in the first place. Safety at work and in the community requires us to take control over producing our lives—and that requires abolishing the class power of employers. Will that be addressed?

  4. Re Infrastructure/programs: How are these demands to be met unless we control our life process? And how are we to control our life process without abolitioning the class power of employers? Will such abolition be front and centre of the strategy?

  5. Re Health care: Is it really possible to care, not just technically, but socially and emotionally, for those in need of health care in a health-care system characterized by, on the one hand, a hierarchical division of labour of nurses’ aides, nurses and doctors and, on the other, budget restraints dictated by the overall need to ensure that there is a constant flow of profit and accumulation of capital? Furthermore, the health-care workers work for a wage. What implication does this have for providing, not health services, but health care? Will these issues be addressed?

  6. Re: Public education: Is it likely that there will be any proposal for abolishing grades or marks or notes that oppress children and adolescents? Will there be any proposal for restructuring the curriculum such that it becomes meaningful for most children and adolescents? For example, John Dewey proposed and put into practice a curriculum that centred on the common needs of most human needs—for food, clothing and shelter. Learning to read, write and to develop and understanding of science emerged through engagements with actually reproducing various forms of human lifestyles in history. In that school, there were also no grades, marks or notes. Assessment occurred, but it was for the purpose of aiding children and adolescents to improve the quality of their work and not to compare one student’s achievements with the achievements of other students.

    Or will such proposals for change merely be “add-ons” to existing oppressive public educational structures, such as those proposed by the Chicago Teachers’ Union in their document Schools Chicago’s Students Deserve?

  7. Re Social housing: As I pointed out in my email concerning 33 Gabian Way, when 23 police showed up, the situation involved social housing—which can be just as oppressive as market housing. Will the oppressive nature of such housing be addressed?

  8. Re: Paid sick days: This demand assumes the continued existence of a class of employers, does it not? It may function as a tactical demand, but it is hardly on the same level as abolitionist demands, which are strategic. Is there any indication—or will there be—that even if there are paid sick days, this will hardly be sufficient since workers as a class will still be exposed to dangers at work over which they have no or little control since it is the employers who have power over the purchase of equipment and the organization of work?

  9. Re: Equity-based social work: What does this mean? Can social work really be equity-based in the context of the class power of employers?

 

Workers’ Demands to Build Upon

  • Status for all workers
  • Paid sick days for all
  • Genuinely safe and healthy working conditions for all
  • Livable wage for all

Questions for “Workers’ Demands to Build Upon”

  1. Re: Genuinely safe and healthy working conditions for all: to achieve this objective would require the abolition of the class power of employers. If this is the case, will such a demand be raised? If so, does not such a demand oppose many among the left who seek only reform and not fundamental structural changes? Would it not be necessary to engage in criticism of those who seek only to reform the class structure rather than abolish it?

 

Foreign Policy Demands to Build Upon

  • Cease all participation in illegal wars
  • Cease all monetary support to state governments known to commit war crimes or participate in illegal occupation, including Saudia Arabia and Israel

Questions for “Foreign Policy Demands to Build Upon”:

  1. Is there such a thing as a legal war? Why the reference to illegal at all? Why the reference to “law” at all? Does not the legal system oppress us in one way or another? Will this issue be raised and discussed?

  2. Re “illegal occupation”: Is there then such a thing as a legal occupation? Same questions as in 1.

 

Draft Itinerary for Day of Action (June Xth)

  • Defunding of oppressive corporations
  • Defunding oppressive police and military

1PM Toronto Police HQ 40 College Street

-Occupy the street, banners of connected struggles, chants

-Physically distant, masks

1:30PM Walk to Bay and College

-Occupy the intersection

-We Demand Everything: speakers connect the struggles and demands

Questions for “Draft Itinerary for Day of Action”:

  1. Re: “Defunding of oppressive corporations”: If all corporations are oppressive, then is the demand really the abolition of the existence of corporations? Or does the demand just mean: “Defund particular corporations that are particularly oppressive?” There is a world of difference between the two kinds of demand. Furthermore, what does it mean to “defund” a corporation? Nationalize it? But nationalization has hardly meant democratization. Nationalized corporations can be just as oppressive and exploitative as private corporations. ‘

  2. Re: “Defunding oppressive police and military”: Does that mean that all police and military are oppressive and should be defunded? Or just particularly oppressive forms of police and military structures? If all police and military are to be abolished—would that not require the abolition of the class power of employers as well since the main function of the police is to maintain the existing social order, with its class, patriarchal and racist structures, internally? And the military’s main function is, at a minimum, to maintain the existing social order externally? (and to extend the power of the government territoriality sometimes, if need be, in order to maintain social order)? Will such a demand be forthcoming? If so, will there be simultaneous critiques of those who seek merely to reform the class power of employers but not abolish such power since those who seek only reforms themselves would oppose such an abolitionist stance?

The meeting was supposed to be at 3:00 p.m. I expected, as usual, an email zoom link to be sent before the meeting started. I did not receive any such email.

I waited until 4:38, at which time I sent the following email to Miss Jessup:

Frederick Harris
Sun 2021-05-23 4:38 PM
To:

  •  Anna Jessup
 
Hello Anna,
 
I will no longer be attending the zoom meetings.
 
Fred
 

I did not think about looking on the organization’s Facebook page since the custom since February was for Ms. Jessup to send the zoom link by email.

I was curious. Was this just a mistake in not informing me that the zoom link would be on the Facebook page? I did look at the Facebook page–and then saw that the meeting was still being held–from 3:00 p.m. until 7:00 p.m.–a double session. I was not informed about the change in zoom link location, and I was not informed about the substantial extension in the length of the zoom meeting? Why was that? There started to exist evidence that this was a conscious effort to exclude me from participating:

Screenshot (6)

Political Implications

The social-democratic or reformist left are a clique; they refuse to engage in serious inquiry about the demands they raise. If there is such criticism, they refuse to consider them, and they may even resort to censorship in order to avoid reconsidering their approach.

Exposing the Intolerance and Censorship of Social Democracy, Part Three: Critique of the Lack of Reference to the Class of Employers and to the Health Implications of Living Under Their Dominance

Introduction

This is the continuation of a four-part series of posts. For the context of where the following fits into my participation and withdrawal from the organization Social Housing Green Deal, see the first part Exposing the Intolerance and Censorship of Social Democracy, Part One: The Working Class, Housing and the Police.

Christoph Henning’s words (2005) express the nature of some so-called leftist social organizations in Toronto, such as Social Housing Green Deal.  From Philosophy after Marx: 100 Years of Misreadings and the Normative Turn in Political Philosophy, page 77:

We will see that Marxian theory, whose import was already lost in the developments discussed above, not only continued to be given a new thematic framework, but also displayed a ‘changing function’. A mode of thinking that operates within complex and dynamic socio-economic structures of development was replaced by a simplified rationale of domination. In functional terms, this led to a transformation of theory. Theory went from being a critical companion of politics to being an instrument by which to ideologically affirm a political voluntarism that was practised in a largely unreflected manner.

Before the May 2 Social Housing Green Deal zoom meeting I had drafted a critical analysis of two motioned items that were on the agenda. The first motion I discussed in the second post. This post is about the other motion. I sent my critical comments to Ms. Jessup, moderator and administrator, for the group. The motion was to support the statement by the grassroots organization “Suppress the Virus Now Coalition.”

The first motion, as I indicated in my previous post, was more or less rubber-stamped. I had the impression that Ms. Jessup wanted the motion by the Suppress the Virus Now Coalition also to be rubber-stamped. However, I, Ms. Jessup and another zoom member had to leave soon.

I managed to have the motion tabled until the next meeting. That meeting was postponed, however, until May 23. I will describe why I did not attend that meeting in the final post of this series.

Second Critique: The Motion to Support the Statement Made By Suppress the Virus Now Coalition

This is what I wrote: 

There is a controversial claim in this statement.

“ANY PANDEMIC STRATEGY THAT RESIGNS ITSELF TO AVOIDABLE SICKNESS AND DEATH IS RACIST, ANTI-BLACK, ANTI-INDIGENOUS, SEXIST, ABLEIST, AGEIST, AND UNACCEPTABLE.”

Acquiescence to avoidable sickness has been the rule, not the exception. This does not mean that there have not been struggles over health and safety in the workplace. There have been constant struggles, but currently the unionized sector of the labour movement has often rested content with rhetoric than dealing with the reality of just how unsafe working conditions were even before the pandemic.

Thus, in a recent nod to the number of injured and dead workers in Canada, the Toronto Airport Workers Council (TAWC, an organization “committed to speaking up for workers at YYZ [Toronto Pearson Airport], TAWC posted the following on its Facebook page on April 28—the Canadian national day of mourning for workers killed on the job: “Photos of the GTAA Administration building of the flags lowered at half-mast as a mark of respect on this National day of mourning.”

My response: “It would be more relevant if all measures to eliminate processes and procedures that treat workers as means for the benefit of employers were instituted–in other words, the elimination of a society organized on the basis of the class power of employers. How many workers have been injured and died at Pearson because of the pursuit of profit?

Flying a flag at half-mast is hardly a symbol of respect if all measures to eliminate dangerous working conditions are not pursued. Have such dangerous working conditions been eliminated at Pearson?”

There were 2 likes and 0 comments.

I had another “debate” on TAWC over the issue of health and safety at Pearson earlier, but I will spare the reader any further references unless someone wants to read it.

