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The hard-won insight that electioneering is a waste of social movement resources doesn't just apply to big, national races, but smaller, state & local races too. #vtpoli A THREAD:
The lure of local elections primarily stems from scale: candidates need to convince fewer voters to win office. But the same fundamental material constraints as higher office exist; they're just rearranged a bit. #vtpoli
In myriad ways large and small, the government is designed to be amenable to reforms that serve capital and hostile to reforms that support workers. That applies all the way down to mayor and city council. (In some ways it's even worse.) #vtpoli
Shit rolls downhill, and municipalities are at the bottom. Officials operate under the weight of 1000s of forced mandates, preemptions & restrictions from their state, federal & judicial counterparts. (Burlington's absurdist charter change process is a prime example.) #vtpoli
Not only are they hemmed in by capitalist-friendly governance above, local pols have their own capitalist class to contend with: occasionally large employers, but always landlords and property developers. These forces influence legislation directly and indirectly. #vtpoli
Capitalists who cannot easily flee with their wealth are both more reactionary and more willing to impose their demands on governments — hence the unique menace landlords & developers pose. A famous example can be found in Bernie's mayoralty. #vtpoli
Bernie was elected mayor in 1981 on his pledge to stop the privatization of the waterfront, a project led by local real estate tycoon Tony Pomerleau. The day after his election, Pomerleau knocked on Bernie's door and said "you may be the mayor, but it’s still my town." #vtpoli
With a whole cast of activists & organizers halting work to go inside city hall, social movements found themselves in a weakened position. Meanwhile, Bernie came around on waterfront privatization, teaming up w/Pomerleau and other rich locals to push a new plan. #vtpoli
Bernie praised the Alden plan as the best possible compromise (tho notably similar to the one he ran against). Thankfully, voters rejected it in a 1985 bond measure. Had the bond passed, the public park Bernie declared his '16 prez bid in would be luxury condos instead. #vtpoli
Socialists who try to capture state power are aspiring to cut off the very branch they’re sitting on. Socialist electoral campaigns are parasitic of, and ultimately destructive to, the working class movements upon which their momentum depends. #vtpoli
Elected socialists haven’t been a toehold of socialist movement within the capitalist state, they’ve been a toehold of the capitalist state within the socialist movement. #vtpoli
The best that elected socialists and their constituents could hope for is a friendlier and more competent management of capitalism. And that’s a task you don’t need to elect socialists to do. #vtpoli
There will always be liberals ready to volunteer to be the officials from whom we will extract concessions. But while opportunists are a given, an organized and militant working class isn’t. It’s up to all of us to make that happen. #vtpoli Read more: https://blackrosefed.org/socialist-dog-catchers-wont-save-us/
