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Analytical Summary: Against the Stream — 7 November 2024

Against The Stream · 2024-11-08

Core Argument

The central thesis of this episode is that the eruption of class anger across Spain, the United States, and Germany represents a single underlying phenomenon: the intensification of capitalist crisis is driving working people toward political expression, but in the absence of a revolutionary alternative, this anger is being captured by right-wing populist forces. The argument is not that workers have become reactionary, but that the bankruptcy of social democratic and reformist parties — which have repeatedly demonstrated their willingness to manage capitalism rather than challenge it — has created a political vacuum. Trump, Vox, and the AfD are not the cause of working-class radicalisation but its distorted expression.

The episode insists that this is a conjunctural phase, not a permanent shift to the right. The same class anger that currently finds expression through right-wing populism can, through experience and organisation, be redirected toward revolutionary class struggle. The task is not to lament the turn to the right but to understand its material basis and prepare the ground for an alternative.

Theoretical Grounding

The analysis draws on several core Marxist concepts:

Class consciousness and sudden leaps. The discussion of Valencia emphasises that consciousness does not develop gradually or linearly. The mud thrown at the Spanish king is presented as a moment where underlying class resentment — present but latent in daily life — becomes suddenly visible and explosive. This echoes Lenin's understanding of revolutionary situations emerging from the conjunction of objective crisis and subjective rupture.

The bankruptcy of reformism. The episode treats the trajectory of Podemos, the SPD, and the Democratic Party as a single historical lesson: reformist parties that enter government to manage capitalism become discredited, and their collapse opens space for the right. This is not presented as a moral failing but as a structural inevitability — the logic of "lesser evilism" leads inexorably to the strengthening of the far right.

The state as class instrument. The Spanish state's failures — ignored warnings, cut emergency services, blocked relief convoys — are not presented as bureaucratic incompetence but as the logical outcome of a system that subordinates human need to profit. The closing of ranks between PP and PSOE is read as the ruling class recognising a shared threat.

The international character of crisis. The episode connects the Volkswagen crisis, the collapse of the German government, and the US-China trade war as expressions of a single global crisis of overaccumulation, mediated through inter-imperialist rivalry. The argument that the Ukraine war is simultaneously a military war against Russia and an economic war by US imperialism against Europe is a distinctive theoretical claim.

The analysis sits within the Trotskyist tradition of the RCI, particularly its insistence on the impossibility of socialism in one country and the necessity of international revolutionary organisation. The rejection of accelerationism — the idea that one should support the worst capitalists to hasten crisis — is a clear demarcation from certain leftist currents.

Conjunctural Relevance

The episode is remarkably specific about the conjuncture:

Spain: The Valencia floods killed over 200 people. The Spanish meteorological agency issued red warnings; local authorities (Popular Party) downplayed them. The king's visit was a PR stunt that blocked relief convoys. The response — mud thrown at the monarchy, mass volunteer efforts rejected by authorities — is read as a dress rehearsal for broader class confrontation. A major protest was called for the following Saturday.

United States: Trump won six of seven battleground states. The episode cites Wall Street Journal polling showing 89% of Americans see homeownership as essential to their vision of the future, but only 10% believe it achievable. It quotes workers describing the need for two or three jobs, the cost of childcare, the price of deodorant. The argument is that the Democrats' "lesser evil" strategy — supporting genocide in Gaza, failing to codify abortion rights, talking down to working-class voters — produced its own defeat.

Germany: The coalition government collapsed the night before recording. Volkswagen announced its first factory closures in Germany since its founding, plus a 10% wage cut demand. IG Metall is demanding 7% wage increase. The AfD won over 30% in Thuringia and Saxony in September. The SPD is at 6-7% in those states. Sahra Wagenknecht's new party is polling at 8%.

The common thread: inflation, housing crisis, declining living standards, and the complete discrediting of traditional social democratic parties.

Where the Argument Continues

The episode explicitly points forward to several developments:

The Valencia protest movement — the episode notes a major protest called for the Saturday after recording, and promises to return to the topic.

The Trump presidency — the analysis of tariffs, trade wars, and the likelihood that Trump's policies will prove inflationary and fail to deliver for working people is left as an open question to be tested by experience.

The German elections — with the coalition collapsed, early elections are imminent. The episode flags the AfD's potential to become the second party and the possibility of Wagenknecht's formation growing.

The Volkswagen struggle — the confrontation between IG Metall and VW management is presented as a potential flashpoint for wider class struggle in Germany.

The broader argument about the trajectory of right-wing populism — that it will be tested in government, exposed, and eventually create conditions for a left alternative — is a recurring theme across the Against the Stream corpus, particularly in episodes dealing with Italy (Meloni), Argentina (Milei), and the Netherlands (Wilders). The special episode with Alan Woods on the US election results, referenced at the start, develops the theoretical framework for understanding Trump's victory in greater depth.

Connections

Within the RCI corpus: - The 6 November 2024 special episode with Alan Woods on the US election - Jorge Martin's article "Spain: Monarchs pelted with mud as rage over avoidable deaths boils over in Valencia" (marxist.com, 4 November 2024) - Previous Against the Stream episodes on Italy, Argentina, and the Netherlands, which trace similar patterns of right-wing populism emerging from reformist collapse

Broader Marxist texts: - Trotsky's The Struggle Against Fascism in Germany — the analysis of how social democratic betrayal opens space for the far right - Lenin's Left-Wing Communism: An Infantile Disorder — the understanding that workers must learn through experience, including painful experience - Marx's The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte — the analysis of how bourgeois factions close ranks when threatened from below

Thinkers and traditions: - The episode's analysis of the Ukraine war as an economic war against Europe echoes positions developed by the RCI over the past two years, distinguishing it from both liberal and left-nationalist analyses - The rejection of accelerationism places the RCI in opposition to certain currents of the post-2008 left

Key Quotes

  1. "How often do you see kings treated like that? In Britain hasn't happened yet. It may well happen one day. In Spain, however, this event has brought to the surface an underlying conflict between the classes."

  2. "The people at the top of Vox realise this is a way of tapping in basically this right-wing populism... But when the PSOE and the PP come together with this call for national unity, which I'm sure a lot of people will sense what it really means is the people at the top are closing ranks against us. Then if there was a genuine revolutionary alternative on the left, it also could start to grow."

  3. "The anger which led to the vote for Trump tomorrow can channel in a different direction. Precisely through the trade unions, through strikes, through class struggle methods. And that can create the conditions for a political expression not on the right but on the left."

  4. "The American workers now will have to go through a painful school of Mr. Donald Trump, who will not satisfy the needs and aspirations and their desires. But he will exacerbate and intensify the process of crisis, of class radicalisation, and at a certain point from that, a deeper movement and more conscious movement, left-wing movement, will arise."

  5. "We're not accelerationists as in we don't support the worst capitalists in order to accelerate the class struggle. We cannot affect the class struggle as it is now. However... you cannot support any wing of the ruling class. You must maintain an independent revolutionary working class position."