Hal Draper

This is a wonderful introduction to the Rank & File Strategy. This is the approach that Marxists should adopt around trade unions and strikes. It was taken from a talk by the US Marxist, Hal Draper in 1970. This remains a relevant strategy for all Marxist socialists. How do we win strikes and, if necessary, fight against the trade union bureaucracy?

“Marxism was and is the only kind of socialism that establishes an integral link between socialism and the struggle for social revolution and trade unionism. That link does not exist for any other kind of socialism. In terms of socialist theory, Marxism is the only one which establishes an integral link between trade unionism and the social revolution which sees the trade union movement as a revolutionary fact, even if and when the trade unions themselves are not revolutionary.”

“Marx puts the stress upon the basic goal – that the primary aim was to get the class as a whole moving, and that any such movement of the class as a whole was in itself and of itself progressive and revolutionary in its implications, because the class was.”

“The Marxist attitude on this point is that the job of the socialist vanguard is to help get the mass of the working class moving as a class, independently of the ruling class and the state.
Moving where? Toward the social revolution in general, to be sure, but in the first place on behalf of its own class interests. The central idea of Marxism on this question is that insofar as the working class does this consistently and without drawing back from the consequences, it thereby moves in the direction of social revolution.”

“Marx’s conception of the elementary process of social revolution is that it is the process by which the mass of people press beyond the limits of capitalism in the course of their class struggle (whether they think that is what they are doing or not). It is in this sense that every strike is a sort of rehearsal for revolution – not in the minds of the strikers, but from the point of view of the Marxists.”

To read this book, click this link: https://ivavalleybooks.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/Hal-Draper-Marxism-and-the-trade-unions-1-2.pdf