The Left Berlin News & Comment

This is the archive template

Category: Uncategorised

Hope and Excitement at die LINKE Party Conference

All-female leadership, a new generation of members and a surprising sense of unity in Germany’s left party


04/03/2021

BERLIN BULLETIN NO. 186 March 2, 2021

Surprise, surprise! Things worked out quite differently than expected at the congress of die LINKE, the left-wing party. After the pandemic forced postponements from June to October and from October to last weekend, most of the 580 delegates were sat at home in front of a screen, microphone and camera; only the socially-distanced, masked leaders sat in a sparsely occupied hall in Berlin. But other parties are meeting that way too, this has become the new normal.

The surprise was rather that the bitter, possibly fatal inner conflicts, greatly feared by some, greatly desired by others, simply did not happen. Unlike the angry quarrels, hostility and near split-ups which troubled some earlier congresses, this time there was an amiable, friendly atmosphere throughout.

No surprise, at least for most members, was the choice of new party leaders. Their predecessors stepped down as required after two four-year terms (plus extra months due to the postponements). Only outsiders may have been surprised that both new co-chairs were women, which was new. But many were indeed moved to see the two so warmly friendly, each congratulating the other on her (separate) election and both assuring party members that they would get along very well while diving into the tough tasks ahead; a year full of elections (in six states, and the federal elections on 26th September). With die LINKE now polling at a worrying seven or eight percent, too close to the five percent cut-off point, they will indeed have their work cut out for them.

New all-female leadership

Who are the two new leaders, no longer a male-female team but still the customary East-West duo?

Janine Wissler, 39, has led the LINKE opposition caucus in the legislature of West German Hesse since 2014. She is known as a fighter. In the last election campaign she covered her whole state by bicycle, speechmaking all along the route, and winning more LINKE votes than in most of West Germany. More recently, joining the protest against the clearing of the ancient Dannenröder forest to build another highway, she stayed a while in one of the high tree huts aimed at holding off loggers and the police.

Susanne Hennig-Wellsow, 42, her co-chair, is also known to be plucky. Originally a professional speed skater, a very good one, she switched to educational issues in her East German home-town of Erfurt in Thuringia, and quickly ascended to a position equivalent to that of Janine Wissler’s, becoming chair of both the state party and its caucus in the legislature. But unlike Wissler she was not in opposition. Thuringia is the first and only German state with a LINKE, Bodo Ramelow, as minister-president (like a governor), because his party won the most seats. Since 2014 he has headed a shaky coalition with a small Social Democratic and even smaller Green caucus.

Hennig-Wellsow gained unusual fame last year after a conservative politician pushed Ramelow out as head of state, but only by accepting the votes of the neo-Nazi Alternative for Germany party (AfD), which is stronger and more rabid in Thuringia than anywhere else. Tradition demanded that party-leader Hennig-Wellsow present the winner, any winner, with congratulatory flowers. She approached him, then suddenly let the bouquet fall to the floor. Impolite, but most anti-fascists rejoiced at what became a top Youtube hit. (After a huge public outcry the man had to step down three days later and Ramelow came back – with Hennig-Wellsow. Now these two state leaders head the national party, and though they disagree sharply on some issues, they are in agreement on a host of others – and friendly.

A new generation

Another striking feature of the conference was how many young, female delegates who made contributions. This was a clear change from the past, when die LINKE was dominated by older men, frequently former members of the Socialist Unity Party, the ruling party in the GDR. This generation is dying out. Ten years ago over 50% of members lived in the five smaller states of East Germany; now they make up 38% of a total of 60,000. With all due respect to these truly “Old Faithful”, the trend towards a new, younger generation is a greatly-needed cause for hope. And so is their militancy – which was reflected in the words and the spirit of Wissler and Hennig-Wellsow.

Many of these young members called energetically for more visible, militant action in all of the party’s important focus areas. Post- pandemic recovery was a key theme at the conference, which has left small firms, retail shops, restaurants and cultural workers with heavy debts, job losses and bankruptcy, while large corporations from Amazon to Aldi have raked in huge profits for their shareholders. Die LINKE demands genuine taxes on the wealthy, higher wages for the workers (including the introduction of a 15 euro minimum wage) and more support for families and pensioners. This means much closer cooperation with unions and their struggles.

The related issue of the environment and climate crisis, too often neglected by the left and dominated by the Green party, also received much attention. The Green party is still in second place in the polls ahead of the Social Democrats (SPD) but well behind the twin “Christian Union” parties and has moved ever closer to arrangements with big business, downplaying the needs of common people and even abandoning major principles in order to gain or keep cabinet positions, as in Hesse, where their coalition ministers agreed to the deforestation of the Dannenröder forest for an unnecessary highway extension.

Many delegates warned of further hospital privatization and argued for affordable, publicly-owned housing to counter the profit-based gentrification expanding through most cities. There was praise for the LINKE in Berlin; it led local coalition partners SPD and Greens in pushing through a rent control law reversing the worst over-pricing and forbidding most increases. It also defied Green foot-dragging and SPD opposition to a referendum to expropriate Berlin’s biggest real estate giants.

Wissler, Hennig-Wellsow and many delegates called for a constant, vigilant resistance to the growing menace of the fascists, from local groups of neo-nazis to those organized on a party basis or embedded in the police, the armed services or as suspiciously spooky secret agents of the FBI-type Constitutional Defence Bureau.There was also general agreement on re-directing billions spent on armament purchases and production toward the repair of decrepit schools, rutty roads, unsafe bridges and public facilities.

