• For
several weeks now, humanity has been facing an expanding and rapidly spreading
epidemic (pandemic), that of coronavirus.
The spread
and danger of this pandemic (with many issues still ongoing and the controversy
among the world's major centers of power) absolutely blames the world
capitalist-imperialist system, especially regarding its course in recent
decades. It reveals all the dominant effort to destigmatize capitalism, its
laws and contradictions, which seeks to load its own responsibility for
exposing humanity to a great health risk to the peoples themselves, who are
supposedly dirty, careless, and irresponsible. It has been shown that the
racial-racist attempt to separate societies into resilient and not resilient,
developed and non-developed, and affected differently by viruses, was
short-lived.
As we have
pointed out, the coronavirus in particular does not do as many "distinctions"
as those before it appeared to do, that the so-called "developed"
world considered to be confined to the underdeveloped, poor and impoverished
regions of the world. (the well-known discrimination between the diseases of "civilization",
and the others). We understand, therefore, from this point of view also, that
the progress of the epidemic has caused such a shock in the metropolises and
other capitalist countries in the West, East, North and South.
So, we must
place the great political and social cost of the global capitalist system in
this context, because it left "defenseless" and
"unfortified" even parts of the planet that were "famous"
for health systems, for social and health protection, for hygiene conditions.
• We
monitor, with many questions and doubts, the data provided to us by the system
regarding the origin of the virus, the routes and the points of spread. Their
weakness and surprise are definitely combined with their willingness to reduce
the cost. Every day that passes, they are forced everywhere on the planet to
modify or even overturn previous "scientific" findings and estimates.
Their statistical monitoring and forecasting models are unreliable, since the
diagnostic precautionary test is unreliable and incomplete (the test case). All
the first "conclusions" (symptoms only in the lungs, targeting old
age, and a number of other temporary "certainties") are tested and
overturned in practice. This situation that is being immediately perceived -
even distorted - by the large masses of the population, makes even us very
suspicious. That is why our analysis is based on the data of our initial
approach, excluding conspiracy theories, and we avoid comparisons with past,
large-scale, health, military, political, social upheavals. The correlations
with epidemics of previous centuries, the comparison with the numbers of
victims of local wars, etc., are disorient and lead to estimates that
degrade-underestimate the health issue that has emerged by the recent epidemic.
• Therefore, with all the data we have and can check, judging by the behavior and attitude of the system, its surprise, its -sometimes- spasmodic reactions and the contradictory measures they take, we conclude that we are dealing with a serious health threat.
• Therefore, with all the data we have and can check, judging by the behavior and attitude of the system, its surprise, its -sometimes- spasmodic reactions and the contradictory measures they take, we conclude that we are dealing with a serious health threat.
The spread
of this epidemic is a serious health threat to today's society, morals, habits
and consciences. Therefore, we absolutely understand, support and show our
solidarity to the affected people and we approach them in this basis, in order
to move forward with the "rest". It is an absolute right of a person
to not wanting to get sick, to not wanting to suffer and to try - in the
context of this society that he is living in - to protect himself and his
children.
Class
social data, are not surpassed even if, as we have said, the full-of-problems
health also affects middle classes. And let's keep in mind that we are not
given the real data on how the poorest and most oppressed strata have been
affected or how the virus will affect them, which have been deprived of voice,
formation, and fighting tools for decades.
The
processing of ways to show solidarity (in the context of building a movement
and not to fill in holes created by state policy) should not frighten us.
Today's
screaming health crisis arises from the same logic and relationship that
defines the heart of the capitalist system. It was not inevitable that humanity
was caught unprepared, and is a cheap systemic excuse, as neutral as it is
classless. The raw truth is that the capitalist system left humanity
unprepared, because it was promoting and preparing its own plans, sacrificing
even basic rights for these plans. The system has shown (unfortunately at a
high cost to humanity) that it is not only sacrificing masses in times of war,
but also in the face of natural phenomena and the treatment of disease and
pandemics.
