Biografia Krzywonos
KP22: prze-moc
Komentarze
CYTAT DNIA
Godzina słynna: piąta pięć
Naciska budzik, dźwiga się
Do kuchni drogę zna na pamięć
Prowadzą go tam nogi same
Pod kran pakuje śpiący łeb
Przez chwilę jeszcze śpi jak w łóżku
Dopóki nie posłyszy plusku
I wtedy wreszcie budzi się
Aniele Pracy - stróżu mój
Jak ciężki robotnika znój
Zbożowa kawa, smalec, chleb
Salceson czasem, kiedy jest
Do teczki drugie pcha śniadanie
I teraz szybko na przystanek
W tramwaju tłok i nie ma Boga
Jest ramię w ramię, w nogę noga
Kimanie na stojąco jest
Aniele Pracy - stróżu mój
Jak ciężki robotnika znój
Przez osiem godzin praca wre
Jak z bicza strzelił minął dzień
Już w domu siedzi przed ekranem
Na stole flaszka z marcepanem
Dziś cały czas w ataku nasi
Aniele Pracy - stróżu mój
Jak ciężki robotnika znój
Nich nas ukoi dobry sen
Najlepsza w końcu jest to rzecz
I co się śni? Podwyżka cen
Aniele Pracy - stróżu mój
Jak ciężki robotnika znój
Edward Stachura, Piosenka dla robotnika rannej zmiany
|
|
Left-wing strategies |
|
|
Political Critique
|
|
15.09.2007 |
The contemporary world abounds in problems that require political action. However, we sense that our present political imagination is not able to resolve them: old cliche solutions are insufficient and traditional remedies simply fail. It becomes obvious that in order to rectify this critical situation, new conclusions and models of action are needed.
At the same time, both in Poland and globally speaking, there are two competing political visions, according to which contemporary problems can be solved with ready-made recipes. These visions are liberalism and fundamentalism.
Liberalism stipulates that human spontaneity should be unrestrained and that the social process should be subordinated to the invisible hand of the market. The liberation of the market from the pressures of the state, trade unions and ‘unrealistic’ demands of ecologists are to solve the problems of poverty and religious, ethnic and racial hatred.
Obviously, these notions are not shared by religious fundamentalists, who recognise the limitations of the liberal model of the state and stand in opposition to free market ‘by-products’ such as exploitation, exclusion and a sense of instability. Their answer to liberalism comes in the form of the defence of old values and traditional communities. Fundamentalists, however, cannot construct a plausible political program without enemies, who should be either eliminated or forced to accept the tradition.
These two visions, that have indisputably come to dominate the political debate, have one thing in common: people who support them do not see the need to come up with new solutions. Instead, they base their convictions on the assumption that humans do not change; consequently, the problems that contemporary societies have to address are, in fact, constant as well. Liberals perceive people as, essentially, pursuing maximum pleasure and seeking maximum gain. For fundamentalists, in turn, the man is a dangerous force that should be tamed with a set of restrictions and norms.
These two visions, when put in practice, prevent any political debate, as both of them create a clear-cut division between ‘us’ and ‘them’, that renders any communication impossible. For liberals, a person who does not share their vision of rationality, defined by the pursuit of gain, is downright mad (and it is hard to reason with a madman). On the other hand, for conservative fundamentalists a person who does not agree with their vision of tradition is simply evil (it makes no sense to argue with evil people, either, especially if it is obvious that they are evil by nature).
These two ahistorical viewpoints still function in the political life as the most valid political options and are presented as two competing projects. However, it is fairly clear today that their opposition is just an illusion. Fundamentalism breeds on the deficiencies of liberalism; liberalism, in turn, justifies the widespread conception that there is no alternative to the free market economy by evoking the oppressiveness and excesses of fundamentalism.
In the situation where both political options fail to handle the contemporary problems (the emerging ecological threats and the growing diversity of western societies are facts that cannot be denied), populism seems to be the answer. At present, it is populism that constitutes the most pronounced alternative to the status quo. The political left should, above all, understand the sources of the triumph of populism and its political essence. To this end, let us recall the basic contrast between traditional socialism and classical liberalism. The main aim of liberalism is to transform the antagonism into neutral ‘difference of opinion’. Traditional socialism would turn social class differences into antagonisms by raising the consciousness of the working class and urging them to stand up for themselves. To sum up, liberalism struggles for the recognition of the other, while socialism aims to defeat the other. Paradoxically, at present it is right-wing populists who rely on the logic of antagonism, whereas liberals follow the logic of appreciation of differences by reducing antagonisms to peaceful coexistence. The grassroot campaigns of the conservative populists, by motivating the poor to fight against exploitation, clearly draw on the tactics of the old left.
Populists usually combine the politics of hatred towards the mysterious evil (conspiracy, pseudo-elites) and minority groups (immigrants, homosexuals) with a pro-welfare rhetoric. In Poland this phenomenon was especially noticeable when conservative populists started to apply the division between the ‘solidary’ and ‘liberal’ Poland. However, apart from several generous gestures (such as ‘the baby bonus’), they have not implemented a single significant economic reform, and have rather chosen to concentrate on campaigns on other public affairs.
Populists, be it Jorg Heider in Austria, Silvio Berlusconi in Italy or the Kaczynski brothers in Poland, are not, in fact, opponents of neoliberalism. Instead, they take advantage of social injustice that inevitably results from neoliberalism, and use the commonly held belief that there is no alternative to economic liberalism to their own ends.
