From protest to movement

Scan page 6

“Over the next months and years we will be called upon to intensify our demands for social justice, to become more militant in our defense of vulnerable populations. Those who still defend the supremacy of white male hetero-patriarchy had better watch out.

“The next 1459 days of the Trump administration will be 1459 days of resistance: Resistance on the ground, resistance in the classrooms, resistance on the job, resistance in our art and in our music.

“This is just the beginning and in the words of the in­ imitable Ella Baker, ‘We who believe in freedom can­ not rest until it comes.’ Thank you.” This was Angela Davis concluding her remarks at the Women’s March on Washington on Jan. 2017. (For the full transcript, see box on next page.)

The worldwide women’s marches on Jan. 21, 2017, were a historic event.

• For the first time since the anti-war demonstra­ tions of Feb. 15, 2003, millions of people in different countries and on all seven continents demonstrated on the same day and for the same reasons, both in a gesture of international solidarity but also an under­ standing how the same political dynamics are at play internationally.”

• In the U.S. the level of mobilization outstripped the 2003 antiwar demonstrations and in Britain rivalled that level.

• The marches were initiated and led by and mo­ bilized majoritarily women. While the spark was the election of Trump as U.S. president and reaction to the announced and probable attacks on women’s rights in that country under his administration, the international response was also provoked by the at­ tacks and fears of attacks on those same rights by women around the world. The rising tides of far-right and religious reaction are underlining the fact that women’s rights—to choose, to work, to live their lives as they wish—are never definitely won.

• While the impetus came from women—of all ages, women of colour, ethnic minority women, migrant women, women with disabilities—defending their rights, the marches also mobilized those concerned by the attacks to come from the Trump administra­ tion—and similar political forces around the world— on migrants’ rights, on Black rights, on the environ­ ment.

• In the U.S. the mobilization had a truly mass na­ ture—as is witnessed by the list of mobilizations that has been compiled [see story on next page]. Even the protests of a few dozen, indeed sometimes a few in­ dividuals, are recorded, showing the extent to which the desire to stand up and be counted against Trump and his policies sank deep.

Of course, such a spontaneous mobilization was extremely heterogeneous, bringing into the same marches radical feminists, Democrats and Clinton supporters, Black rights activists, radical anti-capi­ 6 SOCIALIST ACTION FEBRUARY 2017 talist left forces. That was an enormous achievement notably in the U.S., but also at a worldwide level.

Some left commentators because of this have tended to dismiss the significance of these demonstrations, arguing that they were dominated by bourgeois, white, liberal, pro-Democrat forces. That such forces were present and may well have taken the initiative is undeniable. But all the reports from around the world underline the fact that many, many of the demonstra­ tors were young, spontaneous and new to mobilizing. What could be a worse tactic for the diverse feminist, anti-capitalist left than to leave those people only in dialogue with liberal, mainstream, institutional femi­ nists As Susan Pashkoff writing for Socialist Resistance in Britain, said: “It is essential that socialist feminists and the left participate in this movement and not just criticise from the outside. We need to be there, shifting the boundaries further to the left, to support the demands of working-class women, women of co­ lour, LGBTQ comrades and disabled women. We need to make certain that this potential movement is not seized by those that would subvert its aims to further the needs of mainstream political parties and the lib­ eral feminist movement.”

The need for the marches to be of all women, and in particular those that suffer, and have suffered, the most sharply from oppression, exploitation and dis­ crimination—that is, Black and ethnic minority wom­ en, LGBTQ people, disabled women, working-class women—was expressed strongly from the outset. The “Guiding Vision and Definition of Principles” in the U.S. were far broader than those of liberal femi­ nism and addressed the demands and struggles of women of colour and working class women.

Real efforts were made to ensure that the organiz­ ers (co-chairs) at a national level in the U.S. reflected this diversity, but as with any living movement, such efforts will have to continue if an ongoing movement is to develop out of this surge of protest.

(Photos) Marchers in Washington, Jan. 21.

Pashkoff pointed out, “If you expect this na­ scent movement to understand the fact that it is at the intersections of race, class and gender that women’s oppression is felt the hardest, then we need to be there ensuring that the voices of women of colour, working-class women, LGBTQ people, and disabled women are heard and their demands are taken on board. It is a nascent movement, if you expect that they will not make errors or put out wrong slogans, you are asking far too much.”

Nevertheless the movement, if it is to grow in to the powerful protest movement for social justice called for by Angela Davis in her speech in Washington, will have to go beyond this organized diversity to become an expression of the fights and struggles of women against all forms of oppression, exploitation and discrimination. (The organizers have understood this point, and are addressing it in their fashion. See Susan Chira and Jonathan Martin, “After Success of Women’s March, a Question Remains: What’s Next?” The New York Times, Jan. 22, 2017.)

But movements take time and effort to grow and to build. As the Marxist feminist author Cinzia Arruzza wrote on Jan. 22 in International Viewpoint: “Mass mobilizations almost never begin when we expect them, almost never have the features we would ex­ pect or consider as politically adequate, almost nev­ er have political coherence, they are not free of the social contradictions and divisions that are present in society, or of the cultural prejudices and political shortcomings that characterize them. They are not magical events disconnected from the continuum of social life, although they have the capacity and poten­ tiality of creating discontinuity and breaks. They are messy, contradictory processes, where the outcomes are not given in advance and solidarity is something to be achieved.

“The last 48 hours have shown the potentiality for a new season of mass mobilization, and that this hap­ pened especially in a day of women’s mobilizations is even more relevant. Of course, a possible, perhaps likely, scenario is that the Democratic Party and its surrogates will end up taming, coopting and eventu­ ally kill this potentiality.

“But the relevant decision we should make is whether we want to already sing the funeral eulogy of a mobilization that could be or whether we want to be true to our desire to change this world and have a serious non-moralistic political analysis of the limi­ tations, composition and potential of these last two days, and of what we should do and how in order to help the growth and radicalization of the struggle.”

That is the challenge facing feminist, anti-capitalist (continued on page 7, in “‘The powerful forces of change’”)