We have a
permanent duty and obligation to persist in a substantiated manner in revealing
the causes and characteristics of the health crisis, highlighting all that
defines and limits the general human potential at this level. To popularize as
much as we can in relation to the big "slaughter" that characterizes
the whole economy-industry that concerns prevention-diagnosis-treatment. To
highlight the cynicism produced by the logic of profit, the logic of the expansion-conquest-dividing
of markets that defines imperialism, which has reduced health to a weapon and a
tool that fits into inner-imperialist antagonisms.
The global
capitalist-imperialist system will obviously not sit idle when - in the midst
of all the other matters it struggles to deal with - the feeling that "the
king is naked" is embedded in parts of the masses. Obviously, even in such
moments (much more so in such moments) it brings the machines of distortion,
making black appear as white, in order to put a stop to the masses' awareness
of what they have to deal with. The system does not give up on manipulating,
forcing the masses, when in fact they are going to experience a total
deterioration of their lives in the near future, and not only as a consequence
of the spread of the coronavirus. As surprising as it may be, the motivation
for the system and its effort to tame the pandemic is not its interest in
humans and their health, but not to burden the political and social costs that
are undoubtedly charged at it in a high pace since the spread of the virus. The
capitalist system, especially in recent decades, has demonized the adversary in
a total and studied way and has taken full advantage of the defeat of the
communist movement in order to present itself as eternal and fit for
"human" nature and potential.
In other
words, we should point out that in this effort, the system has weapons and
capabilities that stem from the negative correlation, the ideological
disintegration of the working class, the marginalization and weakness of the
communist movement. We insist that the "interest" of the system in
human health and life goes through a filter of classism, class antagonisms and
class struggle, and that it is determined by the pursuit of the system to expand
its ideological and political dominance, even in conditions where popular
indignation and its questioning by the masses are expanding.
It is clear
that the capitalist system concerning the coronavirus, but also especially at
how it will stand against the consequences, is not united and agreed. Of
course, it would be very difficult to do the opposite if we consider that the
spread of the coronavirus found the system torn apart by fierce
intra-imperialist rivalries and geostrategic controversies that centered on the
search for new strategic alliances.
A system in all-round decay
Expressions
of the parasitic nature of the capitalist-imperialist system also exist in
reference to additional issues - more or less visible - beyond what we have
already pointed out. A look at what is happening in the so-called field of
medicine - one of the most lucrative for the capital in the world - is enough
to understand the magnitude of parasitism.
We are
watching - not for the first time - a ruthless war for the "patent",
for which of the monopoly giants operating in this sector will gain the lead
over its competitors and the corresponding benefits that will come with such a
thing. The drugs, vaccines, diagnostic tests for the virus, even ... masks,
respirators and antiseptics, have become a field of wild profit and
confrontation for some of the most ruthless portions of capital. The fate of
the peoples is left to those who have turned an indisputable human need into a
market of hundreds of billions.
It could be
said that the competition that has erupted in all the fields regarding the
management of the pandemic has now been organically merged with the
pre-existing contradictions in the imperialist camp, raising them to new
heights. It is no coincidence that once again analysts of the system are quick
to point out that "the resilience of globalization is being tested"
and that the "return to the nation-state" momentum is intensifying!
What is
certain is that the dimensions of the current crisis, which has affected, among
other things, the ‘inside’ of key players in the global table, the primacy in
research and patenting, as well as vaccine control, are directly linked to will
of imperialists for upgrading their positions against the rest and is one of
the factors that will significantly influence the formation of relations
between them.
And it is
clear that in another society, free from human-to-human exploitation, what
would be progress and achievement for humanity, is now becoming a real
nightmare for peoples.
To all of
the above the World Health Organization is absolutely submissive. WHO at this
stage appears in many respects as the coordinator of the fight against the
virus and the custodian of mass health around the world.
From the
first moment of its establishment, in 1948, the WHO bore the stamp of its
political control by the dominant imperialist powers, especially the United
States.
At present,
it is clear that this institution operates under the condition of the
correlations formed in the dominant circles.
And while
the West's influence in drafting WHO's policies should be taken for granted,
there is nothing but concern from them about China's growing role in recent
years, as an expression of the general competition on the planet.
