One
of the most amusing reports to come out of France during the recent
unrest was of one panic-stricken capitalist, convinced that his class
was about to be expropriated, who loaded his car with over £1
million in cash and made a dash for the Swiss border. But his terror,
ridiculous in retrospect, was matched by a corresponding euphoria in
left-wing circles. Anyone accustomed to thinking along Bolshevik or
anarchist lines was convinced that "a revolutionary situation"
had developed and, in Britain at any rate, there were several groups
declaring that the socialist revolution had started. Already May 1968
is part of the mythology of the left and there is a generally
accepted explanation of why the agitation seeped away and why the
strikers drifted back to work. The French workers are supposed to
have been ripe for revolution and all that was missing was "a
large revolutionary organisation capable of giving direction to the
demands of the working class".
This
raises the whole question of what constitutes a socialist revolution.
The Socialist Party of Great Britain argues that it is not enough to
have thousands of demonstrators on the streets or even millions of
workers occupying the factories. Above all the working class must
have a clear understanding of what Socialism entails and what methods
are effective in overthrowing capitalism. A grasp of socialist
principles by the vast majority of the workers is a minimal condition
for going forward to Socialism and no party, no matter how
religiously it follows the Bolshevik tradition, can substitute for
this.
If
this is accepted, then we can estimate how close France came to a
socialist revolution by taking a look at the demands which the
workers advanced during the period of upheaval. Most prominent were
the usual claims for higher wages, better working conditions, shorter
hours and security of employment. (There are between two and three
million workers on the minimum wage level of less than £8 a week and
at least four million earning under £11 a week.) Such demands have
the full support of the Socialist Party--but we must emphasise that
there is nothing revolutionary about them.
(Socialist
Standard,
July 1968)
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