Socialist Alternative #97 - October 2023

ISSUE #97 l OCTOBER 2023

ALTERNATIVE

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SOCIALIST

WHAT WE STAND FOR

Fight Inflation & Rebuild A Fighting Labor Movement

Mobilize Against Gender Oppression & Attacks On Bodily • Inflation, unaffordable healthcare, rising Autonomy gas prices and sky high rents, plus a lack of basic respect on the job are pushing hundreds of thousands of workers to go on strike. We need effective strikes that hit the bosses where it hurts most – their pocketbooks – to win lasting victories like Cost of Living Adjustments (COLA).

• Union leaders across all unions should accept the average wage of a worker in their industry and should be accountable to their membership and the broader working class.

• An injury to one is an injury to all! Unions need to fight all manifestations of racism, sexism, queerphobia, and all forms of oppression as part of the struggle to rebuild a fighting labor movement.

• Unions should stop spending hundreds of millions of dollars on electing Democratic Party politicians, and spend it instead on efforts to organize the unorganized.

• Unions should form consumer protection committees to monitor price increases, which should have the power to review corporate finances, especially when money is squandered on CEO pay and stock buybacks.

• The overturn of Roe v Wade opened the door for vicious attacks on bodily autonomy across the country. We need a mass movement against the reactionary right on the scale of the 60s and 70s when Roe was first won.

• Free, safe, legal abortion. All contraception should be provided at no cost as part of a broad program for reproductive health!

• Fight back against brutal anti-trans legislation and all right-wing attacks on LGBTQ people. Noncompliance with these bigoted laws should be organized by the labor movement among workers tasked with enforcing them.

• Full legal rights and equality for trans and queer people, including the right to selfidentification! We completely oppose the attempts of the right wing to spread antitrans bigotry and isolate LGBTQ people from society.

• Fighting gender oppression means fighting for our rights to bodily autonomy, reproductive justice including universal childcare, and Medicare for All including free reproductive and gender-affirming care.

A New Political Party For Working People

Invest In Our Basic Needs

• Pass strong rent control. End economic • Republicans are resorting to divide-andevictions. Tax the rich and big business to rule scapegoating because the GOP have fund permanently affordable, high-quality no real answers to the questions facing social housing. working people, but the corporate Demo- • No pay cuts! We need a significant raise cratic Party offers no solution to right-wing in the minimum wage and to tie raises to attacks against workers and marginalized inflation. people and has repeatedly failed to use • An immediate transition to Medicare for All. their majorities to protect our rights. Biden Take for-profit hospital chains into public is so unpopular, the (un)Democratic Party ownership and retool them to provide free, isn’t even allowing debates. state-of-the-art healthcare to all.

• Fight for the highest possible vote for • Capitalism failed to stop COVID-19, with Cornel West for president, an independent the “post-pandemic” new normal consistsocialist with roots in the movement as a ing of total indifference to public health. We step towards building a new, working-class, urgently need permanently free and accesmulti-racial party that organizes and fights sible testing, paid sick leave, and to take for workers’ interests.

Big Pharma into public ownership – vaccines should be for public health, not profit!

• Bring back the COVID-era child tax credit and make it permanent. Fully fund highquality, universal childcare. No cuts to food stamps!

• Fully fund public education! End school privatization. Give educators an immediate 25% raise and increase staffing. Cancel all student debt and make public college tuition-free.

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A Socialist Program For Environmental Disaster • We need fully-funded emergency systems to protect and evacuate people from ever-increasing storms, floods, and fires, and we need to tax the rich to reimburse

WHY I JOINED SOCIALIST ALTERNATIVE VALIELZA O’KEEFE, BOSTON I first got involved with politics in 2020 when I learned about the sexual assault crisis at my university, Arizona State. I disrupted an awards reception with ASU’s President, Michael Crow, and called his administration out for malfeasance. While the call-out was effective in making him angry, it did little to actually change things.

I did not organize afterwards, and the few student groups concerned about the issue had no strategy. After the short-lived thrill of the disruption passed, I felt extremely defeated and hopeless – I wasn’t sure there was any way to defeat the rape culture predominant on campus. I experienced “activist burnout” and pulled away from politics.

Later, I started listening to the Bad Faith podcast for some leftist analysis of current events. I was surprised to find that the host, Briahna Joy Gray, could cut through issues so clearly. She changed my mind about voting for third parties; the duopoly has done nothing but maintain the status quo. Then she had Socialist Alternativr Citycouncilmeber Kshama Sawant come on for an interview, and I was sold. I was looking for a way to get involved where my actions would actually matter, and not just

working people for their destroyed homes and livelihoods.

• In the wake of ecological disasters like chemical spills, corporations should immediately be responsible for relocation costs, health costs, and home remediation.

• We need a union jobs program to rapidly expand green infrastructure including a massive expansion of free, high quality, fast public transit.

• Fossil fuels can’t coexist with a sustainable future – ban new oil and gas drilling and take the top 100 polluting companies into democratic public ownership, while implementing a democratically planned, just transition to 100% green energy!

End Racist Policing And Criminal (in)Justice • There is still a massive fight to be waged against police violence. We need a new movement in the streets and mass organizations of struggle to fight for Black liberation!

• Arrest and convict killer cops! Purge police forces of anyone with known ties to white supremacist groups or any cop who has committed violent or racist attacks.

• End the militarization of police: ban the use of “crowd control” weapons and disarm police on patrol.

• Put policing under the control of democratically-elected civilian boards with power over hiring and firing, reviewing budget priorities, and the power to subpoena.

• Beyond fighting to end racist policing, we need a struggle against all forms of racism in our society, including segregationist housing and education policies.

be performative. I wanted to do much more than just vote every few years.

I was really impressed to hear about how Kshama, in coordination with SA in Seattle, had managed to pass a bill that finally taxed Amazon. I was only further impressed when I heard about the recall campaign against her pushed by Amazon and corporate Democrats in an attempt to undo the wins achieved in Seattle. I realized that sustained organizing was the only way to not only win victories like those, but protect them. I’m very grateful to be a SA member now and am eager to continue growing my organizing experience. J

No To Imperialist Wars • Socialist Alternative completely opposes Russian imperialism’s brutal invasion of Ukraine. Ordinary Ukrainians who already suffer exploitation, oppression, corruption, and growing poverty conditions now face the horror of war and bloodshed.

• We oppose the aggressive imperialist agenda of NATO and the US for whom Ukrainians are a pawn in the wider Cold War conflict with Chinese imperialism.

• De-escalating the rapidly deteriorating situation in Ukraine requires the return of Russian troops to the barracks in Russia and the withdrawal of all NATO troops from Eastern Europe.

• Build a massive anti-war and anti-imperialist movement linking up workers and youth across borders! Sending increasingly destructive weapons to the conflict only serves to escalate & poses a greater risk of all-out war – only socialist internationalism can end war and destruction and win lasting peace and stability for the working masses around the world.

The Whole System Is Guilty • Capitalism produces pandemics, poverty, racism, transphobia, environmental destruction, and war. We need an international struggle against this failed system.

• Bring the top 500 companies and banks into democratic public ownership.

• We need a socialist world! This means a democratic socialist plan for the economy based on the interests of the overwhelming majority of people and the planet.

EDITORIAL

TOM CREAN, NEW YORK CITY A year ago, many economists predicted that the US was headed for recession.

But in the course of 2023, those same economists have become increasingly optimistic about the prospects of avoiding a recession. Recently, even “Doctor Doom” Nouriel Roubini, who famously predicted the ‘08 crisis, declared that the US will either experience a mild recession or no recession at all – a so-called soft landing. A year ago, he characterized this same view as “delusional.”

A year ago, there were good reasons for Roubini’s view: the highest inflation since the 1970s led to the Federal Reserve raising interest rates at the fastest pace in 40 years. The effect of stimulus measures in 2020 and 2021 was petering out and global economic insecurity was aggravated by the Ukraine War. By the start of 2023, manufacturing, still an important part of the American economy, was slowing down markedly. It has contracted for eight straight months.

Then in the spring, several major banks collapsed including SVB, the bank of high tech venture capitalists. This had the hallmarks of the beginning of a financial crisis, which is often the harbinger of a recession. It exposed massive problems with devalued bank assets (especially long-term Treasury bonds) due to interest rate rises. One estimate, probably way too low, was that there were a total of $620 billion in “unrealized losses” on bank balance sheets. The Federal Reserve and Treasury went to panic stations and stepped in with a massive bailout. Even though this succeeded in steadying financial markets, this crisis pointed to a

Trying to predict the exact “timing of recessions is often very difficult because of the range of variables involved.

What is clear are the longerterm trends. We have entered an era of extreme global instability which makes more frequent crises inevitable.

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OCTOBER 2023

potential credit crunch where businesses and individuals would find it much harder to get a loan, which would help trigger a recession.

Recession Delayed?

And yet, during the spring and summer, a recession did not materialize. Why? There are a number of factors both international and domestic. The world economy did not experience as sharp a downturn as expected, despite massive inflation and debt crises, especially in a number of neocolonial countries. The warmer winter took the edge off the projected energy crisis in Europe.

In the US, virtual full employment sustained demand.

Employers were reluctant to lay off the workers who they had a hard time finding during the Great Resignation in 2021.

The tech industry has been an exception, with significant layoffs in a number of companies. Inflationary pressure eased somewhat, although it is still hitting working people hard with continuing rent increases and the sharply rising cost of eating out as two examples. Demand was also boosted by pandemic-era stimulus checks (long since spent) and higher savings for part of the population who were able to work from home. On top of that, child tax credits temporarily cut child poverty by 30% while the moratorium on student loan payments helped millions.

Consumer spending accounts for 70% of economic activity in the US. American consumer spending has also played a significant role in the world economy over the past several decades, helping to soak up excess capital. This spending is maintained by the massive extension of credit. Capitalist commentators kept pointing to the “resilience” of the American consumer as the crucial factor pointing away from a recession.

Recession Looms Again In the past month, data has come out that is beginning to raise the specter of recession again. A widely reported study by the San Francisco Federal Reserve Bank states that the savings of 80% of the population have been exhausted. Pandemicera programs have ended, and, as of October, people have to start repaying student loans. Credit card debt has hit record levels, even higher than before the 2008-9 crash. It is also reported that sales are down at some key retailers. As a Business Insider headline states, “The U.S. Consumer Is Starting

To Crack.”

In addition to this, a major crisis looms in commercial real estate due to a massive drop in occupancy, partly the result of remote working. This could cause the financial crisis to resume as a number of banks are deeply enmeshed in this market. The housing market is also beginning to be affected by higher mortgage rates. In general there is a lag time before the economy feels the full effects of higher interest rates. The lag time may have been extended for particular reasons but the effects are starting to show.

Meanwhile, there are significant international developments pointing toward a deeper crisis, particularly in China, the world’s second-largest economy. The country’s property sector, accounting for 30% of the economy, has been in a slow motion free fall; manufacturing is slowing down; and youth unemployment is at 21%. There is also evidence of deflation, a general fall in prices, even more dangerous than inflation.