As the
health crisis progresses, new aspects of the rot that characterizes capitalism
in its imperialist stage will be revealed. To the galleys of labor
exploitation, to the blood rivers of imperialist interventions, to the drama of
millions of uprooted people, to the whole web of oppression that this system
builds to the detriment of peoples, another side has been added that has been
very clear lately: the threat to the life of masses from a pandemic. The
awareness that this factor is also the product of a social organization that has
long ago "eaten its biscuit[1]"
strengthens and illuminates the necessary struggle for today's tasks.
The Politburo given that we are facing
unprecedented situations, points out the
need to delve into a series of events and developments for which we have a
first-hand approach:
- To
popularize the special conditions in
China that allowed the spread of the virus there, when areas like those in
Asia have repeatedly been “greenhouses” for a series of viruses.
- To be as
specific as possible on the evolution of the epidemic there (start, peak,
recession), the attitude and choices of the Chinese leadership.
- In
particular, to focus on the impact that the escalating US-China conflict has
had on the decisions of the Chinese leadership, and on the other hand to the
leadership’s need to continue the Chinese soft power expansion.
There are
many gaps and we need to be quite suspicious of what is being
"scientifically" presented. After all, this is not the first time
that scandal-scenarios have been recruited to cover up serious contradictions
and quarrels that permeate the entire global economic network with huge profits
and even huger turnover. (sanitary materials, pharmaceuticals, etc.) A network
in which powerful monopoly centers are involved, that based on their national
characteristics, ie their formation on the basis and in relation to their own
nation-state, exercise their global action.
But even
so, we need to point out that the whole exacerbation of the virus threat is
crucially linked to the competition and relationships within the entire
international network (healthcare,
drugs, protocols, treatments, vaccines, healthcare, hospitals, diagnostic
centers, diagnostic equipment, etc.) A
network that, like any capitalist relationship, operates with the logic of profit
and that has ended up being perforated and vulnerable.
Everything we have described accompanies this
whole plexus over time and never stops. Are being recruited large media networks with large advertising
campaigns, ministers, governments and bills ( ή draft of the law), to hoard the big industries
and any services and transportation associated with them. Today, however, if we understand correctly, this whole
situation cannot be limited to the characterization of a "health
crisis", since the whole issue has gone far beyond that. All over the world, with more or less delay,
with differences, the capitalist-imperialist power ( ή domination) has declared a state of red
alert.
Having, therefore, some such issues open, we
must admit that the first decisive factor in the fact that the whole situation
tends to evolve into a general crisis is the decisions and choices of the
system. These are the ones who have given another
dimension to things! The second, also essential issue, is that the undoubted
catalyst for all this reality is the (any) real threat of the virus.
This is easy to read. The most demanding is exactly what "reaction" catalyzes. Which "reactants" and which "products".
This is easy to read. The most demanding is exactly what "reaction" catalyzes. Which "reactants" and which "products".
But let us briefly state ( ή concisely ) our basic assessments of the global situation that has been the ground on which the current crisis has erupted, reminiscent of the eve of a peculiar "World War III":
intra-imperialist
competition ( ή imperialist infighting )
2. Emergence of
new competitors and signs of relative weakening of the classic great players of
the West, with the US first.
3. The process of
further rupture within the EU and NATO. The great turmoil caused by
Britain's decision to leave the EU.
4. The great pressure created by the stagnant funds,
given (despite the contrary declarations) the expansion of the bubble, which is
also manifested in the present phase with stock market crash. Pressure that
causes a lot of quarrels within the system between the "liberals" and
the "statesmen".
6. One factor that needs to be evaluated is the great
resilience and coherence that the Chinese regime has at every opportunity to
prove. It shows an opportunity to counter the pressure so far, a situation that
will fuel opposition from the rest of the imperialists.
7. The upheavals and reorganizations brought about by
the developments in Syria, the upgrading of Russia's role and the subsequent
opposite attitudes of the Western imperialists towards it.
Therefore, we see that the headaches that
accumulate (on all sides) so far work more "divisively" in the
Western bloc than "aggregate". A reality that also has a big impact
on the economy.
