After atleast twenty years of steady decline of the
“radical movement”, of “leftist activism”, during which those people in society
who were attempting to “change the world” – in a “progressive” or “leftist”
sense – were reduced to a miniscule “fringe group”, a complete marginalization
within society, within even the “left”, broadly speaking; Seattle N30
came along to change all that, to reverse the trend, to turn it all around.
Now, in the wake of N30.99, people who are out there trying to “change the
world” are no longer nearly so marginalized, their existence as a distinct
force or tendency within society is known by (more or less) everyone. Their
existence and activity is now appreciated and welcomed by a significant and
growing part of this society – those who have come to question the direction
the dominant social forces in our society are pushing to take it, and us, in.
So if it is now “respectable” or even “fashionable”
to work (voluntarily, without remuneration, on one’s own free time) to “change
the world” – if such people are no longer universally considered to be “kooks”,
“utopian dreamers”, or “relics of the past” – then why is it that so few of
this new wave of radical social activists have made their way to a position of
revolutionary anti-capitalist critique? Of course, at this still early stage in
the development of this new movement of resistance to capitalist globalization,
the movement itself is in no way “revolutionary”. Revolutionary potential may
exist within the movement, in the most radical current within it, but it is
presently entirely a matter of potential; it is a tendency that might
arise within the movement in the upcoming period.
Presently, the movement is dominated by an agenda
and ideology of “democratization”, i.e., of radically reforming the
dominant institutions and operations of existing capitalist society. Any
thoroughgoing critique of capitalist social relations is presently thoroughly
marginalized within the movement. The predominant critiques of globalization
and “neo-liberalism” within the movement do not in any way at all
question capital and its social relations. Rather, they merely critique the
most socially and environmentally destructive aspects or consequences of the
operation of global capital today. And this is just as true of the “radical”,
direct action faction of the movement as it is of the “moderate”, “fair trade”
faction. There is an almost total lack of understanding and critique of the
underlying reality and forces of capital, its social relations, its historical
development, its imperatives and tendencies, and its conditions of permanent or
historic crisis in the present period. The anti-globalization (a-g) movement
opposes itself to globalization, that is, of course, to capitalist
globalization. But just why is capital globalizing itself so intensively
these days? What are the reasons and what are the (global) economic forces
driving the process of globalization? These are fairly basic, yet vital questions
confronting any anti-globalization resistance movement. But it is coherent
answers to just such questions that are lacking in today’s a-g movement. And
what about the general social conditions of contemporary capitalist society
within which the a-g struggle is taking place? Again we find a serious lack of
understanding of the underlying reality within the movement. If a real forward
development of the a-g movement is to occur, comprehension within the movement
on these questions must increase significantly.
Such an understanding and critique do exist,
but presently they do not have any real existence or basis within the movement.
In no small part, this results from the fact that, even within the radical
current of the movement, all of the emphasis is on actions, on doings
things here and now to change the world “before it’s too late”. There is a real
sense of desperation, resulting from an apocalyptic vision of rapidly
increasing corporate tyranny, and resulting in an extreme “immediatism”
– i.e., exclusive focus on immediate results – permeating the whole of the
movement. The movement’s participants are
primarily “activists”, people who organize and prepare group actions and
events that are meant to challenge or resist specific policies, institutions, or
projects of contemporary globalizing capital.
Of course, these activists do have an understanding
and critique of that which they oppose, but that critique and understanding is
only partial because that which they are currently directly resisting is
just a part of the overall totality of global capital. Thus, they oppose
and are actively resisting: the WTO, IMF, World Bank, and similar
transnational institutions, as well as those processes they see these
institutions directing, such as ecological devastation, displacement of
traditional communities and means of livelihood, child labour, sweatshops,
privatization of education, healthcare, water, energy production,
homogenization of culture, etc. All of these aspects and many more, even taken
as a whole, are still just a small part of the reality of global capital today.