While the effects of a major crisis in China on the American economy are hard to calculate, it clearly would have an impact.

The Switzerland-based Financial Stability Board recently declared, “The global economic recovery is losing momentum and the effects of the rise in interest rates in major economies are increasingly being felt.” The US will not escape these effects.

What It All Means Trying to predict the exact timing of recessions is often very difficult because of the range of variables involved. Capitalist economists have a vested interest in playing down the dangers to their system.

But while the situation clearly points towards a downturn, we can’t yet say how deep that downturn will be.

What is clearer are the longer-term trends. We have entered an era of extreme global instability which makes more frequent crises inevitable. Deglobalization and the fracturing of the advanced

capitalist economies into two capitalist blocs, centered on the US and China, means that capitalism’s ability to manage economic crises is much reduced. In 2008, Barack Obama was able to coordinate a response by key powers, including China, to the biggest financial crisis since the Great Depression. China was the “engine” that then helped pull the world economy out of the ditch. All of this is inconceivable today.

The deeper contradictions at the heart of today’s economic problems go back to the

crisis of overaccumulation of capital in the neoliberal era, stretching all the way back to the end of the 90s. This included massive overproduction and overcapacity. The capitalists’ answer to the problem was to stimulate demand by lowering interest rates to zero, and then to negative territory, and to have an era of “easy money.” This in turn has led to a series of speculative bubbles and massive, unsustainable indebtedness. As long as inflation was contained mainly in financial markets, the party could continue, despite two devastating crises in ‘08-09 and in 2020. But with the reemergence of inflation and sharply rising interest rates, the “easy money” strategy that papered over the deeper problems is broken.

A recession, especially a deep recession, will be a disaster for working people.

It will mean the return of mass unemployment, people losing their homes, and the growth of poverty. The small gains made as a result of pandemic-era measures will be completely wiped away. This will shock working people temporarily but it will also contribute to the growing loss of faith in the system. Socialists must explain that the only answer to rotting capitalism is a democratically planned global economy under the control of the working class. J

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L ABOR MOVEMENT

AUTOWORKERS OUT ON STRIKE ESCALATE TO WIN BIG

by TY NOLAN, BOSTON

The United Auto Workers (UAW) are expanding their strike against the Big Three (Ford, GM, and Stellantis) to two new plants belonging to Ford and GM. As we go to print, roughly 7,000 more workers are joining pickets across the country to demand a strong contract that includes 40% raises, an end to all tiers, job protections against the growing threat of non-union electric vehicle production, and a 32 hour workweek with 40 hours pay.

All three companies are offering 20% raises (a record proposal) but this completely ignores the attacks on workers wages by the Big Three in recent years. Wages were cut on average by 20% from 2017-2022. Costof-living adjustments were removed from the contract during the 2008 crisis so the companies could remain “financially stable,” i.e. profitable for investors. In an era of high inflation and workers gaining confidence to fight back, “record” contract proposals based on old standards are not enough.

Workers are increasingly turning towards unions to fight back against corporate greed and the mounting pressures caused by inflation and stagnating wages. Over 360,000 US workers have gone on strike so far this year (not including the near-strike at UPS and potential strike at American Airlines) compared to just 160,000 over the past two years combined. A high-profile victory in the auto industry has the potential to be a breakthrough moment for the US labor movement.

Biden And Trump We are barrelling towards a rematch of Trump vs. Biden for president, and both politicians are battling for support from the UAW and working-class voters. Biden became the first sitting president to ever visit a picket line on September 26, just nine months after he signed to break a strike by railway workers.

During his visit, he said he is in support of auto workers demanding 40% raises. UAW President Shawn Fain invited Biden to the picket line in the midst of a tense stand-off, with the UAW taking the rare (and correct) step of withholding its endorsement saying that politicians will have to earn their support this election cycle. Meanwhile, Trump tried to court the UAW’s endorsement by holding a “pro-union” rally at a non-union auto plant.

Both men are reading the room and know that unions are more popular today than any

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politician. Biden is saying positive things now, but ultimately, he cannot tolerate a long term threat to the auto industry and will put pressure on the union leadership to call off the strike as time goes on. The role of both Democratic and Republican politicians is to manage the country on behalf of the capitalist class, like the CEOs at the Big Three.

Biden’s attendance at the pickets should be taken as a sign that the overwhelming support for the strike is bearing down on the backs of corporate stooges like Biden.

Stand Up Strikes This strike at UAW does not look like other strikes. Fain is claiming to have created a new strategy called the “stand up strike.” Rather than all plants striking at once, the union is calling on select plants to “stand up” and strike. Meanwhile, workers at all other plants are being asked to continue working without a contract. The union says this strategy provides “maximum leverage and maximum flexibility.”

Fain calls it an “innovative” approach to striking designed to protect the UAW’s $825 million strike fund while maintaining the threat of expanding the strike. The hope is that the Big Three will choose to come to the table with better offers rather than put themselves at risk of a strike that seriously hurts their profits. The companies are seemingly rewarded for good behavior when they make progress, with Ford being spared from the first expansion of the strike, and now Stellantis has been spared this time around for making concessions around cost of living adjustments and the right to strike over plant closures.

Going on strike has already forced a better deal. In a major victory for the union, both Ford and GM have reportedly agreed to eliminate the hated wage tiers system. Compare this to the Canadian auto union Unifor, which also represents Big Three workers, who recently announced a tentative agreement at Ford with just a 15% general wage increase over three years and maintains “temp” workers. Winning the strongest possible contract, though, will require fully democratic discussions are had across the UAW and the broader labor movement to determine how best to truly maximize leverage during a strike.

Fain frequently draws comparisons to the famous sit-down strikes by auto workers in

the 1930s, and claims the stand up strikes follow in the same tradition. However, this approach of deliberately sparing the bosses from the full weight of an all-out strike, and rewarding those who show progress, is the total opposite of what made the sit-down strikes so effective.

The sit-down tactic was developed in the 1930s by workers following brutal attacks faced during the Great Depression. The auto workers at the time were fighting for union recognition along with a 30-hour work week and 6-hour days. If any individual worker on their own tried to demand these things, they’d likely be fired on the spot and replaced with one of the 16 million unemployed workers at the time. The only way to take on the bosses was to organize into a single union, sit down, and show them who really creates the profits.

The sit-down strikes were a response to the many barriers those workers faced, including a union leadership that acted as a stopgap on struggle. They were organized from below following democratic discussions around a series of demands and electing a strike committee in every workplace. Importantly, the strategy emphasized the need to expand the strike to as many plants as possible, especially the most profitable ones to hit the bosses where it hurts.

The socialist organizers of these strikes understood any strike is a test of power between workers and the bosses. They understood that the fight against any boss is a fight against the ruling class as a whole, including the courts and corporate politicians. Winning a strike meant generalizing the struggle into the wider working class, including unemployed workers and families, and mobilizing them directly into the struggle to win. This strategy of expanding the strike and seeking active solidarity from other unions is what just produced a record victory for the Writers Guild of America.

Next Steps Fain won a tightly contested union leadership election by about 500 votes, but the 97% strike authorization vote has given him a mandate to wage a serious struggle at the Big Three. He has taken many positive steps forward by organizing the first ever simultaneous strike against all three companies, but auto workers are showing they want to go further.

On a recent Facebook livestream hosted by

Fain, auto workers were frequently commenting to expand the strike to all plants.

The bosses are not sitting idly while pickets pop up across the country. 2,000 GM workers in Kansas, 68 Stellantis workers in Ohio, and 600 Ford workers in Michigan have joined the growing list of workers who have been temporarily laid off. While Ford and Stellantis have been cut slack by the union, they are engaged in a campaign to wedge divisions between workers on the pickets and those still working without a contract. Workers temporarily laid off are not entitled to layoff pay because of the strike. Instead they need to navigate applying for unemployment benefits. This amounts to a small-scale lockout by the Big Three.

A major drawback of the stand up strike is that there are effectively three groups of workers within the union, those on strike, those still working, and those who have been laid off. Fain explicitly told members that staying on the job was as important as walking out, because “that is the only way the strategy works.” This sets up a prolonged battle of attrition between multi-billion dollar corporations and workers who are struggling to pay rent, healthcare costs, and maintain benefits.

The Big Three have shown they are willing to defend their profits. Their willingness to lay off one worker for every four on strike will put strain on these divisions created by the stand up strike tactic.

Innovation within the labor movement has a rich and powerful history. It will always be necessary to be innovative in order to overcome the enormous power of the bosses.

But this innovation needs to be rooted in empowering rank-and-file organizing and a class-struggle approach. UAW should facilitate expanding the strike to all plants and locals should have elections for strike committees and picket captains to lead the strike.

Expanding the strike is the best way to fight back against the divisive layoffs and win the strongest possible contract.

If the strike fund is a barrier, UAW needs to appeal to the public and other unions to donate to keep striking workers on the picket lines. The Teamsters, for example, could contribute to the UAW’s strike fund following their deal without a strike at UPS. Fain has the support and the ability to follow in the tradition of the sit down strikes and truly maximize their leverage by shutting down all production. J S O C I A L I S TA LT E R N AT I V E . O R G

L ABOR MOVEMENT

THE UNION WAVE HITS

[ REALITY TV ]

SARAH DULLAERT, SEATTLE

EXCERPT

FLIGHT ATTENDANTS READY TO STRIKE FOR BETTER PAY AND WORKING CONDITIONS

by BARBARA O

AIRLINE WORKER, DALLAS An overwhelming 99.47% of American Airlines flight attendants have voted to authorize a strike, with over 93% of eligible flight attendants participating in the vote.

American Airlines (AA) is operated by over 26,000 flight attendants who are demanding better pay and working conditions against the corporation’s reported $1.3 billion profit in the second quarter of 2023. Their union, the Association of Professional Flight Attendants (APFA) is one of three main unions representing flight attendants in the US, alongside the Transportation Workers of America and the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, which is led by international president Sara Nelson.

Labor struggles have shaped the airline industry in the United States, and with support for unions at a historic high, a flight attendant strike would be a powerful tool to flex behind their demands, which include a 35% one-time wage increase along with 6% annual raises and increased benefits.

At informational pickets to announce the strike authorization, AA flight attendants were joined by airline ramp workers, pilots, actors, writers, and transportation workers from other industries and unions. To see the more traditional, ‘heavy battalions’ of the working class in logistics, warehouses, and transportation escalating with major action is key to reversing the race to the bottom workers have faced in the neoliberal era.

The notoriously sexist industry of the past has significantly shifted, but the contemporary battle for gender equality in aviation is a material fight for better pay and working conditions.

READ THE FULL ARTICLE

Streaming services like Netflix, Hulu, and Peacock changed the game for unscripted (reality) TV. Over the last five years, unscripted TV has had a major resurgence. There has never been a survey of just how much the whole industry is worth, and reporting is sparse on how much cash some of these shows actually make networks and streaming companies.

