Rebuilding Class Consciousness in Britain

A May Day message from The Class Consciousness Project

Happy May Day from all of us at The Class Consciousness Project.

We are now into our second year. In that time, we’ve weathered many trials, tested different approaches, and continued refining our understanding of how best we can serve the working class.

The project began as a collective of comrades who left the Workers Party of Britain, united in our determination to confront the severe lack of class consciousness in this country. At the start, most of us were trade unionists, and we believed our best course was to agitate within the unions, assuming that union members were already a step ahead of the wider class in political understanding.

From Trade Unionism to Broader Class Struggle

Over time, our tactics have shifted organically and through struggle. Through constant critique of the trade unions and the development of our own political line, we came to better understand the limitations of trade unionism, especially in Britain.

British trade unions are heavily embedded in the capitalist system. They are stifled by anti-union legislation and run by bureaucracies far removed from the shop floor. While trade unionism still has a role, recognising its constraints is essential. As Lenin said, trade unions can be a “school of communism” but only when they are active and militant. In a Britain where industry has been gutted and union membership is down to 22.4%, this “school” has been largely shut down.

We continue to critique the British trade unions, but now as part of a much broader project. We offer class analysis not just of workplace struggle, but of all the political, social, and cultural forces affecting our class. Our aim is to provide a perspective the mainstream media will never offer, and that the liberal/Trotskyist left cannot even see.

Reclaiming Working-Class Culture

One of the key areas we’ve begun exploring more deeply is working-class culture.

We’ve always written about sport, especially football, which remains a huge part of working-class life. But we are now turning our attention to other cultural forms, poetry, art, music, theatre, architecture, and exposing the lie that these belong to the ruling class and the petty bourgeois.

The liberal media would have us believe that our culture amounts to nothing more than football, pubs, and disposable pop music. And while sport is vital, both to our health and our sense of community, we reject the idea that this is all we have.

The bourgeoisie may claim ownership of the arts, but it was our class who built the theatres they now perform in. Who strings the cello? Who lights the stage? Who builds the galleries and cleans the rehearsal rooms? It is working-class hands that make culture possible. Just as industry is socialised, so too is culture. It could not exist without the labour and creativity of the working class.

Our Mission

Our task is simple but enormous: to rebuild working-class consciousness in Britain. We do this by offering a working-class perspective, and by helping our class to reclaim the cultural and political space that is rightfully ours.

We hope you’ll continue with us on that journey.

Solidarity on May Day!

“The starting-point of critical elaboration is the consciousness of what one really is, and is ‘knowing thyself’ as a product of the historical process to date, which has deposited in you an infinity of traces, without leaving an inventory. Therefore it is imperative at the outset to compile such an inventory.“

– Antonio Gramsci