Populist conservatism is not a political project. Politics, in the classical meaning of the term, is, above all, about creating real effects, whereas populist conservatives, basically, do nothing under the pretence of taking action. In this context, the accusations of neofascism, that appear now and again in the media, are false. Right-wing populism is the product of centre and left liberal formations’ hypocrisy. A typical of the liberal centre disinclination towards populist conservatism, which constitutes the main tension in the western classless liberal democracy, stems from the fact that the former pretends that the growing social injustice does not exist. Neoliberalism considers the presence of left-wing formations to be redundant, and in order to fill the gap, it nurtures populists and tries to control social dissatisfaction by generating artificial conflicts. The socially unjust Third Polish Republic versus its populist version in the form of the Fourth Polish Republic….over and over again.
The political left should not be reduced into being the defendant of the centre (that is, the liberal minimum) at times when it is threatened by conservative populists. If liberals manage to convince the left that there is only one political distinction, namely, the one between the ‘civilized democrats’ and ‘barbarian populists’, it will be equivalent with the acceptance of the present situation and a concession to the endless recreation of the same ritual conflicts.
On the other hand, populists cannot be recognised as allies just because they respond to the problems that are the traditional domain of the left. By no means should the hatred they generate towards the minorities be compromised or accepted. Let us not forget that when populists take over, they do not seem determined to alleviate the imperfections of the market. On the contrary, the alliance with the centre is possible only when populists hold power. But the political left cannot forget that in order to form coalitions and reach compromises a formation should have a clearly defined identity. Also, the left should perceive the long-term consequences of the liberal policy as the threat to its very existence. Therefore, while declaring alliance with liberals in the matter of defending democratic standards or the rights of minorities, political problems cannot be defined solely in terms of culture wars. For the left, the struggle against cultural and economic discrimination must go hand in hand.
Only when the left becomes a true alternative to the symbiosis of liberalism and fundamentalism, will it be possible to escape the political stalemate of conservative populism. It will be possible to raise above the dominant dispute on condition that the imagination of the masses is won.
Nowadays, the media, to the larger extent than ever, have become a political battlefield and political disputes take more and more theatrical forms. The dominant messages the public is fed with contribute to the fact that people no longer share a sense of belonging in the workplace and within a social class. The traditional loyalties have been overshadowed by the ideology of self-interest. We do not want to regard ourselves as part of a community. We allow ourselves to be manipulated into thinking that it is only the unique that is valuable. Those who do not fall into the category of ‘unique’ are more vulnerable to the populist rhetoric. Without winning the war of ideas, all left-wing actions will remain incomprehensible or will be doomed to function in the periphery of the political life.
Thus, the political left cannot limit itself to actions that only stand in opposition to theoretically excessive political programs. Many of those who seemingly endorse the left, encourage left-wing activists to solve ‘real’ social problems, for instance, by establishing orphanages, setting up special schools for troubled youth or providing counselling for the unemployed. They would like the political left to play a role of a big charity organisation that alleviates the consequences of the economic transformation, but does not disturb the integrity of the system.
However, the major problems of contemporary societies (ecological threats, biotechnology) are mainly theoretical by nature and are not empirically accessible. (Even though we all experience global warming, has anybody actually seen the ‘ozone hole’? Why of course, it is nothing but a theoretical construct, as is genetics, macroeconomics and many other crucial issues of the contemporary world.)
The will of action in the leftist formations is understandable and highly praiseworthy, but turns out to be insufficient and ineffective. If the left-wing initiatives are not united by a vision that is deeply rooted in the public consciousness, building a new left-wing alternative will, indeed, be a Sisyphean task. Obviously, it does not rule out the possibility of creating left-wing institutions, both macro-scale (such as think-tanks, research centres) and micro-scale (libraries, centres for legal aid and counselling, etc). The main strategic aim of the political left is to introduce a third language into the public debate (the other two being liberal and conservative), create institutions that would ‘spread the word’ (the media, the paths of progress for left-wing activists, experts and journalists, trade unions, cultural organizations) and, consequently, to entrench the left-wing discourse into the collective consciousness of the citizens. For, generally speaking, people tend to share opinions and support programs that are available to them, that is, present in the public sphere. As the saying goes, it is our language that defines the borders of our world. In order to carry out any left-wing policy and for the actions to have a broader reach, the left must win the ideological debate.
Let us abandon the two anachronistic paths: on the one hand, we should not be misguided by the notion that there is no alternative to global capitalism and the only function of the left is to lessen the hardships caused by the free market economy, however popular this idea may be among western social democrats. This notion and the strategy of the ‘third way’ that resulted from it, were one of the main reasons for the current popularity of conservative populists. The fundamental difference between left-wing and right-wing has become blurred and politicians themselves have strengthened the common belief, that all the disputes between the main political parties are a kind of theatrical performance that serves to conceal the fact that, basically, these parties are no different from one another.
On the other hand, we should not delude ourselves into thinking that creating a political alternative at the periphery of the system will improve anything except our sense of well-being.
Contemporary capitalism blossoms on the ideologies and concepts that are presented as alternative to it. There is a good reason why most advertising campaigns appeal to contestation and rebellion. In the world where defiance has become the best-selling product, let our actions be measured by actual accomplishments, and not by the degree of our ‘alternativeness’.
Fragment of ‘A guide to the left-wing policy by Political Critique. Ideas, dates and facts, questions and answers’(Warsaw 2007)
Translated by Edyta Suprun.
Na podobny temat
|
|
Aktualizacja ( 16.09.2007 )
|
|
|
|
Bugaj jest doktorem habilitowanym. ...
Obserwując ostatnie zdarzenia odnoszę...