What we do know is that reality TV shows bring in a loyal cult following and the cost of buying a 30-second ad is hundreds of thousands of dollars. The profitability of unscripted TV ripples throughout the economy, getting their millions of viewers’ eyes on big business products and services. It is reported that Survivor pays their host $8 million a year and America’s Got Talent paid one of their hosts (Simon Cowell) $95 million in 2022. Unscripted TV is cheap to produce.

There is no script to write and cast members do not get paid anywhere near what their traditional actor counterparts do.

Crucially, reality talent is not unionized, even if they become regulars on the series. With mainstream writers and actors on strike, unscripted TV allows production companies to continue to put out entertainment, and undermines the economic power of unionized talent (on strike at the time of writing).

Unscripted TV was also used as a fallback for entertainment profits during another major writers strike (2007-2008). The rise in reality TV in those years is not a coincidence.

Not all unscripted TV appearances are a one-time thing.

In the new era of unscripted television – appearing on shows like the Challenge, Survivor, Below Deck, or Vanderpump Rules is a full time career for a lucky few. With the rise of the influencer phenomenon, popular unscripted shows often lead to personal fame, to later monetize online. A layer of workers now consider taking a chance on unscripted TV an economically viable pursuit, in one way or another. With a recession and increased instability in the job market, being cast on a reality show is appealing to some, especially on an ongoing basis.

Reality TV Talent Is Hyper-Exploited It’s incredible, given what must be serious profits in unscripted television, that reality TV cast members make on average $1,700 per week in the United States. Typically, these performers quit their jobs to appear on a series, and are overworked in extreme conditions (both psychological and physical).

Unscripted shows make up over 30% of all streaming content, but the cast do not make residuals, which a traditional actor would always have in their contract. In fact, the reverse is more common: for the network to take a cut of the money stars make from brand deals and product sales in return for providing a platform with the show.

It’s especially unfair for those that appeared on shows before streaming existed, who now have no control over use of their content on streaming services today, and were never given the opportunity to renegotiate terms after streaming became the norm. If a cast member has no plans to start a business, become a musician (typical for contestants on shows like The Voice), or sell products on Instagram, they miss out.

Reality TV Casts Should Strike With Screen Actors and Writers

episodes,” said ex-Real Housewives star Bethenny Frankel, who recently called for a “reality reckoning” to examine the mistreatment of reality TV cast members. Bethenny Frankel herself capitalized successfully off her appearance on reality TV, but most are not so lucky.

Most cast members of Love is Blind, for example, were paid below minimum wage, overworked, and will not see a dime of residual pay while the show brings in record viewership on Netflix. It is not enough that these shows give the cast a platform, they should be paid residuals if the show makes a fortune off streaming. SAG-AFTRA have lent public support to Frankel’s efforts to improve conditions for talent in unscripted television. The union has also confirmed they could actually cover some unscripted talent now depending on the type of production and network.

SAG-AFTRA’s statement reads: “We stand ready to assist Bethenny Frankel, Bryan Freedman, and Mark Geragos along with reality performers and our members in the fight and are tired of studios and production companies trying to circumvent the Union in order to exploit the talent that they rely upon to make their product...We encourage any reality performers and/or members to reach out to SAG-AFTRA’s Entertainment Contracts Department so that we may work together toward the protection of the reality performers ending the exploitative practices that have developed in this area and to engage in a new path to Union coverage.”

It will take more than just a few workers reaching out to join established contracts with networks. Forming a union will be a massive battle and will require sustained organizing.

Production companies will not give up such an exploitable and reliable source of profit easily. Reality TV stars with large platforms have tremendous influence and could help organize a fightback.

Undoubtedly, unionizing reality performers would strengthen the labor movement, especially if they are organized into the already fighting Screen Actors Guild. Some reality stars are seeking to fight back through the courts.

Love is Blind cast members recently began a legal battle with the show, suing for inhumane conditions while filming. But with a union, that expensive court case would instead be a contract battle, where workers can actively participate in the union structures, and can even wield the power of a strike to enforce fair treatment. Within the courts, production companies have the upper hand. Collective bargaining and united struggle are more powerful tools for workers than the courts.

Lisa Vanderpump, a wealthy reality TV star-turned-producer celebrated the hyper-exploitation that keeps costs down: “One of the great things about reality shows is that they’ve always been able to be produced for less money than scripted shows,” she said. “And I don’t really understand how you can have a union for people that are normally plucked out of obscurity.” Let’s be clear: what she means by “I don’t understand” is that she does not support a union. Unions can take many forms, and even a portion of unscripted talent being unionized will improve conditions for anyone working on set. How famous someone is has, in reality, nothing to do with whether or not they should have a union – and in fact, as the whole of the entertainment industry shows, it’s those with the least fame who need the protection of a union the most. Ironically the cast of Vanderpump’s own show have enjoyed over a decade of celebrity. It’s time for reality TV talent to join the labor movement and fight for better conditions, better pay, and lend powerful solidarity to striking actors! J

“Why isn’t reality TV on strike? I got paid $7,250 for my first season of reality TV and people are still watching those OCTOBER 2023

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ENVIRONMENT

CLIMATE DISASTERS DON’T KILL EQUALLY JESADA JITPRAPHAKHAN, LOS ANGELES A magnitude 6.8 earthquake rocked the Moroccan province of Al Haouz last month, destroying an estimated 50,000 homes and killing nearly 3000. The region is poor, rural, and largely populated by the marginalized Amazigh people.

Unsurprisingly, they receive little state support, and most of their substandard buildings didn’t stand a chance against the quake.

Some 4000 kilometers east, Storm Daniel flooded Greece, Bulgaria, and Turkey before lurching southward to do its worst, obliterating two dams near the Libyan city of Derna and killing potentially a fifth of the city’s population. These dams were time bombs: neither saw any maintenance in over a decade, a consequence of Libya’s civil war and political instability.

Capitalism is driving climate change – we know that for certain, and climate change supercharges the intensity of most natural disasters. As time goes on, “extreme weather” is becoming so frequent, it’s almost more normal than extreme.

But besides preventing climate change, the society we live in should have a responsibility to plan and construct infrastructure that can weather the worst of the elements and protect the masses of workers who populate most of this planet. In reality, the profit-driven system of capitalism has shown itself completely incapable, and it will be up to working people to build a society up to the task.

Capitalism Produces Shoddy Housing In the High Atlas villages of Al Haouz, homes are constructed primarily with mud brick, rammed (compressed) earth, and stone. These materials produce buildings that are very effective at protecting residents from scorching heat – more effective than concrete – and are also valued for reasons of cultural preservation. But crucially, it’s far less expensive to source local, natural materials than it is to purchase and transport concrete and steel deep into the mountains. As structural engineering professor Mehrdad Sasani succinctly expressed: “The most important reason for that area being so drastically affected by the earthquake is the lack of socioeconomic resources.”

Higher quality building construction is not strictly a question of materials. Where concrete and steel rebar have been implemented in working-class Moroccan neighborhoods, it is often done sloppily. The mere presence of these stronger materials emboldens some builders to cut corners: mixing concrete with muddy water or using less rebar than necessary.

The earthquakes that struck Turkey, Syria, and Kurdistan earlier this year saw even some of the newest buildings fail.

Most collapsed buildings in Turkey were constructed with non-ductile concrete, whereas ductile concrete integrates sufficient steel reinforcement to provide both strength and flexibility. Turkey passed a code decades ago mandating construction with ductile concrete, but widespread government “construction amnesties” provided wide latitude for building companies tied to the government to bypass standards and rake in money.

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Well-placed, well constructed buildings, by contrast, can withstand considerable destructive forces. The Hagia Sophia, the iconic mosque in Istanbul, was built 1500 years ago on bedrock. Its structures have survived over a dozen major earthquakes. In Tokyo, affluent districts receive seismic springs and other protections in their buildings, while poorer areas lack them.

In a society where it’s more profitable to build shabby buildings for working class people, earthquakes do not destroy equally. A socialist society could save countless lives by producing structurally stable, ductile housing for working people, concentrating neighborhoods on bedrock where possible, and integrating earthquake protection features like base isolation and damping devices.

Completely Unprepared For Fires

Forest fires are now burning almost twice as much tree cover worldwide as they did 20 years ago, a trend enormously fueled by the hotter, drier conditions caused by climate change. The 72 million homes at risk of wildfire damage in the US are growing. As a result, many US insurance companies have canceled homeowners’ insurance policies, unable to guarantee steady profits from at-risk homes. As it turns out, higher wildfire risk is well-correlated with higher poverty rate, and majority Native American, Black, or Hispanic communities are far more vulnerable to wildfires than other populations. If their policies are terminated, many working-class homeowners will be left with no affordable options.

The wildfires in Maui, said to be the worst disaster in Hawaii’s history, also razed many uninsured working-class Workers Overexposed To Floods homes. Many Maui residents, especially Native Hawaiians, The impact of Storm Daniel in Libya was made cata- pass down homes generationally and aren’t required to have strophic by the long-term neglect of the Mansour and Derna insurance, which many wouldn’t be able afford anyway. Rentdams. Built in the 1970s for crop irrigation, household water, ers on the other hand, who are some of the most rent-burand flood control, the dams sustained storm damage and dened in the country, face a worsening housing crisis in the cracks were apparent for decades. 2 million Euros were allo- aftermath of the disaster. cated for repairs, but the contracts were never completed.

The scale of this destruction was preventable. Despite This is unsurprising in a country thrust into a protracted inter- its tropical climate, 0.5% of Hawaii’s land burns each year, nal conflict over, among other things, control of Libya’s vast a fraction on par with or greater than other states. Regardoil resources, following the NATO-backed overthrow of Libyan less, in 2022, the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency dictator Muammar Gaddafi. ranked wildfires to be a “low” threat to humans. But Hawaii’s Of course, flood risks are globally pervasive, affecting fire departments and prevention programs have been underfar more than communities in war-torn nations, but they funded for years. Maui has just 65 firefighters working at any always hit working-class and poor one time, shared across three islands. A $1.5 milpeople the hardest. 23% of the lion bill to fund firebreaks and water infrastructure, world’s population (1.81 billion itself completely inadequate, died in committee last people) would be exposed in the year. Meanwhile, Hawaiian Electric admitted that In a society where event of a 1-in-100 year flood. Of its power lines, miles of which were left uninsulated it’s more profitable those people, 43% live on less than and carried by dilapidated power poles, caused $5.50 per day and 89% live in poor at least one of the fires. The company spent less to build shabby or middle-income countries. These than $245,000 on mitigating wildfire risk on Maui buildings for workbetween 2019 and 2022, while the president of its parent company doubled his pay to $3.6 million. ing class people, We need a system that can rapidly take necesearthquakes do not sary measures to manage land for fire risk: to clear flammable vegetation, create firebreaks, invest in destroy equally. fire-protective measures for buildings, and upgrade power lines. This is a substantial amount of unprofitable work, but could provide thousands of well-paying union jobs. The insurance industry needs to be scrapped entirely and replaced with a free system that would fully compensate homeowners in the event of disaster.

