The globalisation of capitalism has evoked a growing number of critical responses. The anti- capitalist, anti-globalisation aspects of these responses are most obviously seen in the
development of social movement politics. Some within the Marxist movement have sought to draw these movements into a broadly defined ideological perspective. Ultimately, however,
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the movements that oppose capitalist globalisation must ultimately contend with the issue that Marxist and non-Marxist theoreticians have struggled with for more than a century. The point of difference is whether a reforming or revolutionary practice provides the best course of action. Social movements have been described as ‘old’ or ‘new’ and these differentiations revolve around the issue of the working class and its role in effecting social change.
The primary ideology surrounding working class action in the face of capitalist globalisation revolves around the trade unions. The unions remain the most obvious and elementary organisations of the working class. There is a problem in such an interpretation. It largely ignores the integration of working class organisations into the structure of the state. While proposing a globalised union response to globalised capitalism, there is a tendency to rely on national institutions and structures which fails to adequately present a challenge, either to globalised capitalism or to individual capitalist nation-states.
Bieler, Lindberg and Pillay (2008: 264-269) isolate two challenges for contemporary labour movements. The first of these is the globalised nature of capitalism and the tendency for workers, based within national borders to become ‘competitors’ against workers elsewhere, while the second relates to a growing global army of unemployed and an intensifying of the informal or casual workforce in all countries. They acknowledge that union attempts to minimise attacks on wages and conditions that stem from international ‘competitiveness’ is less likely to succeed within a nationalist framework and similarly it is all but impossible to act against the trend to an informal global workforce. Unions, in their analysis, act in a defensive capacity at best. Bieler, Lindberg and Pillay (2008: 276) maintain that there needs to be a greater degree of global solidarity between unions and the working class. They
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describe a need to build transnational links between the trade unions, to organise on behalf of the ‘informal’ sector and to forge links between the unions and other social movements.
The proposition of building global links and uniting union struggles with social movement politics has been widely supported. Wills (2004: 87) calls for unions at all levels to foster democratic social movements. The call for social movement unionism is similarly proposed by Haworth (2005: 195) who urges unions to move beyond the ‘economism’ of traditional union activity. Such calls for unions to broaden their scope as a means of incorporating social movement issues need to be considered in the context of a crisis of ‘relevance’ or at the least in membership. Union density across OECD countries has been decreasing for decades. It has been widely acknowledged that the unions have been successfully co-opted into the state. It is unrealistic, in such a context, to suppose that the union movement is in any position to offer a challenge to capitalist globalisation. The call for labour movements to actively engage in the non-class and supra-class social movements would undoubtedly strengthen those social movements, but it is unlikely that capitalism, or globalisation, would in any way be threatened.
For the unions to accommodate the agenda of social movements is to take a further step away from class identification. Moody (1989: 249-250) makes a point of difference between a ‘black’ and ‘white’ American working class. While he accepts that black and white workers have class in common, the very point of referring to a separation between members of the working class is a problem for Marxists. Moody argues that “in addition to the massive gap between black and white, the working class in the United States is criss-crossed by social, racial, national and sexual differences reflecting the distinct forms of oppression that affect
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these groups beyond the shared experience of working-class life” (1988: 271).
Accommodation to social movement ideology tends, in such analyses, to focus on specific aspects of oppression, rather than acknowledging that capitalism is the common denominator in an alienating society. What needs to be remembered is that capitalism is a class-based system. Oppression is ultimately rooted in the class nature of society. To separate black from white, or men from women, is to ignore this fact.
Capitalist globalisation from the 1970s has resulted in the retreat of the working class and its allies. Struggles have been waged, but a feature of these struggles has been a lack of focus and leadership. The amorphous nature of the anti-globalisation movement appeared to be a strength, but both the anti-WTO campaign in Seattle in 1999 and the ‘Occupy’ movement of 2011 predictably ended in dissipation. The Seattle protests garnered widespread support. A brief unity existed between human rights activists, students, environmentalists, unions, anarchists, Marxists and protectionists. They agreed on what they did not want but little else. Waterman (2001: viii-x) argues that Seattle was the formation of a movement that crossed ideological boundaries. The fact remains that despite the capacity to mobilise large numbers of people from a wide range of backgrounds, the protests were short-lived and had little lasting impact.
