On 'the Euston Manifesto'
So two guys I like, Nick Cohen and Norm Geras, have drafted a manifesto for getting the Left back on track.
Now, I think any honest person on the Left will readily acknowledge that the Left is in pretty bad shape, and that new ideas are needed to get it back on track. So I read the Euston manifesto, as they are calling it, with hope.
Unfortunately, one of the first things I read was:
"We propose here a fresh political alignment. Many of us belong to the Left, but the principles that we set out are not exclusive. We reach out, rather, beyond the socialist Left towards egalitarian liberals and others of unambiguous democratic commitment. Indeed, the reconfiguration of progressive opinion that we aim for involves drawing a line between the forces of the Left that remain true to its authentic values, and currents that have lately shown themselves rather too flexible about these values. It involves making common cause with genuine democrats, whether socialist or not."
No, no, no. Socialists can, and should, work with liberals and other democrats on some issues, on the issues we can agree on (i.e. defending secularism). But that doesn't mean differences don't exist between us. The obvious difference, or at least it should be obvious, is that socialists are anti-capitalist and liberals are capitalist by definition. I'm not even using "capitalist" as a boogeyman word here, just a statement of fact. They believe in a free market. We, supposedly, do not.
Just because most of the people out there calling themselves socialists are retards doesn't mean we should chuck the entire project of trying to replace capitalism with socialism. But a permanent alliance, in effect a merger, of socialists and liberals amounts to just that.
That said, most of the manifesto is much better, and contains a lot of stuff so basic it should go without saying, although that is, unfortunately, no longer the case. But the manifesto consistently shows the scars of the past few years of anti-war/pro-war conflict on the Left. For example, when Cohen and Geras write "US foreign policy has often opposed progressive movements and governments and supported regressive and authoritarian ones does not justify generalized prejudice against either the country or its people" I can't help but wonder why they're so mild. I'm 100% opposed to anti-Americanism, but I also believe in calling a spade a spade. Past, and in many ways, present, American foreign policy didn't just consist of "opposing" progressive movements and "supporting" regressive ones, but of economic and military support for mass-murdering regimes all over the world, the blatant subversion of democracy in other countries, support for genocidal policies in Guatemala and East Timor, the use of nuclear weapons on civilians in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, etc. Again, just because most people on the Left have taken an idiotic attitude towards the U.S.A doesn't mean leftists have to excuse the absolutely vile record of post-war American foreign policy.
A final point is the idea of "uniting against terror." This is a liberal illusion. "Terrorism" is a broad term encompassing a variety of tactics which have been used for a variety of different causes in history. It may be nice to imagine purely non-violent means of changing society, and that may indeed be what Cohen and Geras want, but if so I look forward to their denunciations of the ANC struggle against apartheid, the Irish (not just PIRA) struggle against British imperialism, the October Revolution, the founding of the State of Israel, the Zimbabwean chimurenga and many other historic movements of emancipation and liberation.
All in all, the Euston manifesto asks the right questions, and starts the right debate, but reaches many of the wrong conclusions.