The need to clarify, then, how we perceive
"opportunity" underscores that imperialist powers, on a first-come,
first-served basis (but also the rest of the world's ruling classes) have to
deal with an "objective" dynamic of accelerating developments.
prescribing an immediate future that is very uncertain and dangerous for the
peoples of the world.
This, as we have said, does not negate the fact
that they had their plans, it does not negate the fact that they are obliged by
things to modify them, it does not negate the fact that (in the midst of the
evolution of the threat) decisions are made "warmly". each case does
not sit with folded arms.
So far, through relapses and delays, the measures taken by the system (always under the umbrella of its attempt to convince the king that it is not naked) are moving at the following levels:
1. Restrictive measures (which - obviously in an
urgent and coercive way - are taken almost all over the world) are aimed at
temporarily expanding the spread of the virus over a longer period of time,
limiting the peaks of the pandemic and thus mitigating it. pressure for
hospitalization that will be accepted by the care system that with the sole
responsibility of the system itself is considered insufficient even for the
most "developed" economies-societies.
These are measures that have a strong
repressive and repressive character and are in stark contrast to even the small
remnants of democratic, trade union, political and individual freedoms that
survived from its previous repressive period (2008 onwards) not only for Greece
but also worldwide.
So, based on the possibilities (?) αnd the limits of the whole health care system-network, given the anisometries worldwide, these repressive measures have been taken as necessary and without the current data leaving room for some others. Apparently, a month or two ago, not all imperialist countries started with the same treatment, and there was a lot of discussion about the two or three models provided for in the medical and social protocols.
All the centers of power of the main
imperialists (and the rest of the bourgeois governments a little later)
realized that the "pure" and complete implementation of "herd
immunity" without "protectionism" and state intervention would
not ultimately prevent their great agony, that is, the effects on the economy. The supposed "normality" of the herd
immunity, which is supposed to ensure economic operation, proved to be a great
delusion and would cause even greater shocks.
However, as
we can see, the central government is testing the so-called "herd
immunity" in parts and on a case-by-case basis. Because what else do they
do when they EXCLUDE THE OFFERS WITHOUT ANY ABSOLUTELY DAYS?
What else do they do when they put quarantine areas and wait to see the reaction of the population without support? What else do they do when they refuse to close factories that have cases?
What else do they do when they put quarantine areas and wait to see the reaction of the population without support? What else do they do when they refuse to close factories that have cases?
• As we have said, the repressive
measures adopted and continue to be promoted by the system are marked by
serious contradictions and are "undermined" by the very anarchic way
in which the capitalist system operates. However,
for health reasons (as we do not have as a people's movement, as communists,
based on the negative correlation, a special, independent of the popular networking
and reaction system) we are obliged to follow the measures for self-protection
both our own, but and the world next to us and near us. Measures that run
counter to the need to function and intervene also alter our
"normality" in some respects.
So, no, (as
much as we can) «we will play in the opponent’s field», but seeking to
highlight demands and claims in the obvious, in the wider world, anti-popular
aspects that are:
- The horrible and exhaustive work conditions and devastation of the working people (in total) in the health care section.
- The-from every aspect- inadequacy of a perforated care system to cover the increased needs of the population for prevention and treatment.
Volunteering
(or rather the solidarity, the mutual support) of the masses can be manifested
in the context and in relation to a social system, only if this social system
and its political power can inspire and mobilize the people. In order to
manifest itself it must be connected and serve to expand the abilities of the
health care system and not to patch the so-called «bad texts».
On the
contrary, only the major, mass, popular and labor movements managed to expand
the solidarity and mutual support actions. Therefore, despite the negative
correlations and all that we rightly point out about the character of
“volunteering” we also have this task: to favor the need for solidarity,
which-as it seems-will increasingly hedge.
Indeed, in
the first phase the «impoundment» has a legitimacy, as well as the national
solidarity against the «enemy». But, there is another side to this, that of
testing of these «successes» of the system, if the epidemic spreads and these
measures turn into a boomerang, because then they will fuel the reverse course,
swelling and expressing the popular indignation and anger.