Dividing lines

But general agreement on this edged into questions dividing the party for years. Some members – and many in leadership – hope keenly that the LINKE can join with the Social Democrats and Greens in a national, governing “left-of-center coalition”, as in current state governments in Thuringia and Berlin. Former harsh rejection by the other two of any connection with the “former rulers of the GDR dictatorship” has now weakened, especially if the votes of LINKE deputies can help them over the 50% margin to victory. Since both the SPD and the LINKE adopted the color red as symbol, this would be a Green-Red-Red coalition. Such an alliance, say its advocates, would be a bar against the right, meaning the Christian sister parties, the conservative Free Democrats and the far-right AfD.

The state and the national levels differ in many ways. Most importantly, only the latter deals with foreign and military policy, which erects big, important hurdles. Both SPD and Green insist on two conditions for an alliance: the LINKE must abandon its opposition to NATO and to sending Bundeswehr troops outside German borders, even on UN missions. That is their red line; No-NATO means No-go! And well-armed German troops must be able to flutter black-red-golden flags from Kabul to Bamako, from masts in the Indian Ocean, wherever it serves German interests. Roll up the tanks, drones, fighters and armed frigates!

Some LINKE leaders call for compromises. A humanitarian mission for the UN now and then should not be a major hurdle, while replacing NATO with a Europe-wide security agreement, including Russia instead of threatening it, is currently pure fantasy. In a highly controversial open letter, Matthias Höhn, a leading LINKE politician, recently said that such matters can be agreed upon, Germany need not totally reject US demands for 2% of its budget for military build-up but might cut it to 1%, with the other 1% diverted to development aid for countries in the Global South. His opponents were quick to reply – they insisted that Germany was threatened by no one; the Bundeswehr was in essence an instrument of the same expansive powers which have determined bloody German policy for over a century. Bombing Belgrade and Afghanistan was also called “humanitarian”! Any backsliding step in these matters was really a foot in the door, a dangerous foot, and would cancel the basic claim by the LINKE to be the one and only party of peace in the Bundestag.

This question has implications for an even more basic question: does die LINKE support or oppose Germany’s present social system? Many leaders in the East, often having been in power at the state level, insist that die LINKE can only exert political effect to improve life if it takes part on a governmental level. The other side claims that die LINKE, as a tolerated little brother in such a coalition, would be granted lesser cabinet positions and be easily outvoted on important policy questions, foreign or domestic, with only two options – bow down or quit. No, they say, the party wants improvements, but sees the need for the eradication of capitalism. That means active opposition and not becoming part of “the establishment,” a role which has cost it dearly in eastern Germany in poll results, elections and reputation.

We want to change things. Merely being in a government is not enough. Major achievements were always won by movements of the people, whether for women’s suffrage, the eight hour day, an end to atomic power plant construction or same-gender marriage. Bad conditions are placed on the agenda by social pressure, not purely by participation in a government.

Janine Wissler, Der Tagesspiegel 20.02.2021

The dividing line is also clear between the two new leaders. Hennig-Wellsow from Thuringia is ready to consider a GRR coalition, even with a compromise or two. Isn’t that what realistic politics sometimes requires? Wissler from Hesse says No: she wants no cozy, weak-kneed cabinet seat for a LINKE. Let the SPD and Greens change, adopt a genuine peace policy and abandon dangerous “east-west” confrontation!

The differing viewpoints were put to the test during the vote for six deputy chairpersons. Matthias Höhn, who sent that letter proposing a retreat on armaments and deployment, received 224 votes. Tobias Pflüger, a disarmament expert opposed to any dilution of peace positions, beat him out with 294 votes. And it was Pflüger’s views which were more frequently reflected by the overwhelmingly young speakers’ list.

Having the LINKE participate in a government does not amount to systemic change. For real changes social pressures are required. That was true in Berlin with the capping of rent levels. There was interference in the market, in conflict with the interests of the big real estate companies in favor of the interests of the tenants. No such changes would have been possible without pressure from tenant initiatives and protests.

Janine Wissler, Der Tagesspiegel 20.02.2021

The fight for socialism

But this coalition question is purely hypothetical anyway. With Greens and SPD now polling at 17% each and the LINKE at 8% (but hoping to get back to double digits), reaching 50% is just a dream.That explains why so many stressed the need to fight in the streets, factories and colleges, rather than at the parliamentary level or in party meetings; among workers, teachers, nurses, supermarket employees, in defence against current attacks on living standards. This must reach at least as many women as men, both young and old, all sexual orientations, and definitely those hit hardest, the millions with immigrant backgrounds. Hopeful symbols were the hearty greetings from the Alevite Turkish community, from several major unions and young activists in Fridays for Future.

As a party we must prioritize more vigorously the issues about which we agree. We did not succeed very well in doing that in recent years. And we must turn more to the people, to be present among cleaners fighting for better conditions or industrial workers struggling to keep their jobs, with Fridays for Future or Black Lives Matter protests

Janine Wissler, Der Tagesspiegel 20.02.2021

Disagreement on key issues could not and will not be ignored. But the happy surprise was that this did not lead to a split! The sides agreed to disagree and now work together to win supporters – and votes – in the six state elections and the national election soon challenging the party.

