By Steve Clark
Famine in Somalia, twelve million lives threatened. Three days of riots spread now across Britain. Emergency meetings convene in Europe to stave off financial collapse in Greece, Portugal, Italy and Spain. Wall Street drops almost 2,000 points in the last five days of trading. Syria’s regime attempts an all-out crush of the nation’s democracy movement. Hundreds of thousands of Israelis join anti-government protests. The worst day yet of American casualties in Afghanistan. And Tuesday voters in Wisconsin attempt the recall of the rightwing bandits who took the state hostage in February.
What ties all these situations together is the world’s mounting economic and social polarization. The world’s big banks and wealthy corporate elites are getting theirs while leaving the rest of humanity to languish. Yet, it won’t languish. It rebels.
Lenin, a man who knew something about revolution, said a revolutionary situation exists when the ruling class can’t rule in the old way and the masses can’t live in the old way.
We’re there. The problem is that the progressive forces are in disarray, without a clear program and without substantial organization. Without a progressive option, the people are flailing, lashing out angrily, frustrated, sometimes despairing.
Given the lack of leadership, the present explosion of spontaneous revolt is likely to run its course, and a new but temporary calm may emerge. But the underlying problem – the polarization of wealth – is not being addressed. Unaddressed, the crisis will explode again and again.
In all likelihood, we have entered a decisive phase of struggle. Progressives must define an agenda that can impose social accountability on the big banks and global corporations. We must insist that civil society and the global grassroots – the emerging service class of would-be social problem-solvers – be empowered to attack the polarization with practical programs that foster and enable collaborative human survival in local communities worldwide.
There is a way out, but it is going to get more difficult and complex until we find cogency and direction and a progressive global movement gels. If you want to demand and fight for social accountability from the corporate elites, if you want to redistribute some of their expropriation to civil society and real, global, grassroots problem-solving, go to and register for struggle. Consider the action agenda we offer in Digging Out: Global Crisis and the Search for a New Social Contract. We’ll get back to you with help and direction.
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