With a
fairly high speed and despite the phenomena we mentioned, is forwarded in
parallel the reinforcement and support of the capital, on the one hand, and the
further deterioration of the employed and unemployed position on the other.
Next to this is the cynical and inhuman treatment of refugees and migrants.
·
These
measures are the system’s response to the now apparent entanglement of the
health crisis with the rapid re-emergence of a series of crisis phenomena that
correlate with the economical function of capitalism. Measures that prove for
once more what we have been persistently declaring the last decades: that the
state is present and never left∙ at least where the expansion and reproduction
of the capitalist system demands and apparently to the detriment of the working
class and people… It is therefore possible and in the dynamic of developments,
that many of these measures will become permanent. And it is possible that we
will experience new «corona-memoranda» wild capitalist attack in order to get
the broken-ones out from the operation of rescuing capitalism, financial
capital etc.
A FIRST
SUMMARY
The
capitalistic system has a particular nature and that cannot be changed. No
matter how much suffering it causes, and because it will not voluntarily
relinquish its sovereignty, it reacts to the disastrous consequences of its
nature as capitalism: it fuels new anti-popular consequences and disaster. And
along with those it crushes its own delusions and ideologies that it created in
previous periods. Nevertheless, it does not give up from reinstating new ones.
The
system’s main concern against the pandemic, but also its abilities to «act», is
limited to repression and restraint.
First,
because the health care structures are perforated and ineffective from the
ferocious attack of previous years.
Second and
not insignificant, because it can’t and it doesn’t want (based on its
characteristics) to impose the global industrial-financial complex and place it
directly and effectively in the service of treatment of the disease. That is to
force it to remove (if that can be done) completely its class character.
It is
therefore explicable that the popular masses feel unprotected and are coerced
to comply with the measures, since they see no light in the medicines they can
take, nor in the treatment they will have, nor in their ability to make an
early diagnosis.
The situation inside the country
To keep
using the medical terminology of our days, the health crisis of coronavirus has
brought out and will continue to bring to the surface all the «underlying
diseases» of the system of exploitation and dependence.
Mitsotaki’s
government (and in return for dealing with the «refugee» crisis) had reaped
some «nice» benefits from its patrons, such as easing the targets of primary
surpluses and some funding tools (return of profits from the sale of Greek
state bonds), the purchase of the country’s bonds by the ECB (quantitative
easing, with asterisks because it takes place in the so-called secondary market
where investment FUNDS buy and «auction» and not the central banks).
The EU,
with the «German-axis» in the forefront, accepts funding of European economies
only in the context of the European Mechanism, which means that there must be
precautionary lines of support for these programs, i.e. memoranda, if the
countries cannot return the amounts in two years! In this framework, even the
easing of the Stability Pact means few things for countries like Italy or
Spain-even less for countries like Greece.
The
country’s dependence is apparent in the economic growth model they promised to
the people in three levels:
The
so-called «heavy industry», tourism will get and it already receives a very
heavy blow. Estimations (perhaps even conservative) talk about a reduction of
up to 80% of turnover in tourist units, which may mean a multiple effect on
services connected to it like catering and supply, but also on other sectors as
e.g. the construction.
It is very
characteristic from the food crisis (which is discussed by the World Trade
Organization and World Health Organization) and how it will affect our country.
A country with shrinking agricultural production and a food industry
that-mainly in livestock farming- is based on imports.
Also, it is
distinguished by the dependence οn intermediate goods, the constraint of whose production will globally
affect the prices.
The
country’s exporting companies, who had managed to emerge and survive ignoring
the shrinking of the domestic market, in a «counter-role» with the memoranda,
are included in the sectors that are affected from the crisis, according to a
recent survey.
The shale
oil, in which they had invested program and material plans, is currently the
most affected area from the price war on liquid fuels. Of course, the reaction
of the American imperialist state is expected on this.
The fall in
the prices of oil and fuel may favor at this stage the «local» big refineries,
but the fall in prices doesn’t favor the sales or better the profits from them.
Only, of
course, the cosmopolitan ship-owners who, by making the crisis an opportunity
in the midst of the crisis, are building new tankers and, mainly, storage
platforms to «welcome» the cheap oil and profit later! Only that not even the
capitalist economy of the country will benefit at all from their «advances».