Some Canadian statistics before the pandemic (from my blog):

Official statistics:

  1. “More than 1000 employees die every year in Canada on the job, and about 630,000 are injured every year (Bob Barnetson, 2010, The Political Economy of Workplace Injury in Canada. Edmonton: Athabasca University Press, p. 2). The same year as the publication of that work saw 554 homicides (Tina Mahonny, 2011, Homicide in Canada, 2010. Ottawa: Statistics Canada, p. 1) —the number of employee deaths at work under the power of employers was around double the number of murders.”

    Non-official statistics:

  2. Steven Bittle, Ashley Chen and Jasmine Hébert report a much higher figure in their article (Fall 2018), ““Work-Related Deaths in Canada,”, pages 159-187, in Labour/Le Travail, Volume 82, page 186:

“Relying on a range of data sources, and adopting a broad definition of what constitutes a work-related fatality, we generated a revised estimate of the number of annual work-related fatalities. Based on our analysis, we estimate that the number of annual work-related fatalities in Canada is at least ten to thirteen times higher than the approximately 900 to 1,000 annual average fatalities reported by the AWBC [The Canadian Association of Workers’ Compensation Boards of Canada]. This makes work-related fatalities one of the leading causes of death in this country.”

Has there really been any social movement to address this carnage? Not that I am aware of. Resignation to sickness, injury and death at work (and outside work due to preventable diseases such as cancer) is part of parcel of Canadian culture (and many other national cultures). To then call it racist, etc seems to be an inadequate characterization of the situation of many workers in Canada. There may indeed be higher differentials of injury, disease and death among coloured workers, etc. (which requires more detailed data), but the general nature of the problem is not racist, etc but economic: workers, whatever their colour, gender, etc., are subject to the control of a class of workers, and there is no real and effective political organization that questions such control and aims to abolish the conditions that make it eminently reasonable (from an employer’s point of view) to engage in actions that injury, make sick or kill workers.

From Bob Barnetson, The Political Economy of Workplace Injury in Canada, page 2):

“Perspectives on workplace injury

How you react to the vast number of workers injured and killed each year reflects your values and beliefs. Are these injures inevitable? Are they just the cost of doing business? One way to look at workplace injuries is from an economic perspective. This view sees the risk of injury as minimal, unavoidable and, ultimately, acceptable. Is it the price we (or at least workers) must pay for a “healthy” economy? If we are going to lower the risk of injury, we need to ensure the cost is less than the benefit we’ll receive. And the people best positioned to decide that are employers.

This economic perspective dominates the debate about workplace health and safety. It is the lingua franca of employers, bureaucrats, politicians, and most academics. There are, of course, alternative perspectives. An alternative advanced by workers views workplace injuries as the result of choices employers make in order to maximize profitability. Contrary to the slogan “safety pays,” it is usually cheaper for employers to organize work unsafely. This is especially true if employers can (with the tacit consent of government) pass along the cost of occupational injuries and disease to workers.”

The kind of social process called working for an employer (being an employee) that characterizes our working lives is a threat to our health in various ways, Logically, if we take seriously the claim that “ANY [PANDEMIC[ STRATEGY THAT RESIGNS ITSELF TO AVOIDABLE SICKNESS AND DEATH,” should be opposed, then we should be fighting to create an organization and a movement that fights against a social organization dominated by a class of employers (and the associated economic, political and social structures) and for a socialist society that eliminates class relations—period. Otherwise, any other strategy simply “resigns itself to avoidable sickness and death”–regardless of the pandemic, and regardless of its differentiated impact on race, gender and so forth. In fact, what has happened during the pandemic merely highlights the continuity with past practice—and the acquiescence of those who have failed to oppose a society dominated by a class of employers.

Just as an aside. The list of demands: how effective are they really? Are there any priorities? Are there some that need to be implemented right away? Or are all on the same level? If on different levels, should they not have been organized in some fashion to reflect the level of priorities? And not only priorities but power to achieve each demand? What organizations and supports currently exist that are more relevant for achieving each specific demand? Or all all organizations and supports on the same level?

End of my commentary

The “Suppress the Virus Now Coalition” also wrote the following: 

The Suppress The Virus Now Coalition is a network of community groups, labour groups, and individuals in Ontario. We have come together out of a shared concern about the Ontario provincial and Canadian federal governments’ approach to the COVID-19 crisis since the pandemic hit in March 2020. Now, as the second wave drags on, we demand that those governments stop prioritizing corporate profits over the health and well-being of our communities. We refuse to endorse any approach that accepts the needless death of elderly people and those living and working in long-term care; of disabled, chronically ill, and immunocompromised loved ones; of Indigenous Peoples in Ontario and across the country; of the Black, migrant, and racialized communities who have borne the brunt of COVID-19 infections in the GTA; of underhoused, precariously housed, and houseless neighbours; of incarcerated and formerly incarcerated community members; and of the health-care and other essential workers who are on the front lines.

ANY PANDEMIC STRATEGY THAT RESIGNS ITSELF TO AVOIDABLE SICKNESS AND DEATH IS RACIST, ANTI-BLACK, ANTI-INDIGENOUS, SEXIST, ABLEIST, AGEIST, AND UNACCEPTABLE. IN SOLIDARITY WITH THE #COVIDzero CAMPAIGN LAUNCHED BY HEALTH-CARE WORKERS, WE DEMAND THAT OUR ELECTED OFFICIALS EXPLICITLY ADOPT THE HUMANE GOAL OF ELIMINATING COMMUNITY SPREAD OF COVID-19.

Policing, threats, and rhetoric that blames individuals for systemic failures and conditions outside of their control are neither effective nor ethical tactics to deal with this pandemic. Instead, we must turn to principles of solidarity and community care, and toward robust, expansive, and inclusive social supports so that we can all make it through this crisis. Social and economic inequalities have been exacerbated by the pandemic, but rather than returning to a “normal” where a select few lives are privileged over others, we must build the conditions for all to live and thrive. This rebuilding must centre the needs of those most impacted by the pandemic and by the ongoing violence of the Canadian state.

We call for a just, equitable #COVIDzero approach that includes (but is not limited to): 

  • At least seven employer-paid sick days for all workers on a permanent basis, plus an additional 14 paid sick days during public health emergencies.

  • Adequate personal protective equipment (PPE) for all workers, including respirator masks (e.g. N95s, FFP2s) for all workers in indoor workplaces until COVID community transmission ends, now that we know the virus can remain airborne indoors for hours.

  • The right of all workers to refuse work due to unsafe workplace conditions, and to be eligible for income supports like the Canada Recovery Benefit (CRB) after such work refusals.

  • Expanded eligibility for pandemic-related state assistance such as the CRB, including for temporary migrant workers, undocumented people, gig economy workers, sex workers, and others.

  • An immediate ban on evictions; rent cancellation and forgiveness of arrears; a moratorium on encampment policing; and safe, accessible winter housing for unhoused people who want it.

  • An immediate end to the criminalization, racial profiling, and raids that harm migrant and non-migrant sex workers, including anti-trafficking initiatives and repressive bylaws affecting sex workers and workers in massage parlours.

  • Safe and accessible options for isolation when home isolation is not an option, and transparent communication about options that are already in existence.

  • Immediate investment to improve ventilation, reduce class sizes, and offer COVID testing to students and education workers; and robust assistance for students, educators, caregivers, and families when school closures are necessary, like now.

  • Redistributing 50% of all police budgets toward resourcing social and health supports in Black, Indigenous, and people of colour communities.

  • An immediate end to deportations, and regularization and full immigration status now for all migrants, refugees, international students, workers (including temporary or seasonal migrants), and undocumented people in the country.

  • Immediate federal support and funding for clean water access, appropriate health care, and COVID supports for all Indigenous people on and off reserve, and the recognition of Indigenous sovereignty across the country, including heeding demands to immediately classify oil, mineral, and gas extraction as non-essential work, and to hit pause on extraction, exploration, and environmental assessment processes.

  • Immediate decarceration of people from provincial, federal, and immigration detention facilities, and simultaneous access to sanitation and protective equipment, harm reduction supplies, free communication resources, and appropriate and consensual post-incarceration support for all incarcerated people.

  • Permanently increasing Ontario Works and Ontario Disability Support Program (ODSP) rates to match CERB ($2,000/month).

  • Making temporary, uneven pandemic pay boosts permanent by raising the minimum wage for all.

  • Taking profit out of long-term care, replacing for-profit corporations with an entirely non-profit and public system. Enforcing national standards that ensure that long-term care workers – who are disproportionately racialized women – have a living wage, health and wellness benefits, and a safe and secure job, in order to provide high-quality care to residents.

  • Making public transit safe by halting fare inspection, investing in mask distribution, and putting more buses on high-traffic routes to allow for physical distancing.

  • Increasing research and supports dedicated to COVID “long-haulers,” people still suffering from the effects of the virus months after infection.

  • Greater involvement of community groups in public health decision-making, respecting communities’ knowledge about their own life circumstances, and more consistently inviting their representatives into decision-making processes led by researchers and civic officials.

As the pandemic puts our society’s racial and class divides on ruthless display, it is urgent that we all show up with our neighbours to demand a just, equitable pathway to #COVIDzero that leaves no one behind.

To add your name (individual and/or organization) to this statement, and/or to get involved with the coalition’s work, please complete this short form.

We are an Ontario-based group, but the need for a just, equitable #COVIDzero strategy transcends local boundaries. We invite collaboration with people struggling towards the same goal elsewhere. We also encourage groups outside Ontario to adopt and adapt this statement freely for your own purposes.

In Ontario, here are some ways you can plug into powerful community organizing and take action:

  • Follow, boost, and contribute to groups like the Encampment Support Network, People’s Defence Toronto, and Keep Your Rent Toronto that are fighting for housing justice.

  • Volunteer with and donate to Toronto Indigenous Harm Reduction, providing encampment support and working to mitigate the harms of the catastrophic overdose crisis.