“

”

Flash flood damaga in Derna, eastern Libya. Sept 11, 2023.

are parts of the world that have far fewer and lower quality flood protection systems than high income countries have – and sometimes none at all.

Working-class people often live in more flood-prone areas because housing can be cheaper and jobs are closer. For instance, rent in flood-prone neighborhoods of Accra and Addis Ababa are 14-56% lower than unexposed neighborhoods, and workers in Dar es Salaam who have experienced multiple floods live over 25 minutes closer to their workplaces than workers who have not been hit by floods.

This is largely a result of dangerous urbanization plans driven by capitalism worldwide, which develop concrete jungles on top of floodplains and eliminate wetlands. Areas with lost wetlands can see flood peaks increase by up to 80%.

Capitalism is unable to reclaim floodplains and reconstruct wetlands on the scale that would be needed to seriously reduce flood risk. The cost of moving sections of urban areas is too great. Under socialism, working people could decide on development priorities democratically, not with an aim to maximize profit. This way, we could prioritize building high quality affordable housing in flood-safe locations, expand public transit to connect farther flung neighborhoods as needed, and we could de-urbanize vast floodplains and wetlands, restoring them to as close to their natural state as possible.

We Need Socialism Capitalism is, with one hand, destroying the planet, and with the other, overexposing workers to the worst effects of disasters. It simply can’t help itself. Capitalists make decisions based on how much money they can make in the short term, not how many lives may be lost in the event of disaster.

The state is governed by the same logic, prioritizing business incentives over disaster prevention, only to oversee losses that dwarf its disaster budget. So when people die, homes are wrecked, or neighborhoods are rendered uninhabitable – these are not mere tragedies, but the preventable outcomes of crimes by the bosses.

Disaster mitigation and avoidance are absolutely possible, but the profit motive needs to be removed from the picture.

Only a socialist society can bring these solutions to their full potential.

The very people who can bring about a socialist transformation of society are the billions of working people who, in any given year, are exposed to disasters caused by the neglect of the capitalist class. By rallying together around a program of demands – for high quality affordable housing, for environmentally responsible infrastructure development, for disasterproof power grids fueled by clean energy, for free healthcare and more – a mass working-class movement can end the anarchic system of capitalism, reverse climate change, and keep people safe. J

S O C I A L I S TA LT E R N AT I V E . O R G

E D U C AT I O N

THE 2023-24 SCHOOL YEAR IS ALREADY A MESS FIONA CAVANAGH, 8th Grade Math Teacher in the School District of Philadelphia

“I teach 7th grade. They are still performing on a 4th grade level.”

“They just keep passing them on, passing them on... I could put as many zeros in these grade books as I want to.

They’re gonna move that child to the 8th grade next year.”

“I could probably count on one hand how many kids are actually performing on grade level.”

These are quotes from a video by teacher Marquis Bryant who posted a 3-minute rant about student underperformance on TikTok on September 19. He describes a seemingly “unteachable” crop of students and asks why people are not talking about this phenomenon.

Well, people are talking now. Bryant’s video garnered millions of views within days of being posted and was reshared across social media platforms. Several “stitches” – TikTok’s feature of responding to a video with a video – of Bryant’s video also went viral from exasperated teachers sharing their own similar testimonies. They speak about classrooms with wildly inconsistent levels and students who struggle to pay attention and follow directions. One said, “These kids can’t read. They can’t decode [words]. They have no vocabulary, no background knowledge.

I’ve never seen anything like it.”

Test Scores Take A Nosedive It’s not just anecdotal. Test scores and teacher surveys have shown dramatic decreases in students’ math, reading, and social skills. The National Assessment of Educational Progress, known as America’s “report card,” shows math scores for 13-year-olds now at their lowest levels since 1990, plunging by the largest margin ever recorded from 2020-2023. In a survey from last spring, 70% of educators said students are misbehaving more now compared with

OCTOBER 2023

2019, and 80% report that students are less motivated to do their work.

We can trace the crisis in education today to the corporate “Education Reform” agenda championed by both Democrats and Republicans over the last few decades, with disastrous results. This was composed of school choice, standardized tests, underfunding, and attacks on teachers and our unions. All of these strategies to “fix” public schools, especially in poor communities, were meant to purposefully starve out public education and make room for privatization and profitmaking. Now we are seeing how virtual school and the return to in-person learning over the last three years have accelerated the problems from the neoliberal “reform” era.

Meanwhile, broader societal crises, from economic instability to gun violence, continue to play out in our schools. Public schools have also become a focal point of right-wing backlash: educators have long been under attack from the right on the basis of broader attacks on the public sector, but now the crusade against progressive ideas around gender, sexuality, and race pose acute threats to teachers’ job security while also exacerbating the youth mental health crisis.

The result of these conditions has been an exodus from teaching. In a study of eight states, teacher turnover was shown to be at its highest point in at least five years. Shortstaffing schools creates a vicious cycle, putting even more pressure on remaining workers and destabilizing students’ education.

Teachers have long been overworked and underpaid, but the stress is mounting and many feel that it is no longer a sustainable career.

Save Our Schools!

Today’s disillusioned teachers need a revival of the wave of educators’ organizing that began in 2018 in West Virginia.

When teachers, students, and families feel so strained it can lead to isolation and even antagonism, but with strong fighting demands and a united movement, we can fight together for the schools our students need. We need fully funded public education paid for by taxing the rich.

Schools need to hire more teachers, counselors, and other staff with proper training, access to high-quality teaching resources, and livable pay. With more staff, we will be able to have smaller class sizes, which provide better quality education and emotional

support for students, and lighten the load for teachers. We have to take an offensive approach not just against attacks on education but for bold steps forward to adequately educate the next generation.

Some of the viral teacher testimonials on TikTok fault parents for the behavior and low skill levels we are seeing in schools. It is understandable for teachers, who are themselves scapegoated for failures in education, to push back. Our students’ ability to learn in school often is a reflection of their living conditions outside of school. But these living conditions reflect broad social failure, not the failure of individual parents. Long working hours for parents, high costs of housing, food, healthcare and the presence of trauma and violence makes students’ lives and teachers’ jobs harder. The 2012 Chicago teachers’ strike proclaimed that teachers’ working conditions are our students’ learning conditions and they modeled a community-based

organizing approach including demands that went beyond the classroom like rent control.

Blaming overstretched parents lets the real culprits off the hook – politicians from both parties who, when they’re not openly attacking schools and educators, are systematically starving schools of funds and resources.

Even in the face of such chaos, teachers and families cannot and will not give up on our students and their education. They deserve schools that care about them, connect with them, and push them to succeed.

But ultimately, they deserve a safe, sustainable world which means a society built around meeting human needs instead of maximizing profit. The task of caring for and educating the next generation is our collective goal and to make it possible we must fight collectively for an education system that respects teachers and students. J

8TH GRADE MATH

8TH GRADE READING

SOURCE: National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) 2022 School Survey, Institute of Education Sciences

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ONE

“Supporting a third-party candidate means we’ll end up with a right-wing President because of the spoiler effect.”

TEDDY SHIBABAW, MADISON Democratic strategists are beside themselves with lesser-evilist apoplexy over Cornel West’s independent socialist campaign for president. They are reviving the specter of past Green Party candidates as being responsible for right-wing administrations presiding over the country. The prime example of this is Clinton-Era operative James Carville, who is perhaps the slimiest Democratic Party corporate hack of them all. As in the past, he was recently once again resurrected from “MSNBC’s Cryochamber,” as The New Republic called it, to guard the party from any left challengers.

Quintessential quotes from Carville like saying Cornel West is “a threat to the constitutional order of the United States,” and that he’s just going to give the election to Trump, are emblematic of the vitriol unleashed by the corporate media by many other pundits.

This vitriol is necessary to shield Biden and the Democratic Party establishment from the embarrassing questions about how he could possibly be neck-and-neck in the polls with Trump, a four-times indicted megalomaniac with more than a dozen sexual harassment accusations to his name. The answer of course is that Biden’s entire record – whether in the US Senate, as VP to Obama, or as President – has been utterly destructive to the working class and oppressed.

Ralph Nader Didn’t Cost The Democrats The 2000 Election Lesser-evilism is an old game, perfected to fever pitch in the aftermath of Ralph Nader’s 2000 campaign for president on the Green Party ticket. James Carville went on Good Morning America and said “Don’t you think Ralph Nader has done enough damage to the country?

I mean, he was probably single handedly responsible for electing George Bush.” The truth however is that the idea that Nader cost Al Gore the election in 2000 is a lie.

Most Nader voters in the exit polls stated that if he wasn’t on the ballot, they would have just stayed home.

There were numerous far more substantial reasons Gore lost than Nader’s votes in Florida but the media and corporate politicians chose to focus all fire on Nader.

The Clinton/Gore administration’s record was not just totally uninspiring but included vicious attacks on workers and oppressed people.

Corporate free trade agreements like NAFTA

that gutted industrial jobs, virtually ending the Assistance for Families with Dependent Children program, massively ratcheting up the racist mass incarceration state and massive deregulation of essentially casino capitalism on Wall Street. Further, no questions are asked about the 308,000 registered Democrats in Florida who voted for Bush in 2000 compared to Nader’s 97,488.

Lesser evilism treats us like hamsters in a wheel with no exit ramp. In 2004 and 2008, we were harangued to vote Democrat to end Bush’s war on Iraq. Each time telling us how uniquely important that election was.

Then Obama continued the Iraq War for most of his presidency and further expanded the War on Terror to five additional countries. Essentially their aim is to force us to look at every election abstracted from the political events and historical period that led up to it or will follow it.

Meanwhile, lesser evilism allows both parties to get worse and more conservative over time.

Registered Republicans And Democrats Aren’t The Only Voters The fact of the matter is that there is a vast latent army of youth, working people, and the oppressed who do not vote because they see little to no potential for change in the established two corporate parties. Nader’s campaign in 2000 and to a much bigger extent Bernie’s primary campaigns, though ill fated, brought large numbers of new voters into the elections. They were animated by a bold call for a “political revolution against the billionaire class,” with transformative working class demands like Medicare for All and tuition-free public colleges and universities.

Further, there are people who voted for Trump who could be won over to a workingclass campaign that challenged the billionaire class. This is evidenced by the fact that in 2016, there were 12% of Bernie voters who switched to Trump in the general, as he was the only one remaining in the race who painted himself as anti-establishment, as disingenuous as that was.

“The idea that Nader cost Al Gore the election in 2000 is a lie.

Most Nader voters in the exit polls stated that if he wasn’t on the ballot, they would have just stayed home.”

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O T T O N O S F N T O S S E A W E L R E E N E R R TH PORT CO SUPSIDENT...

