Only the working class can defend the environment

BY PATRICIA MARSHALL

WASHINGTON — Tens of thousands rallied here April 29 and in other cities across the country in what was called the People’s Climate March. The action was organized for the 100th day of the Donald Trump presidency, focusing on him as the main problem in the U.S. today, saying his administration was dismantling former President Barack Obama’s “climate legacy.” Many of the placards people carried reflected middle-class panic and catastrophism about the environment.

“Resist Trump,” “If you’re not terrified you don’t understand the situation,” “Keep fossil fuels in the ground” and “Do you want to survive or not?” were signs reflecting the mood.

The action was one of a series of public activities that have revolved around blaming Trump for today’s ills — including a women’s march shortly after his election, mobilizations on tax day and a so-called march for science. The classless framework for the protest was “what we as a nation need to do” and building support for Democratic Party candidates with “strong environmental records” in the run-up to next year’s midterm elections and the 2020 presidential race.

At the same time, there were contingents attracted to the march that raised concrete problems workers faced and pointed to the workings of capitalism as the root of the problem, demanding action. Over 200 came from East Chicago where residents from the West Calumet Housing Complex are being forced out of their homes because of lead and arsenic contamination of the soil from factories that closed decades ago. They are demanding government assistance to relocate.

Members of the Socialist Workers Party joined the action to discuss and debate perspectives with fellow participants and introduce the party’s revolutionary working-class program. They offered the May 8 Militant containing an excerpt from “The Stewardship of Nature Also Falls to the Working Class ,” a statement by the SWP printed in New International no. 14.

“Workers must not fall into accepting the common view — that is, the bourgeois view — that the environment … is a ‘scientific’ question, a ‘natural’ question, that somehow hovers above classes and outside the class struggle,” the SWP statement says. “Many who call themselves environmentalists say the problem is ‘consumerism,’ or industrial development per se. But the workers movement has to explain the source of ecological destruction and why the answer lies along the revolutionary line of march of the working class.”

Anyone interested in getting a copy of the statement can contact the SWP in their area, listed in the directory below.

Jerome McCabe, a 37-year-old barber from New York, was interested in this point of view. He said he was attracted to the march because “global warming is wiping out species and the fossil fuel industry is just about chasing profits.”

“Making profits is what capitalism is about,” I responded. “It’s only the working class — whose interests are human solidarity, not private profit — that has an interest in protecting our environment and ensuring safety on and off the job.

“You can’t just say fossil fuels are the problem,” I said. “What about the need of workers and farmers in Asia, Africa and elsewhere for electricity? What about conditions of life in the coal mining regions as jobs have been slashed and pensions and health care come under threat?”

“It’s only when we get rid of the capitalist system and take political power in our own hands that we can take decisions to use resources to meet the needs of humanity and protect the environment,” I added. “To do that, workers need our own independent party leading a movement of millions.”

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