Three excerpts from recent statements by the Communist parties of Turkey, Greece and Sweden about the coronavirus, capitalism and the need for socialism.
Click on the titles for the full statements.
This social order must change, Turkey should become an example -- Communist Party of Turkey (April 17, 2020):
The epidemic has been the last straw. The existing social order entirely serves the interests of a small minority, and the basic needs, rights, and freedoms of the vast majority of society are neglected. Economic crises, wars have become part of everyday life, and problems such as unemployment and hunger have turned into a nightmare affecting hundreds of millions of people.
There is no good or bad version of this order; it cannot be cured. It is obvious that the US, defined as a superpower, and, France, Germany, England, Italy, which are blessed as European civilizations, have fallen during the last epidemic.
Turkey is also paying the price of not overthrowing this system of exploitation that produces reactionism, darkness, misogyny, and anti-scientism.
No time left. We should take the steps to get rid of this order that threatens humanity as a whole.
THE "NEW MARSHALL PLAN" The new, yet very old, "Great Idea" of the European capital and the communists' response -- Dimitris Koutsoumbas, General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Greece (KKE) (April 15, 2020)
The outbreak of the pandemic, its rapid spread, its profound consequences for human life and especially in the more developed capitalist economies, have brought great problems to the surface, which of course pre-existed, but emerged today in a loud and tragic way. The big contradictions and contrasts are even more evident in all aspects of social, economic, political, cultural life and reality, in each country individually and internationally. We must definitely make a greater collective effort and contribution not only to record and codify the new issues, but also further highlight them as well as the main trends of the developments, to draw the necessary conclusions and tasks, both in theoretical and in political, practical level. After all, many issues and aspects are still in progress.
The developments we are experiencing at this time, in the last month in our country and a bit more in other countries, show and once again confirm more intensely that the real danger for all the peoples of the world is capitalism at its highest stage, i.e. imperialism. It not only goes against the needs of the people and the social development itself but it constantly causes, on a massive scale, irreparable damage in all sectors due to the sharpening of its contradictions. Today, it is indisputable that the health of the people, care, protection, and security are incompatible with the capitalist profit, the greedy capital and the capitalist mode of production. Either solution will be provided based on the real needs of the people or the people will suffer, they will live in miserable conditions, they will constantly pay out of their own pockets so that the few and chosen ones of the capital will treasure. It is time, and will become even more urgent with the end of the pandemic in the coming months, to strengthen the Social Alliance, the anti-monopoly and anti-capitalist line of struggle, our own alternative proposal, our own response, the response of the hopeful socialist tomorrow. The necessity and timeliness of socialism and the socialist revolution are rising to the surface, and as time passes they will do so in a more imperative way, with new dynamics...
...Therefore, the "Great Idea", promoted by the capital and its ubiquitous political representatives, for a "new Marshall Plan" for the reconstruction of Europe, which is supposed to be without commitments and memoranda for the people, beneficial for both the capital and workers, is completely deceptive. The parallels they make with the post-war Marshall Plan, even presenting it as a "quintessence" in favor of the peoples, are funny. In fact, this historical manipulation is not only carried out by the ideological and political descendants of the supporters of the Marshall Plan, but also by so-called "left" forces, which simply confirm their complete bourgeois social-democratic mutation. It is worth remembering that the American funds that flowed into the ruined post-war Europe, as part of the Marshall Plan, in the second half of the critical fifth decade of the last century, was not an act of solidarity with the European peoples, but only a vital energy action for the capitalist system itself. They were used, on the one hand, for the capitalist reconstruction of Europe, which was crucial for American exports, and on the other hand for halting socialism and the revolutionary labor movement, which emerged from World War II with great prestige among all peoples of the world. For this reason, after all, a large part of the Marshall Plan was directed at infrastructure, e.g. military infrastructure, as in Greece, aimed mainly at the socialist system and the struggle of the peoples. However, the necessary post-war state intervention for the reproduction of the capital and the creation of critical infrastructure, neither interrupted the vicious cycle of crises nor ensured the prosperity of the peoples. The offered benefits, also aiming at integrating workers' and people's forces, bore the stamp of the glory of the social achievements in the USSR and the other countries of socialism, but also of the very struggle of the peoples of Europe.
