CWAO IN THE NEWS

South Africa has become the ‘protest capital of the world.’ There are marches, blockades, strikes and shutdowns every day as workers, communities in townships and informal settlements, women’s groups, the unemployed and the land deprived resist the on-going wealth grab by the state-capitalist elite. The time has come for protesting and struggling groups to unite into a powerful movement to take the liberation of the working class forward. We see the call for a Living and Social Wage (LSW) campaign as the next step towards unifying such a movement.

We are calling on activists in all the different struggles and organisations to adopt a common vision of what it would take to ensure a decent living for the working class. Such a vision can provide the basis for practical cooperation across sectional and sectoral divisions.

We recognise that there are many activists who are building the unity of working class struggles. We are not calling for a new organisation or a new event. Our approach is to call for united action by the existing organisations of the working class. We believe that united action can best be achieved by the adoption of a common platform that does not require particular movements and groups to set aside their priorities or submit to the authority of a particular organisation or group of organisations. In our view this platform has to set out the basic elements necessary for a decent living for the working class, and the political attitudes and practical cooperation needed to achieve such a living. Our call for a Living and Social Wage campaign therefore includes the following points:

 1.    A living wage is defined by the struggles of workers

We reject the attempts to define a living wage through research studies. Only a process of mass popular mobilisation can decide on a living wage. Every struggle for better wages, benefits and conditions is part of the struggle for a living wage. Worker struggles against outsourcing, labour broking and casual work are part of the struggle for a living wage. The struggles of these workers for permanent jobs and equal treatment are key to the winning of a living wage for all workers.  We reject the separation of a living wage from a minimum wage, which means we reject the National Minimum Wage Bill. No one who works should earn less than a living wage. We will support workers who mobilise to get the R20 per hour promised by the National Minimum Wage Bill, while at the same time fighting for the minimum wage to be raised to the level of a living wage.

 2.    A social wage is crucial for the unemployed and the employed

A social wage is the package of resources that society makes available to every member, regardless of their ability to pay. Through their struggles, working class communities have already made clear what they want to be part of the social wage. Communities are fighting for every one to have a decent basic standard of living. Everyone should have land, housing, water, electricity, sanitation, healthcare, education and personal safety.

The majority of people of working age are unemployed with no regular basic income. An adequate social wage is crucial to them and they are leading the struggles for its different components such as water and electricity. The social wage is also important to the employed in at least two ways: it will relieve the pressure on their wages from which they support the unemployed, and it will make it possible to stop the situation where wage increases are wiped out by the rise in the prices of resources and services such as water, electricity and education. Community struggles for social wages are crucial for winning a living wage.    

3.    The working class must lead the struggle to end racism 

The structural racism built into the design of the social system by colonialism and Apartheid was carried forward into the present neoliberal capitalism. As the wealth gap between rich and poor has grown, the rich have remained overwhelmingly White and the poor overwhelmingly Black. Black nationalism in power has been proven incapable of ending racism. Instead, it has consolidated it and its offshoots such as tribalism and xenophobia.

The Black working class are still trapped in the position of providers of cheap labour in the workplace and unpaid labour (provided by women) in the household. The struggle for a living and social wage requires that this structural racism be confronted and abolished. Only the working class can lead this confrontation.

4.    The struggles of women are crucial 

Women face institutionalised sexism and patriarchy that target Black women for super-exploitation and violence. Struggles for a living and social wage are therefore at their most liberating and powerful when they are led by Black working class women, as many of these struggles have been over the last two decades. There can be no compromises on the part of a genuine campaign for a living and social wage when it comes to fighting sexist discrimination and violence.

5.    Neoliberalism must be defeated 

The ideology, legal-institutional framework and policy package that underpin the extreme exploitation and poverty forced on the working class is called neoliberalism. This is a fundamentalist, extremist form of capitalism, whose foundational principle is that the richest business corporations should have complete freedom of action and limitless state support in their efforts to maximise profits and returns for their shareholders. Neoliberalism includes interventions such as wage cuts and freezes, job cuts, casualisation and externalisation of work, tax cuts for the rich, removal of import tariffs and other protections of local businesses against competition from foreign corporations, removal of regulations governing investment and lending, cuts to spending on social services, privatisation and commercialisation of public companies and services, and a host of other measures that make it easier for corporations to grab and exploit public assets, natural resources, workers and consumers.

Under the impact of the neoliberalism of the last two and a half decades, South Africa has not only maintained its unequal social structure inherited from colonialism and Apartheid, but has increased inequality to become one of the world’s most unequal societies. Struggles for living and social wages face the forces of neoliberalism as their greatest enemy. A unifying campaign for a living and social wage therefore has to prioritise the defeat of neoliberalism.     

