Tuesday 1 June 2021

Biden building a new democracy?

President Biden has been defending US democracy. He has to. Trump is about to go to his Summer rallies. QAnon conference speakers, assembling mass audiences, suggest the overthrow of the Biden government on the basis that Trump really won the Presidential Election. States, led by Texas, are cutting the franchise for potentially poor and non-white voters. During 2021 States will be partially voting for the Senate (currently held by the Democrats by one vote) and the House of Representatives. 

The US has a well known history of Democrats and Republicans mounting filibusters and meddling with  votes. The particular significance in today's case is that Biden's Democrats have no intention of fiddling the vote - as an organised purpose - but the Republicans, including nearly all of its leadership, are designing exactly that. The GOP proposes to drop democratic measures and instead has decided to create a new(ish) political formation - mainly independent of the norms of US democratic consent. 

If the GOP break into a Senate majority this year it will freeze Biden and extend the polarisation that has been building since the huge failures of Clinton, Bush and Obama. In reality the US right-wing, bolstered by key states, are moving towards the subordination of the US's shaky democracy in favour of a virtual dictatorship and, if resisted, to a version of another civil war. 

The reduction of the franchise is now a regular feature of Western's dwindling democracies. Frankly it is a response to what was becoming dangerous possibilities, where key structures that managed big economics (and therefore politics) were breaking down. The EU and its response to the 2008 crash began to dissolve its domination, which is still happening. Britain cracked via a democratic referendum. It is still now wobbling from its previous core foundations - the EU dependancy, the City of London and the unity of the UK are all in trouble. 

The crisis of globalisation and its effects began initially to move movements in the West in order to demand blocking immigration. This has polarised too. Over three or four years, most particularly in Germany, France, the UK and even now the US, the fear of immigration has declined, becoming instead a hard-line minority social base in the population, but considerably lower than the main, majority demands. The top requirements now are seeking good jobs, health, homes and schools, all below immigration. 

The requirement to use democratic means has never been more essential, as the post-war West collapses under pressure of the East and of the fragility of globalisation. But what has happened is the leaderships in the West are becoming less and less willing to use what was always limited, democratic responses to the crisis.  Several western countries are now are reducing their franchises - which from the 1930s onward had always been expanding. Police measures are being prepared to block public mass-action. The end of Covid 19 will test the real relation of forces in the West as the people come onto their streets for reform. This, in turn, will test the Trumpet cult in the US, the fascists across France, Italy and the UK. Sadly, but essentially to understand, the battle will become more and more combined with direct parts of the state - that is, if popular change appears to break through. 

A new democracy? A new democracy will not emerge from any aspect of the current conditions available in the West - as the western countries continue to reduce democratic means to deal with their crises. Corbyn was blocked, to pieces; now Biden faces the US right. The situation remains open. Two certainties will apply. There will be conflict across the West. Some will want it to be a confrontation with China, others, part two of the US civil war. The battle in the UK will be initially the future of Ireland and Scotland. Europe is disaggregating in various directions. A second certainty will be facing an economy that doesn't work any more. It will be the most dangerous and most international moment in the history of modern capitalism.