Resistance will support Socialist Alliance on Nov 24 and beyond
Resistance has been actively challenging John Howard’s agenda at every step along the way - from protesting his racist attacks on refugee and Muslims to leading student walkouts against the Iraq invasion in 2003 and the introduction of “Work Choices” in 2006. A defeat for the Howard government on November 24 will be a victory for all the movements that have defended workers’ rights and the environment and stood up to his pro-war policies.
But for Resistance, regardless of who wins the elections it is going to take a continuation and strengthening of these movements if we are going to see the end of Work Choices, real action on climate change or end Australia’s involvement in the “war on terror”. Resistance argues that voting alone is not enough to change the world. Real improvements in our lives don’t originate in Parliament House, but from ordinary people – workers, students, pensioners, unemployed – acting to defend their interests.
This is not a reason, however, to abstain from participating in elections or pretending it doesn’t matter who wins. Rather, it is exactly why Resistance is supporting Socialist Alliance, a party that stands for repealing work choices, voluntary student unionism and the anti-terror laws (to name a few) and argues that we need more than reforms to the existing system to make it more green and humane. Socialist Alliance, as the name suggests, stands for socialism - for society’s wealth to democratically owned and managed so that people and the environment are put first.
Resistance, as an affiliate of the Socialist Alliance, advocates a vote 1 SA, 2 the Greens and then Labor before Liberal.
Today, the primary aim of socialists running in elections is not to win, but rather to use them as a platform for ideas. In this way, we can help to win more people to the idea that we can only make real, lasting change by taking the power away from big business and their friends in government and put it in the hands of the majority of people.
By running in elections, Socialist Alliance is following the example of past socialists, such as the Bolsheviks in Russia, who despite the undemocratic nature of the tsar’s parliament used it as a platform to promote their ideas for change.
In recent years, the Scottish Socialist Party (SSP) and the Revolutionary Communist League (LCR) in France have shown the value of intervening in elections. The SSP was able to win several seats in the Scottish parliament, in the process getting their message out to a wider audience. Although not winning any MPs, the LCR has increased their influence as a result of their electoral participation.
For these reasons Resistance finds it remarkable that a number other socialist groups in Australia, including Socialist Alternative (SAlt) and the International Socialist Organisation (ISO), have not been arguing the case for a socialist vote. Instead, both organizations have been arguing through their publications for a vote for the Greens, with little mention of (let alone support for) the socialist candidates running in a range of lower house seats and for the upper house. This is from two organizations that were previously affiliated to the Socialist Alliance! Why is this?
In an article in the November edition of Socialist Alternative titled “Kick out Howard, but vote Green to oppose Rudd's right wing agenda” Mick Armstrong writes: “We need right now to start building a party … that attempts to cohere a concerted fightback to win reforms in the here and now and that is ultimately prepared to challenge the whole basis of capitalist rule.” He then goes on to call for a vote for the Greens.
Does SAlt believe that supporting the Greens over the Socialist Alliance will aid that goal? Given the article does not attempt to justify their position we can only assume they do not think it is a positive thing for a socialist organization to be running in the elections.
The ISO at least tried to explain their position in the November 16 edition of Socialist Worker: “[While] Australia's preferential voting system means voters can vote 1 socialist, 2 Greens, 3 Labor, the unfortunate reality is that the socialist electoral presence is currently so negligible that it is irrelevant.”
This same argument could about the “negligible” readership of Socialist Worker. While currently electoral support for SA is relatively small, the 15,200 votes it received for the upper house in the NSW state election this year is not irrelevant. Certainly more relevant to building a socialist movement in Australia than small socialist newspapers encouraging people to vote Green. And the question the ISO should join us in discussing is how can we more the socialist vote bigger and more relevant?
The reality is that while the majority of electoral space to the left of Labor is taken up by the Greens the Socialist Alliance, in part by running in elections, has made gains in raising the profile of socialist ideas in Australia. The financial support the SA has received recently for the first time from a number of trade unions suggests that there is potential for its networks and support to expand.
We stand alongside the Greens in building a left-wing alternative to Labor but running in the elections independently does not create a barrier to this. For example, on November 9 the Greens candidate for Grayndler Saeed Khan was happy to speak at a Socialist Alliance election campaign launch. We can look to building this red-green alliance.
There is no excuse for socialists to refuse support to other socialists in the elections, apparently just because they belong to another organisation.
In a letter to SAlt and the ISO Socialist Alliance Victorian Senate Candidate, Margarita Windisch, wrote: “Socialist Alliance is running on an explicit anti-capitalist platform calling for a socialist transformation of society. Socialist Alliance also has the best policy to combat climate change putting us ahead of the Greens on "green" issues.”
“Time is running out as we are experiencing the increasingly harsh effects of climate change. We know that only socialism can save humanity and the planet from destruction. If we want to win the battle against corporate power the question of unity on the left and the progressive movement will have to take centre stage. We hope you will be there with us. Voting Socialist in the upcoming federal election is a good start.”