6.    Break with the politics of the Tripartite Alliance 

The governing alliance between the ANC, SACP and COSATU has been the crucial force behind the neoliberal attacks on the working class since 1994. Without them, the capitalist elite known as White Monopoly Capital would not have been able to implement neoliberalism to the extent that they did. The Tripartite Alliance used the standing they gained during the struggle against colonialism and Apartheid to unleash the programme of White Monopoly Capital on the working class.

The activists that took up the defence of the working class therefore faced the Tripartite Alliance as the immediate enemy, even in those cases where these activists were grassroots members of the alliance. By the early 2000s, it was clear to many activists that resistance against neoliberalism required a break with the politics and organisations of the Tripartite Alliance. The main ingredients of Tripartite Alliance politics, namely nationalism, liberalism, reformism and Stalinism, turned out to be perfectly suited for the project of imposing neoliberalism on a mobilised working class. A truly effective Living and Social Wage campaign requires a break with this politics.     

7.    The constitution and the rule of law must be fought and used 

The constitution and the rule of law are part of the foundation of the power of capitalism and neoliberalism. As such, any serious attempt to gain a living and social wage for the working class will run up against it as an enemy and an obstacle. Developing defiance, critiques and alternative visions to the constitution and the rule of law therefore enhances the fight for a living and social wage.

At the same time, as much as the constitution reflects and reproduces the domination of capitalism, it also contains the compromises capitalism had and has to make with the resistance of the working class. There are therefore parts of the constitution and the rule of law that the working class can and should use to support struggles for a living and social wage.

Using the law can be done in ways that support or undermine the building of working class movements.  We call on activists to use the law in ways that put the agency and activity of the working class at the centre and build movements capable of defying, critiquing and building alternatives to capitalist law.

8.    Struggles against corruption, state capture and repression must be struggles for a living and social wage 

Even though the law favours the capitalists against the working class, the capitalists do not really respect the law and especially do not respect the rights of the working class. White Monopoly Capital and their allies among the Black elite are involved in massive corruption, state capture and legal and illegal attacks on the rights of the working class. The fight for a living and social wage requires mass resistance against these anti-working class operations.

We call on activists to be alert that the state-capitalist elite wants to control corruption as well as the struggle against corruption. They turn struggles against corruption and state capture into struggles for ‘proper’ neoliberalism. For the working class there can never be proper neoliberalism because this system is based on the oppression and exploitation of the working class. For us the fight against corruption, state capture and legal and illegal repression is part and parcel of the struggle for a living and social wage and for the emancipation of the working class.

 9.    Take action now

We call on activists in the various struggles of the working class to discuss, adopt and spread this call. Let us make the slogan ‘UNITE FOR A LIVING AND SOCIAL WAGE’ part of the programmes of our struggles. Unifying the struggles of the working class is not an easy task. Divisions run deep and some of them are rooted in the structure of neoliberalism.

At the same time, the basis for unity has been won through years of anti-neoliberal activism and struggles for housing, education, land, jobs, wage increases, women’s liberation and democratic rights. The perspective we are putting forward here has not been invented by us. We are drawing on and summarising the political content of the struggles of communities, women, the unemployed, precarious workers and the landless. The community protestors, the workers of Marikana and the farms, and the women activists in rural areas are our leaders.

We are ready to work with any group who are fighting towards a Living and Social Wage for the whole working class.  Let us take up this Living and Social Wage campaign as the best next step to unify the working class into a powerful self-emancipation movement.

 

A LIVING WAGE CAN ONLY BE WON BY WORKING CLASS STUGGLES!

 

A SOCIAL WAGE FOR THE UNEMPLOYED AND THE EMPLOYED!

 

WORKING CLASS LEADERSHIP AGAINST STRUCTURAL RACISM!

 

THE STRUGGLES OF WOMEN ARE CRUCIAL!

 

NEOLIBERALISM MUST BE DEFEATED!

 

BREAK WITH THE POLITICS OF THE TRIPARTITE ALLIANCE!

 

WE USE OUR RIGHTS AND WE FIGHT THE CAPITALIST CONSTITUTION!

 

AGAINST CORRUPTION, FOR A LIVING AND SOCIAL WAGE!

TAKE ACTION NOW! BUILD THE LIVING AND SOCIAL WAGE CAMPAIGN!

UNITE THE MOVEMENTS OF THE WORKING CLASS!

Category: PRESS RELEASE | WORKERS RIGHTS