PRE

Y H W D N A . .. THEY ’RE .

G N O WR For u s , the key strategic priority is that the US working class and oppressed need our own mass left party, and we need to bring together new activists that will form the base of that now!

As the highest-profile independent left campaign since Nader in 2000, the Cornel West campaign offers a great potential opportunity for that, regardless of how many votes he gets in the end. The bottom line is that there will never be easy favorable terrain in which to campaign for a prominent independent left candidate like Cornel West. We have to build the movement now and take the necessary risks if we are going to build an independent mass working class party to fight unapologetically in the interests of the working class and oppressed. J

S O C I A L I S TA LT E R N AT I V E . O R G

OR

TWO

“Biden has done a good enough job that we don’t need to risk voting for an alternative.”

KEELY MULLEN, CHICAGO The 2024 election is shaping up to be the least requested rematch of all time. With all that is so obviously wrong in the world, historic numbers of Americans do not want either man to win. And yet, the two are barreling toward the general election. Neither party is even pretending to give voters a choice. The DNC has canceled primary debates, preferring to keep Joe Biden in the basement until election time comes, and Trump is not even attending Republican debates, contributing to the lowest viewership since 2015.

Voters were told in 2020 that voting for Joe Biden was the only way to beat Trump. Well, nearly four years later and not only is Trump in the running, he might very well win a second term after all. In October of 2020, Socialist Alternative wrote: “The space for the far right will very likely grow under a Biden administration and Trump may well continue building support for his ideas even if he loses.”

Joe Biden’s presidency not only didn’t stop Trump, it’s made him an even greater threat.

Why Joe Biden Isn’t The Answer To Trumpism Americans aren’t being given anything to vote for, only things to vote against. This is not a real choice. Very few people are genuinely excited about another four years of Joe Biden, and this is because he has done virtually nothing to make working people’s lives

better, despite having plenty of opportunities.

Here’s just a sampling of his failings – failings that can drive working people into the arms of the right.

On the campaign trail, Biden promised to establish a government-run health insurance plan, often referred to as the “public option.” This was intended to be an affordable alternative to the predatory private insurance most Americans have come to rely on.

In 2019, Biden said creating a public option would be the first thing he’d do after becoming president. This was before COVID, which made exceedingly clear how broken our private healthcare system is. Since taking office, not only has Biden not established a public option, he has literally not even said the phrase. Not once. In 2024, healthcare costs are expected to go up by 5.4%.

Joe Biden has anointed himself “the most pro-union president in American history.” This claim has been repeated over and over… and over. If measured by positive things Biden has done for labor, we can cite some important NLRB rulings and little else. If measured by the totality of his intervention into labor disputes, this title couldn’t be further from the truth. In December of 2022, Joe Biden added his name to the long list of strike-breaking US presidents. He orchestrated, along with the shameful participation of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, the crushing of a potentially historic rail strike where the workers were demanding, among other things, 15 sick days a year. 115,000 rail workers were

THREE

“Cornel West is never going to win, so it’s not worth voting for him.”

GREYSON VAN ARSDALE, CHICAGO

The American election system is a brutal one, with campaign season beginning often more than a year before the actual vote, campaign finance laws that benefit corporations and the wealthiest people on Earth, and many basic resources like even campaign software padlocked behind party doors. It’s not surprising that few third-party candidates run, and that not one of them has broken a double-digit vote percentage since 1968.

It is resoundingly likely that Cornel West will not win the Presidency in 2024. Of course, it’s not a closed question – West could win if he successfully built a movement in much the way Bernie Sanders did. Building such a movement is not a question of money or campaign software, though both are necessary, but a question of committing to a program of demands that speaks to working people, and relentlessly fighting to win them. After Bernie Sanders’ capitulation to the establishment of the Democratic Party, doing so would also require convincing a mass working-class audience of his commitment to follow through on those demands.

OCTOBER 2023

But the main reason to support West is not how likely he is to end up in the Oval Office. It’s because of what could be built in the process of fighting for it.

American politics largely don’t represent the viewpoints of American people. Just for example, 57% of Americans support single-payer healthcare, or Medicare for All – even though neither major party will support it. 62% support a federal $15 an hour minimum wage, but both Republicans and Democrats in Congress laugh at the mere thought.

Working-class people need a party where we can democratically decide on a platform of our own, hold our elected officials accountable to fighting for it, and organize ourselves both inside and outside of the electoral arena. A mass working-class party should include community organizations, labor unions, student groups, and more, and would act as a foundation from which workers can actually mount a fight back against the politics of the bosses in both capitalist parties.

This is the real utility of Cornel West’s campaign. Building a successful left-wing independent campaign necessarily means building a movement – gathering workers, families, students, and youth

told they had no choice. According to Biden, it was more important to keep the tracks running without interruption than to guarantee workers can run them safely. The conditions Biden told rail workers they had to accept are the same ones that led to the train derailment in East Palestine just two months later.

The child tax credit, first introduced in 2020 under Trump’s administration, had a profound impact on child poverty rates in the US. In 2021, after the credit was expanded with Biden’s COVID aid package, child poverty in the US was cut in half. Biden promised to make this permanent. But when negotiations came around, Biden went from “make it permanent,” down to “expand it for 4 years.” This brilliant negotiating tactic ended with an allout loss, and later that year the credit expired altogether.

There are a million more examples that could be given to illustrate Joe Biden’s complete inability to deliver on any of his many promises. A most depressing one certainly being his promise to make Roe v. Wade the “law of the land.” But his failings go beyond broken promises. Under his administration, rights have been lost, aid has been taken away, and billions of taxpayer dollars have now been spent on a war we’re “not in.”

This administration’s greatest failing is that it hasn’t done the one thing it duped tens of millions of people into believing that, at the absolute least, it could do. It hasn’t stopped Trump.

The only thing that can stop the runaway train of right-wing reaction is a determined, united, mass movement that includes the whole of the multi-racial, multi-gender working class. Cornel West’s independent campaign for president could provide the seeds for such a movement to emerge. J

of all backgrounds behind a common banner of demands. It means consciously training volunteers and supporters from across the country. It means fighting for the endorsement of labor unions through rank-and-file organizing of members. It means boldly standing up to the lies of Republicans and Democrats who say that basic improvements to our standard of living like universal healthcare, a transition to green energy, and raising the minimum wage aren’t “reasonable.”

If Bernie Sanders had responded to the blatant rigging of the 2016 Democratic Primaries by launching an independent party to run all the way until November, millions of people would have answered that call. He was the most salient political alternative to Trump, his program the answer to millions of working-class peoples’ questions and fears. Had he not capitulated to the machinations of a party that was never going to let him win in the first place, we could be standing in a totally different political moment right now.

Bernie missed that moment. But today, there are still millions of people trying to find a way forward – people who participated in the George Floyd uprising in 2020, who poured into the streets when Roe v.

Wade was overturned, who are trying to find a way to organize in their workplaces, schools, and communities. The Cornel West campaign can be a nexus for everyone who wants to fight for his program, and an embryo of the force that working people can use to change the face of the American political system. J

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I M M I G R AT I O N

IN CHICAGO, JOHNSON FLOUNDERS BUT MIGRANTS FIGHT BACK

NYC POLITICIANS PROPOSE CUTS INSTEAD OF SOLUTIONS TO MIGRANT CRISIS

STEPHEN THOMPSON

ADRIENNE GOMEZ

Chicago is an extremely wealthy city. If gross domestic product (GDP) for the metropolitan area were distributed equally, all residents (including children) would receive about $72,000 per year. One can imagine a future in which this spectacular wealth is used to ensure that all Chicagoans enjoy high-quality housing, healthcare, and mass transit, while also having plenty of free time to hang out at the city’s beautiful lakefront beaches.

There is a massive gap between this possibility and the reality of Chicago today. The Democratic Party, comprised of corporate lackeys and funded by billionaires, has long dominated local politics. Chicago’s wealth is used not to improve the lives of residents but instead to bludgeon them into submission while giving new advantages to the rich. The party’s politicians have ramped up police spending, eliminated corporate taxes, showered developers with hundreds of millions in subsidies, and cut social services. This mix of expanded policing and low social support has created the perfect environment for hyper-exploitative corporations like Amazon, which is now the region’s largest private employer.

Since 1980, as income inequality has exploded nationally, it has increased even more quickly in Chicago. Housing has become increasingly unaffordable, homelessness is rising, and food pantries are swamped with hungry, struggling people. But residents have also fought back in a variety of ways, with successes and failures that people everywhere can learn from.

fact, only a month after taking office, Johnson broke a key promise by renewing the “shotspotter” police surveillance program.

The new mayor now faces an important test as the city prepares its next annual budget. Because the Democrats refuse to tax the rich, the city’s finances are in terrible shape. Current projections show a $538 million municipal deficit in 2024. Meanwhile, in the face of opposition from the state’s billionaire “progressive” governor, Johnson has distanced himself from ambitious plans to tax the rich. Without funding, it is unlikely the budget will include many of the programs Johnson campaigned on.

Migrants Stand Up To Johnson’s Police – And Win Recently, Chicago’s mayor has floundered in the face of an escalating migrant crisis, in which asylum seekers have faced abuse from police officers. The crisis has laid bare just how little things have improved under Johnson, while also showing how people can win by fighting back.

In one incident, sixty migrants were forced to share a dirty portable toilet without toilet paper or a place for washing hands, and denied access to a nearby public bathroom in a police station. The migrants organized a disruptive protest against this horrible treatment, and one of them, Dayrelys Coy, demanded access to clean facilities to care for her young son. A scuffle with police ensued; video footage from the scene showed a crowd of Johnson’s officers attacking Coy, who was charged with three felonies for “resisting arrest.”

But rather than backing down, Coy took her case directly to the public, explaining the inhuman treatment to which she was subjected and the need to fight back. The city government retreated almost immediately: prosecutors dropped all charges, while police opened up the public bathrooms to migrants, provided new portable toilets, and agreed to move Coy into an apartment.

Brandon Johnson Fails To Deliver Which Way Forward?

Brandon Johnson was elected Mayor of Chicago earlier this year, vowing to raise taxes on the wealthy, and prioritize new social programs over spending on police. But Johnson’s approach resembles a long line of other Democrats who have reneged on campaign pledges. In

10

Even as Brandon Johnson, with all his power, has accomplished so little, the example of Dayrelys Coy shows how seemingly powerless people can fight back and win – improving their living conditions. By having clarity about who her real enemies are, and appealing directly to the public for support, a 21-year-old woman, without even the basic legal rights of a US citizen, took on a notoriously brutal police department and won. We need to expand this type of fighting approach to the masses of working Chicagoans. J

In the past year, over 100,000 migrants have passed through New York, fleeing the disastrous results of imperialism and climate crises throughout Latin America and the Caribbean. In New York City, there are at least 40,000 rent stabilized apartments sitting vacant, yet New York City officials resorted to tents and airplane hangars to handle the overflow of migrants in shelters.

