On Revolutionary Reforms

Mixing Up Short-Term and Long-Term Demands

One of the pitfalls in developing a program of revolutionary reforms is the mixing up of short-term and long-term demands. Revolutionary reforms fall in the category of short-term goals. They are demands for reforms which favour the revolutionary forces, but which can be achieved without first overthrowing the capitalist system. As such, their main purpose is to prepare the revolutionary forces, to organize the people and build their capacity for struggle, and to undermine the capitalist system.

Long-term demands are those demands which cannot be accomplished without the revolutionary overthrow of capitalism and the establishment of socialism. They represent the long-term goals of the movement against capitalism, rather than the tactical positions taken to develop that movement. If the short-term and long-term goals of the movement are mixed up, the result can be paralysis of the movement.

For example, the elimination of poverty is a long-term goal of the movement against capitalism. Poverty is a fellow-traveller of the capitalist system. It arises from the very nature of capitalist commodity production, which is based on the private ownership of the means of production, and from the motive for capitalist production, which is the realization of maximum profits. Nothing short of the revolutionary overthrow of the capitalist system and the establishment of an economy based on meeting the needs of the people can eliminate poverty. Therefore, if the elimination of poverty is presented as a short-term demand, it either creates illusions about the ability of capitalism to eliminate poverty, or it results in cynicism, as victory is impossible.

On the other hand, a demand that the people have a fundamental right to food, shelter, clothing, education, health-care and various other necessities of life in a modern society neither creates illusions about the ability of capitalism to eliminate poverty, nor is it impossible to achieve without first overthrowing capitalism. It can be a powerful organizing tool, as it addresses an existing feeling of entitlement amongst the people. It also addresses the growing feeling of disempowerment stemming from the crisis of representative democracy and from the fact that decisions made in corporate boardrooms can affect the economies of entire regions and countries. As the struggle for such rights develops, those involved in the struggle will gradually come to the realization that their aims cannot really be achieved without the elimination of the capitalist system.

Substituting long-term goals for short-term reforms is harmless to the capitalist system. In fact, every capitalist party from the Alliance to the NDP claims to stand for the elimination of poverty, inequality, violence and war, etc. Yet, their short-term policies increase poverty, inequality, violence and the danger of war. The challenge facing the revolutionary movement against capitalism is to develop those short-term demands which not only decrease these social evils, but which also create a mass consciousness that the capitalist system itself is responsible for these evils and must be overthrown.