SOME WORDS ON STRIKES AND COMPROMISES

Strikers rally in front of Town Hall, Barrow, 30 Nov 2011

Guidance worthy of note from comrade Lenin
Can there ever be compromise in the class war?  Is it ever acceptable to retreat at the height of confrontation with the class enemy?


'...proletarians schooled in numerous strikes (to take only this manifestation of the class struggle) usually understand quite well the very profound (philosophical, historical, political and psychological) truth expounded by Engels.  


Every proletarian has been through strikes and has experienced "compromises" with the hated oppressors and exploiters, when the workers had to go back to work either without having achieved anything or agreeing to only a partial satifaction of their demands.  Every proletarian - owing to the conditions of the mass struggle and the sharp intensification of class antagonisms in which he lives - notices the difference between a compromise enforced by objective conditions (such as lack of strike funds, no outside support, extreme hunger and exhaustion), a compromise which in no way diminishes the revolutionary devotion and readiness for further struggle on the part of the workers who have agreed to such a compromise, and a compromise by traitors who try to ascribe to outside causes their own selfishness (strike-breakers also enter into "compromises"!), cowardice, desire to toady to the capitalists, and readiness to yield to intimidation, sometimes to persuasion, sometimes to sops, and sometimes to flattery on the part of the capitalists. (The history of the British labour movement offers especially many instances of such treacherous compromises by British trade union leaders, but, in one form or another, nearly all workers in all countries have witnessed the same sort of thing)' (My emphasis - FR)


And further...
'Of course, in politics, where it is sometimes a matter of extremely complicated - national and international - relations between classes and parties, very many cases will arise that will be much more difficult than the questions of a legitimate "compromise" in a strike, or the treacherous "compromise" of a strike-breaker, traitor, etc.  It would be absurd to formulate a recipe or general rule ("No Compromises!") to serve all cases.


One must use one's own brains and be able to find one's bearings in each separate case.  That, in fact, is one of the functions of party organization and party leaders worthy of the title, namely, through the prolonged, persistent, variegated and comprehensive efforts of all thinking representatives of the given class, to evolve the knowledge and experience and - in addition to knowledge and experience - the political instinct necessary for the speedy and correct solution of intricate political problems.'


And finally...
'Within every class, even in the conditions prevailing in the most enlightened countries, even within the most advanced class, and even when the circumstances of the moment have roused all its spiritual forces to an exceptional degree, there always are - and inevitably will be as long as classes exist, as long as classless society has not fully entrenched and consolidated itself, and has not developed on its own foundations - representatives of the class who do not think and are incapable of thinking.  Were this not so, capitalism would not be the oppressor of the masses it is.' (My emphasis - FR)


Text from "Left-Wing" Communism, an Infantile Disorder, V.I. Lenin, pp 63, 64, 65


For many who took part in the one day of action on 30th November, this was their first ever strike.  The public sector workers who took part that day did so in the belief that their leaders were taking the correct decisions and had a strategic plan for the future confrontations that are sure to follow.  These workers are advised to keep a close eye on that leadership and the nature of any 'negotiations' conducted on their behalf.