Belgique - België PB 2600 Berchem 1-2 BC 9925 International Communist Current

Spring 2017

Russia 1917 and the revolutionary memory of the working class

The Trump election and the crumbling of capitalist world order

Communism is on the agenda of history The 1950s and 60s: Damen, Bordiga and the passion for communism

Review Contribution to a history of the working class in South Africa (iii) From the Soweto movement of 1976 to the coming to power of the ANC in 1993 International

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périodique semestriel Supplement à INTERNATIONALISME.FR Bureau de Depot: B-2600 Berchem 1-2 158 N° d’agréation P408982 International Review 158 Spring 2017 In French, English, Spanish, selections of articles in German, Italian, Dutch, Swedish Contents

Russia 1917 and the revolutionary memory of the working class 1

The Trump election and the crumbling of capitalist world order 3 The dilemma of the Republican Party The dilemma of the Democratic Party The dilemma of the established political parties The dilemma of the American ruling class and Trump's "Make America Great Again" Trump's Russian roulette Trump's promise of violence The fish stinks from the head down The challenge to the working class

Communism is on the agenda of history The 1950s and 60s: Damen, Bordiga and the passion for communism 9 Damen and Bordiga as revolutionary militants The passion for communism: Bordiga's defence of the 1844 Economic and Philiosophical Manuscripts The dialectic of history What communism is not The transformation of relations between the sexes Conscious life at another level Against the destruction of the environment The problem with "invariance" Individual and species Bordiga's contribution

Contribution to a history of the working class in South Africa (iii) From the Soweto movement of 1976 to the coming to power of the ANC in 1993 19 The great imperialist powers get involved The proletarian class struggle shakes the apartheid system A historic turning point in the apartheid system To save its system of production the bourgeoisie gives birth to new unions The struggles of Soweto poisoned by the trade unions and the ideological confusions of the proletariat The ANC diverts the youth struggle of Soweto towards imperialist armed struggle From FOSATU to COSATU, South African trade unionism at the service of the national capital FOSATU prepares to integrate itself into the political apparatus Control of the struggle committees (civics) at stake in the bitter struggles of the union/political apparatus The strikes return in the midst of an economic recession 1986-90, strikes against the backdrop of political manoeuvring within the bourgeoisie

Contact the ICC: http://www.internationalism.org Responsible editor: H. Deponthiere, [email protected] PB 102, 2018 Antwerp Central Station, [email protected] Antwerp [email protected] (rest of world)  Russia 1917 and the revolutionary memory of the working class

For all those who still consider that man- kind’s last best hope is the revolutionary overthrow of world capitalism, it is impos- sible to greet the beginning of the year 2017 without recalling that it is the 100th anniversary of the Russian revolution. And we also know that all those who insist that there is no alternative to the present social system will recall it in their own way. Many of them will ignore it of course, or downplay its significance by telling us that this is just ancient history. Everything has changed since then – and what is the point of talking about a working class revolution when the working class no longer exists, or has been so degraded that the term “working class revolution” can even be assimilated to protest votes in favour of Brexit or Trump in old industrial centres decimated by globalisation? Or if the upheaval which shook the world in 1917 is brought to mind, in the majority of cases it is painted as a kind of horror story, but one with a very definite Russian soldiers marching in Petrograd, February 1917 “moral”: behold, this is what happens when you challenge the present system, if you communist fractions who survived the terri- a revolutionary political organisation fall for the delusion that a higher form of ble defeats of the revolutionary movements defending the principles of international- social life is possible. You get something sparked off by the events in Russia 1917 ism and working class autonomy. much worse. You get terror, Gulags, the and tried to make sense of the resulting At the same time, the revolutionaries omnipresent totalitarian state. It began with degeneration and demise of the very com- of the 1930s and 40s also began the pain- Lenin and his fanatical band of Bolsheviks munist parties which had been formed to ful analysis of the costly errors made by whose coup d’Etat in October 1917 killed lead the way to revolution. Resisting both the Bolsheviks in the teeth of an unprec- off Russia’s fledgling democracy, and it the open terror of the counter-revolution edented situation for any workers’ party, ended up with Stalin, with the whole of in its Stalinist and fascist forms, and the in particular: society transformed into a forced labour more veiled deceptions of democracy, the camp. And then it all collapsed, which most lucid left communist currents, such – The growing tendency for the party demonstrated once and for all that it is im- as those grouped around the reviews Bilan to substitute itself for the soviets, and possible to organise modern society other in the 1930s and Internationalisme in the the fusion of the party with the post- than by the methods of capitalism. 40s, began the enormous task of drawing October state, which undermined not the “balance sheet” of the revolution. First We are under no illusion that, in 2017, only the power of the soviets but also and foremost, against all its denigrators, explaining what the Russian revolution the capacity of the party to defend the they reaffirmed what had been essential really meant is going to be easy. This is a class interests of the workers, even in and positive about the Russian revolution. period of extreme difficulty for the working opposition to the new state. In particular, they insisted class and its small revolutionary minorities, – The recourse to the “Red Terror” in a period which is dominated by feelings of – That the “Russian” revolution only had a response to the White Terror of the hopelessness and loss of any perspective meaning as the first victory of the world counter-revolution – a process which for the future, by the sinister growth of revolution, and that its only hope had led to the Bolsheviks implicating them- nationalism and racism which serves to been the extension of proletarian power selves in the suppression of proletarian divide the working class against itself, by to the rest of the globe. movements and organisations. the hate-filled demagogy of the populists on the right, and on the left by clamorous – That it had confirmed the capacity of the – The tendency to see state capitalism as appeals to defend “democracy” against this working class to dismantle the bourgeois a transitional stage towards socialism, new authoritarianism. state and create new organs of politi- and even as being identical with it. cal power (most notably the soviets or But this is also a moment for us to recall councils of workers’ delegates). The ICC, from its inception, has at- the work of our political ancestors, the left tempted to carry on with this work of – That it demonstrated the necessity for  International Review 158 Spring 2017

