What Is The Difference Between Left and RIght

international | worker & community struggles and protests | opinion/analysis

Monday July 19, 2010 15:55

by Paddy Hackett - Not a member of any political organisation.

maxanger at hotmail dot com

The left and the right are the same. They merely perform different political and ideological functions.

Essentially there is no real difference between the radical left and the
right in general.

The radical left call for more and more state spending as the means towards
the solution of the problems of the working class. In other words it calls
for the growing expansion of the capitalist state as the solution to social
problems. In other words the radical left wants a stronger more
all-embracing capitalist state. This is precisely the corporatism that
European fascism sought and largely achieved. Its references to a
non-capitalist society that they more than times than not call socialism.
They dont like to use the term communism, too strong. It also views
socialism as more a more ambiguous term that implies for them some form of
nanny state. But you cannot have a post-capitalist society that implies a
political state.

Today in the West the capitalist state has been in continuous growth. Even
the Irish state has been subsidising much of the working class through the
expansion in welfarism of one kind or another. It has subsidised capitalists
too through what is called "corporate dole". This takes many forms such as
the state creation of industrial estates, roads, grants, tax breaks etc.

One of the chief reasons the working class has failed to come in behind the
radical left in any significant way is because capitalism has stolen the
clothes of the left. It has been increasingly doling out diverse assistance
to the working class and so called lumpenproletariat.

What is needed is not a "bigger" radical left since it essentially supports
the capitalist state. Indeed to support the radical left is to support
capitalism. What is needed is a communist movement that challenges and
opposes both capitalism and its state. Instead of calling on Cowan to
increase state spending, as the Socialist Party and the SWP do, communists
call on the working class to destroy the state and capitalism.

Indeed the radical left is largely a left counter-revolutionary force whose
political function is the prevention of the working class from becoming
communist. As its popular support grows it correspondingly tends to shift
further to the right. This is what happened to the old Workers' Party as led
by figures such as Rabbitte and de Rossa. Much of this party was absorbed
into the right wing Labour Party. This same process may take place if
support for the Socialist Party and the Socialist Workers Party grows.
Indeed there may be evidence of this process being already underway.
Figures like Joe Higgins and Kieran Allen then end up as respectable figures
of the right. It happend to Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness, in a sense,
too.

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Comments (1 of 1)

Naive about the difference?

by Mike Novack

Tue Jul 20, 2010 16:23

"The radical left call for more and more state spending as the means towards the solution of the problems of the working class. In other words it calls
for the growing expansion of the capitalist state as the solution to social problems. In other words the radical left wants a stronger more all-embracing capitalist state. "

UH -- first of all, you need to be more specific about what part of the "radical left" you are talking about. But more important, those elements of the left that are "gradualist" are NOT necessarily any less radical than yourself with regard to the end goals. Your dispute with them isn't about where we want to go but how best to get there. This is NOT saying that you are wrong and they right about "best methods".

"This is precisely the corporatism that European fascism sought and largely achieved."

Fascism is on the authoritarian vs libertarian spectrum, not necessarily affiliated left or right on the economic spectrum. Pointing at specific historical examples of fascism does NOT define fascism (does not delineate its potential).

"Its references to a non-capitalist society that they more than times than not call socialism. They dont like to use the term communism, too strong."

There's no hard and fast distinction used consistently with these terms and terms mean whatever people use them to mean. ESPECIALLY when you go on to associate "communism" with no state!

"It also views socialism as more a more ambiguous term that implies for them some form of nanny state. But you cannot have a post-capitalist society that implies a political state."

No? Then how did we have political states BEFORE capitalism? (we can document "states" about 4000 years ago). The state isn't a creature of capitalism so it is far from obvious that socialist or communist soceties wouldn't have one. Yes of course, they wouldn't have a state for the same reasons/functions that a capitalist society does. But I can't rule out our descendents won't think up socialist/communist reasons to have a state. We can't say wth any certainty:

1) That a post capitalist society would have no state (however much some of us want no state)

2) That a communist society couldn't be "capitalist". Not NECESSARILY so. If you think that a contradiction, what would you call a society in which everybody lived in one commune or another, these communes INTERNALLY functioning as pure communism, but the relationship BETWEEN communes was on a "market" basis (except perhaps neighbring communes might also act "neighborly"). In other words, what OTHER attributes are you associating with "communism" besides the basic/obvious ones (and why do you expect us all to be in agreement about these other attributes).