There is The United Front Tactic and there is United Front Work.
On the united front issue, Comrade Reihana wrote:
“The United Front tactic, or making tactical alliances with different class forces including the capitalist class, has proven to be a central part of the strategy of the left in its struggle to win influence and ultimately political power. The political imperatives driving such a tactic is the uneven levels of consciousness amongst the masses, including the working class, who continue to be influenced and even organized and mobilized by different class forces.”
As presented, the concept of The United Front Tactic, gives the impression that there exists only a single immutable class-based law on united front. I find United Front Work more multi-dimensional, more appropriate in dealing with “class forces”, or political forces to be more exact. United front work can lead to various and appropriate united front tactics vis-à-vis other political forces.
There can be no disagreement, perhaps, that varied class consciousness shuffles political alliances at every twist and turn of the political conjuncture. Yet the more concrete “political imperative” of united front work is dictated by the political program of any given political force. In other words, united front work is a function of a political force and it is an organic part of any political force’s program.
A political force contends for state power or engages the state within political society. At the heart of a political force is its program, usually buttressed by ideological moorings and organizational requirements. Apart from its leadership and membership, a political force has either a constituency or a so-called mass base that advances the political force’s line, be it rightist, leftist, in between, or extremist. As to organizational form, A political force can be a united front, coalition or alliance, a political movement, a political party, or even an individual.
If The United Front tactic is seen as “essentially ‘the battle for ideas’, the struggle to win political influence amongst the masses”, United Front work considers it otherwise. United front work is not merely “the battle of ideas”, but unity-building amidst power struggle involving political forces. Included in this power struggle is ideological struggle via various social and political institutions. We should also establish a clear distinction between the mass base of the political forces, and the masses in their numbers.
In the case of Laban ng Masa as a political force, various united front tactics can be respectively employed vis-à-vis the myriad of other political forces. The post-Marcos conjunctures revealed various political forces, like today’s YOUng, UNO, the CPP, the CBCP fractions, Cory Aquino, KOMPIL factions, UP Law and La Salle communities, the US, and a whole lot more. United front tactics can assume many forms such as negotiations, compromises, cooperative projects, alliance building on issues, coalition building, up to united front building.
Laban ng Masa (LnM): the Left of a United Front
On LnM, comrade Reihana wrote:
“It should be clarified here that Laban ng Masa is not the United Front. This is the left and progressive forces uniting and coordinating their activities in this period. Those represented in LM (irrespective of the class background they initially originated from) stand on the side of the working class and the poor. They have aligned themselves with the historic interest of the working class and the poor.”
I totally agree that the LnM is not The United Front-but by all indications it is a united front of many Left forces in this period. The LnM is in fact viewed by many as a political coalition of Left forces.
I can still remember the previous Philippine left forum conducted last May 2005. Among the common projects up for cooperation is precisely how the participants can cooperate to address the current conjuncture. The LnM is one end product of such discussions and negotiations.
One of the big drawbacks of The United Front Tactic theory is that it is restrictive to “making tactical alliances with different class forces”. Philippine Left lexicon so far makes a distinction between “tactical alliance” and “strategic alliance”. Tactical alliance is temporary cooperation (which is not synonymous with “short-term”) with political forces representing the classes of the exploiters and oppressors, e.g. capitalism, and vestiges of feudalism. Strategic alliance (which is not synonymous to the time-bound “long-term”) is persistent unity building and/or discourse with political forces representing the proletariat and the rest of the working peoples.
A united front is not necessarily limited “to making tactical alliances”. An example of a united front that works along an “strategic alliance” is precisely the crop of radical and socialist political forces of various Left ideological persuasions as expressed in the Laban ng Masa.
The “Debate”
Regarding “The Debate”, Comrade Reihana wrote:
“In the discussions about applying this UF tactic in relation to sections of the anti-GMA elite, one of the arguments that gets repeated is that we need to strengthen our forces first and then go into a United Front with the non-progressives, i.e., there is tendency to counter-pose the strengthening of the left to the UF tactic. A variation of this is the argument that we need to strengthen the ‘counterpole’ first, and only after this that we can advance to an alliance with the ‘second layer’.”
The layer-by-layer approach that was proposed during one of the Coordinating Committee meetings was not interpreted to mean this way.