  • Join the Migrant Rights Network to demand justice, safety, and #StatusForAll migrants.

  • Support the labour organizing of the Workers Action Centre and the Migrant Workers Alliance for Change to ensure that no one is left behind.

  • Take action with 15 & Fairness and the Decent Work and Health Network to demand paid sick days for all.

  • Learn more about the work of COVID Long Haulers Support Group Canada, a large grassroots organization of COVID survivors experiencing debilitating effects months after infection, and sign the support group’s petition demanding recognition, research, and rehabilitation for Long COVID sufferers.

  • Get involved with the Toronto Prisoners Rights Project to fight for justice for incarcerated and formerly incarcerated people, and take action to demand decarceration.

  • Demand better for residents and workers in long-term care, by following the work of the Ontario Nurses’ Association, Canadian Union of Public Employees, and Unifor, and contributing to their calls to action.

  • Follow and boost Green Jobs Oshawa’s campaign for domestic PPE production, crucial long-term healthcare organizing by the Ontario Health Coalition and the Ontario Council of Hospital Unions, and the campaign to #MakeReveraPublic.

  • Write to elected officials to express your support for the demands of the Wet’suwet’en Chiefs who are calling for a stop to resource extraction projects as COVID-19 outbreaks recur in B.C. work camps.

  • Protect public sector jobs and collective bargaining with the Toronto & York Region Labour Council by adding your voice to their Forward Together campaign.

  • Join TTC Riders to demand adequate funding for safe and physically distanced public transit options.

  • Call the Minister of Children, Community, and Social Services to demand increased social assistance rates.

  • Demand that the Ontario legislature adopt an intersectional gender equity approach to its pandemic response

Conclusion

My general criticism on this blog has been and will continue to be that the so-called radical left fail to connect up a general criticism of a society dominated by a class of employers–with the associated oppressive and exploitative economic, political and social structures–and particular issues. The organization Suppress the Virus Now Coalition failed to do just that.

The pandemic should have been an occasion to develop a movement against the systemic nature of capitalist society. There has really been no such movement–in part undoubtedly because grass-roots social movements fail to link the particular issues surrounding the pandemic with the general issue of the impossibility of maximizing the health of workers, citizens, immigrants and migrant workers in the context of a society dominated by a class of employers.

My comments and criticisms were never addressed. My criticisms, in effect, were censored. I leave it to the reader to decide whether such censorship expresses the democratic nature of some (if not many) grassroots organizations–or if it expresses something else. 

The last post of this series will include further comments and questions about “The People’s Pandemic Shutdown.” 

Exposing the Intolerance and Censorship of Social Democracy, Part Two: Critique of the Standard of Canadians and Landed Immigrants Working for an Employer

Introduction 

This is the continuation of a series of posts. For the context of where the following fits into my participation and withdrawal from the organization Social Housing Green Deal, see the first part Exposing the Intolerance and Censorship of Social Democracy, Part One: The Working Class, Housing and the Police.

I sent two sets of critical comments to Ms. Anna Jessup, monitor and administrator for the group Social Housing Green Deal, located here in Toronto, Ontario, Canada for the May 2 zoom meeting. The two critical comments relate to two motions for support for two grassroots organizations. In this post, I will address the first motion, and in another post the second motion.

The Political Context of the First Motion 

The political context is the federal government’s program for immigrants. From the Canadian government’s website (https://www.canada.ca/en/immigration-refugees-citizenship/news/2021/04/new-pathway-to-permanent-residency-for-over-90000-essential-temporary-workers-and-international-graduates.html):

New pathway to permanent residency for over 90,000 essential temporary workers and international graduates

From: Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada

News release

April 14, 2021—Ottawa—Today, the Honourable Marco E. L. Mendicino, Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship, announced an innovative pathway to permanent residence for over 90,000 essential workers and international graduates who are actively contributing to Canada’s economy.

These special public policies will grant permanent status to temporary workers and international graduates who are already in Canada and who possess the skills and experience we need to fight the pandemic and accelerate our economic recovery.

The focus of this new pathway will be on temporary workers employed in our hospitals and long-term care homes and on the frontlines of other essential sectors, as well as international graduates who are driving the economy of tomorrow.

To be eligible, workers must have at least 1 year of Canadian work experience in a health-care profession or another pre-approved essential occupation. International graduates must have completed an eligible Canadian post-secondary program within the last 4 years, and no earlier than January 2017.

Effective May 6, 2021, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) will begin accepting applications under the following 3 streams:

  • 20,000 applications for temporary workers in health care
  • 30,000 applications for temporary workers in other selected essential occupations
  • 40,000 applications for international students who graduated from a Canadian institution

The streams will remain open until November 5, 2021, or until they have reached their limit. Up to 90,000 new permanent residents will be admitted under these 3 streams.    

To promote Canada’s official languages, 3 additional streams with no intake caps have also been launched for French-speaking or bilingual candidates. Communities across Canada benefit from French-speaking and bilingual newcomers, and this pathway will contribute to the vitality of these Francophone minority communities.

A detailed explanation of all eligibility requirements is available within the public policies.

As we continue the fight against the pandemic, immigration will remain critical to our economic recovery by addressing labour shortages and adding growth to our workforce.

With an accelerated pathway to permanent residency, these special public policies will encourage essential temporary workers and international graduates to put down roots in Canada and help us retain the talented workers we need, particularly in our health-care system.

Today’s announcement will help us achieve our 2021 Immigration Levels Plan, which will see Canada welcome 401,000 new permanent residents. The skilled newcomers and international graduates welcomed under our plan will help create jobs and drive long-term growth in Canada. 

First Critique: The Motion to Support Justice4 Immigrant Workers 

The grass-roots organization J4MW (Justice for Migrant Workers), which arose in the largest Canadian province, Ontario, responded to this federal program. The first motion was to endorse the response of J4MW.

When discussing the first motion, Ms. Jessup indicated that she had not read my critical comments that I had sent her. I had to provide, on the spot, a summary of my first criticism, which I did, I argued that the Justice4 Immigrant Workers implicitly uses a standard of judgement based on regular Canadian workers, whether citizens or landed immigrants–and yet they too are exploited and oppressed. This standard should be criticized and not ignored. Louis George, a participant in the May 2 meeting, accurately described it as the reverse of the view that we should just fight against reducing regular workers to the lowest working-class positions. However, Ms. Jessup claimed that we need to support Justice4 Migrant Workers–that they are a strong organization.

The issue, however, is not support but–critical support. Rubber stamping organization’s statements is not what is needed; we need to look critically at what they are saying and offer critical analysis in order to improve our position. Without critical discussion, it is unlikely that there will be much social advance but rather dogmatism so typical of the left.

The motion was carried–but there was not much discussion. After this meeting, I told my wife that I may withdraw from this organization–I felt it had an exaggerated idea of both its own effectiveness and the effectiveness of other grassroots organizations. I also felt that it was dogmatic and lacked much needed critical spirit. I still, however, plodded along, trying to see if there was really any hope in participating effectively in such an organization.

The following is the motion (in English and Spanish) and my critical comments–which largely fell on deaf ears.

J4MW[Justice For Migrant Workers] Response to the 90,000 PR Pathway / Respuesta de J4MW a la vía de los 90.000 PR

ESPAÑOL ABAJO

“Thank you for your support! Take a read through the letter and add your name and organization to our list. Please note that your name/organization will be published.”

“Justicia for Migrant Workers (J4MW) strongly condemns Canada’s announced ‘reforms’ to its immigration system. A one-time only short-term access to permanent residence for 90,000 people is a smokescreen that fails to address Canada’s racist and exclusionary immigration system. These reforms do nothing to address how the current point system discriminates against both undocumented communities and migrants deemed ‘low skill’ and ‘low wage.’ More troublingly, the reforms do nothing to change the indentureship of thousands of migrant workers in Canada. In particular, migrant agricultural workers who work under a system of indentured labour will once again see no improvements to their working and living conditions as a result of the continuation of a closed work permit system that binds workers to one employer. Instead, migrant farm workers are put into competition with over 90 other occupations for a measly 30,000 spots, when over 50,000 farm workers have entered Canada on tied work permits during the pandemic alone.

The language requirement that determines eligibility for this pathway system is discriminatory and will exclude most low-waged and agricultural workers. The additional and exorbitant permanent residence fees have long restricted access to permanent residence for low-wage, racialized families, and are another method of extracting money from exploited workers. There is nothing compassionate, humanitarian or just about this temporary pathway. It is yet another means for Canada to extract capital and labour from migrants for its own economic objectives. It is not a blanket grant of permanent residence status to the tens of thousands of migrant workers and undocumented persons in Canada who contribute to Canada every day, and is, in fact, just a temporary
pathway for a lucky few.

It is a grave mistake to characterise the announcement as a ‘win’ for anyone but the corporate class in Canada. With this fleeting pathway, the Canadian government continues its legacy of divide and rule by pitting some communities against one another in a dire competition for status. In this particular example, some essential workers are deemed more deserving than others. Canada is not opening up its borders. In fact, it continues the illusion of ‘inclusion’ while reinforcing racial hierarchies that will continue to perpetuate a system of racial apartheid. Make no mistake – migrant workers are not newcomers and they are not peripheral to Canada’s economy. They are the foundation of our society and their labour has been the lynchpin of Canada’s agricultural and industrial complexes. Canada continues to expand the status quo. Absent from the narrative is that in December 2020, Canada expanded the Seasonal Agricultural Workers program to additional commodities, entirely to bolster its exports. It has expanded the Agricultural Stream of the Temporary Foreign Worker Program to increase the number of workers in order to address the mythical narrative of a ‘labour shortage’ in agriculture. 