There was one other aspect which surprised many and deserves attention: how many participants, especially the younger ones, stated that the current social system, now proving its decay and inhumanity more clearly than ever, must be replaced. The goal was also named, without many former taboos; a socialist economy, no longer determined by a tiny elite whose desire for unearned profit has caused a huge, growing gap between billionaires and billions facing deprivation.

If this new fighting spirit and renewed orientation can be maintained, the LINKE party could play a far more potent role in strengthening opposition within Germany. And after the vicious defeat of Jeremy Corbyn’s fight in Britain and with the weakness of leftist parties in France, Italy and elsewhere in Europe, a militant Left in central, powerful Germany could regain the importance it once possessed in the heyday of people like Rosa Luxemburg – who was born 150 years ago, on March 5 1871!

If we want to prevent the gap between rich and poor from widening even further, if we want everyone to have an equal chance at getting an education, culture and health care, with no one having to worry about paying the rent, then, in the final analysis, we must talk about changing the system. We will also be unable to to solve the climate crisis without changes in property and power relationships, for the corporations will block the necessary changes… The same holds true in the medical sector; private hospital corporations pay big dividends to third parties while doctors and hospital personnel responsible for their earnings are hugely overburdened.

Janine Wissler, Der Tagesspiegel 20.02.2021

All interested in earlier Berlin Bulletins – or in me and my books:

victorgrossmansberlinbulletin.wordpress.com

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Can there be a progressive patriotism?

There’s no reclaiming what never belonged to us: A Reply to Keith Prushankin


03/03/2021

I enjoyed reading Keith’s article Putting the Red back in Red, White, and Blue, which makes a number of important points. In order to effectively oppose capitalism, we need a vision of socialism based on love of democracy and of each other. Under neo-liberalism we are alienated and robbed of our sense of community. We need more solidarity and democracy as an antidote to the “runaway, politicized capitalism” so articulately described by Keith.

Unfortunately, I cannot agree with Keith’s central premise. I am most definitely not a patriot, and I see patriotism as standing in contradiction to my socialist internationalism.

Can the Left reclaim patriotism?

This is not a good time for the Left to try to reclaim patriotism. In the US, “patriots” stormed the White House wearing clothing which said that 6 million [Jewish Concentration Camp victims] were not enough. Meanwhile, in Great Britain, Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer is dragging his party to the right, attacking teaching unions for wanting safe working conditions and making Labour’s support for nuclear weapons “non-negotiable”. Each of his press conferences is now made with the backdrop of one, often several, union flags.

Now, I don’t think that this is the sort of patriotism that Keith endorses. His is probably more in line with the musician Billy Bragg, who in his book The Progressive Patriot wrote the following: “Defending our rights, fighting for greater accountability, fighting for social justice, standing up for the traditional value of fairness: these are the things which mark me out as a patriot.”[1]

Bragg bases his patriotism on English progressives “from the Peasants’ Revolt to the Diggers and the Levellers, from Captain Swing to Ned Ludd and the Suffragettes.” He goes on to cite “Tom Paine and the Tolpuddle Martyrs … the Ragged-Trousered Philanthropists and the Battle of Cable Street.”[2] That is an impressive list.

I am sure that Keith can produce a similar list of worthy US Americans, from Frederick Douglass to Emma Goldman, from the 1930s Flint strikers to the Civil Rights marchers 30 years later, from Angela Davis to Tom Paine. Yes, Paine again. A man who was politically active in 3 countries (Paine was also a member of the France’s revolutionary National Convention) does not lend himself easily to being a symbol for one particular place.

Besides which, why should “standing up for the traditional value of fairness” be seen as a specifically British quality? Are Britons really more fair than Iranians or Iroquois? History does not seem to be on the side of people making such assertions.

What is national identity?

Many of the traditions assumed to be an essential part of a national identity are recent inventions. Hardt and Negri explain how the idea of nation played an important ideological role in the transition from feudalism to capitalism: “This uneasy structural relationship was stabilized by the national identity: a cultural, integrating identity, founded on a biological continuity of blood relations, a spatial continuity of territory, and linguistic commonality.”[3]

They note that for Rosa Luxemburg “nation means dictatorship and is thus profoundly incompatible with any attempt at democratic organization. Luxemburg recognized that national sovereignty and national mythologies effectively usurp the terrain of democratic organization by renewing the powers of territorial sovereignty and modernizing its project through the mobilization of an active community.”[4]

Marxist historian Eric Hobsbawm co-wrote an important book about the phenomenon of “invented tradition” – assumed national values which were mainly invented in the 19th and 20th Centuries. These traditions “tended to be quite unspecific and vague as to the nature of the values, rights, and obligations of the group membership they inculcate: ‘patriotism’, ‘loyalty’ ‘duty’, ‘playing the game’, ‘the school spirit’ and the like.”[5]

Hobsbawm notes elsewhere that the Dictionary of the Royal Spanish Academy “does not use the terminology of state, nation and language in its modern manner before its edition of 1884.”[6] Before that, nations as we understand them today did not exist. National borders are an artificial construct. So, Benedict Anderson calls nationalism a “fraternity that makes it possible, over the past two centuries, for so many millions of people, not so much to kill, as willingly to die for such limited imaginings.”[7] It is a tool used by the rich to make the poor fight and die in their wars.

When Keith says that “belonging in a shared project plays an enormous role in creating identity and sustainable contentment in individuals” I agree with him. The trouble is that the “shared project” with which most patriots are expected to identify is a recent invention, introduced to try to bind us to nascent capitalist countries.