Today, unfortunately, this formidable adversary does not exist. The peoples, however, will come out from this crisis with greater experience. The huge impasses and historical bankruptcy of the current exploitation system are becoming even more apparent today. It is up to the people to organize the struggle, their own alliance
Corona and capitalism - Statement from the Communist Party of Sweden (March 23, 2020)
A lot is being written on the economic effects of the corona virus and how it affects different
branches of the economy. Governments in all affected countries has put billions upon billions to the
disposal of capital, while they at the same time have carried out numerous measures that push back
the conditions and wages of the working class. To the extent that the conditions are not directly
rolled back, the individual companies shift the weight of the crisis onto the back of the collective
capitalist: the state. The state pays the wages, compensates for defaulted incomes and carries out an
active policy to further concentrate capital and knock out smaller companies.
All this is portrayed as an effect of and reaction on the corona virus. The spread of the virus gives
capital both the opportunity and possibility to hide the crisis of overproduction that was visible
already before the virus. Every catastrophe also offers capital possibilities and the measures now
carried out are not primarily carried out as a response to the effects of the corona virus, but to push
back the crisis of overproduction.
The capitalist crisis of overproduction is a crisis generated by the fact that production no longer
corresponds to the ability of people to consume and the ability of markets to absorb all commodities
produced – production has outrun the purchasing power. The crisis is cyclical, returns regularly, and
is proceeded by an economic boom, only to be relieved by a downward phase. The beginning of the
downward phase was possible to see already before the spread of the corona virus. Signs that point
in this direction is the fact that flexible workers in manufacturing, the buffer of capital, was being
phased out.
When the corona virus spread, capitalism was already on its way into the next crisis of
overproduction and the measures now carried out had either been planned before, as an answer
to the expected crisis, or they have the character of opportunism – capital seizes the opportunity
to rationalize.
What we now see happening on the labor and financial markets is what always happens during a
capitalist crisis: measures are carried out that lowers the wages, make the conditions of the workers’
more insecure and secures the profits of the companies. Simultaneously, the natural tendencies
towards concentration and centralization of capital that exist under capitalism are enhanced. The
smaller and less profitable companies are bankrupted and the monopolies grow even more. The
capitalist crisis is an incredible opportunity for big capital and in short, it means a bloodletting of
capitalism...
...The crisis, regardless of whether it has been sped up by the corona virus or not, clearly shows the
world such as it is. It shatters illusion after illusion and it becomes all the more difficult to hide the
class contradictions. The propaganda that we sit in the same boat and that we can solve the crisis
together is becoming increasingly hollow. Without hesitation, companies socializes their losses and
let the whole of society compensate them, while the profits they have made remain private. Openly,
the companies sacrifice the workers to strengthen its own competitiveness and profit while the state
openly appear as the defender of monopoly capitalism, against both the working population and the
petit bourgeoisie, which have been affected by the crisis, just as the working class has. The working
class and the other exploited strata in society, such as those in the service sector and the petit
bourgeoisie, have a common interest in a fight against capitalism, because, in the end, it crushes
them all – the need for social alliances between the working class and the other exploited strata is
the only way forward.
Hand in hand with the attacks against the economic situation of the working people come the attacks
against their political situation. In country after country, measures directed towards the possibility of
political expression have either been carried out or prepared. In the trail of the corona virus, strikes
and demonstrations are forbidden; the police and the military are awarded even more far-reaching
capacities and are armed even heavier. Bolivia offer perhaps the most glaring example: to secure the
coup-regime of the country, a complete lockdown is enforced, hindering all protests. The political
tendency under monopoly capitalism is always in the direction of political reaction and the current
situation offer great possibilities to capitalism to carry out reactionary political measures that they
can hide behind the need to fight the spread of the virus.
In addition to revealing the nature of both capital and state, the capitalist crisis of overproduction
also punctures the myth that the nation-states are disappearing. The billions that in country after
country have been made available for the strengthening of the companies show this. All the
measures carried out in country after country are directed towards the working class and the petit
bourgeoisie in favor of the monopolies show the continued importance of the nation state to the
monopolies. The national state is not disintegrating and it has not lost its role. It is what it has
always been: an integrated part of the capitalist system, whose purpose is to strengthen its own
capital against capital in other countries.
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