In the shadow of the fascist ICE crackdown throughout the U.S., about 30 workers and students from Northern and Southern California joined together for our annual Progressive Labor Party (PLP) political retreat. New and veteran members of the Party and their base came together to discuss political theory, its relationship to practice in this period of growing fascism and looming imperialist war, and ways to build the Party and advance the fight for communist revolution.
Why capitalism can't be fixed
The first session of the weekend focused on political eonomy, a document that demonstrates that capitalism cannot be reformed to meet the needs of the workers because it is structurally based on commodity production for profit, not the well-being of workers. Party members created presentations linking theory from Karl Marx’s Capital to current-day examples. They pointed out that workers are forced to sell their labor in order to survive. They explained that only human labor can add value to raw materials. Workers’ labor is thus the source of capitalists’ “surplus value.”
We discussed how capitalists compete with each other to make as much profit as possible in order to beat out their competitors. When technology advances, individual capitalists lay off workers in order to use this change to produce commodities more cheaply than other capitalists. But soon all competing capitalists are using the new technology. And each capitalist projects that they are going to take a bigger share of the market than they will. The presenters pointed out that these basic elements of capitalism make it inherently unstable, causing cycles of overproduction, economic crisis, and mass hardship for workers. To maintain profits, capitalists attack wages, expand repression, consolidate monopolies, engage in speculation, and turn to war and fascism.
What is our role in fighting fascism?
Our Black and brown class siblings have long been terrorized by the naked brutality of this racist capitalist system. The events in Minneapolis prove without a shadow of a doubt that we are moving toward full-blown fascism. This means that the bosses are no longer able to use democracy to hide the brutality of their system, leading to heightened racist attacks on Black, Latin, and immigrant workers—and, ultimately, attacks on the entire working class. Protesting fascist ICE raids has become a death sentence for white workers, as it has always been for Black and brown workers.
The second session focused on how our Party must adapt to a prolonged period of fascism and severe capitalist crisis, as well as impending imperialist wars. We discussed why and how we should have a long-term approach to working in mass organizations.
The third session focused on the dead end of electoral politics. Even the most “progressive” politicians such as Zohran Mamdani, AOC, and Bernie Sanders cannot give workers what we need. Their role is to squash revolutionary sentiment. The liberals’ role is to convince the working class that capitalism can be reformed. But we in the PLP know that it isn’t just about government-run grocery stores or free child care. The root of all workers’ misery is capitalism, which cannot be voted out, but must be uprooted and consigned to the graveyard of history.
In the final session members of the Party and their base discussed plans for our respective areas in Northern and Southern California. May Day committees were formed so that we can plan large marches and celebrations. Our retreat was brought to a close on a very positive note when two of the workers who participated announced they wanted to join PLP. All in all, this was a very positive event for our Party, with our growth proving that our confidence in the working class to rise to this historic occasion is well-placed and with many comrades recommitting to the struggle for a communist world!