Patriotism, Nationalism. What’s the Difference?

Some defenders of patriotism argue that it is fundamentally different to nationalism. George Orwell is often cited:

“By ‘patriotism’ I mean devotion to a particular place and a particular way of life, which one believes to be the best in the world but has no wish to force upon other people. Patriotism is of its nature defensive, both militarily and culturally. Nationalism, on the other hand, is inseparable from the desire for power. The abiding purpose of every nationalist is to secure more power and more prestige, not for himself but for the nation or other unit in which he has chosen to sink his own individuality.”[8]

It seems that, for Orwell, patriotism is felt by nice people and nationalism by nasty people. Nonetheless both are based on the idea that the random fact of where you happen to have been born is important. Keith himself calls patriotism “a sense of belonging derived from a shared and common experience of being citizens of a particular country.” Yet why should “my” country be any better or worse than anyone else’s?

It seems that Orwell just lucked out by being born in the one country which he believes to be the best in the world. Now he may not want to force this belief onto other people, but it is pure parochialism to assume that by an accident of birth, the piece of land upon you which were born is somehow superior to all others.

Not all nationalism is necessarily oppressive. In Catalonia and Palestine, Ireland and Scotland, in parts of Africa, Asia and Latin America, we have seen the emergence of movements which are both nationalist and progressive. After centuries of being denied to speak their own languages, of national oppression and enslavement, inhabitants of these countries share a common bond as the victims of imperialism.

We can argue which of these movements deserve the support of socialists on a case-to-case basis, but they are clearly not the same as racist White Supremacists who want to retain old repressive structures. In countries that have suffered from imperialism, fighting for national rights, for equality, often involves some sort of challenge to the status quo.

The bloody history of imperialism

There is no such case to be made for progressive nationalism in Keith’s home country, the USA, nor in mine, “Great” Britain. For centuries, British colonisers travelled the world, stealing natural resources and forcing the inhabitants into servitude. Ever wondered why so many geographical borders in Africa are straight lines? It has much to do with an event that ended 136 years ago this week. In the Berlin Conference of 1884-5, European powers carved up the continent between them and literally redrew the map.

Similar processes happened throughout what we now know as the “Global South”. At the end of the Second World War, with national liberation movements clamouring for independence, Britain did its best to hold on to what it could, and to divide the rest into competing factions. This led, among other things, to the bloody partition of India and other unnecessary massacres.

But British imperialism was on the wane. As the Twentieth Century developed, the USA took over Britain’s role as the world’s leading imperial power, and used force to enforce its global hegemony. Only this week, that nice Joe Biden bombed Syria in order to show the world who’s still boss.

I cannot conceive of a British or US-American nationalism (or patriotism, call it what you will) that manages to extricate itself from the crimes of imperialism – from the first Concentration Camps, erected by the British in South Africa, via slavery, initiated by White Europeans and implemented with gusto in the States, to centuries of murderous wars.

“Progressive patriots” have a problem. If you want to be proud of a country, you have to take all or nothing. You can’t celebrate the “British values” of the suffragettes and ignore the slave trade. I’m not quite sure how Keith can laud US democracy without acknowledging that until very recently only white men had voting rights. We can be proud that Rosa Luxemburg came from Germany (well, German-occupied Poland to be precise), but if “German culture” is to include Luxemburg, it must also accept responsibility for Hitler and the Holocaust.

Class not Nation

There is a way out of this dilemma, and it is to reject the relatively new phenomenon of nations. It should not matter that I was born on one side of an artificial border, and you were born on the other. Our interests are united, not by geographical accidents, but by class.

There are some famous quotations that are so familiar that we rarely consider what they really mean. Take the opening line of the main part of the Communist Manifesto: “the history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles.”[9] The dynamic in history – which causes both political progress and reaction, is not the clash between imperialist nations, but the struggle between the working class and the ruling class.

Capitalism divides us between the few who control the means of production and own almost all of the wealth, and the rest of us. To maintain the privilege of the few, it encourages divisions which turn us against each other. Racism and sexism are obvious examples, but so too is patriotism. I have no common interests with the corrupt Boris Johnson, the murderous racist Winston Churchill or our parasitical royal family. I have much more in common with people throughout the world who are actively fighting them and their legacy.

Keith may be able to consider his passport a “proud possession”, but I resent the implications of this pride. Of course, it is beneficial to me that I have the privilege of carrying not one but two passports – one British, one German – when so many refugees and sans papiers are denied basic human rights because they can’t produce theirs. This should in no way bind me to those same countries which deny rights to people who do not possess the correct documents.

It is not an accident that many of the people who feel it most difficult to sign onto patriotism are recent migrants – be they French citizens from Northern African families, Britons from the Indian subcontinent or German Turks. They may now hold the passport of the country in which they live, but their families were the victims of white imperial politics. Many are still victims of racist attacks in the mother country. Why should they be expected to unconditionally identify with the country responsible for this repression and racism?

Why has patriotism become important?

The Left tends to cling onto hopes of patriotism when it is at its weakest. Jeremy Corbyn and Bernie Sanders have both experienced serious defeats, which has demoralised the mass movements that they both inspired. Socialists who were involved in these campaigns are licking their wounds and trying to find a way of recovering. Some are seeing patriotism as a possible way of reuniting our side.

