IS A REVOLUTIONARY SITUATION DEVELOPING?

WHAT'S A 'REVOLUTIONARY SITUATION'?
A revolutionary situation is a build-up of social/political conditions necessary for revolution.


Its symptoms may change at various stages in history but in all cases it presupposes a profound crisis of the old system.  It can be brought about by economic shocks, failures of government policy (such as the collapse of a military adventure), or national or racial conflicts leading to a sharp aggravation of social contradictions, etc.


Lenin defined these symptoms as follows:
1.  a crisis among the upper classes, when it is impossible for them to maintain their rule without any change,
2.  the suffering and want of the oppressed classes have grown more acute than usual,
3.  as a consequence of the above causes, there is a considerable increase in the activity of the masses who, in peace time, uncomplainingly allow themselves to be robbed and exploited but, in turbulent times (such as a severe financial crisis) are drawn by all the circumstances into independent historical action.
V. I. Lenin   Collected Works Volume 21 pp213-14


Think now of the draconian laws passed by the previous New Labour government and the errosion of civil liberties these brought about, the rising unemployment figures and the suffering that will result from the coalition government's austerity programme, British involvement in the military disaster in Afghanistan, and now the threat of yet another 'banking crisis' and all the boxes seem to be ticked for the creation of a revolutionary situation in Britain today.  So why isn't it happening? 


Lacking a politically educated, class conscious, advanced section of the proletariat means a revolutionary situation remains just that - a revolutionary situation (impotently without direction).  When will it become evident that the British working class has developed class consciousness?  Only when it supports the political parties that truly represent its interests. 


Until then, the proletariat will be prey to all manner of diversions such as soft porn comics masquerading as 'newspapers'; radio, TV and popular mass-produced culture dumbed down to the lowest common denominator; to intensive advertising campaigns for shoddy goods or the latest technological toys; to the religious messages of a better life after death and that joyous poverty has more merit than miserable wealth;  to a choice of political parties that claim to be different yet which all promise to maintain the capitalist system of greed and exploitation.  A politically educated working class would not tolerate this stinking mess but flush it down the nearest lavatory - where it belongs.
And that is why the ruling class will do everything in its power to keep the proletariat in political ignorance.


And once more to comrade Lenin -
" The division of any society into different political parties is revealed most clearly of all in times of profound crises shaking the whole country .... all phrase-mongering, all that is petty and extraneous, is brushed aside by the gravity of the struggle; the parties strain every nerve and appeal to the masses, and the masses, guided by their unerring
instinct and enlightened by the experience of an open struggle, follow the parties that represent the interests of a particular class."
V. I. Lenin  Collected Works  Volume 18 page 45


The party of the working class, the Communist Party, is the advanced, politically organised and active section of the working class - its vanguard.


All other organisations of the proletariat - trade unions, social, cultural and educational associations, etc. serve as necessary means in the class struggle but they cannot solve the fundamental problem - the problem of abolishing the capitalist system and carrying out a socialist revolution.


Only a Marxist-Leninist Party, which is the highest form of class political organisation of the proletariat, is capable of uniting the activities of all proletarian organisations and guiding them to the single aim of socialist revolution.