This is the conclusion of our two-part series on the upcoming US election. Part one detailed the theoretical and historical reasons why Marxists refuse to support capitalist political parties under any circumstances. Part two tackles some frequently asked questions about our position, especially in light of the threat posed by Trump.
The upcoming US presidential election is once again provoking arguments from liberals about the “lesser evil” amid widespread concern about the reactionary right. Revolutionary socialists never support capitalist parties or their candidates — our class enemies — and we reject lesser-evilism as a justification for doing so, even when the “lesser” evil isn’t complicit in genocide. Here, we outline the history of this fundamental Marxist principle.
Most on the broad left view electoral activity as all-important to progressive reform and even the advance of socialism. They focus almost exclusively on elections, inevitably to the benefit of parties of the liberal bourgeoisie, like the Democrats. By contrast, revolutionary socialists recognize the electoral system as a weapon in the hands of the ruling class that can never be used to transform the system in any lasting way.
Every year I teach an Introduction to Cultural Anthropology course. In the section in which we focus on socioeconomic class, I ask my students to read and interpret the famous first pages of the Communist Manifesto. These are the pages in which Marx and Engels broadly...