Meeting of the Petrograd Soviet, 1917 drawing the lessons of the Russian revo- against the revolution by the ruling class at our own future as they were to the future lution and the international revolutionary the time, the problem of “Red Terror”, and she herself confronted: wave of 1917-23. We have over the years so on); articles which respond to the current “What is in order is to distinguish the developed quite a library of articles and campaigns of capitalism aimed against the essential from the non-essential, the kernel pamphlets dealing with this absolutely vital revolutionary memory of the working class; from the accidental excrescencies in the era in the history of our class. In the com- and articles which will look at the condi- politics of the Bolsheviks. In the present ing year, and beyond, we will be making tions for the proletarian revolution today period, when we face decisive final strug- sure that these texts are more accessible – at what they have in common with the gles in all the world, the most important to our readers, by compiling an updated time of the Russian revolution, but also and problem of socialism was and is the burning dossier of our most important articles on above all at what significant changes have question of our time. It is not a matter of the Russian revolution and the international intervened over the past 100 years. this or that secondary question of tactics, revolutionary wave. Each month or so we The aim of this publishing venture is not but of the capacity for action of the prole- will headline articles which most directly simply to “celebrate” or “commemorate” tariat, the strength to act, the will to power correspond either to the chronological long-past historical events. It is to defend of socialism as such. In this, Lenin and development of the revolutionary process the view that the proletarian revolution is Trotsky and their friends were the first, or which contain responses to the most even more of a necessity today than it was those who went ahead as an example to important questions posed by the attacks of in 1917. Faced with the horrors of the first the proletariat of the world; they are still bourgeois propaganda or by discussions in imperialist world war, the revolutionaries the only ones up to now who can cry with and around the proletarian political milieu. of the time concluded that capitalism had Hutten: ‘I have dared!’ So this month we will be “promoting” to entered its epoch of decline, posing human- the front page of our website an article “This is the essential and enduring in ity with the alternative between socialism on the February revolution first written Bolshevik policy. In this sense theirs is and barbarism; and the even greater hor- in 1997. It will be followed by articles on the immortal historical service of having rors – symbolised in place-names like Lenin’s April Theses, the July days, the marched at the head of the international Auschwitz and Hiroshima – that followed October insurrection, and so on; and we proletariat with the conquest of political the defeat of the first attempts to make the intend to keep this process going over a power and the practical placing of the socialist revolution starkly confirmed their long period, precisely because the drama problem of the realization of socialism, and diagnosis. A century later, capitalism’s of the revolution and counter-revolution of having advanced mightily the settlement continued existence poses a mortal threat lasted for a number of years and was by of the score between capital and labour in to the very survival of humanity. no means limited to Russia, but had its the entire world. In Russia, the problem echoes all across the globe, from Berlin Writing from her prison cell in 1918, and could only be posed. It could not be solved to Shanghai, from Turin to Patagonia, and on the eve of the revolution in Germany, in Russia. And in this sense, the future from Clydeside to Seattle. Rosa Luxemburg expressed her fundamen- everywhere belongs to ‘Bolshevism’.” tal solidarity with the Russian revolution At the same time, we will be seeking ICC and the Bolshevik party, despite all her to add to this collection with new articles very serious criticisms of the errors of the which deal with issues that we have not yet Bolsheviks, in particular the policy of the examined in depth (such as the onslaught Red Terror. Her words are as relevant to  The Trump election and the crumbling of capitalist world order

