A drift to "BDS" as the universal answer

In spits and spats, BDS, once a policy special for Israel, has moved into being seen as a general answer to war and repression.

The 28 March Green Party in England & Wales (GPEW) Spring Conference had motions submitted that called for BDS-like campaigns against the US (for its policies in Venezuela) and against all countries involved in continuing the Sudanese civil war.

Workers’ Liberty has long campaigned against Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) on Israel as a meaningful or effective tactic to achieve Palestinian self-determination. It has proved ineffective in achieving even steps towards that, in many places where it has been applied. It has even been actively harmful to Palestinian solidarity, used for example to block British union support for strikes within Israel, or to “boycott” speeches in Britain from the Palestinian-Jewish anti-war social movement within Israel. Blanket BDS targeting Israel can quickly slide into left antisemitism, with, for example, Israeli art people excluded from international forums.

The “exceptionalisation” of Israel as a uniquely evil state, supposedly founded on genocide, remains a problem. In fact, the histories of most modern states include persecution of populations that did not “fit”, as for example the Armenian genocide and persecution of Kurds in Turkey.

The “success” of the BDS campaign has apparently been less to put pressure on Israel from the outside, more to educate a layer of activists into believing that BDS is now the catch-all solution to states behaving badly. Nix bad capitalists by getting the good capitalists and governments to shun them?

Sudan

The Sudan motion rightly highlighted the growing humanitarian crisis in Sudan and supported action to address it. It resolved to “support Sudan-specific boycott, divestment, and sanctions measures against individuals, corporations, financial institutions, and state actors complicit in genocide, war crimes, or crimes against humanity in Sudan, until such violations cease and full accountability is achieved”. Those would be nigh on impossible to implement and could not possibly be effective.

For one, it was asking the GPEW to support a campaign that does not really exist. (GPEW itself presumably does not have billions in investment funds to redirect).

And if there were a broader campaign (by whom?), what role could it play? Appealing to capitalists and governments to boycott Egypt, Russia, the UAE, Iran and Turkey might allow you to feel that something is being done, but is unlikely to “work”. Look at the current sanctions regimes against Russia and Iran. The Russian sanctions have done nothing to stop Putin’s war against Ukraine. Associated measures to ban Russian tourists or Russian literature are positively destructive. Sanctions on Iran have damaged and impoverished the country, and have not stopped the regime from waging war against its own people.

Venezuela

The motion on Venezuela, which had no criticism of the Maduro government, called for “boycotts of, divestment from, and sanctions against US companies which profit from the US war machine”. Given the US’s outreach as the world’s biggest capitalist power, there is a good chance this would mean “boycotting” most of the world economy.

In the case of Sudan, the movers may genuinely be hoping for pressure to stop the war. No one can seriously believe a boycott of the US will even gain any grip, let alone change its foreign policy.

There is a campaign to boycott Turkey from “Rise up 4 Rojava”, aimed at what they term “fascist” Turkey’s repression of what was the autonomous Kurdish area in Syria. I know of no trade union passing motions for that policy. And would the intent be to ban links with progressive and leftist organisations and people in Turkey (and USA, etc.), or, let’s say, to stop people seeking cheap holidays in Turkey, or ban academic links with Turkish universities?

If no, then a boycott is not the right word; if yes, then the boycotters may actively harm what they wish to support.

It is surely better for the left to support working-class and left-wing allies within the states that wage reactionary wars. BDS as a Swiss Army knife universal tool will cut against that.