We are the Labour Party's libertarian socialists. Our socialism is one that empowers communities and ensures power is kept in the hands of the many, and not a select few.
It's only through such a philosophy that we can ensure liberty and prosperity is there for all - and we believe these ought to be the tenets at the heart of everything we do.
Black Rose is a social and organising space for the Labour Party's libertarian socialists, as well as a campaign group that aims to democratise the party and push its policy platform in a socialist direction. In the wake of an additional five years of hard-right government, we want to promote and organise extra-parliamentary and non-electoral work among the membership. Our strength will come not from Parliament or from a leader above, but from our collective endeavour.
Together, we can put economic and political power into the hands of every single member of our communities. We have a world to win.
Polling shows that Labour voters have the most libertarian stances on these issues, and it isn’t a stretch to imagine that the Labour membership particularly would be even more sceptical of state power. Yet this isn’t fairly reflected in PLP voting records, in our rhetoric, or in our message.
As the voice of the working class our party is meant to stand up for the oppressed, and while many on the party left recognise that this means the party must more effectively stand against capitalism, not many think the same about the state. The state oppresses workers too, primarily through the facilitation of capitalism but also through institutions and structures such as the police, borders, the judicial system, the prison industrial complex, etc. All of which, for various reasons, particularly impact women, BAME people, LGBT+ people and disabled people the hardest.
This is why we are launching Black Rose: the libertarian socialist caucus of the Labour Party. Black Rose will be a radically democratic, decentralised organisation for members of the party who identify as intersectional libertarian socialists: people who, like all other socialists (and as stated by our party’s old Clause IV), believe in the common ownership of the means of production, distribution, and exchange, but who also recognize that the fullest realisation of this core socialist principle can only occur in a system where the working class have direct power over their lives. We believe in the transfer of power from the state to the ordinary civilian, through principles of radical democracy, decentralisation, liberation and anti-capitalism.
We also recognise intersectionality: the recognition of the multitude of ways in which individuals and communities are affected by a multiplicity of oppressive structures and coercive power relations. These include not just class, but also racism, patriarchy, heteronormativity, ableism, colonialism, just to name a few.
An intersectional approach requires the recognition of these oppressive structures and relations in order to understand people's and communities' social, political and economic positions in order to work towards solutions to emancipating them. For us, intersectionality, libertarianism, and socialism go hand-in-hand and guide us in all our political activities.
Within the party, we will advocate for changes to our current policy platform. We want the party to oppose the war on drugs that has left communities in ruin, and end it in government, decriminalising drugs alongside policies based on a public health approach to addiction. The party must also oppose state surveillance and excess police powers, such as stop-and-search.
To this end, we aim to bring motions to the next party Conference to ensure these stances are adopted and that Labour politicians offer a real alternative to the authoritarian status quo.
In terms of policy, we welcome the moves made by John McDonnell and his team towards a model of public ownership that puts workers and communities in charge of services, and not the state as nationalisation previously has done. The party must continue in this vein, studying all parts of our policy platform and revising policies where needed to put as much economic and political power into the hands of the civilian as possible. Black Rose will be lobbying for this.
We also aim to be much more than a cog in an electoral machine; we want to be an organisation that puts our principles into practice, engaging with and supporting the wider left outside the party. We must become organisers out in the real world, organising in our workplaces through trade unions and in our communities through renters’ unions. We also need to be supporting smaller, member-led unions doing great work on the ground such as IWW, IWGB, and UVW. These unions, as well as plenty of other worthwhile extra-Parliamentary struggles, often lack support from Labour members, mostly due to a lack of awareness of their work. This is something that has to change.
Our organisation will be built from the ground up with other libertarian socialist members, ensuring that our principles are embedded into our very organisational structures. Although we draw inspiration from our comrades in the Libertarian Socialist Caucus of the Democratic Socialists of America, our structures will only be the result of a multitude of voices of the Labour Party coming together to create a true model for radical democracy.
There is a lot more to say on many of the points above, but we want to keep our announcement short and straight to the point. Our call to those who agree with the ideas and principles expressed above is to sign up to our mailing list and get involved with this project. Together, we can make sure Black Rose becomes the strong voice of libertarian socialism this party desperately needs.
What is libertarian socialism?
Libertarian socialism is a current of socialist thought that promotes the fullest realisation of socialism: the extension of democracy to every aspect of people's lives. We are anti-authoritarians, sceptical of top-down hierarchical power structures as they empower a select few over the many.Capitalism is an example of these structures, where the means of production are owned by a few at the expense of the many. So too is the state, which is why our ultimate aim is a society free of both capitalism and the state.
Libertarian socialism advocates for decentralized structures, direct democracy, an end to illegitimate social hierarchy, and the empowerment of communities from the grassroots.
Why are libertarian socialists organising in the Labour Party?
Despite our recognition that there is no parliamentary or statist route to emancipatory socialism, some libertarian socialists choose to participate in the parliamentary system in order to mitigate the damage caused by capitalism and the state. It is a recognition of the fact that extra-parliamentary socialist organising is made substantially easier when you aren't worried about the roof over your head or about your healthcare being taken away; i.e. under a progressive Labour government.However it is important to not allow parliamentary and electoral work to take up the majority of our time and energy, but rather devote our efforts towards organising fellow workers in and supporting trade unions, organising tenants in tenants' unions, engaging in anti-fascism, and being involved with community and mutual aid projects. This is the vision of leftist organising we wish to promote amongst the Labour Party's 500,000 strong membership, because we believe in their capacity to truly make a difference in our communities.