Every day, migrant adults and their children approach commuters on the train, selling candy to scrape together a few dollars while politicians decide their fate.

As more migrants arrive, New York City Mayor Eric Adams and New York Governor Kathy Hochul – both Democrats – insist that migrants are draining valuable resources.

Instead of taxing the rich to fund public services, Adams proposed that all city agencies cut their budgets by 15% to allegedly pay for the cost of the migrant crisis. Budget cuts to public services while publicly scapegoating migrants all but guarantees public ire towards the migrant community.

The Cause And Pain Of The Migrant Crisis US foreign and immigration policy are direct contributors to the migrant crisis.

The US is notorious for destabilizing other nations to gain access to oil and other raw minerals, often propping up corrupt regimes to maintain the flow of profits. Those fleeing the aftermath of climate change, devastating neoliberal trade deals, and the endless “War on Drugs,” desperately seek refuge in the US. In January of this year, in response to pressure over its abysmal immigration policy, the Biden administration introduced the Humanitarian Parole Program. If passed, up to 30,000 migrants would be admitted to the US each month. Those admitted would need to have financial sponsors, undergo background and security checks, and complete an online application to stay in the US for up to two years.

This program prioritizes migrants with the financial means and resources to apply. The tents and airplane hangars are unlikely to have access to WiFi for their migrant occupants. Many migrants are from the poorest regions of their home countries.

According to the mayor’s office, only a fifth of the migrants in New York City have filed asylum applications, not including those being assisted by the non-profit sector.

Hochul wants to authorize work permits to migrant workers at the state level, which is unprecedented. However, as this legislation is debated in Albany, time is running out.

Adams is actively trying to dismantle New York City’s “right to shelter” laws. In late September, the mayor’s office has ordered that any single migrant occupying a city shelter

must vacate their spot after sixty days, forcing even more people out onto the street.

Neither Adams, Hochul, Abbot, or any member of their parties are interested in solving the migrant crisis. Both the Democrats and Republicans have made migrants the perfect scapegoat for their ineffectiveness. Blame is laid on migrants in need when in fact both parties were slashing the budgets of public services long before the migrants arrived. To solve this crisis, both migrants and native-born New Yorkers must join forces.

Building a Mass Struggle for Migrant Rights Corporate politicians bake xenophobia into their campaigns to gain political clout and present themselves as the only ones who can protect American workers and American jobs. There are sections of the population already emboldened by Adams’ claim that the migrant crisis will “destroy the city,” leading to far right demonstrations outside of migrant shelters in Staten Island and Brooklyn.

Misleading voters with racist rhetoric is an old tactic used to turn ordinary working people against one another. The working people of New York City must reject this dirty trick, as we have more in common with the migrant community than we do with Adams or Hochul or the big businesses actually running the city. Big developers and corporate politicians are responsible for the housing crisis and lack of social services, not migrants.

Ordinary people have done more to help the migrant crisis than any politician so far.

Throughout New York City, mutual aid and immigrant rights groups have pivoted to gathering food, clothing, funds, and legal aid for the migrant community.

Organizing the broader working class in New York City is crucial in pushing back against the hostility directed at migrants from City Hall. New York City has a long history of class struggle led by both immigrant and native New Yorkers alike. The needs of migrant people are deeply tied to the needs of native New Yorkers and together, they can fight – and win – a better city for all. J

S O C I A L I S TA LT E R N AT I V E . O R G

IT MATTERS WHERE YOU LIVE

HOUSING

TRANSFORMING OUR NEIGHBORHOODS: CAPITALIST DEVELOPMENT VS. SOCIAL PLANNING

If you rent, you probably have to move often. In the US, 20-25% of all renters move every year, repeating an endless cycle of selling and buying furniture, dragging couches and bed frames up and down stairs, signing leases and paying security deposits that you’ll never get back. Most people go through this annual hellscape because they are trying to find a better deal on rent, which seems to constantly go up.

But choosing where to go next is an increasingly impossible decision. Low-income neighborhoods have cheaper housing, but it’s cheaper because it’s shoddy and often not even up to code. These neighborhoods often lack convenient grocery stores, good schools (because schools are paid by local taxes), and community amenities like libraries and green

spaces. People who live in low-income areas are likely to have worse health outcomes, not just because of a lack of hospitals and healthcare options, but because these areas are also often where corporations place polluting factories and refineries, like the infamous “Cancer Alley” of Louisiana.

More affluent neighborhoods, on the other hand, have safer housing and convenient grocery stores, but everything is so expensive that working-class people are hard-pressed to live there. These neighborhoods quickly become playgrounds for the most well-todo of a city, and circle back around again to having none of the essential things that neighborhoods need – featuring boutique build-your-own-$18-salad bars where there should be playgrounds for families. Why can’t

The below four photos show the same block of Hazelridge Street in Detroit over the course of five years.

September 2009

October 2011

September 2013

August 2014 OCTOBER 2023

capitalism give us any neighborhoods where we can live long-term, happy lives?

Poor Neighborhoods Stay Poor, Rich Neighborhoods Get Richer Low-income neighborhoods in American cities frequently remain segregated. In urban centers, these neighborhoods tend to be majority Black and Hispanic, and in more rural areas, they often have a higher indigenous population. In many cases, highway systems and infrastructure were built to specifically silo people of color away from wealthier, white areas – as was the case with Robert Moses’s transformation of New York in the 1930s. Other neighborhoods have undergone periods of “white flight” where wealthy and middle-class white residents have retreated to the suburbs with the rise of expanded highway systems and car infrastructure, as well as moral panic around “rising crime rates” and other even more explicitly racist alarmism about the “cultural decay” of cities.

Roads, bridges, and public transportation networks are left to rot in lower-income regions of the country by a political establishment which profits from maintaining this de-facto racial segregation. This is an economic phenomenon which is amplified in Black neighborhoods in cities and suburbs alike, but it affects working-class people of all races, with infrastructure like clean water and access to the internet, which is essential to operating in modern society, becoming largely inaccessible in rural white communities as well.

Infrastructure is one of the biggest reasons that poor areas stay poor – it’s not just a matter of building better houses or bringing in new services and businesses. From the cell phone towers to the phone lines to the pavement to the lead pipes in the ground, under-resourced communities need massive investment.

But capitalism’s response to low-income communities – gentrification – doesn’t work either. When big developers swoop in to capitalize on low land prices, the housing they build isn’t just expensive, it’s quickly and shoddily built. While fancy new condo buildings might look high-end, they often lack proper ventilation, draining systems, and other protective measures that renters and homebuyers won’t notice until there’s an emergency.

When our communities are planned and constructed by major developers whose primary interest is maximizing profits, they will always cut essential corners. They will build with subpar materials with no consideration for the type of amenities all working people

deserve. As long as the capitalist government continues to give handouts to these developers rather than invest in our communities, we will never have fully stocked libraries and well-paved streets.

Social Housing Is The Answer There are many examples throughout the last century of social housing projects that have transformed the lives of working people for the better. One such example is the socialist planning of neighborhoods in the Soviet Union during the 1930’s, a period of rapid development after the revolution of 1917.

While living standards were low to begin with – a consequence of the overwhelmingly feudal economy in Russia at the time, as well as a blockade of resources from capitalist states – the economic planning which was used to develop neighborhoods can be seen as a useful example for a genuine reconstruction of impoverished neighborhoods in the United States today.

Because of the planned economy, guaranteed housing was constructed in the Soviet Union which led directly towards city centers, and contained ample green spaces and community services like laundromats and communal kitchens. Houses were often built towards the ends of streets, as a means of reducing noise and dust from the newly developed factories which had begun to sprung up as part of a plan for rapid industrialization.

Planning whole communities based on the needs of the people who would live in them would have been impossible under capitalism – but it’s just the beginning of what a socialist economy can achieve.

Today, we need to fight to take our right to housing and to fulfilling communities out of the hands of the capitalist market. We need to fight for rent control, so that landlords can’t just charge whatever they want without fixing anything, and we need to tax the rich to fund permanently-affordable social housing that would be run democratically, not for profit.

None of these things are remotely acceptable to the capitalist class – which shows why we need to fight for a socialist world where these basic reforms would not just be possible, but commonplace.

The housing system we face not just in the US but globally does not work in our interests or the interests of the people around us. Capitalism claims to be able to provide all things to all people based on the laws of supply and demand, but has completely failed to realize its promise. We need to fight to take this system into our own hands, and transform it to bring us the housing and services we need. J

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REPRODUCTIVE RIGHTS

MEXICO | ABORTION DECRIMINALIZED, THE STRUGGLE MUST GO ON! Alternative Socialista — ISA in Mexico On September 6, the First Chamber of the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation granted the appeal that Information Group for Chosen Reproduction (GIRE), a human rights organisation focused on reproductive rights, brought against four articles of the Federal Criminal Code that maintain prison sentences for people who decide to have an abortion. In this way the Supreme Court of Justice has fulfilled the wish of millions of women to decriminalize abortion in Mexico.

This is undoubtedly a huge step forward for the feminist and LGBTQ+ movement in the conquest of rights for women and LGBTQ+ people, but only organisation and mobilisation in the streets will make it a reality.

The green tide, as the fight for abortion is known thanks to the inspiring feminist

BRAZIL Liberdade, Socialismo e Revolução (LSR) — ISA in Brazil Translated from the original article in Portuguese.

On September 22 the Supreme Court began voting to remove abortion up to the twelfth week of pregnancy from the Penal Code. We have never been so close to changing part of the reality of millions of Brazilian women and people who can conceive!

The previous week, as a result of the struggle led by feminist movements, Mexico’s Supreme Court approved the decriminalization of abortion. This is just one of a number of experiences around the world of victorious struggles to guarantee and expand the reproductive rights of women and pregnant people. There have also been setbacks, such as in the United States, revealing a social polarization that, together with the attack on the rights of trans people, reveals a dispute over bodily autonomy within the capitalist system.

Although it is necessary to consider the particularities of Brazil, the conservatism of the elites and politicians, this is not a debate detached from the global growth of the far right, nor the feminist uprisings in Latin America.

There are achievements and setbacks in the same period that shape the current situation of consciousness in what we call the Age of Disorder.

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movement in Argentina that achieved the decriminalization of abortion in that country in 2020, has achieved a new and unparalleled triumph in Latin America, this time in Mexico. This is the result of the mobilization of millions of people across the country to achieve the decriminalization of abortion at the national level. The decriminalization of abortion in Mexico has been a long process that began in 2007 in Mexico City. Afterwards, the green tide spread to various states in the country: Aguascalientes, Baja California, Sinaloa, Guerrero, Colima, Hidalgo, Baja California Sur, Veracruz, Coahuila, and Oaxaca.