What can the world expect from the new Trump Administration in the USA? Oval Office. Whether under Bill Clinton or Whereas the traditional political elites across the globe are full of anxiety, the Barak Obama, contemporary Democratic Russian government and the right-wing populists in America and throughout presidents combine a social welfare touch Europe see history on their side. And while big world-wide operating companies with fundamentally neo-liberal economic (such as in the car industry) fear reprisals now if they do not produce in the United policies. A direct interventionist state States, the stock exchanges and economic institutes were initially confident, economic policy of a strong “Keynesian” expecting increased growth for the US and even the world economy under Trump. As for Mr. President himself, he regularly contradicts not only his own character (such as that of FD Roosevelt new administration, but also himself. Thus NATO, free trade or the European before and during World War II) is as Union can in one sentence be “essential” and in the next “obsolete”. much anathema to the Democratic as to the Republican leadership today. This explains Instead of joining in with this crystal ball gazing about the near future of Ameri- why Sanders never made a secret of the can state policy, we will try here first of all to analyse why Trump was elected fact that on some issues his policies are president, although the traditional established political elites did not want him. Out of this contradiction between what Trump represents, and the interests of closer to those of Trump than they are to the US ruling class as a whole, we hope to win firmer ground for giving some those of Hillary Clinton. After the Trump first indications of what can be expected from his presidency, without falling into election, Sanders immediately offered him too much speculation. his support in the implementation of his “insurance for all” scheme. traditional Republican voters. Moreover, The dilemma of the Republican none of the other candidates had anything However, as opposed to what hap- Party else to propose, at the economic level, pened to the Republicans, the revolt in other than more of the same of what had the Democratic Party was successfully It is no secret that Donald Trump is looked not prevented the 2008 disaster. crushed, and Clinton safely nominated on as a foreign body in the Republican instead of Sanders. This succeeded, not Party which nominated him for election to Indeed, the rebellion of the traditional only because the Democratic Party is the the White House. He is neither religious Republican voters directed itself not only better organised and controlled of the two nor conservative enough for the Christian against their leadership, but against some of parties, but also because the elite of this fundamentalists who play such an im- the traditional “values” of the party. In this party had been less discredited than its portant role in that party. His economic way, the candidature of Trump was not only Republican counterpart. policy proposals, such as a state organised made possible, it was virtually imposed on the party leadership. Of course, the latter But paradoxically, this success of the infrastructure programme, protectionism, party leadership only paved the way for or the replacement of “Obamacare” by a could have prevented it – but only at the risk of estranging themselves from their mass its defeat in the presidential elections. By state-backed social insurance for everyone, eliminating Sanders, the Democrats set are anathema to the neo-liberals who still basis and even of dividing the party. This explains why the attempts to foil Trump aside the only candidate who had a good play a central role in Republican circles, as chance of defeating Trump. The Demo- they do in the Democratic Party. His plans were half-hearted and ineffective. In the end, the “Grand Old Party” was obliged cratic Party realised too late that Trump for a rapprochement with Putin’s Russia pit would be the adversary, and that they were him against the military and intelligence to try and make a “deal” with the intruder from the East Coast. underestimating his electoral potential. lobby which is so strong both in the Re- They also underestimated the degree to publican and Democratic parties. The dilemma of the Democratic which Hillary Clinton herself was discred- The presidential candidature of Trump Party ited. This was above all due to her image as was made possible by an unprecedented representative of “Wall Street”, of the “East Coast financial oligarchies” - popularly revolt of the Republican membership and A similar revolt took place within the Dem- seen as a major “culprit” and at the same supporters against their leaders. The other ocratic Party. After eight years of Obama, time major beneficiary of the financial candidates, whether they came from the belief in the famous “yes we can” (“yes we crisis. In fact, she had become almost as Bush clan, the Christian evangelists, the can” improve the lives of the population much identified with the catastrophe of neo-liberals or the Tea Party movement, at large) had seriously waned. The leader 2008 as the Republican leadership itself. had all been discredited by their participa- of this rebellion was Bernie Sanders, the The arrogant complacency of the Demo- tion in or support for the George W Bush self-proclaimed “socialist”. Like Trump on cratic elite and their blindness towards administration which preceded that of the Republican side, Sanders was a new mounting popular fury and resentment Obama. The fact that, in the face of the phenomenon in the modern history of the was to characterise the whole of Clinton’s economic and financial crisis of 2007/08, Democrats. Not that “socialists” as such electoral campaign. One example of this a Republican president had done nothing are a foreign body within that party. But was her one-sided reliance on the more to help millions of small property owners they belong to it as one minority among traditional mass media, whereas Trump’s and aspiring small property owners – who many, who underline the claim to multi- campaign team was using the possibilities in many cases lost job, home and savings cultural plurality within that party. They of the new media to the hilt. at one go – while bailing out banks with are considered a foreign element when government money, was unforgivable to they stake a claim for candidature to the  International Review 158 Spring 2017

