By Kamran Nayeri, November 8, 2024
Editor's Note: The Farsi edition of this short commentary was published in the socialist website Critique of Political Economy (نقد اقتصاد سیاسی). The free English translation is by the author.
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Contrary to the expectations of Democratic Party supporters, the victory of Trump and the Republican Party in the November 2024 elections was inclusive. Peter B. Baker, who wrote a book about Trump, wrote in the New York Times on November 6: "The assumption that Mr. Trump is a fleeting phenomenon and will soon be consigned to the dustbin of history on Tuesday night as the red wave swept through the country, including in those states that did not yet favor either presidential candidate. It was wrong." Three reporters from Reid Epstein, Lisa Lerer and Nicholas Nehamas, wrote on Nov. 7 that
“What was indisputable was how badly Democrats did. They lost the White House, surrendered control of the Senate and appeared headed to defeat in the House. They performed worse than four years ago in cities and suburbs, rural towns and college towns. An early New York Times analysis of the results found the vast majority of the nation’s more than 3,100 counties swinging rightward since President Biden won in 2020.”
They quote Bernie Sanders that the Democratic Party “which increasingly has become a party of identity politics, rather than understanding that the vast majority of people in this country are working class. This trend of workers leaving the Democratic Party started with whites, and it has accelerated to Latinos and Blacks.”
However, it would be a mistake to reduce the reasons for the Democrats' defeat to economic issues. There is a tendency to distrust both parties, especially the Democrats. In 2020, Trump received 74,223,975 votes. But in this election, 71,353,269 people voted for him, which is 2,870,708 less. In 2020, Biden received 81,283,501 votes, but Harris in 2024 has 66,405,656 votes, which is 14,867,845 fewer votes. Both parties had fewer votes in this election, but Democrats have lost more support.
One reason for this is that the Democratic Party has surpassed the Republicans in its imperialist warmongering policies. Among the "achievements" of the Biden administration are his push to expand NATO and fan the flames of war in Ukraine and unconditional support for Israel's genocidal war in Gaza and its extension the West Bank, Lebanon, and now Iran. Democrats berate Trump and his Republican supporters as "isolationists" because they have less appetiate for U.S. military interventions around the world. American Arabs and Muslims, who usually voted for Democrats, have voted for Trump in their majority. The reason for this is Biden's support for Zionism and Israel's war in Gaza.
Kamala Harris called Trump a fascist in her election campaign. Liberals and some leftist currents also call the Trump phenomenon as fascism. They cite his anti-immigrant politics, especially against Latinos and Muslims, his misogyny, and anti-democratic and authoritarian actions and ideas. During his presidency small fascist armed groups calling themselves militias were active and they were involved in the riots of January 6, 2021.
However, this situation is fundamentally different from what existed in Germany, Italy and Spain in the 1920s and 1930s analyzed by socialists as fascism. Fascism at that time was a bourgeois in response to the vast and deep crisis of capitalism in Europe when there was also mass trade unions and powerful social-democratic and Communist parties, and as the Soviet Union was rapidly industrializing and arming itself. At that time, the capitalist classes found themselves in serious and immediate danger of the socialist revolution. Fascism was created to crush the workers' and socialist movements by large organized and armed anti-labor and anti-communist fascist groups. In the United States today, there are no mass trade unions, powerful socialist and communist parties, or any "communist" states that threaten capitalism. On the contrary, capitalism dominate the whole world facing no serious opposition.
The Relative Decline of American Imperialism and Capitalist Political Crisis
The Industrial Revolution of England (1830-1870) turned that country into the superpower dominating the world economy. However, Germany and the United States went through their industrial revolution at the end of the 19th century and overtook England economically with the creation of modern industries and new products by 1913. The First and Second World Wars were fought to create a new order between the imperialist powers. At the end of World War II, the United States became the global capitalist superpower. Some have called this period the "American Century."
However, since 2000, the top position of the United States has been threatened by the industrialization of China, which has a population of 1.5 billion. Currently, China produces 20% of the world's industrial products, mainly for export, while the share of the United States, which was 40% in 1960, has fallen to 18%. China excels in modern infrastructure, new industries, and new products, and is highly competitive in the global market. Meanwhile, China's domestic market is expanding rapidly with a middle class estimate to be about 300. In contrast, the United States has a total population of 330 million people, and its middle class is shrinking. China's economy is still growing on the engine of industrial development, but the U.S. economy is largely dependent on the services sector, which make for slower labor productivity growth and lower economic growth.
The relative economic decline of the United States has threatened its military position. Although after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, it seemed that the United States had become the hegemonic power in a unipolar world, it soon became a multipolar world. and now the dominance of the United States in challenged in the Pacific, the Middle East, Africa, and even Latin America, which Washington has called its “backyard” since the time of Monroe Docterine of 1823.
The process of deindustrialization in the United States has weakened some industries and regions and led to the decline of the U.S. middle class—especially the white working-class aristocracy—which has ignited the flames of reactionary nativism, white nationalism, and retrogressive capitalist economic views. The Trump phenomenon and its slogan "Make America Great Again” have emerged in this context.
The neoliberal policies that had been embraced by both parties since the Reagan presidency have long exhausted their use to uplift the U.S. economy. Democratic Party politicians have decided to use Keynesian fiscal and monetary policies to modernize the infrastructure and develop new industries and new products, along with social policies to motivate the working people and strengthen the middle class to increase productivity growth and expand the domestic and global market of the United States.
The intensification of the strategies of the Democratic and Republican are the result of the relative decline of U.S. imperialism.
The 2024 presidential and congressional elections should be examined in this context
The Need for an Independent Ecocentric-Based Socialist Policy
Neither of the two parties of US imperialism and their presidential candidates paid any attention to the urgent needs of the working people in this country and globally. Today, humanity and life on the planet face four existential threats: catastrophic climate change, the Sixth Extinction, recurrent pandemics, and nuclear holocaust. Two bloody wars, one in Ukraine between Western imperialism and Russian imperialism, and the other an expanding genocidal war a war by colonial-settler state of Israel in Gaza, which has now expanded to the West bank, Israeli genocide. In Gaza, and even in the West Bank, Lebanon and even to a war with Iran which will require direct U.S. military intervention in the Middle East.
The root of all these crises is the anthropocentric industrial capitalist civilization which both parties uphold and defend. These issues were not part of the presidential debate as there is general agreement about foreign policy. Both parties supports the $1.7 trillion program for the modernization of the U.S. nuclear arsenal and the current U.S. military preparation for war with China.
Just as the two world wars of the twentieth century were aimed at creating a new order between the imperialist powers, the economic rivalry between China and the United States could quickly escalate into a war between the two nuclear powers. In the war in Ukraine, there were several overt threats of use of nuclear weapons by Putin. According to press reports, Biden explored the possibility of using nuclear weapons against Russia last April.
The future of humanity and life on the planet depends on the development of independent power mass organizations the working people to transcend anthropocentric industrial capitalist civilization in the direction of Ecocentric Socialist society worldwide, especially in the United States.
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