SOME IDEAS ON WHAT TO DO ABOUT CAPITALISM Revolution & Reforms vs. Reformism. So basically, in order for us to even begin to be free we must destroy capitalism in its entirety: classes, the market, the state, money, exchange, wage systems, borders, racism, sexism, homophobia and the destruction of the environment all have to go. We can’t permently reform capitalism, and we can’t build a different capitalism on the state-controlled / Leninist model. So how the hell are we supposed to do this? And what do we do until this glorious day when capitalism is smashed? We must expand the floor of our cage in wasy that openly conflict with the ruling class, and thus open up greater possibilities for the destruction of capitalism. History shows us we can force breathing room for ourselves, and we must. We should use organizational forms and methods which themselves contradict capitalism. That is, non-hierarchical, grassroots, organic organizational forms that subvert the attempts made by the ruling class to strengthen our reliance on institutionalized leadership and hierarchies. Such attempts by the ruling class include voting. We should use direct action, individually and collectively, instead of relying on people to do things for us. We should demand autonomy, not beg. We should take everything we want, not wait to be given. We should force open liberating possibilities, not hope for change. We should work to find ways to overcome exchange as much as possible, whenever possible. We should instead work to build mutual aid in our communities by creating sharing programs that make resources free and available to all. Most importantly, we should avoid allowing reforms to become ends in and of themselves. We have to understand that reforms only exist because we fight for them, and not because the ruling class wants us to have them. In fact, the ruling class, in order to preserve its power and in order to maintain the growth that capitalism requires,  must strip us of anything that gives us power. Thus, reforms are, at best, temporary, which history has shown repeatedly. Reforms provide us with breathing space that we can use to widen and strengthen our movement to destroy capitalism. They are nothing more than that, and if we don’t take advantage of them, we will find ourselves set back… as we have been many times when we see reforms as ends instead of means. When reforms become ends, when we use capitalist means of opening breathing spaces (such as voting, mediators and hierarchical organizational forms), we create reformism. Reformism strengthens capitalism by maintaining the illusion that capitalism can be “permenantly reformed to meet our needs”. Reformism doesn’t understand that globalization is the natural movement of capitalism. Reformism doesn’t understand that capitalism is class struggle, and thus inequality cannot be ended save through the movement to end capitalism – in capitalism’s final destruction. Openly contradicting capitalism while working for reforms strengthens the working class movement toward community, strengthens and realizes our desires to be more than “workers in the capitalist machine” and in these ways opens up the possibility of ending capitalism. That is: these ways strengthen and open up revolutionary possibilities. SOME SPECIFICS Mass Protest. Since Seattle, mass protest has seemingly returned with a vengeance. Every few months somewhere there is a relatively large-scale protest. Unfortunately, many of these protests hang on to the notion of being “symbolic”, of making symbolic stands against something instead of concretely attacking it. Mass protest can have but two main purposes: 1) to directly and concretely stop something from happening, and 2) to inform others about what needs to be stopped. These are both concrete only in as much as “2” leads to “1” and “1” succeeds on some level. If “1” succeeds it will naturally reinforce “2”. In order for concrete attacks to succeed, a diversity of tactics must be encouraged. Shouting slogans, doing civil disobedience, destroying property, fighting with cops and much else all has its place in our tactical repertoire since all can be necessary for success. For mass protest to succeed, we have to stop worrying about the corporate media, and how they will portray us and what we do. We get only two kinds of press: no press and bad press. It doesn’t matter what we do, if they are not ignoring us they are attempting to make us look crazy, stupid and bad. So the best plan is to force them to report that we have succeeded in shutting down another meeting, or succeeding in winning our strike demands, or succeeded in stopping Neiman-Marcus from selling fur, or chased the Klan out of town, or whatnot. It is important to realize that mass protest is a way of fighting for reforms until the point when it turns into an insurrection. Until then, it doesn’t matter if you are holding a sign or throwing a brick through a Starbucks window or fighting with cops, it is reformist in nature. Attacking, and even