Canada continues to fail to recognize racialized labour as skilled labour by devaluing industries such as agriculture that are racialized, gendered, and segmented. In addition to the exclusion of hundreds of thousands of undocumented peoples, the overwhelming majority of participants in Canada’s long standing agricultural indentured programs (the Agricultural Stream and the Seasonal Agricultural Worker Program) will reap no benefits to their everyday lived realities despite their ongoing and continued resistance against deplorable housing and working conditions.

It is comical to see business interest organizations such as the Business Council of National Issues and the Canadian Chamber of Commerce usher praises for these reforms. There are no commonalities between the interest of migrant labour and capital. Furthermore, there are whole communities that are denied any possibility of benefitting from these temporary pathways schemes. Generations of workers and their families will reap no benefits from this announcement. As one comrade commented, the immigration reforms announced are basically an expedited system of the existing Canadian Experience Class, providing access to permanent residence to migrants who already had one foot in the door. 

Some of the excluded groups are:

– Undocumented workers 
– People who are “repatriated” (returned to their home countries) for being injured and or sick while working in Canada, so that they cannot access healthcare and benefits
– People who are deported, even after working and living in Canada for decades
– Those with any form of criminal record, even after years of rehabilitation
– People barred from working in any of the temporary foreign worker programs for exerting their rights at work since there is no protection from reprisals
– Families of workers who have been employed in Canada
– Families of workers who have become sick or died while working in Canada
– Workers and family members deemed “medically inadmissible” 
– Workers who have recently lost their jobs or who might be terminated during the course of the long application process

The language requirements will mean that workers will need to bear steep expenses on top of legal fees, application fees, and other administrative costs. Considering many workers are precariously employed, they will face unaffordable costs in applying under this pathway. As a result, permanent status will remain a pipe dream for many.

EN ESPAÑOL:

Gracias por su apoyo. Lee la carta y añade tu nombre y organización a nuestra lista. Tenga en cuenta que su nombre/organización se publicará.

Justicia para los Trabajadores Migrantes (J4MW) condena enérgicamente las “reformas” anunciadas por Canadá a su sistema de inmigración. El acceso único y a corto plazo a la residencia permanente de 90.000 personas es una cortina de humo que no aborda el sistema de inmigración racista y excluyente de Canadá. Las reformas no abordan la forma en que el actual sistema de puntos discrimina tanto a las comunidades indocumentadas como a los inmigrantes considerados de “baja cualificación” y “bajo salario”. Y lo que es más preocupante, las reformas no hacen nada para cambiar la situación de dependencia de miles de trabajadores inmigrantes en Canadá.

En particular, los trabajadores agrícolas migrantes que trabajan en régimen de servidumbre no verán, una vez más, ninguna mejora en sus condiciones de trabajo y de vida como resultado de la continuación de un sistema cerrado de permisos de trabajo que vincula a los trabajadores a un solo empleador. Los trabajadores agrícolas inmigrantes compiten con más de 90 ocupaciones para obtener unas míseras 30.000 plazas, cuando más de 50.000 trabajadores agrícolas han entrado en Canadá con permisos de trabajo cerrados sólo durante la pandemia.

Los requisitos lingüísticos que determinan la elegibilidad para este sistema de vías son discriminatorios y excluirán a la mayoría de los trabajadores agrícolas y con salarios bajos. Las exorbitantes tasas de residencia permanente han restringido durante mucho tiempo el acceso a la residencia permanente de las familias con salarios bajos y racializadas, y son otra forma de extraer dinero de los trabajadores explotados. No hay nada compasivo, humanitario o justo en esta vía temporal. Es un medio más para que Canadá extraiga capital y mano de obra de los inmigrantes para sus propios objetivos económicos. No se trata de una concesión de residencia permanente a las decenas de miles de trabajadores inmigrantes e indocumentados que contribuyen a Canadá cada día y, de hecho, es sólo una vía temporal para unos pocos afortunados.

Es un grave error caracterizar el anuncio como una “victoria”, ya que el gobierno canadiense continúa con su legado de “divide y vencerás” enfrentando a unas comunidades contra otras. En este ejemplo concreto, se considera que algunos trabajadores esenciales son más merecedores que otros. Canadá no está abriendo sus fronteras. De hecho, continúa con la ilusión de “inclusión” mientras refuerza las jerarquías raciales que seguirán perpetuando un sistema de apartheid racial. No nos equivoquemos: los trabajadores migrantes no son recién llegados. Son la base de nuestra sociedad, cuyo trabajo ha sido el eje de los complejos agrícolas e industriales de Canadá. Canadá sigue ampliando el statu quo. En diciembre de 2020, Canadá amplió el programa de Trabajadores Agrícolas Temporales a otros productos básicos, totalmente para reforzar sus exportaciones. Ha ampliado la Corriente Agrícola del Programa de Trabajadores Extranjeros Temporales para aumentar el número de trabajadores con el fin de abordar la narrativa mítica de una escasez de mano de obra en la agricultura.

Canadá sigue sin reconocer la mano de obra racializada como mano de obra cualificada, al devaluar sectores como el agrícola, que están racializados, son de género y están segmentados. Además de la exclusión de cientos de miles de personas indocumentadas, la abrumadora mayoría de los participantes en los programas de contratación agrícola de larga duración de Canadá (el Programa de Trabajadores Agrícolas y el Programa de Trabajadores Agrícolas Temporales) no obtendrán ningún beneficio en sus realidades cotidianas, a pesar de su continua resistencia contra las deplorables condiciones de vivienda y trabajo.

Resulta cómico ver a organizaciones de interés empresarial, como el Consejo Empresarial de Asuntos Nacionales y la Cámara de Comercio de Canadá, alabar estas reformas. No hay puntos en común entre los intereses de la mano de obra migrante y el capital.

Además, hay comunidades enteras a las que se les niega cualquier posibilidad de beneficiarse de estos planes de vías temporales. Generaciones de trabajadores y sus familias no obtendrán ningún beneficio de este anuncio. Como comentó un compañero, las reformas de inmigración anunciadas son básicamente un sistema acelerado de la clase de Experiencia Canadiense existente, que proporciona acceso a la residencia permanente a los migrantes que ya tenían un pie en la puerta.

Los grupos que quedan excluidos son
• Los trabajadores indocumentados
• Las personas que son “repatriadas” (devueltas a sus países de origen) por estar lesionadas o enfermas mientras trabajan en Canadá, por lo que no pueden acceder a la asistencia sanitaria y a las prestaciones
• Las personas que son deportadas, incluso después de haber trabajado y vivido en Canadá durante décadas
• Las personas con cualquier tipo de antecedentes penales, incluso después de años de rehabilitación
• Las personas a las que se les prohíbe trabajar en cualquiera de los programas de trabajadores extranjeros temporales por ejercer sus derechos en el trabajo, ya que no hay protección contra las represalias
• Familias de trabajadores que han sido contratados en Canadá
• Familias de trabajadores que han enfermado o fallecido mientras trabajaban en Canadá
• Trabajadores y familiares considerados “médicamente inadmisibles” –
• Trabajadores que han perdido recientemente su empleo o que podrían ser despedidos en el transcurso del largo proceso de solicitud

Además, el J4MW plantea una gran preocupación por los exorbitantes costes asociados a la solicitud de este régimen de vías. Los requisitos lingüísticos supondrán que los trabajadores tengan que asumir unos gastos elevados, además de las tasas legales, las tasas de solicitud y otros costes administrativos. Teniendo en cuenta que muchos trabajadores tienen un empleo precario, tendrán que hacer frente a unos costes inasumibles para solicitar la residencia permanente en el marco de este programa, que seguirá siendo una quimera para muchos.

These are my comments:

[One way of analyzing this document is to ask: What is its primary goal or goals? It would seem to have two primary goals:

  1. The elimination of discrimination against both undocumented communities and and migrants deemed ‘low skill’ and ‘low wage.’ (perhaps by granting them permanent residence status automatically if they work here?)

  2. Change the indentured system of labour that obliges migrant workers to work for one and only one employer
    a. by eliminating the tie to only one employer ,
    b. By improving working and living conditions and
    c. By eliminating the language requirement and fees associated with their working and living in Canada.

    These goals, if achieved, may improve the lives of migrant workers, but do they really express justice for migrant workers? If these goals are achieved—perhaps the primary goal is to assure that migrant workers have the same rights as permanent residents and Canadian citizens—is there then justice? By failing to criticize the daily exploitation and oppression of millions of Canadian workers and permanent resident workers, the document implies that once migrant workers have achieved equality with other workers in Canada, there will be justice.

    To prevent such an implication, I would suggest adding the following to the endorsement, if possible, in the “Comments in support section” [of the post by J4MW]: 

    ““The New pathway to permanent residency for over 90,000 essential temporary workers (and international graduates) program initiated by the federal government in no way addresses the superexploitation and superoppression of migrant workers as a whole. It only opens up the possibility to a minority of migrant workers of being exploited and oppressed on a regular basis, on a par with permanent residents and Canadian citizens.”

A few other points that we probably cannot do anything about.

1. The response states: “There is nothing compassionate, humanitarian or just about this temporary pathway. It is yet another means for Canada to extract capital and labour from migrants for its own economic objectives.” The use of the term “capital” is inappropriate. It is money, not capital. To equate all uses of money with capital perpetuates the myth that we are all capitalists. The money received by a worker, for example, after having worked for an employer, is not capital for the worker but a means of purchase; if the employer is in the private sector, on the other hand, the money is capital.