As a
result, and because we have lived the memoranda, we have the experience as a
people that the economic and social desertification can be absorbed and
reproduced even by this dependent Greek capitalistic system with the respective
painful redistributions, even within the bourgeoisie. Unless it is really
threatened by the people and their movement.
Of course,
the new situation that will rise when the part of the health crisis is over and
when the outcome meets the effects of the memorandums, will be unprecedented in
terms of social misery. It is truly doubtful which commitments or emergency
measures will be "remembered" by the bourgeoisie for the health care
system, as soon as the quarantine is over.
Attempts to
secure anti-labor practices and measures and to make society addicted to
coercion and fear are already underway.
It is
certain that the direction that will get forward, and already does, is
"let's all give a hand". That is why all the predators, who steal the
wealth produced by the working class, have mobilized and are giving some petty
cash now.
Will this
be enough to drag impoverished peoples into the pursuits of the dependent
bourgeoisie, -whose ranks now include large-scale middle class parts who
managed to escape or regenerate from the memorandum period? That is quite
doubtful.
Whether the
government today, along with other seven countries, raises the flag of the
epidemiologists, demanding more funding, is not enough an alibi to calm down
the anger and the resentment of the masses (which are in a suffocating
repressive blockade, especially the youth) and for a people who already tends
to starvation. Literally, and without having any other choice.
• It is a lie
that the ruling class and the government have “moved with huge speed”. No, that
is not the case at all! They did not have many options based on the dependency
grid they rely on, as we presented earlier. The ruling class remained exposed
and naked in the face of this development. A number of ridiculous ideas proved
wrong, during both the SYRIZA, as well as the ND (Mitsotakis) era.
Taking
these measures, the ruling class is obliged to harm a number of functions and
sectors of the economy. In order to "refresh" her stand, she will
charge the people and the working class with new burdens; considering the
extent of the virus threat. And if the German policy prevails again in the
conflict that has erupted in the core of the EU, perhaps the reinforcements
from the EMS will form the basis for new ... (corona) memorandums.
Therefore,
there is a second (not so hidden) aspect of the repressive measures, which form
a status of "quarantine" and isolation of the people that aims to
stem the flow of anger and resentment that will undoubtedly come, if the spread
of the virus and the austerity measures continue.
So, even if
the medical guidelines are clear and must be taken into account, they are also
used for anti-popular purposes and aspirations, since they are in the hands of
a reactionary ruling class.
The mottos:
"Stay at home", "wait and don't investigate", "leave
the matter to the experts", as they have become daily directives, can
offer nothing more than an extension in the occurrence of infected cases. We do
not ignore that, but it is a weak and insufficient measure, and especially when
it is used to conceal and bypass the key issue of supporting and strengthening
the healthcare system, of offering massive diagnosis and prevention.
• So what
can the people do with the organizations and the meager means at their disposal
(and as they have been deprived of weapons)? Indeed, there is a serious risk
for people to be trapped at home, for workers to be stacked as long as they
work, for the unemployed to also be stunted and multiply, for refugees and
migrants will be stacked in camps, and for the youth to also be trapped.
During
these difficult circumstances, we have no inclination to self-sabotage
ourselves, as we consider that the health risk for us and the people who want
to act are still far from being second or third in the scale of significance.
After all, this attitude of ours, which takes into account the health-risk
data, creates the need for us to forge a series of demands regarding care,
prevention and early diagnosis, intensively and urgently. We call for specific
precautions for workers who continue to be stacked in production and private or
public services.
A
significant part of our intervention and action has been adapted and perhaps
given extra attention to health-risk data. Political data have a double meaning
for us. On the one hand, as we have said, they create a strong need for the
masses (which -let's not forget- were already marginalized) to defend
themselves against the virus. On the other hand, however, what we are searching
for in these new context, concerns the ways, the forms and the possibilities
for the masses not to stay quiescent, without a voice in these wild conditions.
[1] To be no longer functional or
useful; to be dead or about to perish. Primarily heard in Canada.
29/3/2020
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