Because they did not want Sanders, they the full brunt of modern capitalist racism. America is no longer as “great” as it used got Trump instead. Even for those within To gain access to bourgeois equality before to be. Economically it has been unable to the US bourgeoisie with a strong dislike the law, and to power and privileges for a prevent the rise of China. Militarily it has for a phase of neo-Keynesian economic black elite, overtly political movements suffered a series of more or less humiliat- experimentation, Sanders would undoubt- had to be created. Without Martin Luther ing reversals: Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria. edly have been the lesser evil. Sanders, not King, the Civil Rights Movement, but also America is a power in decline, even if it unlike Trump, wanted to slow down the a violence of a new kind – the riots in the remains economically and above all mili- process of what is called “globalisation”. black ghettos in the 1960s and the Black tarily and technologically by far the leading But he would have done so moderately and Panthers – there could not have been the country. But not only this. America is not with a much greater sense of responsibility. Obama presidency. The established ruling an exception in an otherwise flourishing With Trump, the ruling class of the world’s elite succeeded in meeting this challenge world. Its decline has come to symbolise leading power cannot even be sure what by attaching the Civil Rights Movement that of capitalism as a whole. The vacuum it is getting. to the Democratic Party. But in this man- created by the absence of any alternatives ner, the existing distinction between the coming from the established elites has The dilemma of the established different ethnic groups and the political helped to give Trump his chance. parties was put in question. The black vote political parties Not that America has not already at- goes regularly to the Democratic Party. At tempted to react in the face of its historical first, the Republicans were able to develop The United States is a country founded decline. Some of the changes announced a counterweight to this by gaining a more by settlers and populated by waves of im- by Trump had already begun, in particu- or less stable part of the Latino vote (first migration. The integration of the different lar under Obama. They include a greater and foremost the Cuban exile community). ethnic and religious groups and interests priority for the Pacific zone, economi- As for the “white” vote, that continued to into a single nation is the historically evolv- cally and above all militarily, so that the go to one side or other depending on what ing task of the existing constitutional and European NATO “partners” are asked to was on offer. political system. A particular challenge bear a heavier burden than before; or at for this system is the involvement of the Until the 2016 elections. One of the fac- the economic level a more state-directed leaders of the different immigrant com- tors which brought Trump into the White economic policy in dealing with the 2008 munities in government, since each new House was the electoral alliance he made crisis and its aftermath. But this can only immigrant wave begins at the bottom of with different groups of “white suprema- slow down the present decline, whereas the social ladder and has to “work its way cists”. Unlike the old-style racism of the Ku Trump claims to be able to reverse it. up”. The alleged American melting pot is Klux Klan with its nostalgia for the slave In the face of this decline, and also of in reality a highly complicated system of system which reigned in the southern states growing class, racial, religious and ethnic (not always) peaceful co-existence between until the American Civil War, the hatred of divisions, Trump wants to unite the capi- different groups. these new currents directs itself not only talist nation behind its ruling class in the against the urban and rural black but also Historically, alongside institutions such name of a new Americanism. The United Latino poor, condemned as criminals and as the religious organisations, the formation States, according to Trump, has become social parasites. Although Trump himself of criminal organisations has been a proven the main victim of the rest of the world. may not be a racist of this type, these mod- means for excluded groups to gain access He claims that, while the US has been ern white supremacists created a kind of to power. The American bourgeoisie has exhausting itself and its resources main- voting bloc in his favour. For the first time, a long experience with the integration of taining world order, all the rest have been millions of white voters cast their vote, not the best rackets from the underworld into profiting from this order at the expense of according to the recommendation of “their” the upper echelons. This is an oft-repeated “God’s own country”. The Trumpistas are different communities, and not for one or family saga: the father a gangster, the son thinking here not only of the Europeans or the other party, but for someone they saw a lawyer or a politician, the grandson or the East Asians who have been flooding as the representative of a larger “white” granddaughter a philanthropist and patron the American market with their products. community. The underlying process is of the arts. The advantage of this system One of the main “exploiters” of the United one of increasing “communitarisation” was that the violence it relied on was not States, according to Trump, is Mexico, of American bourgeois politics. A further overtly political. This made them com- which he accuses of exporting its surplus step in the segregation of the so-called patible with the existing two party state population into the American social welfare melting pot. system. To which side the Italian, Irish or system, while at the same time developing Jewish vote went depended on the given its own industry to such an extent that its