The truth is that under capitalism we are all alienated and searching for life rafts which bring us a sense of belonging. I invest undue emotions in the future of local sports clubs (I draw the line at supporting England). My only real connection – apart from attending matches – is that they are based in the area where I grew up. Ultimately, my choice for supporting specific teams is not really rational, but neither does it hurt anyone, so it’s not really important.

Similarly, I have a pride in Berlin, where I now live. I am active in the Deutsche Wohnen & Co Enteignen campaign because I want to make the city better and more accountable to its residents. I am active in movements in Berlin and not Barcelona, because this is where I can be effective, but I expect similar localized militancy from everyone, wherever they live.

A lively socialist movement will include patriots who choose regional chauvinism over rampant neo-liberalist conformity. A recent example is in France where the members of the Yellow Vests movement were often motivated by a desire for a better France. We should welcome such people into our movement with open arms. At the same time, we should be clear that looking for a solution in patriotism is a false hope. Instead, we must reiterate the old slogans – workers of the world unite, for the many not the few, the workers united will never be defeated.

If we look for solutions which transcend class we run the permanent risk of ending up in an unholy alliance with our rulers and bosses. Concepts like patriotism have always been imposed from above. They never belonged to us in the first place, and ultimately they hinder rather than help our common international struggle. In contrast, let us build a socialism based on international solidarity.

Phil Butland is the joint speaker of the Berlin LINKE Internationals and a commissioning editor for theleftberlin.com. theleftberlin attempts to represent a range of discussion on the Left and we encourage our readers to be part of this debate. If you would like to respond to any articles that we publish, please contact us at theleftberlin@yahoo.com.

Footnotes

Thanks to Amanda Dillon, Mimi Howard, Carol McGuigan, John Mullen and Anna Southern for commenting on an earlier version of this text

1 Billy Bragg, The Progressive Patriot: A sense of belonging, Black Swan 2006, p350

2 Bragg, op cit. p14

3 Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri, Empire, Harvard University Press 2001, p95

4 Hardt and Negri, op cit, p97

5 Eric Hobsbawm, Inventing Traditions in Hobsbawm and Ranger, The Invention of Tradition, Cambridge University Press 1983, p10

6 E.J.Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism since 1780, Cambridge University Press 1990, p14

7 Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism, Verso 1983, p7

8 George Orwell, Notes on Nationalism, in The Collected Essays, Journalism and Letters of George Orwell. Volume 3 As I Please, 1943-1945, Penguin 1968, p411

9 Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, The Communist Manifesto, Penguin 1967, p79

Greece’s #Metoo Moment

Women (and Men) Rise up against Sexism


02/03/2021

Until 2021 Sophia Bekatorou was known as the leading sports woman in Greece. Olympic gold medal winner and world champion in sailing, she was the first female flag bearer for Greece in the history of Summer Olympics and generally a very popular figure in the country and worldwide.

The Facts

During a press conference in mid- January, Bekatorou revealed that in 1998 she had been raped by a senior member of the Hellenic Sailing Federation (HSF) in his hotel room, shortly after trials for the 2000 Sydney Olympics. The HSF initially tried to refute the accusation, but after Bekatorou named the perpetrator, they had to retreat and expel him. Within a few days, Aristides Adamopoulos was also expelled from the governing party, New Democracy (ND), whose loyal and honored member he had been for many years. Such a thing was unprecedented! The Greek #Metoo had just been born!

Public reception was positive from the beginning. The majority across the political spectrum rushed to issue “stand with Sophia” statements, declare solidarity with the victims and make promises to confront sexism and harassment. But the real change was happening in the minds and memories of people. And although in Bekatorou’s case the offense was beyond the statute of limitations due to the lapse of time, what followed was a landslide. An immediate reaction came from universities, where female students confirmed a vicious circle of harassment and intimidation from professors, who blackmailed with a pass or a higher grade for sex. Then came the media, a sector badly battered by financial crises and the accumulation of enterprises in the hands of a few moguls; here workers took a chance to reveal its horrors, with women publicly disclosing certain practices of direct and indirect violence.

But a real turning point was #Metoo reaching theaters. Actors, artists and workers in art production comprise a big community with a militant tradition. The Union of Greek Actors (SEI), was strengthened in the year of the pandemic. SEI has been in the forefront of the struggles against the total neglect of their work and means of living by the Greek state, demanding that the government supports art workers financially and practically. For this reason, they plucked up courage to come out quickly denouncing publicly all sorts of sexist, abusive, or plainly authoritarian behaviors. Needless to say that these came from theater bosses, producers and company directors, i.e. people with power over the lives of the victims. Accusations started with actresses, but soon they expanded to actors: men, gay men, immigrants and refugees, and a number of cases who claim that at the time of the raping they were minors! For a couple of weeks testimonies of traumatic experiences were circulating on social media about a “famous actor and director” as the perpetrator of repeated rapes.

Last week (20.02.21) the general director of the Greek National Theater, Dimitris Lignadis was arrested for multiple accusations of sexual abuse, pedophilia and child rape. While rumors were pointing the finger at him, the minister of Culture, neoliberal boss Lina Mendoni, insisted on defending him vehemently, …until he submitted his resignation just before his arrest.

