fight IN THE NEW unified TWELVE days of selecGermany the successor to a tive strikes by the giparty which once locked up ant IG Metal!
dissidents the Democratic Soengineering union cialist Party (PDS) has behave forced conces- come itself become a party of sions from the employ- dissidence. ers. The survival of the PDS in All 3.4 million union the face of unrelenting estabmembers will begin a 35- lishment hostility makes it, hour week from October almost despite itself, a part of 1 this year, despite the radical opposition. bosses attempts to delay Following the collapse of the final one hour cut. the Stalinist German DemoAnd the 3.8 percent an- cratic Republic (GDR) in nual pay increase this 1989 the West German capiyear and next, while fall- talists pushed hard to ensure ing short of the union's 6 that the new united Germany percent claim, is higher would be built on their terms. than most employers had The PDS however has expected the engineering weathered the storm, and at firms to concede. the general elections last OcIt appears that the un- tober won seats in the Gerion threat to spread the man Parliament owing to its strike beyond the initial continuing strength in East stoppages in Bavaria Germany - especially in Berforced the hand of the ne- lin. gotiators for the bosses' Among those elected were Gestamtmetall confedera- Winfried Wolf, a long-standtion. ing supporter of the Fourth In the event they even International. dropped their call for 'oftsetting measures' to fi- Defending GDR nance the shorter hours. Dissidence, however, is The outcome will ennot a political programme. courage other unions to The PDS's real concern refight for their outstanding mains defence of a separate pay demands. A million East German identity and, bye construction workers are implication, defence of some demanding 6.5 percent, aspects at least of the former and chemical workers GDR. are seeking 6 percent.
While efforts are being The fight should also made to expand the party reinforce demands westwards, almost all PDS across Europe for the 35 members are in the GDR hour week. (130,000 as against 2,000 in the West). Sixty per cent of the membership is over 50 years old.
The debates at the PDS conference at the end of January were dominated by the GDR problem.
The party's well-known "human faces" - such as Gregor Gysi and Hans Modrow - wanted to drive the Communist Platform current out of the party.
The Platform's best known figure Sarah Wagenknecht has said that the GDR should have been saved and improved. Other supporters of the Platform have espoused unrepentant Stalinist positions. Stalinist rule in the old GDR collapsed in the face of mass opposition from the working class Gysi and his right wing allies want to get rid of the Communist Platform as part of their bid to make the PDS an acceptable partner for the major parties in local or national government coalitions - a real possibility given the current parliamentary arithmetic.
Fond memories On the other hand in order to survive the PDS must seek both to attract electoral support on the left and maintain such support from those with fond memories of the former East German state.
It must therefore try to be all things to all people. Point two of the "five points" adopted by the conference says "whether a parliamentary fraction of the PDS finds itself playing in parliament an oppositional role, supporting a government from outside, or in a coalition, does not affect the PDS' principled oppositional stance".
At the same time the leadership's efforts to exclude members of the Platform were thwarted by conference delegates.
Half of the PDS parliamentary group issued a statement opposing exclusions and calling for an open debate on all fundamental issues.
The PDS is both a major opportunity and a big problem for the German left. Indo." volvement in its debates is both an inevitability and a potential trap:
Above all the GDR problem is a potential quagmire for anybody who shares the prevailing confusion between socialism and the bureaucratic caricature that existed in the former East Germany.
The heritage of Stalin therefore continues to cast a long shadow over the left, despite the collapse of the one-party regimes in Central and Eastern Europe.
The radical critique of Stalinism carried out by Trotsky and others in the 1930s retains all its relevance today.