Should we expect
the a-g movement, such as it is,
to move on from these extreme symptoms and “superstructural” (not
a term I like) institutions of present day global capital, to a more comprehensive
and in-depth focus of confrontation? Not likely. That’s because the present
movement is held together – as an international mass movement – only by those
political views held in common by of all its participants. And as we all know,
the movement is characterized by an extraordinary diversity of people, groups,
and their political views. As soon as an attempt is made to move beyond
reforming symptoms and institutions of capital, towards the real enemy itself,
a large part of the present-day movement (probably a majority in terms of
absolute numbers of movement participants) will drop out, or, alternatively,
the radical faction will split away from the moderate faction (transforming it
from a mass movement to a ‘minoritarian’ movement); that is, more or less all
of the “moderate”, “fair trade” faction, including the trade unions, the
“moderate” environmentalists, religious groups, and third-worldist groups, will
not participate in or support any attempt to push the movement towards a direct
confrontation with the ruling class as a whole, and all the presumptions and
imperatives of the power of capital and the state themselves. Such a
confrontation, I assume, is what the radical, “anti-capitalist” faction of the
movement looks forward to. Of course, some people will be radicalized within
the course of the movement. But how many moderate reformists can be expected to
become radical revolutionaries within the movement? As long as existing social
conditions don’t deteriorate drastically, surely not too many.
Part of this critique is part of a larger critique
of activism more generally, or rather, of leftist activism, in particular. Such
activism always holds or implies that some “action” or activity by even a small
group of people is always more important, is always more politically valuable,
than any political discussion or debate of political positions, orientations,
or strategies between fellow militants. This attitude exemplifies a hidden, or
not so hidden, elitism and vanguardism, in that it implies that a small group
of people can effect significant social change, as opposed to the reality that
only mass actions can do so. Under conditions of social passivity of most of
the masses, the activism of a small minority tend to merely become part of the
capitalist political spectacle; thus, if anything, reinforcing the
passivity of most of the masses.
Of course, many activists would reject these views.
Some would argue that relatively small scale actions, while they can’t actually
effect significant social change, can have a significant effect on the
consciousness of a significant number of members of the public (or,
alternatively, the working class). Others would argue that while small scale
activism is insignificant, a “critical mass” of activists and of actions (such
as we saw in Seattle) can affect significant change. Certainly that is
true, but such mass actions are relatively rare, except in extreme social
crises (under the conditions of the real domination of capital, which we are
subject to) And then, it must be asked what kind of actions are being conceived
of, and, what kind of actions are possible for a mass a-g movement. This
latter is important because although mass, “in the streets”, actions are
capable of stopping certain policies of a government or institution from being
put into practice, even of forcing the adoption of opposing policies
(temporarily), or shutting down an institution (for a while) – and although the
results of such actions may consist in significant social change -- they are
essentially “defensive” actions that can never force a government, institution,
or corporation to put into practice policies which are contrary to the capital
interests of the organization in question represents. Before such a thing were
ever to happen in this era, the state whose jurisdiction the actions were
within would unleash military repression of whatever magnitude necessary
to crush the threat.
Anti-capitalist anti-globalization activists
have to be clear why this is so. The capitalist state’s fundamental mission is
to safeguard capitalist order, capitalist social relations, and to defend the
interests of the capital of the whole nation. In conjunction with a precarious
global economy in a state of deep historic crisis, the result is that each
national state will undertake whatever it deems necessary to defend the
interests of the nation’s capital; and in this era of globalization,
more or less all the world’s states will undertake whatever they deem necessary
to defend the interests of the global economy, and thus of global capital. Not
least among those measures states will utilize in the course of such a
“defence” against the actions of a-g activists is brutal military repression,
even against “its own civilians”. This represents a “wall”, a limit beyond
which the a-g movement, operating on the terrain and with the methods currently
deployed, will not be able to step. And it is at this limit that genuine
anti-capitalists among a-g activists must focus their theoretical attention.
How to go further towards total confrontation with capital, with the aim of
eliminating capitalism itself? In other words, civil war. In fact, all out
CLASS war, if total confrontation with capital is indeed the aim.