Decriminalization does not guarantee dignified, safe and free access to legal termination of pregnancy. It must be accompanied by the allocation of resources and the expansion of health service coverage at the federal, state, and municipal levels. Otherwise,

as has been the case until now, only women and pregnant people with greater resources will be able to have abortions, while the rest will be forced to have abortions in poor conditions in the best of cases, or to die or to continue an unwanted pregnancy in the worst of cases.

The patriarchal policies of this country will not change simply because they are decreed in local and federal congresses; a radical transformation of society is required. For this reason, in addition to the decriminalization of abortion, it is necessary to strengthen sex education in all the country’s schools and to wage a frontal battle against the backlash from the right wing that seeks to prevent schools from talking clearly about sexuality in the classroom. It is also essential to strengthen the distribution of contraceptives, for the free and full exercise of sexuality for all.

From Rosa International Socialist

Feminists and Socialist Alternative, we are convinced that the emancipation of women and our bodies will only be achieved through the complete emancipation of our class, not only through a change in political discourse and good legal initiatives. Undoubtedly, the pronouncement of the Supreme Court has been a great step forward, but it is not enough. There is still a long way to go to advance in the conquest of rights for working women. J

March on “International Abortion Day” to demand legal, free, and safe abortions in Mexico City. September 28, 2023.

ABORTION DECRIMINALIZATION WITHIN REACH – BUILD AN INDEPENDENT MASS MOVEMENT TO GUARANTEE VICTORY! The struggle in defense for the right to abortion in different countries shows that if we don’t struggle to defend our rights then they will be lost and that this struggle will not be completely won within capitalism.

The Brazilian Context The WHO estimates that almost one million illegal abortions are carried out every year in Brazil. This means that legalization here would directly affect those who profit from the ban. High-end clandestine clinics, or even travel to other countries to have a safe abortion, can only be accessed by the upper class. Access to pills is through illegal trafficking and means more risks. For this reason, it is the very illegality of the practice that causes so many deaths and affects the poorest.

Abortion is a reality. The latest National Abortion Survey, published earlier this year, found that one in seven women under the age of 40 have had an abortion at least once, and 52% were under the age of 19. According to the survey, the proportion is higher among indigenous and Black women.

In other words, although the moral and religious debate prevails when it comes to terminating pregnancies, criminalization and prohibition is above all a debate about class, determining which women can carry out the procedure safely and with dignity, and which women carry out the procedure in a traumatic, unsafe way, in some cases being imprisoned or killed.

No Arrests, No Deaths Criminalization has been used to imprison and prosecute poor, indigenous, and black people. In addition, the stigma of prohibition and poor health care has led many to their deaths. That there has been an increase in prosecutions of people suspected of causing

abortions. Since 2022, the number of lawsuits filed against women who have had abortions has been on the rise, with an average of more than one such case per day. In 2021 there were 136 cases, in 2022 there were 464 cases, an increase of 340%, three times more. The monthly average in 2021 was 11.3 cases; in 2022 – 38.6; and this year it’s already at 41.6, just from January to May. For every five women who have an illegal abortion, two are taken to hospital. In 2021, 151,000 women were hospitalized in Brazil for abortions (spontaneous, induced, incomplete, or legal) and taken for a uterine curettage, a procedure that has been considered outdated for at least ten years worldwide and has been strongly discouraged by the World Health Organization (WHO) since 2012.

The Supreme Court Is As Unjust As The System That Sustains It We have no illusions in bourgeois justice and especially in this sector, which in recent years has been singled out by the vanguard of the failed struggle as “the saviors of the fatherland.” We must know how to recognize the opportunity to fight, without forgetting that pressure on the streets is the best guarantee of the response we want. The indigenous movement’s victory in court over the denial of the attack on land demarcations was due exclusively to the movement’s incessant mobilizations over the last almost three years.

This same Supreme Court dances to the tune of the interests of those at the top, remembering that in 2018 they condemned Lula so that he could not be a candidate and in 2021 they cleared Lula so that he could be a candidate again. This same Supreme Court has blood on its hands and we don’t trust it for the future of the millions of women and people who can get pregnant. Let’s fight!

We’re in favor of a struggle that reaches more people each time. Our task is to turn this into a mass struggle, guiding a movement built from the bottom up, building a movement independent of the government and trusting in the potential of the working class.

Our Socialist Program We have always raised the demand for the legalization of abortion, we want legal and safe abortion within the public health service or, as the Argentinian women rightly shouted, “legal abortion, in hospital.” We will fight for a truly secular state. For the closure of all cases that criminalize people who have had abortions. For the investigation and punishment of medical staff who reported patients who had abortions. For quality healthcare that is 100% public, free, and universal.

Sex education in schools, including gender diversity. Access to free contraceptives. Free access to abortion pills with safe knowledge of their use, produced by the state and free from the pharmaceutical industry. We will not back down on any slogan. We also know the way: collective organization and struggle.

We can use the institutions in our favor when possible, but the movement needs to have independence and autonomy and not be subordinated to the institutional struggle.

This is a point of difference with other forces in Brazil, which even if they have an interest in winning the right to abortion, subordinate the struggle to institutionality and could put the brakes on and retreat from the struggle if it threatens the government and its alliance with the centrist and right-wing parties. We are part of the wing that will intervene to open up the potential for struggle that is now emerging. No step backward! Let Brazil join the green wave that has won more rights in Latin America! J

S O C I A L I S TA LT E R N AT I V E . O R G

I N T E R N AT I O N A L Originally published by Socialist Alternative in England, Wales, and Scotland.

Low paid school support workers at Ash Field Academy in Leicester have voted by 85% (with a turnout of 67%) to continue their six-month campaign of strike action. The workers, who are members of the UNISON public sector union, have taken 27 days of action in that time. Now entering a new phase of their campaign, they are appealing for solidarity, and our readers can play an important role in aiding this key dispute.

The Ash Field dispute developed during the big strike wave that took place in Britain over the last year. That wave has in many ways subsided in recent months. Several of the biggest disputes have been settled without decisive victories for either workers or the employers – unions have emerged with better pay rises than initially offered, though not what they had been demanding. We can expect an even bigger second wave at some point in the future, but also some important disputes still continue. That includes train workers and hospital doctors, both seeming set to last a significant time, with workers and employers looking determined not to give in.

But the wave of action we have seen has had an impact beyond only the big national disputes. It has put strikes on the agenda for a very wide section of workers. One consequence of that is an increase in local strikes, not only in number but also in militancy, numbers of workers actively involved, longevity, and understanding of what might be necessary to win. Many of these are continuing to develop even in this phase of retreat in the wider movement.

Ash Field, where Socialist Alternative member Tom Barker is a union representative who has played a leading role in the strike, is one of the most important examples of this trend. It has become a point of reference in the labour movement across Britain, not least because of the impressive concessions it has already won.

The workers – who are very low paid, mainly women and people of color – have already secured an 8% local government pay rise, on top of an agreement to bring classroom-based staff pay in line with other equivalent school workers (backdated to April 2022). The school has also offered a one off payment of £1,075. This is the biggest increase won by any school support staff over the last five years, and shows what a fighting approach

can force from employers, who initially claimed that anything beyond their opening offer would be impossible. But the workers are determined to keep fighting for a real cost of living pay increase – not only one which corrects an unjust historic underpayment. This is critically important to support staff at Ash Field who, because they have been underpaid for around ten years, have been left significantly more exposed to the cost of living crisis.

This campaign has maintained momentum in a truly impressive way, based on an approach of constantly involving the widest possible layer of workers, including a large strike committee, vibrant, dynamic picket lines, as well as appealing for support from parents and the public. To keep this up heading towards their 30th day of action, and with this new mandate lasting for another six months, solidarity from across the movement in Britain and beyond is essential. J

Email solidarity messages to Unison Leicester City branch: unison.leicestercity@virgin.net Send an e-mail to the City Mayor of Leicester at themayor@leicester.gov.uk or send a tweet: @CityMayorLeic

ON THE GROUND IN BRITAIN:

ASH FIELD ACADEMY STRIKE ENTERS VITAL PHASE

New episodes air every Thursday at 6pm EST!

On Strike is the video broadcast of Workers Strike Back, hosted by socialist City Councilmember Kshama Sawant and Bia Lacombe. We’ve seen more protests and strikes than any time in a generation, but rarely do we hear about them from the perspective of working people and our movements. On Strike provides an independent socialist analysis and strategy to rebuild a fighting labor movement and campaign for a new mass party for workers and young people.

/OnStrikeShow

OCTOBER 2023

@OnStrikeShow

@OnStrikeShow

See striking Ash Field Academy workers in action on the fourth episode of On Strike!

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POLICE

COPS INVESTIGATING COPS WILL NEVER WORK

WE NEED WORKINGCLASS OVERSIGHT OVER POLICE! BIA LACOMBE & VARUN BELUR, SEATTLE On January 24, 2023, a 23-year-old exchange student from India, Jaahnavi Kandula, was killed at a Seattle crosswalk by a speeding police car going nearly 50 miles per hour over the speed limit. Police officer and Vice President of the Seattle Police Officers Guild (SPOG) Daniel Auderer, who has a long history of racist harassment, illegal arrests and violence, was caught on video joking about Jaahnavi’s death.

“She was 26 anyway,” he said, mis-stating her age. “She had limited value.”

As Socialist Alternative member and Seattle City Councilmember Kshama Sawant pointed out, we only have this evidence of the officers’ callous disregard for human life because Auderer accidentally left his police bodycam running.

On the phone with SPOG President Mike Solan, Auderer suggested that the police department “write a check” for $11,000 as compensation for taking Jaahnavi’s life. And even more outrageous than the footage itself is the fact that in the over nine months since Jaahnavi’s death, the city’s Democratic establishment have failed to take any action whatsoever, other than toothless bureaucratic proposals.

They have turned a deaf ear to the widespread demands from American and immigrant activists and working people to fire Auderer and issue compensation to Jaanhavi’s family in India.

Sawant is the only councilmember calling for what’s actually necessary to hold the police accountable: her office has called for an independently-elected community control over the police and the immediate firing of Auderer and Solan.

Capitalist Institutions Aren’t Neutral According to Seattle’s Community Police Commission (CPC), Auderer has been the subject of 29 complaints to Seattle’s Office of Professional Accountability (OPA) and 18 investigations, three of which involved sustained findings.

Yet Auderer has not been suspended once!

During Seattle’s George Floyd protests in 2020, the OPA received over 19,000 complaints about police violently cracking down on peaceful protesters. The OPA chose to dole out a mere 25 punishments that year, most of them oral reprimands.

In a society with massive wealth and racial inequality, institutions are not independent or neutral, regardless of the establishment’s claims otherwise. Far from being independent, the OPA is hand-in-glove with the Democratic establishment which has controlled Seattle for decades, and with Seattle Police leadership. It is not a viable tool to hold the police accountable. As Sawant said, in reality the OPA “is designed to exhaust working people’s outrage over police abuses, by miring every complaint in months of ‘investigation’ certain to accomplish nothing.”