The Crisis of the Government of New Democracy

The political repercussions of this event are a blow for the government of New Democracy and PM Kyriakos Mitsotakis, whose personal choice was Lignadis (he was directly appointed, surpassing the legal procedures for selecting the Head of the National Theater). It is even worse: Lignadis had been promoted as a symbol for the right wing in Greece as a nationalist intellectual, challenging the long hegemony of the Left in Theater and arts. He had served these aspirations perfectly, with open attacks to the “pseudo left” (his own term), with his obsession with ancient Greece, the re-instatement of theater personalities such as Nazi collaborator actress Eleni Papadaki, who was executed during the civil war, and other political manifestations adored by conservative audiences. He presented himself as both unconventional and part of the establishment, and for years that looked cute and clever. His fall and the way it happened destroyed not only him, but also the entire narrative he had built. Now the Emperor has no clothes…

The government of New Democracy survived the first wave of Covid -19 pretty well. From the summer of 2020 everything they did was obviously wrong, resulting in a full health crisis and deep economic depression. Regardless of this they seemed to get along well, despite growing resistance from the working class and the youth.

They handled the declarations of Bekatorou cautiously, trying to present themselves as part of the Greek #Metoo. When Mitsotakis urged state support for Sophia and all the victims of sexual harassment, he did not expect that the accusations would burst in his own face.

Speaking of sexism and discrimination, New Democracy is part of the problem. Not only are they a right wing and conservative party, the traditional party of “Homeland – Religion – Family”, but they also make the life of women harder with their policies. They have cut salaries, removed benefits and positive arrangements for women, facilitated lay-offs by bosses, and by dismantling social services, public health and education the conditions for women have deteriorated. Last year the government endorsed organizations for the “right of the unborn baby”, challenging the right to free and safe abortions. This caused outrage. Now they are preparing a law enforcing joint parental custody to replace the existing one which appoints the mother for child custody. They voted against all gay rights: civil partnership, Gender Recognition Act; their representatives hardly distinguish between homosexual orientation and abnormality.

In the case of Lignadis, ND were probably aware of his activities, as he was a notorious abuser in theater circles, but they did not care as long as they were kept secret. When the scandal exploded, they declared that they “had been cheated by his fine acting” and of course they denied that he was the PM’s friend. Minister Mendoni implied that the scandal was made up to victimize her, because she has been the minister engaged in neoliberal projects such as the sellout of Greek museums and the privatization of archeological sites.

In the meantime, Lignadis does not look like he is accepting his fate. He has hired the most notorious -though successful- defense attorney in the country, a racist and sexist thug who has managed so far to get dozens of infamous criminals acquitted, like the policeman who murdered 15 year old Alexandros Grigoropoulos in 2008. Alexis Kougias is vulgar and relentless against his rivals. His first declarations stated that his client is innocent and plainly targeted by “professional homosexuals”, people who allegedly make a living of their sexual orientation.

But the case is not another keyhole story, but rather a hard social and political fight. Greek society stands for the first time face to face with the sexism within its ranks, and so far it looks like the oppressed are winning.

Why now?

Initially this sort of question came from those skeptical about #Metoo. “Why did Bekatorou refresh her memory now?”, was a trivial remark coming from the tabloids and some macho lads in social media, implying that she was selfish enough to stay silent as long as she wanted to boost her career, only to remember that she can take revenge 22 years later.

Interestingly, these kind of rotten comments soon became a boomerang for those who expressed them. The spontaneous answer is: “Because of sexists like you”, but sexism and oppression are to be found in all spheres of life. Rape and abuse stayed secret for decades, because the dominant ideology blamed not the rapists but the victims for provoking them. Women’s organizations have reported that hardly 10% of rape cases ever reach the court rooms. The police and justice system make it a nightmare for rape victims to stand up against their abusers and most trials end with soft punishment or even acquittal for the rapists, especially if they are members of the ruling elite and a public intimidation for the raped and their families. According to a recent poll, 85% of Greek women have experienced some sort of sexual harassment in the workplace. Considering soaring unemployment, austerity and the dismantling of the welfare state; standing up against the boss requires financial independence and confidence, which the majority simply can’t afford. Therefore silence, embarrassment and self blaming are the dominant feelings which lead to a sort of cynical trivializing of the situation as a “natural law”. But it’s not natural at all. What is it then?

Oppression and Resistance

This brings us to the roots of the problem. There is a common cliché describing Greece and generally the European South as a haven of machismo, attributed to qualities such as underdevelopment and poverty or even …the Mediterranean mentality and psyche. But the narrative that Greece has plainly been stuck in good old patriarchy ignores a rich history of class and emancipation struggles within Greek society. The women of the working class have been protagonists in these struggles from the dawn of the 20th century, to resistance in WWII and the civil war that followed, and later, in the movement that brought down the military regime of 1967-74, until today. They built trade-unions and organized strikes. Their struggles and demands forced the social-democratic government of PASOK to modernize legislation with a law in 1983 declaring full equality between men and women, abolish backward institutions like dowry, abolish arrest for adultery (!), legalize abortion and introduce family planning. However, equality was achieved only in theory.

Oppression didn’t wither away and Greek women continued to face discrimination and everyday sexism, occasionally dressed up in new clothes and lifestyle, but in essence little changed. Conservative attitudes were promoted by almost all governments and institutions like the powerful Orthodox Church, which insists that the country has to stick to its old good traditions. It benefits, of course, the capitalist class, which needs women in production and in the family, but not equal and confident. Violence and rape confirm that women will continue to play this role, that’s why the establishment always fails to punish the doer and silence preserves the vicious circle. Hand in hand in the same context goes homophobia as a by-product of sexism, and lies behind assaults and discrimination against LGBT+ people.