constellation and what Trump would call The dilemma of the American automobile production is overtaking that the “deals” Republicans and Democrats ruling class and Trump’s “Make of its northern neighbour. were offering the different communities America Great Again” and vested interests. In America, these This amounts to a new and virulent form constellations between communities con- The problem of all the Republican candi- of nationalism, reminiscent of “underdog” stantly have to be dealt with, not only those dates who tried to oppose Trump, and then German nationalism after World War I and between different industries or branches of of Hillary Clinton, was not only that they the Treaty of Versailles. The orientation the economy for instance. were not convincing, but also that they did of this form of nationalism is no longer to not seem convinced themselves. All they justify the imposing of a world order by But this essentially non-party political could propose were different varieties of America. Its orientation is to itself put in integration process, compatible with the “business as usual”. Above all, they had no question the existing world order. stability of the party apparatus, began to fail alternatives to Trump’s “making America for the first time in the face of the demands great again”. Behind this slogan there is Trump’s Russian roulette of the black Americans. The latter had come not just a new version of the old national- to America originally, not as settlers, but ism. Trump’s Americanism is of a new as slaves. They had from the onset to bear But the question the world is asking itself kind. It contains the clear admission that is whether Trump has a real political offer The Trump election  in response to America’s decline. If not, if today is that it has not really completed the still the heart of the world economy. And his alternative is purely ideological, he is transformation from a Stalinist command Russia still has the second largest nuclear not likely to last for very long. Certainly regime to a properly functioning capitalist arsenal after the US. Another possible Trump has no coherent programme for his order. This transformation was, during a problem is that, if the economic sanctions national capital. Nobody is clearer about first phase, hampered by the priority for against Russia were lifted, the sphinx in this than Trump himself. His policy, he the Putin regime of preventing strategically the Kremlin, Vladimir Putin, is considered repeatedly declares, is to make “great deals” important raw materials or the armaments perfectly capable of outwitting Trump for America (and for himself) whenever industry being bought up by foreign capital. by re-introducing the Europeans into his the opportunity presents itself. The new The necessary process of privatisation was plans (in order to limit his dependence on programme for American capital is, it done half-heartedly, so that a large part of America). The French bourgeoisie, for would seem, Trump himself: a risk-lov- Russian industry still functions on the basis instance, is already getting ready for this ing, several times bankrupt businessman of an administrative allocation of resources. eventuality: two of the main candidates as head of state. During a second phase, the plan was to for the coming presidential elections there tackle the privatisation and modernisation (Fillon and Le Pen) have made no secret But this does not necessarily mean that of the economy in collaboration with the of their sympathies for Russia. Trump has no chance of at least slowing European bourgeoisie, first and foremost down the decline of America. He might For the moment, the outcome of this with Germany. But this plan was success- at least partly succeed – but only if he is latter conflict within the American bour- fully foiled by Washington, essentially lucky. Here we are approaching the crux of geoisie remains open. Meanwhile, Trump’s through its policy of economic sanctions Trumpism. The new president, who wants argument remains one-sidedly economic against Russia. Although the occasion of to run the world’s leading state as if it were (although it is not at all excluded that he these sanctions was Moscow’s annexation a capitalist enterprise, is ready, in the pur- can extend his adventurism to a policy of policy towards the Ukraine, it addition- suit of his goals, to take incalculable risks military provocation against Peking). But ally aimed at preventing a strengthening – risks which no “conventional” bourgeois what is true is that an effective long term of the economies both of Russia and of politician in his position would want to response to the Chinese challenge must Germany. take. If they work, they could turn out to have a strong economic component, and be to the benefit of American capitalism But this success – perhaps the main cannot take place solely at the military level. at the expense of its rivals, but without too achievement of the Obama presidency to- There are two areas in particular where the much damage to the system as a whole. wards Europe – has negative consequences US economy has to bear a much heavier But if they go wrong, the consequences for the world economy as a whole. The burden than China does, and which Trump could be catastrophic for American and establishment of more classical private would have to try to “rationalise”. One for world capitalism. property in Russia would create a cluster of of them is the enormous military budget. new credit-worthy economic players who Concerning this aspect, the policy towards We can already give three examples can vouch for the loans they take with land, Russia also has an ideological dimension, of the kind of Va Banque policies Trump raw materials etc. In view of the economic since, in recent years, the idea that Putin wants to launch into. One of them is his difficulties of the world economy today, wants to re-establish the Soviet Union has protectionist blackmailing policy. His goal where even in China growth is