Syriza and Podemos: I would prefer not to

While there are certainly some very real and very possible benefits to pursuing a party strategy, still I worry about the current tendency on the Left to become re-enchanted with the “machinery of the State” (and to use those very words with a straight face).  The idea that we need to seize the State to make real change, to fight for democracy, to give real power to the people…I think this is a truly dangerous path they are heading down.

Should Syriza and Podemos become “successful,” I feel certain we already know what the outcome will be.  In the short term, they will produce some policies that are more favorable to the mass of people.  In the long term, they will consolidate their power and use it to dominate society, including, without doubt, the same mass of people they claim to represent.