Things started to change in the first years after 2000. The movement against capitalist globalization played a significant role, especially for the re-emergence of the LGBTQ+ movement in Greece. Recent years saw the re-appearance of massive Pride demonstrations and the development of actions and struggles which challenged sexism and oppression. In the last years, the women’s movement has been on the offensive as well. The American #Metoo campaign made a huge impact, and the women’s strike in Spain 3 years ago was an inspiration in Greece. They sparked actions of resistance to oppression and shaped the consciousness of a new generation, not to feel ashamed, but to speak out and organize to fight back. For the last two years the 8th of March has been a work stoppage and a big event. As for the artists, their mobilizations and experience of solidarity for an entire year provided the fertile ground, on which the encouraging example of Bekatorou sparked the fight against the abusers. It is doubtful that ten years ago we would have witnessed the same reactions.

But whereas the way of thinking of ordinary people has moved towards more radical ideas concerning gender and sexuality, the establishment (bourgeois parties, government officials, media) and the public discourse dominated by them seemed to be stuck in the past, to a time when rape victims would shut up and disappear and sexist behaviors would be tolerated. This time it has been impossible for them to turn the clock back. They have had to endorse Bekatorou and sack Lignadis. The sexist accusations of his lawyer have already been denounced by so many people who state “we are all professional homosexuals”. Artists demonstrate outside the ministry and demand that Mendoni resigns as well.

In this atmosphere, the 8th of March looks like it will be a huge event, one that will encompass the thunderstorm we experience and the big changes that the Greek #Metoo has brought.

No demolition of Karstadt Hermannplatz

Billionaire Benko wants to tear down Karstadt Hermannplatz and replace it with a luxury shopping mall. With enough resistance, we can prevent that


01/03/2021

At the end of January, the department store chain “Galeria Karstadt Kaufhof” received a state loan of 460 million euros. The company had already filed for bankruptcy last year. Now there again is a threat of impending insolvency and a loan that may never be paid back.

In 2019, the Austrian multi-billionaire René Benko and his company Signa took over Germany’s largest department store group. In Austria he was convicted of corruption and in the “Ibiza video” the then chairman of the right-wing FPÖ Heinz-Christian Strache claimed that Benko was secretly a major donor to his party. Now there are investigations into the delay of insolvency against “Galeria Karstadt Kaufhof”.

After the bankruptcy in 2020, more than 40 department store branches were closed and thousands of jobs were destroyed. Additionally, seven branches in Berlin were initially due to close. At the beginning of August, SPD Mayor Michael Müller, Green Economy Senator Ramona Pop, and LINKE Senator Klaus Lederer stepped in front of the cameras and, beaming with joy, declared, that they had “saved” four branches through an agreement with Benko. These department stores are now to remain open for another three to eight years.

In return, the Senate promised to support Benko in the implementation of three highly controversial real estate projects: a high-rise at the location of the Kaufhof on Alexanderplatz, a high-rise group on Kurfürstendamm and the demolition of the Karstadt and its replacement with a luxury shopping mall with a 1920s facade at Hermannplatz.

The news horrified both DIE LINKE and people who live around Hermannplatz, for whom Benko’s project was already presented in 2019. The plan would see the demolition of the Karstadt building and its replacement with an 11-storey high-rise with the replica facade of the department store that had stood there from 1929 to 1945, all with a price tag of half a billion euros. This tacky block would house a shopping mall as well as a hotel, offices, and restaurants. The plan shows that Benko has little interest in maintaining the department store concept, instead looking toward huge profits from the exploitation of this valuable site.

Such a project would not only mean years of major construction, but it would also act as an accelerator of the rent explosion and displacement of residents and the predominantly migrant-run small businesses in the area. There is also a risk of hundreds of Karstadt employees’ jobs being destroyed. Following Benko’s announcement, resistance quickly formed: residents founded the initiative Hermannplatz – karSTADT erhalten (Hermannplatz – preserve(karSTADTD). Since then, the activists have been keeping residents informed with information stands, protest campaigns and events, and the public critique of Benko’s plans.

Comrades from DIE LINKE Kreuzberg and Neukölln formed a joint working group to organize protests. The district building councillor of Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg, Florian Schmidt, refused to issue the building permit because the mammoth project would blow up the building and social structure around Hermannplatz.

In spite of the fierce opposition, Benko is not giving up. Instead, he has begun an elaborate campaign to turn public opinion. He talked to local politicians about spaces for social uses such as a library, doctors’ offices, or a kindergarten in the giant new building, but without naming a specific rent figure. His staff toured the two districts with pretty pictures of a clean Hermannplatz and a roof terrace.

Then Benko shifted to the tactic of “Greenwashing,” which involved receiving the advice of the consulting firm of former Green Party Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer. Although the environmental effects of a demolition and new construction with a concrete monster would be disastrous, Benko made his plans appear to be “climate neutral” through twisting the facts through calculation games. In addition, a bike path was added through the backyard of Karstadt and a second-hand store slated to open in the department store.

Embarrassingly, the used goods store in Karstadt was then also advertised as an “innovation” by Berlin’s Green-led environmental administration at public expense. The Green Party leadership and the entire SPD support Benko’s plans for “upgrading” and want to secure the “investment” in the new building at any cost. That Benko has just collected about the same amount of state credit for his over-indebted department store company as he wants to invest in the new building, does not seem to matter; nor does the fact that he wants to squeeze every euro invested out of the project several times over – at the expense of those who now live and work around Hermannplatz.