slowing been one of the main justifications given is not to put an end to the present world down, can capitalism afford to renounce for the persistence of astronomic “defence” economic order (“globalisation”) but to get such “deals”? spending. a better deal for America within that order. The USA is the only country whose inter- No, according to Trump. His idea is that The other budget Trump wants to signifi- nal market is so big that it can threaten its not Germany and Europe, but America cantly reduce is the social welfare budget. rivals with protectionist measures on such itself should become Putin’s “partner in Here, in attacking the working class, he a scale. The summit of the rationality of transformation”. According to Trump (who can however count on the support of the the policy of Trump is his calculation that of course also hopes for lucrative deals for ruling class as a whole. the political leaders of his main rivals are himself), the Russian bourgeoisie, which is less crazy than he is, i.e. that they will not obviously unable to tackle its modernisa- Trump’s promise of violence risk a protectionist trade war. But should tion on its own, can choose between three his measures unleash a chain reaction possible partners, the third being the Chi- Alongside an attitude of irresponsible that gets out of control, the result could nese. Since the latter are the biggest threat adventurism, the other major feature of be a fragmentation of the world market to America, it is vital that Washington and Trumpism is the threat of violence. One of comparable to what happened during the not Peking assume this role. his specialities is to threaten internationally Great Depression. However, none of Trump’s projects have operating companies with reprisals if they The second example is NATO. The provoked such bitter resistance within the do not do what he wants. What he wants, Obama administration had already begun US ruling class as this one. The whole phase he says, are “jobs for American workers”. to pressure the European “partners” to bear between the election of Trump and his ar- His way of harassing big business by tweet a greater brunt of the alliance in Europe rival in office was dominated by the joint is also aimed at impressing all those who and beyond. The difference now is that attempts of the “intelligence community”, live in constant fear because their exist- Trump is ready to threaten to discard or the mainstream media and the Obama ences depend on the whims of such giant sideline NATO if Washington’s will is not administration to sabotage the envisaged companies. These workers are invited to followed. Here again, Trump is playing rapprochement with Moscow. Here they identify with his strength, which is alleg- with fire, since NATO is first and foremost all think that the risks Trump wants to take edly at their service because they are good an instrument to secure the presence of US are too high. Even if it is true that the main obedient honest Americans who want to imperialism in Europe. challenger today is China, a modernised work hard for their country. Russia would constitute a considerable ad- Our last example is Trump’s project of During his electoral campaign, Trump ditional danger to the USA. After all, Russia a “great deal” with Putin’s Russia. One of told his challenger Hillary Clinton he is (also) a European power, and Europe is the main problems of the Russian economy wanted to “lock her up”. Later he declared  International Review 158 Spring 2017 we would show clemency towards her – as if the case that the basis of economic life in replace buying and selling, this is at once the question of when other politicians land capitalism is indeed robbery: the surplus the self-realisation and self-destruction in prison depended on his own personal value the capitalists gain from the unpaid of bourgeois civilisation. In the absence whims. No such clemency is foreseen for surplus labour of the wage workers. This of an alternative, of a revolutionary com- illegal immigrants. Obama had already robbery has been legalised in the form of munist perspective, the longing to exercise deported more than any American presi- capitalist private property of the means of violence against others grows. dent before him. Trump wants to jail them production; it is enforced every day by the for two years before evicting them. The state, which is the state apparatus of the The fish stinks from the head promise of bloodshed is the aura through ruling class. Capitalist economy requires downwards which he attracts the growing multitude a taboo on violence at the market place. of those in this society who are unable Buying and selling are supposed to be What happens when parts of the ruling class to defend themselves but who thirst for peaceful actions – including the buying itself, followed by some of the intermediate revenge. People who come to his meetings and selling of labour power: workers are layers of society, start to lose confidence to protest he has beaten up under the eyes not slaves. Under “normal” circumstances, in the possibility of sustained growth for of the TV nation. Women, outsiders, so- working people are ready to live more or the world economy? Or when they start to called misfits are made to understand that less peacefully under such conditions, lose hope that they themselves can benefit they should count themselves lucky if it is despite realising that there is a minority from whatever growth still takes place? On only his verbal violence they are exposed which refuses to do the same. This minority no account will they want to give up their to. Not only does he want to have a wall is composed of the criminal milieu, which aspirations to a (greater) share of wealth built to keep the Mexicans out – he prom- lives from robbery, and the state, which is and power. Should the wealth available ises to make them pay for it themselves. the biggest robber of all, both in relation no longer increase, they can still fight for To exclusion