MAY DAY : THERE IS STILL A WORLD TO WIN

Today is International Workers' Day but the political establishment would prefer it just went away.

IN LESS THAN six months we will be invited to vote for which major political party we wish to see oversee the management of the market economy on behalf of corporate interests. There will be the charade of an election campaign when an obliging media will peddle the fiction that there really is a contest of ideas between Labour and National. But our representative democracy has long been subverted by corporate interests that have taken control of our economy and political system. Over 600,000 New Zealanders will decline the invitation to vote because they recognise that it does not matter who they vote for because nothing ever changes.  And they will be labelled 'apathetic' and 'irresponsible' by conservatives and liberals alike.

The left, such as it is, has nothing to offer but more of the same thin gruel. Its continued loyalty to the Labour Party means that, once again, it will play the 'lesser evil' card. While 'progressive' trade union officials and commentators might concede that Labour is not up to much, they will argue that at least it isn't National. Any claims that Labour will actually improve the lives of working people are sacrificed on the altar of its immediate electoral interests. It has been like this for over three decades but the madness continues. 

This is the politics of centrism but centrism won't defeat economic inequality or climate change. This is, as socialist U.S. congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has observed, a politics that shrugs its shoulders and says 'meh'. 

International Workers Day' or May Day reminds us that it does not have to be this way. It is not just the way things are and will always be.

May Day was born out of the fight for an eight hour working day by workers in 19th century Chicago. In 1889 the socialist Second International chose May 1 as the date for International Workers' Day to commemorate the struggle of the Chicago workers. 

It has since become a day marked by rallies and demonstrations throughout the world, but not in New Zealand. As Rosa Luxemburg wrote in 1894:

'The first of May demanded the introduction of the eight-hour day. But even after this goal was reached, May Day was not given up. As long as the struggle of the workers against the bourgeoisie and the ruling class continues, as long as all demands are not met, May Day will be the yearly expression of these demands. And, when better days dawn, when the working class of the world has won its deliverance then too humanity will probably celebrate May Day in honour of the bitter struggles and the many sufferings of the past.'

Perhaps it is because of May Day's political origin in the socialist tradition that it is determinedly ignored by the political establishment. It will be shunned by the trade union bureaucracy. It won't be the subject of opinion columns on Stuff. Wallace Chapman and his liberal panelists won't be discussing May Day on RNZ. It won't be a topic of talkback conversation on Newstalk ZB. There won't be any mention of it on the six o'clock TV news bulletins. And not one parliamentary politician will be celebrating it, not even the various Labour MP's who claim to be socialists. This may also be the only blog post you will be able to find on the subject.

Perhaps the political establishment still feels threatened by a day associated exclusively with the working class and that has the potential, for one day at least, to invade the ideological domain normally occupied by our rulers and their courtiers. But in a New Zealand that is racked by chronic inequality, poverty and homelessness May Day will continue to remind us that there is, despite everything, still a world a win.  And that's something the political establishment would like us all to forget.