Commentary

What Constitutes a Revolutionary Reform?

In the last issue of Modern Communism we discussed the necessity for a program of revolutionary reforms to position itself within the struggle for democratic renewal in such a way as to provide both content and coherence to the struggle. How is that accomplished? It is not sufficient to simply latch onto some demand that has a certain amount of mass appeal and then present such a demand as being a revolutionary reform. Such methods have more in common with populism than with revolutionary politics. As discussed previously, a revolutionary reform must serve to weaken the capitalist system and strengthen the anti-capitalist forces.

An example of a populist reform is the demand that the minimum wage should be raised. As a thing in itself, this is a perfectly just demand; there are many working poor in this society who deserve to be raised out of the abject poverty to which they are condemned by capitalism. However, raising the minimum wage will not accomplish this. In fact, the minimum wage has risen steadily since its introduction during the 1920s, but the percentage of people living in poverty has increased, not decreased.

Nor does increasing the minimum wage weaken the capitalist system; on the contrary, it actually strengthens it. First, most large capitalists are unaffected because they already pay their employees higher rates of pay. Second, certain sections of the capitalist class benefit from an increase in the minimum wage because people living in poverty immediately spend any increased income on necessities. Third, every increase in the minimum wage is more than offset by immediate increases in rent and other necessities of life. Fourth, such a demand creates illusions amongst the people that poverty can actually be eliminated under capitalism.

So, calling for increases in the minimum wage neither weakens capitalism, nor strengthens the anti-capitalist forces, nor even decreases the levels of poverty in the society. Thus, it cannot be considered to be a revolutionary reform. The same can also be said for every other reform which purports to alleviate poverty without eliminating the main condition which perpetuates poverty – the capitalist system itself. Under these circumstances, it is far better to raise the demand that a dignified standard of living is a basic human right and let the capitalists and their pundits explain why they disagree. Such a demand would, at least, isolate and weaken the capitalists politically, even if it cannot be achieved within capitalism.

This is not to say that the struggle for higher wages is unnecessary or that it should be opposed. On the contrary, this struggle is essential; workers who do not organize to resist the downward pressure on their wages will never organize to overthrow capitalism either. The point is that the most that such struggles can achieve is the slowing down of the reduction of real wages. They are not revolutionary struggles and cannot actually eliminate poverty.

Similarly, there are attempts to present the preservation of Medicare as a revolutionary demand. Opposition to cutbacks in social spending is part of the struggle for democratic renewal, but opposing the anti-social cutbacks in health care spending cannot and should not be equated with preserving Medicare. Canada’s health care system is a capitalist health care system and, as such, its first priority is not the health of Canadians but rather the health of the profits of the capitalists. It is a system which is designed to funnel billions of dollars of public money into the pockets of the rich, and the health of Canadians is being sacrificed on a daily basis in order to achieve this objective. It is a system which is in permanent crisis and which is incapable of providing Canadians with the level of health care to which they are entitled. Why would any sensible Canadian want to preserve such a system? It should be completely overthrown and replaced with a health care system in which the first and only consideration is providing the highest possible standards of health care to the people. In other words, on the issue of health care a revolutionary reform would be one which couples the demand for increased spending on health care with a demand that all for-profit elements of the health care system be nationalized and brought under democratic public control.

From these examples, it can be seen that simply latching onto a popular struggle is fraught with dangers for the revolutionary, anti-capitalist movement. Instead, ways must be discovered in which to divert these popular struggles into a broad anti-capitalist struggle as the only way in which they can hope to achieve their aims. Therefore, a program of revolutionary reforms must begin, not with specific demands, but with a broad outline of what elements a movement for democratic renewal must embrace. We will begin this discussion in the next issue of Modern Communism.

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