is added humiliation. to its “own” population (taxation), and in a bigger share at the expense of the rest. relation to other states (war). And although These threats have obviously been a Here lies the connection between the eco- the state represses the criminals in defence calculated part of Trump’s demagogic nomic situation and the growing thirst for of private property, at the upper echelons election campaign, but on assuming of- violence. The perspective of growth starts the top gangsters and the robber state tend fice he lost no time pushing through a to be replaced by the perspective of robbery to collaborate rather than oppose each number of “accomplished facts” aimed at and pillage. If millions of illegal workers other. But when capitalism can no longer proving that he, unlike other politicians, were to be expelled, so the calculation goes, credibly offer even the illusion of a pos- is going to do what he says. The most there would be more jobs, housing, social sible improvement of the living conditions spectacular expression of this - one which care for those who remain. The same goes for society as a whole, the compliance of has caused enormous conflict both within for all those who live from the system of society may be revoked. the bourgeoisie and within the population social benefits without paying into it. As as a whole – has been his “Muslim ban”, Today we have entered a period (not un- for ethnic minorities, some of them have suspending the right of travellers from like that of the 1930s) where large sectors of businesses which could pass into the hands a selected number of Muslim-majority society feel cheated and no longer believe of others. This kind of thinking seeps up countries to enter or re-enter the US. This their renunciation of violence pays off. from the very depths of bourgeois “civil is above all a statement of intent, a sign But they remain intimidated by the threat society”. of his willingness to target minorities and of repression, by the illegal status of the However, according to an old expres- associate Islam in general with terrorism, criminal world. This is when the longing sion, the fish begins to stink from the head however much he denies that this measure to be part of those who can rob without downwards. It is first and foremost the state is aimed specifically at Muslims. fear becomes political. The essence of their and the economic apparatus of the ruling “populism” is the demand that violence What America needs, Trump tells the class itself which produces this putrefac- against certain groups be legalised, or at world, are more guns and more torture. Our tion. The diagnosis made by the capitalist least unofficially tolerated. In Hitler-Ger- modern bourgeois civilisation produces no media is that the Trump presidency, the many, for example, the course towards shortage of such bragging thugs and bullies, victory of the Brexiteers in Britain, the rise world war was a “normal” manifestation just as it admires and acclaims those who of right wing “populism” in Europe, are of the “robber state” which it shared with take for themselves whatever they can get the result of a protest against “globalisa- Stalin-Russia, Roosevelt-America etc. at the expense of others. What’s new is that tion”. But this is only true if violence is What was new in National Socialism was millions of people in one of the world’s understood as the essence of this protest, the systematic robbery, organised by the most modern countries want such a thug and if globalisation is understood, not only state, against part of its own population. as head of state. Trump, like his model and as an economic option among others, but Scapegoating and pogroms were legalised. would-be friend Putin, are popular not in as a label for the extremely violent means The Holocaust was not first and foremost spite of but because of their thuggery. through which a declining capitalism the product of the history of anti-Semitism has, in recent decades, kept itself alive. In capitalism there are always two or of Nazism. It was a product of modern The result of this gigantic economic and possible alternatives, either equivalent capitalism. Robbery becomes the alterna- political offensive of the bourgeoisie (a exchange or non-equivalent exchange tive economic perspective for sectors of kind of war of the capitalist class against (robbery). You can either give someone the population sinking into barbarism. the rest of humanity and against nature) else an equivalent for what you get, or you But this barbarism is that of the capitalist was the production of millions of victims, don’t. In order for the market to function, system itself. Criminality is as much part not only among the working populations its subjects have to renounce violence in of bourgeois society as the stock exchange. of the whole planet, but even within the economic life. They do so under threat of Robbery and buying-selling are the two apparatus of the ruling class itself. It is reprisals, such as prison, but also on the poles of advanced modern society based not least this latter aspect which, in its promise that their renunciation will pay off on private property. The profession of the dimensions, is absolutely unprecedented for them in the long run in terms of secur- robber can only be abolished by abolish- in modern history. Unprecedented also is ing their existence. However, it remains ing class society. When robbery starts to the degree to which parts of the American The Trump election  bourgeoisie and its state apparatus itself willingness of important factions of the Trump is not only the result of a loss of fell victim to this devastation. And this ruling class – above all those linked to perspective by the capitalist class, but also is true even though the United States was the oil, coal and gas industries – to back by the working class. As a consequence, the main instigator of that policy. It is as Trump’s wholesale rejection of the science many more workers than otherwise