As noted above, a revolutionary critique and
understanding of total global capital, of its relations and underlying forces,
of its immanent tendencies, of its imperatives, and of the conditions of its
historic crisis, do exist, but not within the movement. That’s because such a
critique is a concern of revolutionary theory. And the development of
such theory does not take place by way of activism, it does not occur within
the milieu of activist organizations. It occurs, rather, by way of, and within,
revolutionary political groupings, groups which recognize from the beginning
and at all moments, the necessity for the abolition or overthrow of capitalism
as an entire social system, as a set of social relations which regulate
all of social activity in the world; groups which recognize, moreover,
that such a monumental project is a historical process, one which has
been around for a long time and will be going on for a long time to come if it
is to reach fruition.
As capitalist society has historically developed and
transformed itself throughout the 19th and 20th
centuries, so too has revolutionary (anti-capitalist) theory had to develop, to
transform itself, to update itself, so as to reflect the changes in the reality
of the development of capital and of those conditions which permit its
overthrow. These changes have been especially profound in the last 20 to 30
years of the 20th century. As a result, revolutionary theory has
been forced to renew itself, to critique itself, to discard old schemas and
partial understandings, and to develop new means of critical comprehension that
go beyond the old, discarded ones. This has not been easy, and consequently
there has been much disagreement, and fragmentation, within the international
milieu of revolutionary political groupings.
However, there have also been real developments, real advances and
breakthroughs, and the critique some are in the process of developing has shown
real promise to lay bare the reality of globalizing capital in deep historic
crisis in the 21st century. Their understanding of the underlying
forces and immanent tendencies of global capital as a historically evolving process
– of the ongoing reproduction of the material means of life of society,
which at the same time involves the accumulation of wealth by those who control
the means of production – is based on a number of central concepts and a method
of analysis first developed as a coherent system by Karl Marx; concepts
such as <mode of production>, <means of production>, <forces of
production>, <relations of production>, <commodity structure>,
<use-value>, <exchange-value>, <commodity fetishism>,
<surplus-value>, <labour-power, as a commodity>, <generalized
commodity production>, <concentration of capital>, <centralization
of capital>, <absolute surplus-value>, <relative surplus-value>,
<rate of surplus-value>, <constant capital>, <variable
capital>, <organic and technical composition of capital>,
<realization of surplus-value on the market>, <productive
consumption>, <formal domination of capital>, <real domination of
capital>, <historic growth vs. historic decay, or ascendance vs. decline,
of capital as a mode of production>, and of course <total or global
capital>, and of course, <capitalist class> or <bourgeoisie> and
<working class> or <proletariat>, among others.
The marxist method of utilization of these concepts
is known as the dialectical method, a method which permits a dynamic understanding
of social reality, because it explicitly sees this reality as an overall
developing, historical process, a totality of component manifold
processes which are concretely related to each other within the whole, which
condition and interact with each other. This marxist dialectical method
attempts to grasp the overall movement of social reality by investigating
various immanent tendencies which underlie the surface phenomena of
capitalist society, and by examining the relations between these
tendencies, especially the relation of contradiction or opposition, in order to
achieve a comprehensive, balanced, overall understanding of social reality as a
totality. There is nothing ‘orthodox’ or ‘dogmatic’ about such a marxism;
it is not a ‘doctrine’ or set of ‘absolute truths’, for it involves an
ever-closer approximation to the underlying reality, and it is essentially critical;
and this involves the capacity to critique itself, its own results.
Those forms of ‘Marxism’ which in contrast are
orthodox and dogmatic, a body of ‘doctrine’, an ideology, are vulgarized,
static, imitations of the real thing, which don’t employ all (or even close to
all) of the key conceptual tools, don’t employ the dialectical method, and are
incapable of marxist self-critique. Such are the ‘Marxisms’ of the
‘Marxist-Leninists’ (i.e., Stalinists and Maoists), the various ‘Bolshevik-Leninists’
and other Trotskyists, and the academic ‘Marxists’ (or Marxologists). Whereas
genuine revolutionary marxism is to be found primarily within the milieu of
groupings which has evolved out of the “left-wing” of the international
communist movement, breaking with the Communist International (C.I.) well
before Stalin rose to power, while both Lenin and Trotsky still held dominant
positions within both the Bolshevik Party and the C.I.. This left-communist or
“ultra-leftist” marxist current arose primarily in Germany, Holland, Italy, and
Russia (existing as a minority within the Bolshevik Party itself until Lenin,
Trotsky, et. al. banned factions within the party in 1921), with the German and
Dutch variants never accepting the Leninist theory of complete domination of
the revolutionary struggle by the Communist Party.