The affected residents are also subject to Benko’s public relations campaign. With the help of an opinion research institute, he ordered door-to-door interviews on the topic of “sense of security” at Hermannplatz, and held several publicity events which he passed off as organic expressions of citizen’s participation, with the impression they were official measures of the municipal administration. The NGO “Lobby Control” considers these tactics very questionable. Benko tries to manipulate public opinion in the social media as well. The “not without you” is the slogan with which the billionaire tries to gain public legitimacy.

The people in Kreuzberg and Neukölln have not fallen for the propaganda. Every event organized by the “Initiative Hermannplatz – KarSTADT erhalten” and THE LEFT against the demolition plans was well attended and the info booths always got much encouragement. If the Senate indeed wants to enforce Benko’s plans against the will of the local residents and the district of Kreuzberg, we must organize massive protests. The referendum “Deutsche Wohnen & Co. Enteignen” shows, that we are not powerless against real estate speculators. The Karstadt demolition, the luxury shopping mall, and the displacement of the people stops with us!

Do you want to find out more information about Signas’ plans and why we have to prevent them? The “Initiative Hermannplatz – KarSTADT erhalten” homepage offers a lot of information in different languages. If you want to get active against the Karstadt demolition in a working group of THE LEFT Kreuzberg and Neukölln, get in touch with Carla: carla.assmann@die-linke-neukoelln.de

This article was written in German for theleftberlin.com. Translation: Ilona Addis

Filipino Nurses are not for sale

Bayan-Europe condemns Duterte’s government commodification of Filipino nurses


28/02/2021

Bayan-Europe expresses its strong condemnation of the Duterte government’s plan of securing COVID19 vaccine from the United Kingdom and Germany, in exchange of lifting the employment cap for nurses to work in those countries. “It is a shame that the Duterte government exploited the dignity of our Filipino nurses, making them a bargaining tool for the utter incapacity of government regarding the purchase of COVID-19 vaccines,” said Gary Martinez, Bayan-Europe Chairperson.

The Duterte government is known to be extortionist. It demanded money from the United States government in exchange for the implementation of the Visiting Forces Agreement. Now, the Duterte government demands vaccines from the United Kingdom and Germany in exchange for the services of the Filipino nurses.

The Duterte government promised the ‘Overseas Filipino Workers’ 5 years ago to end the export of labor by providing jobs and just wages in the Philippines. But Duterte has once again showed his government’s heartless and cruel treatment to our health care workers by treating them as bargaining chips of the Duterte government to access vaccine against COVID19.

From the very start of the pandemic, the Philippine government has never regarded the Filipino medical professionals as important players in the campaign against COVID19. While most world leaders rely on scientific research and expert opinions of medical professionals in their respective countries to address the pandemic, the Philippine government relies on active and retired military officers.

This clique of military officers close to the president, implemented the world’s longest community lock down. They are responsible for the mass arrests of people who demanded the promised aid and support from the government, and the surveillance of political oppositions and dissenters. Instead of promoting mass testing and contact tracing for identification and treatment of those infected; and effective control of the spread of the virus – the Duterte government railroaded the passing of the ‘Anti-Terrorism Act 2020’. The Duterte government ballooned the Philippine debts because of its insatiable borrowings. Meanwhile, the government has allocated significant amount of its national budget to the defense department; and to a task force composed of war-freaks to fight communist insurgency. But it did not instead allocate a bigger budget to the health sector to address the pandemic.

The Duterte government is also known for its harsh treatment to the migrant workers. Last year, when the COVID19 pandemic impacted the hundreds of thousands of land-based Filipino migrant workers and seafarers it resulted in their unemployment in the host countries. But the Philippine government representatives turned them away when they sought the help of the Philippine embassies and consular offices. Here in Europe for instance, there are thousands of Filipino migrants that are unable to receive the promised financial aid from the Philippine government because they are undocumented. The images of Filipino migrant workers stranded in the Middle East scavenging food from trash bins in order to survive are still fresh to our memories. And even when migrant workers are able to return home, the Philippine government is guilty of criminal neglect and abandonment – as hundreds of returning overseas Filipino workers were stranded for months due to lock down. They were forced to stay in the open in the side streets of Manila Airport.

“The commodification of our Filipino nurses by this despotic government is in itself an expression of lack of concern on Filipino migrant workers. The dedication of our nurses working to address the COVID-19 virus exemplifies the image of the working Filipinos; sadly, our own government desired to use our Filipino nurses as a means of exchange just to beg for the supply of vaccines… Is this the only solution to address the pandemic crisis?”

said Elnora Held, Gabriela-Germany President.

Bayan-Europe believes that the health of the people is a responsibility of the state and therefore vaccines must be provided for free to the Filipino people by the Duterte government. While Filipino nurses are regarded as key workers who have important role in the care of people affected by COVID19 in the United Kingdom and Germany, the Duterte government should not hold them hostage in exchange of the vaccines. Filipino nurses should not be treated as commodities. Filipino nurses are not slaves and the government has no right to coerced and forced them to work whenever and wherever Duterte wishes.

Philippine Nurses are not commodities!

Stop holding the Filipino Nurses as hostage in exchange of Vaccine!

Gary Martinez

Bayan–Europe Chairperson

Elnora Held

Gabriela Germany President

E-mail: aprilnens@yahoo.de