Sunday 4 May 2014

Why I no longer believe in elections

I once stood in a local election. I lay that on the table as my confession. I stood for TUSC. The Trades Union and Socialist Coalition and got a modest 59 votes in a big Tory area. I gained nothing out of this no one approached me since and I wonder why I did it now. I think it was more the pressure from one of the main constituent parties that being the Socialist Party who I was a member of at the time who pushed elections in a big way. I cannot understand why looking back now. I am still a big socialist and still believe in a common society run for the many not just the few. But elections and Bourgeois elections are not the way to go in the path to gaining this. I have fallen out with electoral politics. I pay it attention as many workers still look to it for change but for me I know the reality now there can be no change as the famous saying goes if elections changed anything they’d have banned it. Too right! I personally cannot see any benefit to standing in elections you line yourself up and alongside some very shady characters who are hungry for power. I once stood as I said and got very little out of it and wonder what the point of standing is. Many Marxists tell me it gives you a platform well where as that platform got you so far?? A small way towards anything I’d suggest. You’re fighting on the terms of the bourgeoisie and they set the rules you have to play for to get anywhere. I think that is a recipe for disaster the moment you start to conform to the bourgeois rules and boundaries you set yourself up for defeat in the long run. I think our energies can be better used elsewhere in community campaigns and building resistance on the ground. If the likes of TUSc and the Socialist party put as much effort in to building a genuine rank-and-file union movement as they do as pushing their own self serving candidates in TUSC and beyond we may just maybe be in a healthier position. I have been there I have seen it all TUSC and the SP think they can gain out of the upcoming elections not by votes but by recruits yes building the party not the class and the movement. That folks is what it is all about for parties like the Socialist party. So good luck if you’re standing it’s not for me and many others do not look surprised when you register poor results and left wondering why. Allow us to continue the fight for a better world free of hunger and greed.

1 comment:

  1. Very well put comrade, we don’t need to stand in elections and as you say that change very little for our class. As you know some will say that this gives a platform and wins an audience, but you know every morning when we wake up we all have that chance to make a platform and win an audience, at our place of work, in the community and at every given opportunity that exists each and every day, the founders of our movement took their campaigns on to the streets and held meetings with fellow workers. The fact is that many don’t vote any-more simply because they don’t trust what some call the democratic process. And I really must question the real interest and integrity of many on the left who do stand.

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