Target | Tool | Terrain
Here are three views on the function of government:
But first: government refers to the executive, legislative, judicial & bureaucratic institutions that make decisions about the organization of society within the limitations, constraints and dominance of the alliance of ruling classes and their principal political expression (the state). The state and the government are not synonymous. Given that regimes ascend within, struggle for stability within and decay within the context of state power, a major goal of all revolutionaries is to win the fight for democracy and win state power, which is political supremacy. Achieving left governing power provides a major lever to both open mass democratic participation of everyday people in the work of transforming politics and also provides a major lever to battle against the ruling classes state power. Okay, so given that, here are three views on the function of government:
Government As Target- the historic battle taking place across the United States between the forces for a 2nd American Redemption movement and its governing project (the New Confederacy) and the forces for a 3rd Reconstruction program reminds us that government is a target of peoples protest. The first amendment not only guarantees us the right to protest, but built into the fabric of a democratic society is the right to criticize, challenge and confront government. And, even in extra-legal circumstances (see the insurrectionist attempt of January 6th 2021 and the insurrectionist insurgency of the former Confederate states) the government as a target takes on a literal meaning.
Government As Tool- the forces for redemption and for reconstruction also show us that government is a tool or instrument for peoples power. We can look at the New Confederate actions like the mass expulsion and ethnic cleansing of immigrant communities, the imposition of arrogant and chauvinistic global tariffs, the pulverization of the democratic rights of the people to vote and to a safe and secure environment are all as examples of government as a tool. And conversely, so are the world-historic victories of the Reconstruction Revolution (the abolition of chattel slavery, due process and equal protection of the laws and the abolition of the US states rights to deny the right to vote based on race, color or previous conditions of servitude), victories that the present day Redeemer movement cannot help but to openly salivate at the prospect of destroying.
Government As Terrain- the forces for Confederate Neo-Secession and the forces for Third Reconstructionist revolution both view government as a terrain to navigate. This is why Trump and his arrogant minions and MAGA lackeys have gone to war against civil society and the bureaucratic institutions of the government. This is why General Tubman enlisted in the Union Army as a spy, and it is why courageous leaders like Cori Bush today decide to enter into the Lion’s Den of elected office with their principles and heads held high: navigating the unfriendly terrain of government is the necessary precondition for learning how to more effectively target it when it is a force for suppression and wield it when it is a force for liberation.