Left Party Congress | Left Party Congress: Radical against capitalism

For several years now, delegates to Left Party party conferences have always brought home a special gift. The party has made it a habit to distribute bright red promotional items bearing the party logo—sometimes a hat, sometimes a scarf, sometimes socks—to increase the Left Party's visibility. The selection so far shows that party conferences often take place in the fall.

This time, at the party conference in Chemnitz , beach towels bearing the words "Tax the rich" were placed on the delegates' seats. Summer is just around the corner, and the precarious financing or even closure of many swimming pools is a political issue. After the federal election, The Left wants to continue where it was surprisingly successful during the election campaign: It wants to address the everyday concerns of people—those, as co-party leader Ines Schwerdtner puts it, who are oppressed by capitalism.

That's why it is sharpening its tone in political debate , wanting to articulate its views more clearly, harshly, and even more shrilly. According to Ines Schwerdtner, The Left wants to "no longer talk in camouflaged terms," ​​but rather speak straightforwardly about classes and democratic socialism. And co-faction leader Heidi Reichinnek declared in an interview before the party conference that capitalism should not be propped up, but overthrown - which led to gasps in conservative and right-wing media. The main motion adopted at the party conference states that The Left should be developed "into a powerful socialist members' party for the 21st century," "one that is capable of conducting and even winning campaigns beyond elections."

This means that The Left wants to become more effective in political practice. On the one hand, in the confrontation with the Merz-Klingbeil coalition – "They despise our people, and therefore we despise their policies," said co-party leader Ines Schwerdtner about the policies of Merz and Co. And it also affects the competition with the opposition parties, the Greens and, even more so, the AfD. It should be clear to everyone that it takes a great deal of staying power to get an issue from the opposition through – not just as a subject of public debate, but also as a resolution and law. The Left Party cites the statutory minimum wage as a model, for which it took several years of struggle against many reservations and resistance, first within the Left itself, then within the unions, and then within other parties, before the statutory minimum wage was passed.

After the federal election, the Left wants to continue where it was surprisingly successful during the election campaign: It wants to address people's everyday concerns.

There are plenty of topics for campaigns on pressing issues. The main motion mentions campaigns for a nationwide rent cap, and members of the Bundestag parliamentary group have stated that they are striving for a campaign for tax justice. There is an incredible amount of wealth in Germany, said co-party leader Jan van Aken at the party conference, but this wealth is grossly unequally distributed. Many people are lonely because they have no work, because they fear for their housing, or because they worry about whether they will be able to put a hot meal on the table for their children at the end of the month. "This loneliness must end," demanded van Aken. In the hundreds of thousands of door-to-door conversations the Left Party conducted during the election campaign, two issues played a major role: "horrific rents and high food prices." But the term food prices does not appear once in the coalition agreement between the CDU/CSU and SPD. "This is out-of-touch politics," criticized van Aken.

To improve the party's campaigning capabilities, which had long been a weak point before the recent federal election, training courses are planned, especially for its many new and young members. After all, half of the current approximately 112,000 Left Party members have only joined in the last nine months. Co-party leader Ines Schwerdtner spoke of a learning party that, according to the main motion, is intended to become an "organizing class party." This ranges from dealing with mistakes and failures to continuing education in organizing and the "ABCs of Marxism."

Left Party representatives regularly discuss how such a thing can be achieved in discussions with fellow left-wing parties, for example in Belgium and Austria. The goal originally envisioned in the main motion, to increase membership to 150,000 within four years, was ultimately dropped; some considered it too tame, others too ambitious. Instead, the adopted motion simply states in general terms that The Left Party should be made fit for practical political work. Co-leader of the parliamentary group, Heidi Reichinnek, had proclaimed this line right at the beginning of the party conference: "If it is radical to demand that everyone get what they need to live, then we are radical."

Getting fit for practical work – this is also the task of the Bundestag parliamentary group. It has 64 members; only 13 were most recently in the Bundestag, five more previously, but 46 parliamentary group members are newcomers to parliament, including nurses and mechatronics engineers. It's a challenge to turn them into a functional team in such a short space of time. Co-group leader Sören Pellmann can still remember how he joined the Left parliamentary group as a newcomer in 2017, "and nothing about the structures could be questioned, nothing was discussed." This criticism also directed at the parliamentary group's leadership at the time, led by Sahra Wagenknecht and Dietmar Bartsch. "We'll do things differently this time," Pellmann promised.

However, if The Left Party remains a permanent force in the Bundestag, it must prepare for more change and flux. The party conference passed a resolution in its main motion that the term of office for members of the Bundestag should be limited to three electoral terms. The key phrase in the debate was "anti-establishment." This also means that, after Gregor Gysi, there will likely be no more senior president of The Left Party; the short-term office at the beginning of a legislative term will be given to the member of parliament with the longest service in the Bundestag. The party conference passed a resolution calling on Left Party members of parliament to donate a portion of their salaries to the party's social fund.

According to Pellmann, the Left Party faction intends to dedicate itself, among other things, to the fight against right-wing extremism and to the interests of East Germany. "We will not leave the East to the Nazis," said Pellmann, whose parliamentary group in the Bundestag sits directly opposite the rapidly expanding AfD faction. Contrary to its self-proclaimed status, the AfD is not a party of the common people, van Aken had previously declared, "but a party of the rich." It makes politics with fear, and those who, Pellmann said with reference to the new federal government, "pursue right-wing policies out of fear of the right are only deepening that fear."

In contrast, The Left wants to focus on the hope of a more just society, one worth fighting for. "We are the hope!" is the title of the main motion of this Chemnitz party conference. This also applies to the upcoming local and state elections this year and especially next year, in which The Left aims, among other things, to enter the state parliaments of Baden-Württemberg and Rhineland-Palatinate for the first time.

According to Jan van Aken, many new members are back on the road again after the federal election, making door-to-door calls. Mass public outreach isn't meant to be a one-off event during the election campaign; The Left wants to continue to be more visible. Perhaps soon, even with a towel on the lawn at the outdoor pool.