What’s the alternative to capitalism?
I’m sure we all agree that the modern globalized industrial-capitalist system sucks. Unequal, unjust, hyper-exploitative, ecologically ruinous.
During the twentieth century a critique of capitalism would imply an advocacy of socialism as the alternative. But attempts to implement socialism were generally disappointing.
There’s an idea that, in the wake of the rethinkings associated with “the Sixties,” Green politics emerged as an alternative to all the old ideologies: liberalism, conservatism, socialism, nationalism, libertarianism, religious fundamentalism, etc.
Some Greens are sympathetic to a perspective like that of Paul Hawken re: there can be a greened-up form of capitalism that can be made sustainable (and socially just). Not many of us buy into that. So the main ideological debate all along (it’s almost 50 years now, since about 1975) has been whether the Greens should embrace a new kind of socialism (eco-socialism) or some new kind of post-capitalist vision (like bioregionalism).
Last year advocates of the former viewpoint initiated a Green Eco-socialist Network. A dialogue about it appeared in the (Spring 2021) issue of Green Horizon Magazine. Below is David Cobb’s announcement of GEN. My following four blog posts will feature commentary about it.
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Establishment of the Green Eco-Socialist Network
By David Cobb
As a reader of Green Horizon, you already know that our current social, political and economic systems are fundamentally flawed. You already know that we need new systems that reflect the Four Pillars of the international Green Party: Peace, Justice, Democracy and Ecology. The purpose of this essay is to suggest the best way to accomplish that.
I believe that the best way to create these new systems is for the Green Party of the United States to embrace eco-socialism — publicly, explicitly, and unapologetically. It is in that spirit that I am excited to share with you information about the emerging Green Eco-Socialist Network (GEN).
WHAT IS THE GREEN ECO-SOCIALIST NETWORK?
GEN is a dues-paying membership organization of Green Party members who self-identify as unapologetic revolutionaries. We want to build the Green Party into a functional, revolutionary eco-socialist political party that is serious about taking and exercising state power and using it to help facilitate the end of capitalism and the creation of an eco-socialist society.
By “eco-socialism” we refer to a transformational economic and social system based on:
. social ownership (not state ownership) of the instruments of production and exchange,
. production geared to meet human needs,
. all production decisions made democratically by the workers and affected communities themselves,
. all major social decisions made democratically by society as a whole,
. an end to patriarchy, racism, imperialism and all forms of oppression and top-down power and privilege, and
. all decision-making guided by the need to restore and maintain the health of our natural ecosystem.
We recognize that there are some Green Party members who disagree with us, and we are committed to engaging in political discourse/debate toward our goal in a respectful, comradely manner.
WHAT WE BELIEVE
We believe that capitalism — a system based on private ownership of the instruments of production and exchange, and the exploitation of wage labor — is the fundamental cause of poverty, privation, militarism and war, environmental devastation and most of the other crises confronting human society today. Capitalism is inherently racist, sexist, divisive and oppressive in its origins and in its operations.
We support the eco-socialism plank that was introduced into the Green Party platform in 2016 and support further identifying and branding the party as the party of eco-socialism. We want the Green Party to become a political expression of, and explicit advocate for, the broader movement for eco-socialism already rising in the US, sometimes under other names, such as the movement for a “solidarity economy” or “cooperative commonwealth.”
We can and do support immediate changes that can tangibly improve social, economic and environmental conditions while helping facilitate the revolutionary transformation for which we are striving. (Non-reformist reforms.) We want Greens to run for office, not as an end in itself, nor to operate the existing government “better,” but to gain state power for the purpose of dismantling capitalism and its corollaries (imperialism, militarism, racism, patriarchy), and empowering its successor institutions.
We believe the Green Party must be a mass-based party that is politically and financially independent, recognizing that political independence can look different from state to state, and even across local communities in the same state. We make a clear distinction between the leadership of the corporate parties (who are part of the problem), and their rank-and-file membership (who we want to convince to vote for and join the Green Party).
We believe Greens must engage in real political struggle in a respectful, comradely manner. We reject the dominator-style “with me or against me” tendency that exists within some circles.
The initiators have made a commitment to create GEN as a place where people can work together and authentically struggle over ideas even as we build a friendly and loving community. We want to create an atmosphere where we can share ideas and experiences (what is working in your local and why? what isn’t working and why?).
We wish to deepen our understanding of what eco-socialism means, what forms it may take, and how to create it — both amongst ourselves and in the party as a whole. We want to engage in internal self-education about capitalism, patriarchy, white supremacy/racism and imperialism, and how they are interconnected.
We want to improve our basic organizing skills and become better advocates for the society we wish to create.
