Today’s dormant period for the working class is not going to last forever. October 7 proved that in our stage of capitalist crisis, where the global workers are trapped in a perpetual decline, these masses will be compelled to mobilize when a major disruptive event appears. The next catalyst for renewed popular struggle could be another anti-imperialist revolt like October 7, or it could be a domestic uprising where one small group of workers inspire millions of others to act. It’s certain that they will act, though, even after all of the shock-and-awe tactics our rulers have used to paralyze the people.
Class struggle is the defining factor in the present stage of humanity’s long-term development. Therefore there will always be some new upsurge in the revolutionary activities of the masses after the masses have been beaten back. Mao said that “Classes struggle, some classes triumph, others are eliminated. Such is history, such is the history of civilization for thousands of years. To interpret history from this viewpoint is historical materialism; standing in opposition to this viewpoint is historical idealism.” American civilization could soon reach the same point in its evolution that China’s civilization did when its workers won; the proof of this is how many Americans now embrace an anti-systemic politics. Our duty is to guide the mass energy in the right direction when this inevitably produces revolt.
When it comes to the question of how we can prepare for the next big upswing, of how to create an organizational force that gives the masses the means to win this confrontation, a critical aspect is the generational divide in how today’s masses are responding towards our conditions. Class struggle is immutable, but people with different class roles will have to navigate a situation in their own ways. And the increasingly unstable environment that we’ve been thrust into since 2008 has forced the bulk of Gen Z into a different role than the bulk of their Gen X parents, who along with millennials will make up the vast majority of the workers which are in position to carry out the upcoming strike waves.
The other working-age adults are largely missing from this equation. Those who’ve graduated in the post-Covid era are faced with the worst job market in our lifetime, and this will likely continue to be the case for a long while. This means that the ones in this generation who are out of school aren’t on the path to gaining the careers and economic leverage which the established workers possess. It also means that for those who are still in school, there’s an even greater political chilling effect. The attitude among the students right now is that throwing themselves into political struggle isn’t worth it, because the risk of being tracked and shut out of employment is too great. And when employment is so scarce, these students are further inclined to treat self-preservation as their sole priority.
This doesn’t mean that these parts of the masses won’t be brought into revolutionary politics. But it does mean that any organization which seeks to lead the working masses to victory must learn how to bring in an uncertain strata such as them. Accompanying his statement on the principle of class struggle within civilization, this was the problem that Mao said China’s communists needed to solve: “It is the duty of progressives -- the Communists, members of the democratic parties, politically conscious workers, the student youth and progressive intellectuals -- to unite with the intermediate strata, middle-of-the-roaders and backward elements of various strata, with all those in People's China who are still wavering and hesitating (these people will waver for a long time to come and, even after they have once become steady, will waver again as soon as they meet difficulties), give them sincere help, criticize their wavering character, educate them, win them over to the side of the masses, prevent the imperialists from pulling them over and tell them to cast away illusions and prepare for struggle.”
The role of these students and unemployed graduates is uncertain because they mostly are not part of the working class, and most of them likely won’t be allowed into the working class for a long time. So though a new uprising by the workers is guaranteed, we don’t yet know what will come from the disgruntled professionals. Part of creating a cohesive organizational structure for the workers depends on bringing these professionals into the struggle; there is real revolutionary potential within this strata that we can’t ignore, and intellectuals always have a part to play in a revolution. Therefore one of our central tasks is to cast away the illusions that threaten to bring these professionals away from such a revolutionary role, with the main illusion right now being reformism.
This is not to say that revolution can only come from the intellectuals and the elites, which is an idea that the reformists are pushing. I’m saying we need to bring in these alienated members of the “professional-managerial class” partly because if we don’t lead them away from reformism, then reformism will swallow up the working-class movement as well; because the intelligentsia hold a unique kind of leverage over movements, and we need at least a considerable part of them as allies.
Without our intervention into the politics of the PMC, Democratic Party entryism will remain the default, and after this strategy fails it will be replaced by other deviations. What we need to do is put forth a working-class politics that brings in all parts of the masses who share revolutionary potential; and, thereby, takes on a character which is truly working-class precisely because it’s shed exclusivity towards the workers.
For a politics to actually be revolutionary, rather than a narrow economism that solely focuses on affairs in the workplace, it needs to account for every strata that could become class allies of the workers proper. This is why Mao so strongly emphasized persuading the classes who vacillate, and why the flag of China’s revolutionary government would include four stars to represent the proletariat, peasants, urban petty-bourgeoisie, and national bourgeoisie. It’s the eclecticalism in your practice, the intelligence to go deep into the masses and find all of your friends-in-waiting, that gives real revolutionary life to your working-class organizing.
The ranks of the American communist movement are at this stage in the process of re-learning the unionist skills that we lost with the 20th century’s retreats. These skills can only be acquired through direct experience, and the bulk of us aren’t yet ahead of the masses in this area. What can give our politics broad appeal, though, and earn us many new recruits in our efforts to re-organize the workers, is a project at unifying the masses around advancing the next civilizational steps.
The bulk of the people already in effect support our politics; they want to get rid of the system that’s destroying their lives and liberties, while forcing them to pay for billionaires’ wars. If we build a series of coalitions against Epsteinite corruption, data centers, Flock, the military-industrial complex, and all other enemies that the masses recognize, the path forward will become clearer—both for the masses and for us.
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