Independently-elected community control over the police, as Sawant and Socialist Alternative are calling for, would be nothing like the OPA. A democratically-elected, civilian-led police control board would have full powers to hire, fire, subpoena, set budgets and department policies, and take over the negotiation and approval of police union contracts.

Police And Political Establishment Go Together

Democrats and Republicans have effectively given carte blanche to violent police officers by increasing funding for policing Community members contributed to a memorial and dismantling what for Jaahnavi Kandula at the intersection where she was killed by a speeding police officer. little oversight there is. In the absence of a movement to fight for police accountability and to fund housing and social services by taxing the rich, Democrats have swung back to their default of “law and order” policing.

This can be seen from the policies of Black Democratic Party Mayors Bruce Harrell of Seattle and Eric Adams of New York, and former Mayor Lori Lightfoot of Chicago, all of whom have used their racial identity to push through pro-corporate, propolice policies.

Mayor Harrell has made it a priority to increase the police budget and hire more cops, while slashing Seattle’s funds for social services by tens of millions of dollars.

Atlanta’s predominantly Democratic political establishment is building a massive $90 million dollar training facility for police officers, dubbed “Cop City” by grassroots activists opposing it. Just weeks after Tyre Nichols was savagely beaten to death by five Memphis police officers, both Democratic and Republican Tennessee legislators passed a bill to ban community oversight boards entirely. Taking their place are powerless “advisory boards” that have no authority to investigate police abuses, let alone hold the police accountable. And Biden’s 2023 budget included over $537 million in grants for police departments, the most of any budget in over a decade, and set aside billions to put 100,000 more officers on the street.

Working-Class Oversight Now! In 2018, Sawant was the only Councilmember to vote against the SPOG contract, which undid many of the limited police oversight measures that were put into place under pressure from the BLM movement. And in 2020, rank-andfile union activists, members of Socialist Alternative, and Sawant’s office succeeded in expelling the SPOG from the MLK County Labor Council, sending a message that there is no place in the labor movement for an utterly reactionary organization that defends the right of the police to attack poor and working people with impunity.

Working people can’t trust any arm of the ruling class to hold police accountable. Under capitalism, the real role of the police is not to keep ordinary people safe, but to enforce the interests of the elite by force, such as when they have been deployed against workers’ strikes or to intimidate peaceful protests. We need to fight for independent, democratically-elected community boards with full powers. But it will be impossible to wage a real struggle for community control without breaking from the Democrats and Republicans.

We need an independent movement based in the working class, not the two parties of Wall Street.

And ultimately, fighting against police brutality and the political power brokers has to be a fight against capitalism itself, and for a socialist society free of exploitation by a ruling class, a society that can be free of crime and provide safe communities and high standards of living for all.

Justice for Jaahnavi! J

DEMOCRATS PROMISED TO CUT POLICE BUDGETS. THEY DID THE OPPOSITE. Out of 109 city budgets analyzed by ABC News, only eight reduced police budgets by more than 2% after 2020. 49 cities increased their police budgets by over 10%. Here’s how much some cities have increased their police budgets since 2019:

HOUSTON TX 9% CHICAGO IL 15% LOS ANGELES CA 9.4% OAKLAND CA 18% PHILADELPHIA PA 3% One of the only cities to significantly cut police spending after 2020 was Austin, TX. Austin cut its police budget by 30% in 2021, proposing to spend that money on family violence prevention programs, mental health responders, and police oversight.

It lasted one year. The Texas legislature voted to bar cities from cutting police budgets, so Austin’s police budget increased by 50% in 2022.

In the years since George Floyd’s brutal murder, both

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S O C I A L I S TA LT E R N AT I V E . O R G

S O C I A L I S T A LT E R N AT I V E I N A C T I O N

75,000 MARCH IN NYC FOR CLIMATE ACTION

JESSE SHUSSETT, NYC In September, members from Socialist Alternative in New York City joined over 75,000 protesters to march across Manhattan in response to the complete lack of response to the climate crisis by Biden and other world leaders, as the UN prepared for their annual General Assembly.

Socialist Alternative members marched alongside unions, student groups, and community organizations, calling for working-class solutions to the climate crisis. As we experience ever-growing impacts of climate change, it’s clearer than ever that we need democratic public ownership over energy

companies and big polluters, and a Green New Deal to provide good union jobs and effect a full transition to clean energy.

This was the largest climate demonstration since Biden took office. Students and organizations from up and down the East Coast bussed into the city to march – people attended from Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Maine, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, DC, Virginia, and New Hampshire, as well as some international protesters!

Independent socialist presidential candidate Cornel West attended the march. West is the only candidate running for President that calls for the nationalization of the fossil fuel industry and an immediate transition to green energy.

This stood in stark contrast to the approach put forward by the protest’s official organizers, who called to “make Biden do something” and mainly pointed to registering to vote, and voting for Democrats. However, part of the immense frustration of workers and youth at this protest was the fact that the two parties of the billionaire class have so far been both unwilling and unable to do anything to fight climate change – and continuing to vote for them won’t be effective.

August was just labeled the planet’s hottest on record according to NOAA, with both June and July breaking records as well. So far this year, the US has experienced 23 separate weather and climate disasters, including Southern California’s first ever tropical storm watch during Hurricane Hilary and the catastrophic wildfires on Maui last month.

We need to fight for a Green New Deal that provides union jobs at living wages, expanding green infrastructures, democratic public ownership of the top 100 polluting companies, a major expansion of public transportation that doesn’t cost $2.90 a ride, and much more. To most effectively wage this fight we need an independent workers party rooted in our workplaces, schools, and social movements. To put an end to the continued damage big business and the billionaires are doing to our environment we need to fight for a socialist world. J

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SOCIALIST DAVID RHOADES, LOS ANGELES

After 148 days on strike, the Writers Guild of America (WGA) forced the Association of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) back to the negotiation table and squeezed major concessions out of frustrated studio heads. With a tentative agreement that surrenders ground to the writers on AI usage, staffing minimums, and streaming residuals, the film and TV strike has demonstrated what’s possible when a strong strike escalates again and again.

American workers have seen two potentially explosive near-strikes end in disappointment over the last year. Progressive Democrats in Congress went along with a scheme to break the railroad strike last winter. In July, Socialist Alternative supported a “Vote NO” campaign against the weak UPS Teamster tentative agreement (TA) that UPS executives celebrated as a “win for both sides.” But with an oncoming recession, record inflation, and stagnant wages, workers don’t need dilute compromises; we need victories.

That’s what makes the WGA struggle so notable: there was no illusion of compromise. The workers wanted an unprecedented deal; the studios wanted to starve them into submission.

What The Writers Won Among the concessions listed in the TA are terms dictating that studios cannot use ‘AI’ language learning models (LLMs) to make any scripts, treatments, or narrative work of any kind or require any writer to use them; that streamers must disclose streaming data to the WGA and pay 50% residual bonuses to shows above a certain performance threshold; and that streamers must employ a minimum of three writers for at least ten weeks for development rooms, with longer employment guarantees for greenlit shows.

While there are numerous wins included in the TA, studio concessions on the use of AI, streaming transparency and residuals, and minimum staffing deserve special attention.

From the start, these three demands were irreconcilable with the AMPTP’s interests; during the May 1 negotiations, the studios refused these demands outright without a counter proposal.

It was in reference to these demands that Bob Iger, CEO of Disney, patronizingly lectured the actors and writers to “be realistic about the business environment, and what this business can deliver.” As it turns out, the strikers were indeed being realistic.

The primary lesson from this struggle is that when bosses say a demand isn’t realistic, what they mean is “you’ll have to fight me for it.”

Lessons Of The Writers’ Strike There are multiple factors that made the writers’ win possible.

The first is the dual strike of writers and actors. The dual strike tactic not only escalated it in terms of size – SAG has nearly 10 times the membership of the WGA – but also gave it the character of an industry strike.

Solidarity and industry-wide action robbed

the studios of leverage, reinforced the pickets, and demonstrated how all workers share the same interests.

The second factor that made these concessions possible was a militant perspective.

Working writers like Adam Conover (a negotiating committee member) were instrumental in polarizing the strike, highlighting the mutually exclusive interests of workers and bosses while calling out the union’s enemies openly and unapologetically. This approach was a bracing dose of reality after decades of the labor movement treating contracts like collaborations between workers and bosses, not zero-sum struggles for survival.

Polarizing the struggle maintained the strength of the strike for its entire duration.

The strike had 60% public support by its end, according to a Reuters poll. The Drew Barrymore Show and Real Time with Bill Maher received such vehement backlash after announcing they would resume production that they rescinded their announcements almost immediately.

It’s very rare for a strike as drawn out as the writers’ to end in a position of strength.

Long strikes are a risk: the longer workers aren’t getting paid, the more vulnerable they are to getting starved off the pickets (or out of an entire industry). Strikes that stop production immediately and concentrate all pressure on the company’s profits immediately are more likely to win.

Protecting The Victory Some writers and actors have correctly expressed skepticism about whether streaming companies will report accurate audience numbers, per the proposed contract. Currently, only six Guild leaders are allowed to review viewership data, but they’ll be bound to a confidentiality agreement with the bosses. Every WGA member went out on the pickets to fight for streamer transparency, yet workers still won’t be allowed to know precisely how much value their labor produces.

Even if the union calls for an audit – one of the contract’s protections

ALTERNATIVE

HOW WRITERS BEAT THE STUDIOS ISSUE #97 l OCTOBER 2023

– members wouldn’t be allowed to know the results of that audit. It drives a wedge between the membership and its leaders.

There’s also concern about how studios might get around specific protections; for instance, residuals for streaming films apply to movies with a budget of $30 million or more.

These concerns have precedent; studios often use finance trickery to pocket what would be paid out to workers, like ensuring revenue-generating movies ‘lose’ millions every year decades after release.

Writers’ concerns make it clear that they’ll need to defend their victory. The strengths of this tentative agreement notwithstanding, the struggle isn’t over. A contract is only as strong as the membership that enforces it.

To put it bluntly, the studios aren’t going to stop trying to grind down writers’ wages or get around paying residuals. When they test the strength of the contract, writers will need to fight back, and go on the offensive with new demands to amend the contract in the future. For that to be remotely possible, member militancy has to continue developing through to the 2026 contract fight and beyond.

The major streaming platforms have already formed a lobbying group to fight for their interests on the political stage. They’ve hired a 36-year year member of Congress and a former chair of the FCC to leverage their political connections – one Republican and one Democrat, to cover their bases. Given that workers don’t have a political party in the US, this is an arena where the

WGA – and all unions, in fact – are at a severe disadvantage.

The AMPTP will begin negotiations with SAG on October 2, indicating the studios seek a conclusive end to the strike. Meanwhile, the writers will vote on the tentative agreement from October 2 to October 9. Regardless of what happens, the writers have secured concessions that the bosses said could never happen – a testament to their endurance and the power of the working class.

Solidarity with the members of WGA and SAG. IATSE, you’re up next! J

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