defeating, parts of the capitalist system (such as a single corporation, or a single state, or a single global entity such as the WTO) is not equivalent to attacking the system as a whole. We can only attack the system as a whole by working to overcome capitalist social relations in our everyday lives, and from that basis attack the parts of the capitalist system. And, again, the best way to do this is in ways that contradict capitalism: non-hierarchically, directly, using mutual aid instead of exchange as much as possible. The most important aspect of mass protest, however, is that part which is more-or-less imperceivable to people who are not there. This is the links which are formed, individually and collectively, by the people who participate. These links enable wider solidarity through wider personal communication, and are galvanized by the success of collective action. Dual Power. Mass protest means nothing if we are not “forming the structure of the new society within the shell of the old” [14], if we are not creating bases of power in our communities from which to confront the ruling class and their capitalist system, and which are as autonomous as possible from capitalism. This is known as creating Dual Power. “Dual” because our structures of power exist beside and against the ruling class’ structures of power. To do this, we need to take the participatory decision-making, solidarity, respect and encouragement of all kinds of diversity and mutual aid that are being used on the streets and find ways to apply them to our everyday lives. We should find ways of applying them in our homes, workplaces, neighborhoods, schools, and in all of our relationships and interactions. We can create autonomous community centers in which we can hang out, have meetings, stage cultural events, host speakers, run soup kitchens, organize buying and eating co-ops, organize knowledge and skill shares, play games… the possibilities are endless. We can build autonomous groups in our workplaces to discuss our problems, come up with solutions and implement them. We can also do this in our neighborhoods by forming autonomous coalitions and assemblies. And so on. From there we must then find ways of linking our autonomous groupings and centers in our cities, regions and ultimately the world. Some possibilities of these ideas working can be found in the ongoing Zapatista Revolt in Chiapas, Mexico, the directly democratic General Assemblies and Councils used in most 20th Century revolutions (before they were co-opted or destroyed by groups like the Bolsheviks in Russia) and the farming collectives created by peasants during the Spanish Civil War. Discussion, Propaganda & DIY Media. One of the most important aspects of confronting capitalism is to openly propagate ideas and be willing to discuss them. We cannot be afraid of stating and defending our positions, but we also cannot be afraid to refine and develop our ideas through listening to others and honestly considering their ideas. We also have to develop means of getting ideas and news that isn’t reported by the corporate media out to as many people as possible. To this end, we need to create autonomous media sources. The Independent Media Centers (IMCs) are a great start. However, we also have to develop means of getting hardcopies of such news into people’s hands, especially into the hands of those with no access to the net or who would not stumble on the websites. In this we also have to be careful not to let one autonomous media source be the only voice we hear. We should start our own neighborhood, city and/or regional newssheets and papers, pirate radio stations and television (cable access, perhaps) shows. We can advertise these with flyer and poster, and in one another’s initiatives. The hardcore-punk music scene [15] has created a global, counter-cultural Do-It-Yourself (DIY) network that is autonomous from many aspects of capitalism. With it they communicate, travel / tour, self-release and distribute records, books and ‘zines and do a myriad of other things. We should take their example and use it in our initiatives. It can be applied to other sub-cultural scenes [16], to the publishing and distribution of our own literature and such, to the sharing of resources and possibilities and much else. THE END? In this work, we have tried to outline the basics of what capitalism is, and give some ideas on what we can do about it. In many ways our analysis is deficient because of our limited space. Though we have put forth ideas on how to end capitalism, these are not exhaustive, and they are here not only to give ideas but also, we hope, to help stimulate the development of more ideas. In the next section is a list of resources that have helped us. We put them here in hopes that they can help you as well. Notes: 14. From the Preamble to the IWW Constitution. 15. This is not the “punk” you see on MTV, but the real, underground thing. 16. DIY hip hop and DIY country scenes are already developing. resources back to "what is capitalism"