Dave Gardner

Human beings need to live in association with each other. They can live in societies without a state, but the world of today is dominated by states. But each of these states is composed of different kinds of social groups based on family, economic, religious and linguistic ties. The state relates not just to individuals but to the groups in which they live. Political action begins in civil society, the complex of social groups that make up a nation. Where states are dominated by one national group they are known as nation states. 

 Marx and his followers recognised this; it is one of their great insights that politics is not just to be understood in terms of the state and the individuals who live under its dominion but also in terms of social groups of various kinds. Those associations which are not part of the state are known as civil society. Politics operates in civil society as much as it does in the state and the economic struggle between different classes, owners of capital and sellers of labour power, is the dominant force in politics in most nation states. To a large extent that struggle takes place in civil society. However, it is important not to forget the other kinds of association that make up civil society. Ignoring these gives a one-sided perspective on working class politics.

Families are groupings united by parenthood and blood lines and exist in all societies. They are usually the most intimate form of association and many of our strongest allegiances lie within the family. However, the role that families play in politics differs according to social class. Working class families can be a bulwark against the hardships of life in capitalist societies. They provide some protection from the worst misfortunes and can provide the inspiration for young people to make their way in the world. At their best, members of families relate to each other through mutual support. They are not the nexus of buying and selling or of market relationships. But they can be fragile and hardship and the intrusions of market society can weaken and even destroy them.

Capitalism is antagonistic to working class family life as it can form the basis of resistance to its operation when families organise together to create their own institutions. Ideologies such as feminism, which seek to sow discord between men and women and to undermine family life are promoted by capitalists for a good reason: they allow market relationships to penetrate into the most intimate and private parts of life by turning family members into individual consumers and even antagonists to each other through falsely suggesting that there is a struggle between the sexes like a struggle between the classes. Working class communities can seek to support family structures and to resist the relentless march of market relationships, but there is no doubt that they are often under siege. 

The families of the wealthy and of the capitalist and political ruling class are also subject to some of these pressures although not to the financial precarity that often afflict working class families. But they also play a powerful role in maintaining political and economic power. Through extended family relationships they can form clans exercising influence over capital and political institutions, not only maintaining their grip on them, but ensuring that power is not spread more widely. It is not the goal of working class politics to destroy these families but to ensure that their ability to project and protect their power is weakened through growing working class institutions such as trade unions, particularly when some form of workers’ control is exercised over enterprises.

Class Institutions.

In order to protect their interests under hardship and great pressure, the working class has historically developed its own defensive institutions, most notably trade unions and co-operative societies. Collective action can be an effective antidote to the clan-based network of economic and political power exercised by a ruling class. This development has been fiercely resisted however, and in countries like the UK, the ruling class has never reconciled itself to the working class exercising its power through its own institutions. This attitude is often justified with reference to the economist, Adam Smith, who argued that ‘combinations’ either of employers or employees, upset the efficient workings of markets and ultimately undermine capitalism. The ideal relationship is a bargain struck between an individual employer and an individual worker as a so-called relationship between equals. As Marx pointed out, the bargaining relationship is unequal since workers need work in order to live and to support their families, while individual employers usually have a choice of whom to hire. In addition, it is much easier for employers to work informally as networks agreeing on actions to prevent working class resistance, to raise prices and to exclude competitors. This can all be done ‘behind closed doors’ while trade union activity has to involve large numbers and is difficult to conceal. It took decades of action for trade union activity to be legally recognised and for workers to obtain rights to strike and to bargain. These have been eroded since the time of Thatcher starting in 1979.

Employers can be in competition with each other, but it is not unusual for them to work together on issues that affect their common interests. Workers can work together on matters of common interest, most obviously when they are together in the same workplace or same industry. But they can also be set apart from each other through issues to do with hierarchy, craft skills, pay differentials and ethnic differences. Unity of purpose, which involves uniting diverse groups can be difficult to achieve and in general capitalists will do their best to hinder the development of a united purpose among working people. In particular they will seek to avoid the working class becoming aware of itself as a class with a common interest and purpose. Any form of divisiveness that can be used to prevent this happening: male versus female, religion, region, language, race, nationality can be used for this purpose.

Working class politics is unlikely to be effective if it does not have roots within civil society and does not concern itself with local or workplace issues. This is not enough however and working class politics needs a political party both to mobilise support within civil society but also to compete with other political parties and to influence the state. Developing an effective political party that can bring together the diverse interests within the working class, develop political awareness and political campaigns and fight elections on behalf of working class candidates is the first task. Ultimately the aim is to gain control of the government, but the working class cannot make the state act according to its will without a strong presence in civil society. Creating and maintaining a political party without the resources of capitalists and oligarchs is an extremely difficult but essential task for working class movements that seek to attain political power.

A working class party has to compete with parties that do not have the best interests of the working class at heart, although nearly all parties pretend to do so. The Labour Party achieved this by making itself the political vehicle of the trade union movement promoting the interests of the working class via parliamentary representation. As pointed out in the article on class struggle (Labour Affairs November 2024), this worked to some extent until the trade union movement itself faltered and the Labour Party was given over to careerists with their own interests in mind. It has now become necessary to reconstitute a working class party with strong roots in communities and trade unions. Once political careerists are allowed to take over a working class political party it is likely to be corrupted to serve capitalist interests. The Labour Party is a very good example of this.

One important asset of capitalist oriented parties is the support of capitalists who not only donate to them but support them through the ownership of newspapers, radio and television channels. Powerful individuals or families often control these, and they become an important asset of the political parties that they support. A working class party cannot hope to match such support without the help of trade unions who, despite efforts, never succeeded in the long term in running a newspaper that could seriously challenge the influence of capitalist supporting newspapers. These civil society institutions are in some ways the opposite of working class civil society. They rely on great private wealth held in a few hands, they are closely connected to friendly political parties, there is a crossover between media ownership and political party membership and they are usually close to state power. Alternative media are definitely an asset for a working class movement to get its ideas across and to attract support but not enough in themselves. Apart from resources the biggest barrier to the success of working class oriented newspapers and other media is the liberal cultural inclination of most journalists who are hostile to working class attitudes and preferences.

In later articles we will look at the role of trade unions and political parties in more detail.