2. The response also says the following: “It is not a blanket grant of permanent residence status to the tens of thousands of migrant workers and undocumented persons in Canada who contribute to Canada every day, and is, in fact, just a temporary pathway for a lucky few.” [my emphasis]

This gives the impression that those migrant workers who are approved by the program are fortunate—to be on the same level as permanent residents. Being fortunate is often, however, relative. Relative to other migrant workers, they are probably fortunate but to permanent residents and Canadian citizens who are exploited and oppressed on a regular basis, they are not fortunate since they then would be in a similar situation.

3. Immediately after the above quoted statement about the lucky few, the response then contradicts itself by stating the following: “It is a grave mistake to characterise the announcement as a ‘win’ for anyone but the corporate class in Canada.” But if certain migrant workers are a lucky few, then surely they are asserting that it is indeed a win for these “lucky few.”

4. Another statement is also awkward: “Make no mistake–migrant workers are not newcomers and they are not peripheral to Canada’s economy. They are the foundation of our society and their labour has been the lynchpin of Canada’s agricultural and industrial complexes.” I am rather ignorant of the supply of workers in the agricultural system, and so cannot dispute the assertion that migrant workers are “the lynchpin of Canada’s agricultural complexes.” However, is it true of the industrial complexes? Certainly, immigrants have been and are necessary for the reproduction of the Canadian capitalist economy; Canadians do not produce enough children to replace worn out workers. On the other hand, there are two controversial issues here. Firstly, is there not a confusion of migrant workers with immigrant workers? Are most workers in the industrial area migrant workers? Even if most were immigrant workers, that does not make migrant workers “the lynchpin of Canada’s industrial complexes.” Secondly, are even immigrant workers the lynchpin of the industrial complex? I worked in a capitalist factory—a brewery—in Calgary in the early 1980s. There were some immigrants who worked there, but they were a minority. Furthermore, on my blog there is a list of the 20 largest employers in Toronto according to level of employment. For manufacturing employers, are most of the workers mainly immigrants? How do we know? Levels of employment: Magna International: 11,500 workers; Rogers: 10,000; Telus, 4000; Air Canada, 3,100; Bombardier, 2,030; Maple Leaf Foods, 1,300; The Coca Cola Company, 1,100. How many of these workers are immigrants? Migrant workers? To claim that “migrant workers” are the lynchpin of industrial complexes is probably false and, if so, will probably diminish the appeal of the response. Is that not contrary to the goal of the organization?

5. Another statement is debatable: “There are no commonalities between the interest of migrant labour and capital.” Perhaps in the long-run, but in the short-run there are some common interests. If a migrant worker works for a particular employer and that employer goes bankrupt, does that not harm the immediate interest of the migrant worker? If so, do they not then have some common interests?

Conclusion

The reformist grassroots left often fail to adopt a critical outlook. They often do not think through the implications of their own views or the views of others. They often cannot even bother engaging in even preliminary inquiries to see if their views or the views of their allies need modification. The uncritical attitude of much of the social-democratic left itself contributes to the continued power of the right by unconsciously using and accepting standards that themselves need to be criticized. 

I will describe the second motion, which was tabled to the next meeting (Ms. Jessup obviously did not want it tabled to the next meeting but wanted it rubber stamped, like the first one) in a future post. 

Exposing the Intolerance and Censorship of Social Democracy, Part One: The Working Class, Housing and the Police

Introduction

From around February 20 until May 23, 2021 I belonged to an organization in Toronto called Social Housing Green Deal. The organization came to my attention when one of my friends on Facebook invited me to join.

The reason why I joined is that it is involved in a movement for defunding (if not abolishing) the police. I thought that perhaps I could participate in such an organization and contribute by expressing my own point of view. I was wrong.

The following outlines how I actually started participating in the organization and how such participation led to the practical censorship of my views through both actual censorship and the possible manipulation of protocols used for general meetings.

My conclusions about the efforts of this group, at least in relation to defunding the police (and abolishing it) is: it will not be very effective. Its characteristic lack of critical spirit will result in an incapacity to determine what really is required to defund and abolish the police. Its lack of willingness to critically analyze other organizations’ statements will undoubtedly contribute to that incapacity. Finally, its probable use of control over protocols to silence others expresses as well an incapacity to engage in self-criticism–a basic condition for any political advance.

I wish I were wrong, but given their collapse of strategy into tactics and their lack of a critical spirit–my prediction will probably come true. In May 2022, it will be interesting to see whether the social-democratic left has managed to defund the police to any great extent in Toronto. I doubt it.

I believe that Meursault, the protagonist of the existential writer Albert Camus, in his book “L’Etranger (The Outsider in English) sums up my conclusions concerning this organization:

 J’avais eu raison, j’avais encore raison, j’avais toujours raison. [I had been right, I will still right, I was always right.

It is necessary to critique the social-democratic left from the outside since they will try to take measures to stifle dissent from their dogmas. I will elaborate on this assertion in a future post. 

Joining the Group

To join the group, it was necessary to answer why you wanted to join. Anna Jessup is the moderator and administrator. Ms. Jessup asked the following question on February 17, 2021:

Hi Frederick.  Before I add you to our group tell me a bit about yourself.  What made you want to join?
 
Anna

Here is how I responded on February 18, 2021:

Hello Anna,
 
  1. We have met before–at ETTO, I believe, and at Black Creek Community Farm, where, unfortunately, a list of things to be done were itemized but, as far as I know, nothing came of it.
  2. The question, perhaps, is meant to ensure that right-wing people do not attend.
  3. To answer the question properly would involve much personal information and history, and I am uninclined to share that at this time.
  4. I could, as well, ask what the purpose of the group is; I am somewhat reluctant to get involved in organizations that are purely reformist in nature.
  5. To be more specific: Why do I want to “participate?” Because the police are a central feature of a society dominated by a class of employers. They are central to the reproduction of a social order that treats human beings as things to be used by employers.
  6. I have a blog (the abolitonary.ca–although I do not think it is accessible only via that URL, but you made try if interested.) I have posted five posts with the title “Reform versus the Abolition of Police,” and I argue for the abolition of police.
  7. I will be posting a sixth post on Friday concerning the relation between police and unions (not police unions), where I use an article that tries to show that unions function to protect workers by limiting their exploitation (defensive mechanism) but simultaneously function as ideological organizations to integrate workers into the class system of employers.
  8. James Wilt, in Canadian Dimension, argued for the abolition of police whereas Herman Rosenfeld argued for their “transformation.” I criticize severely Mr. Rosenfeld’s view, arguing that his claim that Mr. Wilt engages in sloppy thinking in fact applies to him.
  9. I will be drafting a critique of Harry Kopyto’s critique of Mr. Rosenfeld’s claim that the police can somehow be reformed–and then concedes way too much by claiming that Mr. Rosenfeld is however correct to argue for “reforms” “in the meantime.” This is a social-democratic trick of putting off forever the aim of abolishing the police. Of course, the police cannot be abolished all at once, but the aim of such abolition should always be present–and accepting reforms for the moment when there is insufficient power but always pressing for the abolition of the police. 
  10. My purpose of “participating” in the zoom conference is really to listen–nothing more, for now (perhaps I can learn some things). I have experienced insults from “the left” here in Toronto–“condescending prick” from Wayne Dealy, executive director of CUPE 3902, and “insane” from Errol Young, of JFAAP. I am undoubtedly considered by some among the left as “sectarian”–but they do not seem to want to engage in any kind of debate on my blog concerning issues that I have raised. 
  11. I self-identify as a Marxist.

    Fred Harris

Ms. Jessup responded as follows, on February 20, 2021:

Yes Fred, I remember you.  I respect your Marxist analysis and certainly wish to apply such an analysis to on-the-ground work. 
 
One complication I ran into with our previous work, was that your posts ignited more discussion than I had the time or resources to moderate.  
 
Are you willing to avoid debate on this google group, and simply use it as a way to receive information about upcoming meetings and events?
 
Anna

I responded on the same day as follows:

Hello Anna,
 
I was going to participate at least to a  minimum degree at first, but given the email, I will not even do that. I will limit myself to listening and taking notes.
 
Fred

Being Drawn into Participation 

 
The same day I received the following message: 
 
The link to the meeting will come to you by email a few minutes before 3PM today.
Hope to see you all there.
 
Anna
The important point in the above message is that the zoom “link to the meeting will come to you by email before 3PM.” This is relevant for what happened on May 23, 2021.
 
On February 21, 2021, I wrote the following: 
 
Hello Anna,
 
I am copying below part of a post from my blog that may be relevant to the discussion yesterday–namely, the creation of protective teams, which I believe is a better approach than relying on pressuring council members to vote for defunding the police (until there is sufficient power on the ground).
 
Feel free to use part or all of it–or not.
 
Fred
What I sent Anna was a large part of the post on alternatives to policing (see  Reform versus Abolition of Police, Part Four: Possible Alternatives). 
 
Ms. Jessup’s response was: 
 
Wow, what a great read.
 
I will post it if that’s alright.  I’ll cut out the criticism of Herman as I don’t want to make my friends defensive. 
 
I will post it on our Facebook group. 
 
Very glad I read this.  Thank you.
Ms. Jessup then sent a quest to have what I wrote put up on the organization’s website–which it was.
 
Being drawn into the organization, I started sending recommendations for reading, and in the process expressed some of my own views. On March 10, 2021, for example, I sent the following:
Hello Anna,
 
Attached is another open text document file, this time relating the police to the emergence and maintenance of capitalism. It is, as I indicate in the text, a series of short comments followed by many quotes from the book by Mark Neocleous (2000), The Fabrication of Social Order: A Critical Theory of Police Power.  I will be posting this in the future on my blog. Again, feel free to do anything you want with part or all of it or anything at all.
 