The capacity for social movements to quickly grow and to quickly dissipate was abundantly clear in the ‘Occupy Wall Street’ movement. Its ‘Declaration and Manifesto’ identifies a broad range of issues including housing, health, race and sexual oppression, environmental, animal rights, the rights of workers, legal, press freedom and militarisation. The declaration then issues the following appeal:
184 To the people of the world,
We, the New York City General Assembly occupying Wall Street in Liberty Square, urge you to assert your power.
Exercise your right to peaceably assemble; occupy public space; create a process to address the problems we face, and generate solutions accessible to everyone.
To all communities that take action and form groups in the spirit of direct democracy, we offer support, documentation, and all of the resources at our disposal.
Join us and make your voices heard! (Declaration 2011)
This was an appeal to protest and to mobilise but failed to advance a program beyond mobilisation. Roberts reviews a range of literature relating to the Occupy movement. He concludes that the authors were energised “by the spirit of the moment. Unfortunately, they are also blinded by it. The prevailing theme of these books is that OWS has fundamentally changed American politics. A more sober assessment is that OWS has exposed the limitations on popular protest against the failures of the neoliberal project” (2012: 754).
The life cycle of social movement failure has already been discussed (Robinson 2004, Giugni 1999 and Macionis 2007). The successes of social movement politics in mobilising large numbers are countered by disappointment when the status quo has not been seriously challenged. An emphasis on finding ways to combat globalisation has also drawn social movement activists, including Marxists, into campaigns that either seek to reject globalisation or to ‘de-globalise’ (Scholte 2005). If the purpose of a social movement is to change the
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existing political or economic reality, but lacks clarity and program beyond that of mere protest, then it has a very real potential to dissipate and to drift. Bernstein’s (1975) argument that the movement is everything returns as an echo. It is a continuation of the disputation between Marxist and non-Marxist theories of reform or revolution.
What does anti-globalisation mean and how does it equate with any move towards
emancipation? The campaigns against globalisation have frequently evolved into campaigns that give tacit support for a resurgent nationalism. The US Presidential campaign of 2016 moved this a step further. Left and right populism, as expressions of nationalist responses to globalisation, dominated the early stages of the campaign, as Sanders and Trump vied with each other to promote economic nationalist ‘solutions’ to the crisis that American workers were experiencing. By the time the election campaign concluded, Trump was able to harness working class discontent and manoeuvre the hostility of the working class to serve his particular agenda.
Bello argues that deglobalisation “is not about withdrawing from the international economy. It is about reorienting economies from the emphasis on production for export to production for the local market” (2004: 113). This is a direct appeal to economic nationalism. Populist politics, and in Bello’s case left populist politics, argues for a position that seeks to promote ‘progressive’ ideology, opposition to the ‘elites’ and which acts as a voice for the ‘people’. Muddle characterises populist political ideology as “a thin-centred ideology that considers society to be ultimately separated into two homogenous and antagonistic groups, ‘the pure people’ and the ‘corrupt elite’ and which argues that politics should be an expression of the volonte generale (general will) of the people” (2007: 23). Muddle’s definition fits equally
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with either left or right populist politics and it is in such a characterisation that ultimate weaknesses in the logic of populism appear. It almost inevitably offers immediate national responses to what are effectively global problems. In focusing on an often amorphous elite, broader understandings of class and internationalism become blurred. The issue of leadership again reasserts itself. Organised manifestations of discontent all too quickly dissipate. ‘Left’ and ‘right’ expressions of disaffection frequently appear to merge. The ‘enemy’ can be foreign workers, economic competition from other nations, or an ill-defined globalisation. Herein lies a dilemma for those seeking to combat globalisation while not firmly integrating globalisation and capitalism. Capitalism, by default, remains unchallenged and effectively embraced by left and right populists alike.