On the Unitary Organization

In a weekly report from the Chemnitz agitation district, the “Volkszeitung für das Muldental”, an offshoot of the “Leipziger unabhängige Volkszeitung”, deals with the allegedly “unpleasant” style of writing of the “Bremer Arbeiterpolitik”.

The author of the article first of all acknowledges the difficulties with which “Arbeiterpolitik” is currently struggling, and these difficulties, which are increasing from day to day, also explain why “Arbeiterpolitik” no longer stands on as high a journalistic level as it otherwise should and could.

The lack of theoretical sharpness and clarity is also largely due to these enormous difficulties, but this is not to say that it has been replaced by a vague word radicalism, which we can confidently leave to the independents, who, in the absence of a fundamental program, urgently need this tool for their agitation.

Above all, the writer of the article was taken with the statement of “Arbeiterpolitik” on the question of the unitary organization, in which a “great danger” for the whole movement is said to lie.

It is not clear which endangered movement is meant by this; if it is the Independent movement, well, then such a result of the withdrawal slogan would only be welcome from the point of view of left-wing radicalism and a very desirable goal as progress towards the final victory of socialism, because such a wavering hybrid between right and left, such as the Party of Independents, with its meaningless formulas inherited from the old party and a “program” originating from the pre-imperialist era, may well bring confusion into the minds of the working class, but it can never bring the struggling proletariat closer to socialism. Or are we referring to the endangered trade union movement, in which case we would have reached the core of the article in question.

Basically, the author of the article considers the unitary organization to be the only viable form of organization, but only for the future and beyond, this organization should grow out of the “comfortable” ground of the existing trade unions.

Anyone who, in view of the tremendous political upheaval that is now taking place, is still moving along the track of such thoughts has of course not yet grasped the signs of the times, and the clarification process promoted by “Arbeiterpolitik”, as admitted by the author of the article himself, has passed him by without a trace.

What would the slogan, into the trade unions, mean? Nothing but a strengthening of the enemies of socialism. The trade unions are now the strongest supporters of imperialist policy, in this they even outdo the government socialists. After the war they will continue, indeed must continue, this policy, true to their previous reformist activity; their entire organizational apparatus is built on this activity alone.

The entry of the workers into the old trade unions would also mean a financial strengthening of the latter and thus only further consolidate the rule of the trade union bureaucracy, because despite all the fine paragraphs in the statutes, there can be no question of democracy in the trade unions, the bureaucracy rules the unions and the members are only the object of their personal interests.

The author of the article is certainly right when he says that the slogan of resignation has not yet created an organization capable of fighting, and one can also agree that the united organization will be the product of a period of enormous struggles for socialism. But the time of tremendous struggles is not only in the future, it has already arrived.

The old “two-penny wage movement unions” have important functions to fulfill now and in the future. What are these functions? The author says nothing positive about them, only points to the tasks as a professional organization. In other words, the old tactics. Like this: Tuesday, June 11, 8 o'clock in the evening, works meeting. Agenda: wage movement. After a long back-and-forth between the employers' organization and the trade union, a wage increase of perhaps 2 to 4 pfennigs is happily negotiated, which is then described as a great success. With the help of statistics that have been trimmed down to size, this works very well, because you can prove anything with figures. The trade union bureaucracy then has the particular advantage of proving to the members that it is absolutely necessary to employ a trade union official, as it is “overloaded with work” by processing the statistics, which in turn strengthens its position vis-à-vis the members.

The fact that this apparent wage increase is more than compensated for by price increases by employers, and that the price-increasing effect during a period of prosperity even reduces real wages and thus the workers' standard of living, is cleverly concealed, as this would confirm the Sisyphean work of the trade unions as proven by comrade Rosa Luxemburg. This would be just a small part of the tasks that the trade unions have to fulfill. The anti-worker tendencies in the trade unions are of course far from exhausted.

The political and economic conditions have changed fundamentally and completely different conditions for struggle have been created. Only a unitary political-trade union organization will succeed in adapting to these new conditions of struggle. To want to create such a unitary organization from the old trade unions is simply to misjudge the development of the trade unions.

Long before the war, they were already deeply shaken by internal crises. The inadequacy of this form of organization compared to the business organizations, the cartels and trusts became more and more obvious. Too powerless to wrest improvements for the workers from the employers through struggle, the collective agreement policy was now used to avoid the struggle.

This tactic then developed into the struggle between the masses and the leaders in the trade unions. This contrast was most clearly demonstrated during the shipyard workers' strike in 1913, where the union leaders, in alliance with the employers, crushed the strike.

But the concentration of large masses in the modern giant companies also made the old trade unions impossible as a professional organization. Apart from small skirmishes in small and medium-sized companies, the old unions will be powerless in the future. The old trade unions will be powerless in the giant struggles of the future, since the workers of these large, giant enterprises will see their salvation in these bureaucratized and bourgeois organizations, as they did in the past, and even more so in the future.

But wait! The author of the article has reserved for the old trade unions even more important functions for the future beyond their tasks as professional organizations.

These places are to be the “fighting and germ cells” of the new socialist society. What a great deal! Here the author has undoubtedly reached the peak of his wisdom.

These trade unions are not the nuclei of the new socialist society, no, they are the nuclei of anti-socialism, as their past and present social-imperialist activities prove, as the future will also prove.

Now the author of the article wants to see the old trade unions transformed into real fighting organizations, and to this end he recommends that workers join these organizations. Organizations. A useless beginning!

The reference to the events of the party split is fully justified here. The struggle here would be no different, the course and result of this struggle would be no different. Any opposition to this policy of the trade unions would be suppressed by the whole mob of trade union officials with all the means of power of the organizational apparatus. How useless this struggle against the trade union bureaucracy is is best demonstrated by the general assemblies of the Metalworkers' Federation, Building Workers' Federation, etc., where Schlicke, Winnig and company have remained firmly in the saddle despite their anti-worker, anti-socialist policies.

Anyone who now recommends that workers join the old trade unions is doing socialism a disservice. Anyone who joins the old trade unions now, who remains a member of these organizations, only strengthens his enemies, complicates and delays the struggles ahead of us. The economic struggles will no longer be fought with the trade union form of organization. The economic interests of the proletariat will be fought for in the political struggles, and for this we need the unitary organization.

Trying to create this unitary organization by reorganizing the old trade unions is, of course, an absurdity and would only mean a useless waste of energy. Why the protracted, pointless struggle with the bureaucracy, when the struggle with our other class opponents would have to take a back seat?

Those who are convinced of the necessity of a unitary organization must leave the trade unions. When Legien declared at the metalworkers' general assembly that those who do not like it can leave, this is a very consistent position, because the trade unions can no longer take any other path, and the only consequence is withdrawal.

Although we have not yet been able to create the necessary unitary organization, which is not surprising given the suppression of all political rights, we must nevertheless call on the workers to leave the trade unions in their own best interests. The unitary organization will and must come. Only the large army of trade union officials can still have an interest in the preservation of the trade unions, whose good bourgeois existence could very easily be jeopardized if the trade unions are weakened.

The slogan can therefore be no other than: Get out of the Trade Unions!