How do libertarian socialists view capitalism?
Libertarians socialists view capitalism similarly to other socialists; recognising the dehumanizing existence under wage-labour, the commodification of social goods such as education and healthcare, and the exploitation of land and property under private ownership.Where libertarian socialism differs is its solutions. Libertarian socialism sees the solution to ending capitalism not in the taking of state power, but in decentralizing powerful institutions which reproduce the concentration of capital (including the state), direct-democracy and worker ownership of the means of production and common goods. A core tenet of libertarian socialism is worker empowerment and democratisation.
What is state power?
Libertarian socialism recognises the concentration of power, whether that be economic, political or legalistic, as sources of social oppression. Because of this, Libertarian socialists attempt to extend their analysis of oppression beyond just the violent and dehumanizing structures of global capitalism, to also include the coercive domination of state institutions. These include examples such as legal institutions which restrict the ability of populations to "legally" resist the state, and the role of policing and prisons to violently enforce those laws. After all the state is, by definition, a political entity that wields the monopoly on the use of violence.State power, therefore, exists as a range of structures, institutions and techniques which attempt to achieve the subjugation and control of populations to maintain and reproduce it's own authority.
How do libertarian socialists view civil liberties?
Libertarian socialists are strong advocates of civil liberties and the ability for individuals and communities to have power over their own lives, economically, politically and socially. Libertarian socialists recognize the importance of individual and community freedom at the social level, as well as the political and economic, which are necessarily intertwined with each other.This means emancipation of BAME communities from racist structures, LGBT+ people from homophobic and transphobic structures, women from patriarchy, disabled people from ableist structures, as well as the freedom of citizens from the exertion of state power through apparatuses such as policing, surveillance and mass-imprisonment.
What is abolitionism?
Abolitionism, from a libertarian socialist perspective, refers to the philosophy and movement advocating for the replacing or dismantling of oppressive institutions which violate people's ability to have control over their own lives such as the state, the prison industrial complex, policing, and borders. Libertarian socialists tend to support abolitionism, recognising the aforementioned structures both help to maintain the reproduction of capitalism, either by providing direct profit to private ownership or dispossessing and incarcerating populations, as well as regulating and controlling human life for the purposes of maintaining state power.What's your views on internationalism?
Libertarian socialists recognise that all workers exist in exploitative relationships to global capitalism. Therefore, all workers require rights to common ownership, legitimacy and deserve a place within worker movements. Libertarian socialists recognise borders are imperial and colonial constructs, which aid in maintaining divisions between workers and upholding global capitalism. International solidarity is a core tenant of libertarian socialist philosophy and praxis.What is intersectionality?
Intersectionality is an analysis, developing out of black feminist theory, recognising the multitude of ways in which individuals and communities are affected by a multiplicity of oppressive structures and coercive power relations. These include not just class, but also racism, patriarchy, heteronormativity, ableism, colonialism etc.An intersectional approach requires the recognition of these oppressive structures and relations in order to understand people's and communities' social, political and economic positions in order to work towards solutions to emancipating them.
About Us
Socialism is inherently about democracy – true democracy – for it empowers workers to break the chains of wage slavery and take control of their workplaces. Extending this democracy to all aspects of a person’s life is at the heart of libertarian socialism. It is about taking the means of production from the hands of a powerful minority, whether that be private capitalists or state bureaucrats, and putting it instead into the hands of all.
We are members of the Labour Party because we see it currently as the best vehicle for social change. It is a mass movement of 500,000 members with the biggest trade unions in the country affiliated to it. Many of these members were inspired to join by the party’s turn to the left since the election of Jeremy Corbyn in 2015. However, despite massive improvements from the New Labour and Miliband years, we are not entirely content with the party’s policy platform – and nor should any true socialist be! It is our job, as members on the left of the party, to continue to leverage the party’s democratic mechanisms to push its platform in a socialist direction.
This is why Black Rose is launching alongside two motions for Labour Party Conference 2020:
- Our Civilian’ Rights motion is motivated by our libertarian principles, and, if passed, will ensure that the party will finally take a proper anti-authoritarian stance that will directly empower workers, activists, and the ordinary citizen.
- Our 'Portugal Plus' drug decriminalisation policy will also ensure that the party is promoting a public health approach to drug policy, one that is evidence-based and puts the people most affected by our poor drug laws - people with unhealthy addictions and BAME communities - at the heart of our aims.
Our Plan
It is important to note that we are not another electoral faction of the party because we will not be standing candidates in internal party elections. We are members that firmly identify as being on the left of the party, and thus will be working with and supporting the rest of the grassroots left. We strongly believe in the democratisation of the party, and it is only the Labour left that has consistently fought for it.We aim to promote extra-parliamentary workplace and tenant organising among the membership, as well as community organising. We believe the party should adopt worker ownership as the centrepiece of its policy offer, as well as the libertarian stances we are putting forward at Conference.
Over the next year we will work with interested Labour Party members to develop our two policy ideas in time for us to push them forward for Conference, as well as to develop a set of structures and governing documents that will formalise us as the Labour Party's Libertarian Socialist Caucus.
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