Fred

Ms. Jessup’s response on March 11, 2021:

Thank you!

On April 3, 2021, I sent the following, along with the documents:

Hello Ana,
 
I am attaching two items. The first is a document recommended by SURJ  [Showing Up for Racial Justice] that I received recently, “Building the World We Want: A Roadmap to Police Free Futures,” assembled by Robyn Maynard, graphics by Sahra Soudi. In the document, there is much about defunding the police (much less about its abolition), and very little about the kind of society that the police protect. It is my view that unless the two are connected, it is highly unlikely that the police will be defunded/abolished on a permanent basis since, as I tried to show in the quotes from the book by Mark Neocleus (The Fabrication of Social Order: A Critical Theory of Police Power) and my short comments, the emergence of the modern police and the emergence of a society dominated by a class of employers went hand in hand. 

Hence, the second document is from my blog, quoting from Elizabeth Anderson’s book on the nature of employment relationship: what, in effect, the police protect, is a dictatorship.

Feel free to edit it any way you want.
 
Fred
Ms. Jessup, on April 5, 2021, responded (edited to omit personal information that I should respect): 
Thank you so much.  I’ll need time before I can get to it … But it is very nice to get an email about something positive!
The second document is from my blog:  Employers as Dictators, Part One.
 
On April 6, 2021, Ms. Jessup added: 
 
Good reading.  Thank you.  I have added the Maynard piece to our group’s resource folder.
 
Out of curiosity, in your piece, which I enjoyed, why did you characterize totalitarian aspects of our society as communist rather than simply as totalitarian?
To which I responded on the same day:
 
Hello Anna,
 
To answer your question concerning communist vs. totalitarian: It was not I but Elizabeth Anderson who made a parallel between the dictatorship at work and a communist dictatorship.
 
I believe it was an astute tactic on her part. Many Americans undoubtedly still equate the former Soviet dictatorship with communism. To make a parallel with this former dictatorship may shock many Americans (and undoubtedly many Canadians and Europeans), but it also resonates with their experiences at work. It may thereby create an opening–by creating a contradiction in the readers’ point of view–for discussing the issue of just how democratic the U.S., Canada, Europe, Australia, New Zealand, England, etc. are. Such discussions are sadly lacking in the labour movement in general and the union movement in particular.

 On my blog, I have systematically tried to exhibit the dictatorial nature of employers even in unionized settings via the implicit or explicit management rights that employers have. I have also tried to expose how unions not only fail to address the dictatorial power of employers but serve, through their rhetoric of “fair contracts” and the like, as ideologues of employers. For example, I searched for the expression “fair contract,” “fair deal,” and similar expressions on the Net for CUPE–the largest union in Canada. I quoted 10 different CUPE sources using such ideological rhetoric.

I will be posting, in the future, a similar post on the second largest union in Canada, this time in the private sector, Unifor. 
On April 6, 2021, I received an email indicating that we would have a zoom meeting the following day (April 7), with a zoom link (so that we could video conference). It was to be at 7:30 p.m. rather than the usual 3:00 p.m.: 
 
At that meeting, the eviction of a father with his children was discussed, with twenty-three police cars showing up in Toronto.  I suggested that we need to try to connect this incident with larger issues (the micro with the macro). Ms. Jessup suggested that I do that. I stated that I would do that if someone else would jointly work on it since I lacked the specific details. There was silence.
 
As a consequence, I decided to draft something on my own that would connect up the micro with the macro, starting with the micro and linking it up with wider and wider issues. I did some research to familiarize myself with some writings on the subject of housing as well as to gain a more concrete understanding of the specific incident.
 
As a result, I wrote to Ms. Jessup, on April 15, 2021, I sent the following to her, with the subject heading “Write up: A Critical Analysis of the Life Situation of the Working Class in Relation to Housing and the Police—and What To Do About It.” 
 
Hello Anna,
 
Attached is a draft on some thoughts about the relationship between left-wing activism and the situation of the working class and what can be done about it–by linking short-term problems with long-term goals. 
 
If you or anyone else has any criticisms or suggestions, feel free to make them. I am all ears.
 
Fred
The draft follows. It is quite long (13 pages in draft form). The last part I copied from the page from this blog The Money Circuit of Capital, so I will omit that part. 
 

A Critical Analysis of the Life Situation of the Working Class in Relation to Housing and the Police—and What To Do About It

Introduction

I have been accused, among union circles, of being condescending. However, if by condescending is meant questioning actions that do not lead to goals that I believe are worth pursuing, then I admit to be condescending.

Some may consider the following to be academic. However, I have had some experience with activism. For example, in the early 1980s, when I worked at a brewery in Calgary, I refused an order by supervisors and justified my refusal by stating that I had nothing but contempt for capitalists and their representatives. I was sent home on two consecutive nights. When the union president and the bottling manager met to discuss the issue, the bottling manager stated: “Do you know what that Marxist son of a bitch said?” We workers won this particular battle—the order was cancelled. That, of course, did not mean that we had won the war.

I would appreciate criticisms and suggestions for improvement in what follows, both in terms of accuracy and in terms of arguments.

Immediate Incident as an Occasion for Grassroots Activism

On Good Friday, April 2, 2021, 23 police cruisers showed up at 33 Gabian Way, which is a 19-story building owned by Vila Gaspar Corte Real Inc., or Villa Gaspar Corte Real Non-Profit Housing Inc. (there is some inconsistency in spelling the company).

The building is a combination of rental and social housing, built in 1993. There are 248 residential units. Apparently, the building is linked to Project Esperance, which is a non-profit registered charity. It services 111 units of from one- to three-bedroom units. Rents are geared to income.

According to the police, there were so many police present in order to remove a large number of protesters. The facts speak otherwise.

There were indeed protesters; they were protesting the eviction of Alex, a father of a one-year old and a six-year child. Alex had made arrangements with the landlord to pay rent arrears by March 29. Alex had managed to obtain the money to pay the rent, but a sheriff’s officer showed up to evict him on April 2, without warning. He left the apartment with his two children, but he returned to obtain his possessions. The police showed up and forced their way into the apartment.

The police denied that they were there to enforce the eviction—but if that were the case, why did they force their way into the apartment? Furthermore, one police officer claimed that the police had a court order for eviction and that they were there to evict Alex.

Due to the resistance of neighbours and supporters, Alex was not evicted.

This incident has several aspects to it. Firstly, immediate organized resistance to those with power and wealth can be effective in the short-term. Secondly, when there are supporters for those who are to be evicted, it is likely that the police will show up—in force.

Thirdly, and something that was not emphasized in references to the incident, it is sheriff’s who have the legal right to evict a tenant (with the assistance of police if the sheriff believes there will be trouble), and they need not inform the tenant when they are coming, as the website Steps to Justice: Your Guide to Law In Ontario points out (https://stepstojustice.ca/questions/housing-law/what-happens-if-theres-eviction-order-and-i-dont-move):

“After the Landlord and Tenant Board makes an order to evict a tenant, a court official called the Sheriff is in charge of enforcing or carrying out the order.

If you have not moved out by the date the eviction order says you must move, the Sheriff can make you leave and let your landlord change the locks.

Only the Sheriff is allowed to physically evict you

The law does not let your landlord, a private bailiff, or a security guard physically evict you or lock you out. Only the Sheriff can do this. The police can’t evict you either but the Sheriff can ask the police for help if the Sheriff thinks there might be violence.

You can get evicted at any time of year

Many tenants believe that the law does not allow evictions in the winter. That is not true. The Sheriff can enforce eviction orders at any time of year.

The Sheriff does not have to tell you when they are coming to evict you

If you have an eviction order against you, the Sheriff could come to change your locks on any weekday after the date the Board ordered you to move out.”

The issue of the power of sheriffs to evict links up to the more general issue of the modern property system and the aims of those who engage in resistance to evictions (and other forms of resistance involving law-enforcement officers).

Fourthly: What was the aim of the supporters and neighbours? To prevent the eviction, evidently. It worked. It is a short-term victory, however. There will be other evictions, and other evictions, and other evictions. This issue can be looked at from a number of angles.

Strategy and Tactics

The left here in Toronto and elsewhere frequently collapse strategy and tactics, in effect advocating only tactics. This leads nowhere except the perpetuation of the problems and the constant need to resist and to struggle—without any realistic hope of resolving the conditions which constantly generate the problem. This does not mean that reforms should be thrown out of the window. It does mean, however, that activism that stays at the level of tactics will never address the more profound causes of the immediate problems. Robert Knox (2012) addresses this problem in his article titled “Strategy and Tactics.” in pages 193-229, The Finnish Yearbook of International Law, Volume 21, writes, p. 205:

“only tactical interventions occur, which are then branded as strategic interventions, foreclosing the possibility of an actual strategic intervention.”

What is the difference between strategic interventions and tactical interventions? The difference has been specified in terms of war as follows (pages 197-198):

“Carl von Clausewitz, one of the most influential exponents of modern military theory, defined strategy as:

[T]he use of the engagement to attain the object of the war … It must therefore give an aim to the whole military action. Its aim must be in accord with the object of the war. In other words, strategy develops the plan of the war, and to the aforesaid aim links the series of acts which are to lead to it; that is, it plans the separate campaigns and arranges the engagements to be fought in each of them.

Strategy is – in essence – how it is that one would fight and win a war: connecting the various individual battles together so as to achieve this broader objective. In contradistinction to this is tactics, which is concerned with smaller and shorter term matters. Tactics are concerned with how to win the individual battles and engagements of which the war is composed.