But what about the anarchists or libertarian
socialists? Don’t they have a radical critique of capitalism? As a historically
evolving phenomenon, the answer must be: no. Their critique – insofar as it
isn’t borrowed from marxism, although all too often that has meant vulgarized
‘orthodox’ Marxism – is fundamentally static and moralistic, in terms of
categories such as authority, hierarchy, and centralism. However, some
anarchists do possess a more robust, more dynamic critique and understanding.
But this is primarily because they have incorporated key marxist conceptual
tools or employed a(n atleast partially) dialectical method in developing their
critique, that is, by appropriating elements of a marxist analysis. This
appropriation has occurred over the years, first with the early syndicalists
(such as the IWW in the U.S., the early CGT in France, the CNT in Spain, etc.);
then, in the ‘30s, ‘40s and ‘50s through the movement of some of the council
communists (a tendency which came out of the communist left in Germany and
Holland) joining or working with anarchist, syndicalist, or libertarian
socialist groupings; and more recently by way of the appropriation of (aspects
of) situationist theory by certain anarchist tendencies.
Anarchism, of or on its own, is utterly incapable of
producing a comprehensive critique of capital as a totality and as a historical
process. Revolutionary marxism alone has provided the basis of such a critique.1 And especially in North America, as
distinct from western Europe, the present day ‘radical movement’ is almost
entirely unaware of the theory of revolutionary marxism, of its
analysis/critique of capital and capitalist society. This in part helps to
explain why (as queried above) so few of the new ‘radicals’ (in North America,
atleast) have yet made their way to a revolutionary critical comprehension of
capitalism. It also partly explains why such a large proportion of today’s new
wave of radical a-g activists have rejected what they think Marxism to be in
favour of anarchism or some form of libertarian socialism.
As time goes
on, however, some of them atleast are bound to realize the utter inadequacy of
their theoretical understanding of capitalism and the direction it is moving
in. If they really are anti-capitalists, they are going to reach a point where
their activism comes up against a wall, incapable of going further ahead,
because of their lack of comprehension of the underlying reality of capital.
Then, if they are to move forward in their active antagonism to capitalism,
they will realize the need to develop their theoretical comprehension of
capital as a historically developing process. They will realize then the need
for revolutionary theory, for what Marx called ‘the critique of political
economy’. They will thus need to become aware of the already developed revolutionary
theory of the currents of the internationalist communist milieu (i.e., of the
‘communist left’ or ‘marxist ultra-left’). Otherwise, they will be forced to
try to retrace the steps taken by that development, a development which has
taken decades of collective work to realize.
Wage Slave X
2000.
[NOTE: The author of this text realizes well its
incompleteness. It is to be hoped that an expanded, revised version will be
produced sometime. Comments and criticisms are welcomed.]
1 This assertion will of course strike many a-g activists as sectarian and divisive. That is the risk one runs as the movement develops, and the contradiction deepens between the tendency to unity and massiveness, on the one hand, and the tendency to push forward the confrontation with capital, to radicalize it, to sharpen it and clarify its means and its ends, on the other hand. For those a-g activists who see the need for both of these tendencies to mature, but for the second one to be primary, if the a-g movement is to be a factor in a genuine (but still only potential) global revolutionary anti-capitalist movement, I recommend reading some of the texts at this site (and at others accessible via my links page) which address the issue of globalization from a revolutionary marxist perspective, such as “Globalization and the Historic Course”, and “Deeper into Deadend Street”, both by Internationalist Perspective. Beyond that, back issues of IP magazine contain further analysis. I also hope to provide new texts of my own here soon which aim to clarify a revolutionary theoretical understanding of both capitalist globalization and the movement to destroy it.