United front work requires the simultaneous UF tactics in varying degrees in relation to other categories of political forces. It also goes that the intensity, or degree, in the conduct of our UF tactics relies heavily on our political potential and capacity. Conversely, successful efforts in UF tactics serve to increase our strength as a political force.
There is also another way of looking at the matter. Laban ng Masa has three basic calls that can serve as broad parameters in its united front work: (1) End the GMA Regime!; (2) Build the transitional revolutionary government!; and (3) End Elitist Rule! For example, other political forces want to end the GMA regime but are against ending elitist rule or even the transitional revolutionary government (TRG). (I deliberately reversed slogan number (2) with slogan number (3) to open a discourse on the hierarchy of importance or “directional frame.”)
The “Real” Debate
The real debate, I think, is the Left’s relation with UNO forces in the current conjuncture, which The United Front Tactic theory aptly homed in.
Comarde Reihana wrote:
"The UF tactic with UNO and the like includes hard-tack negotiations to win more ground on our terms. If we can’t, then we walk away from any particular activity or even from joint activities with them, such as if they insist that we also carry the demand for an Erap restoration (however, this does not preclude their speakers calling for it at rallies). But let’s test out the tactic fully first on an ongoing and systematic manner.
We also need to move beyond a “rally-by-rally” approach. This is ad-hoc and unsystematic and does not provide any directional framework to the tactics needed today to win mass influence. I think the rally-by-rally approach is also extremely pragmatic. It could lead to making mistakes if we negotiate without a clear tactical framework."
In other words, should we operationalize “tactical alliances” with the Marcoses and the rest of the UNO forces? I agree with Comrade Reihana that a “clear framework” in relating with the Marcos and UNO forces is imperative, rallies or otherwise.
There are many ways to pursue the discourse. One immediate vantage point is the set of LnM calls that emphasize LnM’s independent pole, or third-pole character.
In my view, the LnM’s overarching objective is to persistently challenge and end elite/trapo rule. The most practicable means thus far to pave the way for a systemic change is through a transitional revolutionary government. We can exact a significant role in a TRG and post-TRG regime for systemic change by actively partaking in ousting the GMA regime. The end-goal is clearer, and the means are defined, despite projections that the current conjuncture and overall political instability might run for some years.
The overall frame and posture of the LnM constituency is anti-trapo or anti-elite rule-this is precisely what captured the imagination of the LnM members and supporters. Our objective is not merely to get a piece of the pie and be pawns of the elite anew as the experiences of Boy Morales, Bobby Tiglao, and Dinky Soliman aptly demonstrated.
The “revolutionary” portion of the TRG concept goes way beyond the extra-constitutional argument. If ever the TRG’s composition and the direction it would pave will favor the working peoples, then it is “revolutionary”. Conversely, if the TRG will be dominated by the elite and its direction would serve to perpetuate the EDSA-type of neoliberal democracy, or a restoration close to the Estrada or Marcosian models, then let’s better refer to it as a Transitional Counter-Revolutionary Government.
Another angle in the discourse is concrete history itself. In this regard, politics in command sets in, tactical alliance takes the back seat. For brevity, let me focus solely on the Marcos forces who are part of the UNO, and first set aside the predator-cum-casino state legacy of the past Estrada regime.
The Marcosian legacy is a fundamental political issue that remains politically unresolved until today.
The Philippine Left has paid a heavy price in winning the counter-hegemonic ideological struggle against the far-right and fascistic Marcos dictatorship. We are still investing heavily in securing this victory because post-Marcos regimes from Cory Aquino up to Gloria Arroyo are just letting the criminals associated with the Marcos dictatorship go scot free along with their stolen billions.
Our generation of activists is aghast with the spectacle of Satur Ocampo and Lisa Masa, both of the national-democratic bloc within the Congress, joining hands with Imee Marcos on national television. The political mileage the national democrats have gained over the years have simply crumbled in inverse geometric proportion with the size of their mobilizations and million earned during the previous SONA rally.
Our political struggles to gain state power are difficult enough. Central to our efforts is to demonstrate to the whole nation and international community that we have the capability to govern both in the political-coercive and ideological hegemonic spheres. We should not take part in hoodwinking and mis-educating the masses as the national-democrats are precisely doing right now. Let us stick to what we should nurture right now-Left political consistency. #