If we wish to translate this metaphor into more general terms, we might say that strategy concerns the manner in which we achieve and eventually fulfil our long term aims or objectives, whereas tactics concerns the methods through which we achieve our shorter term aims or objectives. The obvious conclusion here, and one that will be important to bear in mind throughout this article, is that when we talk of ‘pragmatism’ or ‘effectiveness’ it need not be referring to only the immediate situation. As will be explored more fully below, any tactical intervention will also have strategic consequences. This means that when thinking about effectiveness, it is necessary to understand the inherent relation between strategy and tactics. In so doing, the distinction allows us to consider how effective particular (seemingly ‘short term’) interventions might be in the longer term.”

If evictions are going to be stopped permanently, then immediate forms of resistance and immediate actions need to be linked to that goal—not just to incidents of crisis as they arise.

Nothing Fails Like Success

This is a take on the title of chapter one of Jeremy Reiman’s and Paul Leighton (2017), in The Rich Get Richer and the Poor Get Prison: Ideology, Class, and Criminal Justice; that title is “Nothing Succeeds Like Failure.” They argue that the police and prisons fail to reduce crime rates and, in their failure, perpetuate their own need or existence. Page 45:

“Failure is, after all, in the eye of the beholder. Here lies the key to understanding our failing criminal justices ystem: The failure of policies and institutions can serve vested interests and thus amount to success for them!

If we look at the system as “wanting” to reduce crime, it is an abysmal failure that we cannot understand. If we look at it as not wanting to reduce crime, it’s a howling success, and all we need to understand is why the goal of the criminal justice system is to fail to reduce crime. If we can understand this, then the system’s “failure,” as well as its obstinate refusal to implement the policies that could remedy that “failure,” becomes perfectly understandable. In other words, we can make more sense out of criminal justice policy by assuming that its goal is to maintain crime than by assuming that its goal is to reduce crime!”

Leftist activism, similarly, but from the opposite end, by succeeding in short-term tactics, perpetuates its own constant need to engage in activism—activism for activism’s sake. It may make those who engage in such activism feel useful, but it fails to address the need to incorporate a strategic approach into activism. If activism succeeded in eliminating the need for activism, it would eliminate itself. This is one reason why strategy is collapsed into tactics—it permanently perpetuates the need for activism. Its short-term successes guarantee the continued need to engage in—short-term tactics.

The Bad Infinite

We can give this problem a philosophical turn. G.W.F. Hegel, a German philosopher, criticized the theoretical equivalent of this view in the following terms of the “bad infinite”–an infinite that never reaches an end (from The Encyclopaedia Logic, page 150:

“A limit is set, it is exceeded, then there is another limit, and so on without end. So we have nothing here but a superficial alternation, which stays forever within the sphere of the finite. If we suppose that we can liberate ourselves from the finite by stepping out into that infinitude, this is in fact only a liberation through flight. And the person who flees is not yet free, for in fleeing, he is still determined by the very thing from which he is fleeing. So if people then add that the infinite cannot be attained, what they say is quite correct….”

The bad infinite never reaches any end since it presupposes the general context that generates the particular or specific problems will continue to exist. To go beyond the bad infinite requires questioning that context—and hence developing a strategy designed to specify the problem at the general level while simultaneously addressing more immediate problems in such a way that successes feed into the resolution of the problem at the more general level.

Housing and Capitalism

Houses and housing form a central aspect of capitalist society. This has been noticed since the World Economic Crisis of 2007-2008. Wolfgang Streeck (2016), in his book How Will Capitalism End? Essays on a Failing System, argues that there have been four crises of democratic capitalism since the last world war:

“With the crash of privatized Keynesianism in 2008, the crisis of postwar democratic capitalism entered its fourth and latest stage, after the successive eras of inflation, public deficits and private indebtedness (Figure 2.5). With the global financial system poised to disintegrate, nation states sought to restore economic confidence by socializing the bad loans licensed in compensation for fiscal consolidation. Together with the fiscal expansion necessary to prevent a breakdown of the ‘real economy’, this resulted in a dramatic new increase in public deficits and public debt – a development that, it may be noted, was not at all due to frivolous overspending by opportunistic politicians or misconceived public institutions….”

Monetary instability (inflation), unemployment, public deficit spending and indebtedness followed by a shift to private indebtedness and deregulation of credit (and austerity measures) led to a bubble in housing prices and to speculative credit extended to those unlikely to be able to pay for mortgages once interest rates rose or they became unemployed. Of course, the crash of 2007-2008 increased public debt several fold and the pandemic has done the same.

Housing, Capitalism and the Police

Brendan Beck and Adam Goldstein (2017), in their article “Governing Through Police? Housing Market Reliance, Welfare Retrenchment, and Police Budgeting in an Era of Declining Crime, argue somewhat differently from Reiman and Leighton—though both arguments may complement each other.

They note, like Reiman and Leighton do, that crime rates have generally declined since the 1990s. On the other hand, police budgets have generally blossomed. They explain this general increase in municipal police budgets because of the increased centrality of real estate in the city economy. Page 1183:

“One key puzzle is why penal state growth continued unabated long after crime levels peaked in the early 1990s. We focus on local policing and consider the relationship between growing city-level law enforcement expenditures and two shifts: first, the move toward an economy increasingly organized around residential real estate; and second, city-level welfare retrenchment. We argue that increasing economic reliance on housing price appreciation during the late 1990s and the 2000s heightened demand for expanded law enforcement even as actual risks of crime victimization fell. At the same time, cities increasingly addressed social problems through criminal justice—rather than social service—capacities.”

As homes became a vehicle for workers to not only live but also to obtain some security with rising house prices, their interests in maintaining the price of the house increased. This interest has spilled over into support for policing efforts (however ineffective) that contribute to the maintenance of the prices of housing and land. This spillover, in turn, has racist implications since concentrations of coloured and minorities are perceived by homeowners as threats to property prices—but there is counterevidence that in the case of the Latino population there is no such perceived threat. Page 1186:

“Thus, the threat theory hypothesizes that investment in police forces (per capita force size and/or expenditure) will be positively associated with racial minorities’ share of the local population, net of crime rates. Studies have consistently found support for this hypothesis (e.g., Carmichael and Kent 2014; Jacobs and Carmichael 2001; Kent and Jacobs 2005; McCarty, Ren, and Zhao 2012; Sever 2003; Vargas and McHarris 2017). In fact, the percentage of black residents typically appears as one of the single most significant predictors in models of city police strength. However, recent studies find no evidence of a similar positive association between the percentage of Latino residents and police strength, neither cross-sectionally nor longitudinally (Holmes et al. 2008; Zhao, Ren, and Lovrich 2010).”

On the other hand, it is necessary also to consider competition between workers in working for an employer:

“Two different studies, King and Wheelock (2007) and Stults and Baumer (2007), use geocoded survey data to probe the mechanisms underlying racial threat effects. Both found that the observed association between the percent of black residents and police size is driven substantially by whites’ perceived economicthreats in the labor market and in social service provision. Racial threat is driven to a lesser extent by whites’ fears of crime victimization (Stults and Baumer 2007).”

However, their study seems to use the threat of falling residential prices as a proxy or for economic threat. Page 1187:

“In examining the use of police as a means of governing housing markets, we also consider how the ethno-racial makeup of cities might have interacted with shifting forms of economic threat. As we elaborate below, as urban economies came to be based more and more around real estate, perceived economic threats (and the racialized fears on which they draw) increasingly took the form of concerns about protecting housing prices. Previous research, using the Gini coefficient to measure economic threat, finds a positive effect on police department size (Carmichael and Kent 2014). We use measures of more specific economic threats: those around housing.”

They mention other factors that influence the growth of police budgets, such as the structure of municipal politics (the degree to which it is subject to partisan politics), whether it is a mayoral election year and the previous year’s budget.

The Financialization of the Housing Market

Beck and Goldstein argue that, as crime rates declined in the 1990s, there was a simultaneous financialization of the housing industry. This compensated, at least in part, for the stagnation in wages and salaries. Page 1188:

“Between 1992 and 2005, the median home price doubled and the amount of outstanding mortgage debt tripled (Census Bureau 2012; Federal Reserve Board 2016). Wages were stagnant during this time, but the proliferation of home equity loan instruments allowed homeowners to utilize their houses as income streams, making homeowners’ economic livelihoods predicated increasingly on continual housing price growth (Davis 2010). Home equity extraction made up 10 percent of households’ income nationally and as much as 15 percent in places like California and Florida (Greenspan and Kennedy 2007; Irwin 2006). Home value was important for homeowners and for regional economies.”

Homeowners, especially in the present, where heightened prices for homes takes up some of the slack for limited wage and salary increases, tend to support the police more than renters:

“Given linkages in popular narratives between crime rates and residential property values, we suspect that part of the explanation for continual expansion of policing can be found in the increasingly central role of housing markets in the economy, and politicians’ responsiveness to homeowners’ concerns about protecting property prices. As Simon has theorized, “the more a person’s future economic security depends on the value of his or her home, rather than earning capacity, the more we might expect this person to focus on factors like crime that could damage the value of the home” (2010, 195). Past research has shown that homeowners are more satisfied with and supportive of police than are renters (Reisig and Parks 2000; Schuck, Rosenbaum, and Hawkins 2008).

The shift from homes being a place primarily to live in and have a private life to a form of equity involves not just support for measures to reduce crime but other measures to ensure that the “public area” of the surrounding neighbourhood be protected from potential threats of disorder and not just crime:

Economists have long documented the negative effects of reported crime levels on housing prices, and this effect was especially pronounced during the 1990s (Hellman and Naroff 1979; Pope and Pope 2012; Schwartz, Susin, and Voicu 2003). The deleterious impact of crime on property values represents a salient social fact within the residential real estate field, one that is ubiquitously repeated in popular media and on real estate websites. Indeed, the reorientation toward real estate heightened the importance of guarding against not only crime, but also disorder, lifestyle nuisances, loitering, and anything else that might threaten property values. The salience of such economic fears may help explain the fact that the same exact majority of GSS respondents (57 percent) supported spending more public money on law enforcement in 2006 as they did in 1990, when crime rates were 50 percent higher.3 Even safe-feeling homeowners might have supported expanded policing to protect home values.”

