Good ideas don’t just grow legs and start wandering around in the world, changing things for the better. History, for good and for ill, is made by organised political forces. Helping to build such a movement that can fight for socialism is one important reason for running electoral campaigns.
A surge in votes for the far-right Alternative for Germany and significant gains for the Left Party in the German national elections highlights the growing political polarisation in the country.
As more votes are sorted, it becomes much clearer that Trump’s victory, far from being a landslide, was quite narrow. When the count is finalised nationwide, more voters will have chosen someone other than the bigoted billionaire.
America needs a form of politics that is pro-worker, anti-racist and not beholden to the oligarchy. But just as much, it needs a form of politics that operates outside elections.