It was no longer actual crime (however defined by the status quo) but the threat or possibility of disorder and crime that became a concern. Pages 1188-1189:

“…policing strategies that had police respond to perceived disorder, the expanded role for police went hand in hand with an expansion in the justificatory logics and motives to rationalize continued growth. For instance, a 2010 Department of Justice Community Oriented Policing Services report aimed at the law enforcement community argues that police agencies should reconceptualize their role and refocus their energies on combating fear of crime (rather than crime) because—among other things—it undermines residential property values (Cordner 2010).

At the same time, as governments retrenched on welfare services, the police were called upon to address problems normally handled by such services. The expansion of police services and the retrenchment of welfare services, however, should not lead the left to idealize welfare services. Welfare services have been oppressive in various ways such as supervising personal lives to ensuring that those who receive assistance are the “deserving poor.”

Furthermore, as the incident at 33 Gabian Way demonstrates, public housing can be quite oppressive. Evictions can occur in just as brutal fashion as in private housing. The left should not idealize the public sector—which they often do.

Housing, Police and the Working Class

The use of houses as equity among the working class has led to a split within the class in terms of immediate material interests. From Michael Berry, Housing Provision and Class Relations under Capitalism: Some Implications of Recent Marxist Class Analysis, in pages 109-121, Housing Studies, Volume 1, Issue 2, pages 115-116:

Income differences are, as has been argued, also internalised within classes. In the case of the working class, for example, higher paid workers in primary jobs are doubly advantaged; they enjoy both higher and more secure wages and a higher probability of: (a) gaining access to owner-occupation; and (b) securing high capital gains from domestic property ownership. Conversely, workers in the secondary job market and those relegated to the reserve army of unemployed are more likely to be denied access to home ownership, or, if allowed access, concentrated in housing submarkets where property values remain relatively stable. Tenancy therefore evolves as a residual tenure category in a dual sense; not only can land supporting rental housing often be converted to more profitable non-residential uses, it evolves as ‘housing of last resort’ for less privileged sections of the working and nonworking population whose low incomes place strict limits on the rental returns to landlords, both factors leading to a degree of underprovision and homelessness.

In summary, working class disunity, associated with unequal access to and benefits from home ownership, and its political expression through various forms of struggle, is part of a wider system of inequality and exploitation. Both forms of advantage to higher paid workers privileged position in the workplace, over and against the immediate interests of other workers. depend on their being able to maintain their privileged position in the workplace, over and against the immediate interests of other workers.

Bad Infinity Again, or the Labour of Sisyphus—Unless We Begin to Link Strategy and Tactics

The upshot of all this is that unless activists begin to linking the immediate issues to larger issues, it is highly likely that they will achieve only fleeting success. The split in the working class means that there will be substantial resistance by a substantial section of the population to efforts to defund the police or to abolish it unless measures are taken to address the wider concerns and issues.

How to Link Strategy and Tactics

How can this be done? One possibility is to divide those who do have relatively secure positions, with relatively well-paid jobs (frequently the unionized sector) into two or three age groups as well as dividing each group into homeowners and those who do not own homes (condos, townshomes, houses, life leases or other forms of home ownership).

Those who are nearing retirement are unlikely to want to threaten their own security, both in terms of their pensions and in terms of their home ownership (for the importance of security for identifying working-class consciousness, see Marc Mulholland (2010), ‘Its Patrimony, its Unique Wealth!’ Labour-Power, Working Class Consciousness and Crises: An Outline Consideration. Pages 375-417, In Critique: Journal of Socialist Theory, Volume 38, Issue 3—although I believe he fails to include other aspects that motivate workers, such as the fight for their freedom and justice). Older workers also do not also have a whole life ahead of them to work for an employer. It is likely that only if their livelihood were threatened in some way (such as redefining the age of retirement) would they be prone to engage in serious battles with the aim of changing the economic and political structure. Older unionized workers would more likely support the police and less likely support a movement for defunding the police or in abolishing the police (empirical studies are needed here. Are there any?)

Some middle-aged workers, on the other hand, may still have to pay off their mortgage and still have to subordinate their will to the power of an employer for some time; others, of course, may approach older unionized workers in having a secure life. Some middle-aged workers may thus be more prone to oppose the police whereas others may be more prone to support them. It all depends on their life circumstances.

Younger unionized workers may have inherited housing from their parents, so they may be more prone to support the police. On the other hand, they more likely have a lifetime of having to work for an employer (although some may aspire to owning their own businesses, of course). These workers may be more susceptible to opposing police funding and the existence of the police because of their life situation.

To combat some of the unionized workers’ tendency to support the police, it would be necessary to show them the nature of their situation for the foreseeable future and to criticize alternative views that present their lives as somehow being fair. On the one hand, it would be necessary to show that their life working for an employer in hopes of owning a home entails a substantial part of their lives being used as means for employers’ ends over which they have little control. On the other hand, it would be necessary to criticize union rhetoric that presents collective bargaining and collective agreements as somehow fair.

To provide such criticisms, it is necessary to show that workers are used as means for other person’s ends. To that end, I reproduce the page on my blog on the money circuit of capital (it is fairly detailed, but it is necessary in order to oppose the rosy picture presented by union and business rhetoric about the future life of workers—especially younger workers) (if anyone has alternative means for exposing the limitations of union rhetoric, feel free to criticize this writing, including what follows, or if they can simplify it in any way).

… 

Conclusion: Using All Opportunities for Criticizing the Treatment of Human Beings as Means for Other People’s Ends

If a movement for defunding the police is to gain ground, it is necessary to use every opportunity that arises to criticize the economic and political structure in the wider sense and not just engage in activist actions at the micro level. The micro (where tactical decisions must be made) and the macro (where strategic decisions must be made) need to be linked constantly. How to do that is the central question.

In the movement for a fight for $15, for example, for whatever reason, the fight in Canada (not in the United States) has been paired with the concept of “fairness.” This provides the more radical left with an opportunity to challenge such rhetoric.

The same could be same with union rhetoric. For example, I compiled a list of 10 statements by CUPE on the fairness of collective agreements, put them up on my blog and queried how collective agreements, which limit the power of employers (and hence are, generally, better than no collective agreements) are somehow fair.

I would like to hear from others on how to link strategy and tactics together in the case of defunding the police and abolishing the police. Alternatively, I would be interested in reading arguments that short-term tactics can solve long-term problems.

The Silence of the Social-Democratic Left 

On April 18, 2021, I received an email indicating another meeting was to take place on April 24 at 3:00 p.m.  However, on April 24 the meeting was postponed until the following week. I received an email on April 29, which contained a zoom link for the Sunday, May 2 meeting. 
 
I was already feeling frustrated by any lack of response to what I considered to be a request by Ms. Jessup as administrator and monitor of the organization for a linking of micro and macro issues. Ms. Jessup’s silence–and the possible lack of circulation of the draft that I had written to other members of the previous zoom meetings–seemed to indicate that my draft work may have been censored. I had agreed at the beginning of joining this organization not to participate in its meetings, and then I was invited to participate, which I did by drafting something that tried to link up issues on the ground with more general issues–only to be met with–silence and possible censorship. 
 
I wanted to place the issue on the agenda (it was not on the agenda), but I also wanted to avoid clashing with Ms. Jessup, so I did not say anything about it at the May 2 meeting. However, I did draft something else that was more immediately relevant to the meeting: On the agenda, there were two motions for support of statements made by other organizations; I made some comments on these statements. One was a statement made by an organization in Toronto called Justice for Immigrant Workers (J4MW). I sent it to Ms. Jessup on May 1, 2021. 
 
Ms. Jessup’s reply:
Great.  Looking forward to seeing you Sunday
I also sent her some comments on another motion for support of the statement made by “Suppress the Virus Now Coalition.” 
 
Since this post is already quite long, I will post the two drafts  in future posts and conclude this series by including my final writing to this group, on the People’s Pandemic Shutdown.
 
I will merely repeat what I wrote near the beginning of this post: The reason why I joined is that it is involved in a movement for defunding (if not abolishing) the police. I thought that perhaps I could participate in such an organization and contribute by expressing my own point of view. I was wrong.
 
My conclusions about the efforts of this group, at least in relation to defunding the police (and abolishing it) is: it will not be very effective. Its characteristic lack of critical spirit will result in an incapacity to determine what really is required to defund and abolish the police. Its lack of willingness to critically analyze other organizations’ statements will undoubtedly contribute to that incapacity. Finally, its probable use of control over protocols to silence others expresses as well an incapacity to engage in self-criticism–a basic condition for any political advance.
 
I wish I were wrong–even partial defunding of the police would improve our lives, but given the dogmatism of the social-democratic left and their lack of a critical spirit–my prediction will probably come true. In May 2022, it will be interesting to see whether the social-democratic left has managed to defund the police to any great extent in Toronto.
 
I believe that Meursault, the protagonist of the existential writer Albert Camus, in his book “L’Etranger (The Outsider in English) sums up my conclusions concerning this organization: 

J’avais eu raison, j’avais encore raison, j’avais toujours raison. [I had been right, I will still right, I was always right.

It is necessary to critique the social-democratic left from the outside since they will try to take measures to stifle dissent from their dogmas.