would if the ruling class was obliged to lop off explaining climate change, which he has be the case are negatively influenced by parts of its own body in order to save the famously dismissed as a hoax invented by what is called populism. It is significant, rest. Whole sectors of the national industry the Chinese. This is a further manifesta- for instance, that along with millions of were closed down because their products tion of the fact that significant parts of the white workers, many Latinos also seem could be produced more cheaply elsewhere. bourgeoisie have so lost any vision of any to have voted for Trump, despite his dia- Not only these industries themselves had future for humanity that they are openly tribes against them. Many among those to shut down – whole parts of the country prepared to put their (“national”) profit who were among the last to gain access to were laid waste in the process: regions and margins above any considerations for the “God’s own country” - precisely because administrations, local consumer, retail and natural world, and thus risk undermin- they are afraid of being among the first to credit branches, providers of parts, the local ing the fundamental basis for all human be evicted - were lured into thinking that building industry etc. were all shattered. social life. The war against nature which they would be safer if the gate were closed Not only workers, but big and small busi- was vastly intensified by the “neo-liberal” firmly behind them. nesses, civil servants and local dignitaries world order will be waged even more ruth- What has happened to the working were among its victims. Unlike the workers, lessly by Trump and his fellow vandals. class, to its revolutionary perspective, to who lost their livelihoods, these bourgeois What has happened is very grave. its class identity and its traditions of soli- and petty bourgeois victims lost their Whereas the leading fractions of the Ameri- darity? Over half a century ago, there was power, privileges and social status. can bourgeoisie still adhere to the existing a return by the working class to the stage This process took place, more or less economic world order, and want to engage of history, above all in Europe (May 1968 radically, in all the old industrial countries in its maintenance, the consensus about this in France, Autumn 1969 in Italy, 1970 in over the past three decades. But in the US within the ruling class as a whole has started Poland etc.) but also more globally. In the there has been, in addition, a kind of earth- to crumble. This is firstly because a grow- “New World” this renaissance of the class quake within the military and so-called ing part of it no longer seems to care about struggle manifested itself in Latin America intelligence apparatus. Under Bush Jr. and this world order. It is secondly because the (above all 1969 in Argentina), but also in Rumsfeld, parts of the armed and security ruling fractions were unable to prevent the North America, in particular in the United forces and even of the intelligence services arrival of a candidate of these desperadoes States. There were two main expressions were “privatised” - measures which cost into the White House. The erosion both of of this resurgence. One was a whole many high-ranking leaders their jobs. In the cohesion of the ruling class, and of its development of often large scale wildcat addition, intelligence had to face the com- control over its own political apparatus, strikes and other, often radical, struggles petition of modern media concerns such as could hardly have manifested itself more on an economic terrain, for working class Google or Facebook which in some ways clearly. Ever since, with its victory in demands. The other was the reappearance are as well informed, and as important for World War II, the American bourgeoisie of politicised minorities among the new the state, as the CIA or FBI. In the course took over from its British counterpart the generation, attracted towards revolutionary of this process, the balance of forces within leading role in the running of the world proletarian politics. Particularly important the ruling class itself has shifted, including economy as a whole, it has continuously was the tendency to develop a communist at the economic level, where the credit and assumed this responsibility. In general the perspective against Stalinism, which was finance sectors (“Wall Street”) and the bourgeoisie of the leading national capital is more or less clearly recognised as counter- new technologies (“Silicon Valley”) are best placed to assume this role. All the more revolutionary. The return to centre stage of not only among the main beneficiaries of so when, like the United States, it disposes the workers’ struggles, class identity and “globalisation” but also among its main of the military might to lend its leadership solidarity, and a proletarian revolutionary protagonists. additional authority. It is remarkable that perspective, went hand in hand. During the today neither the USA nor its predecessor 1960s and 70s probably several million As opposed to these sectors, who sup- Britain are able to assume this role – and young people in the old industrial countries ported the candidature of Hillary Clinton, basically for the same reason. This is the were politicised in this manner – a hope the supporters of Donald Trump are not weight of political populism, which is tak- and strength of humanity. to be located within specific economic ing London outside the European economic fractions, although his strongest support- Apart from the suffering of the work- institutions. It was a sign of something close ers are to be found among the captains of ing class, the two most burning issues to desperation when, at the beginning of the old industries which have declined so at the time in the United States were the the new year the Financial Times, one of much in recent decades. Rather, they are Vietnam War (the American government, the important voices of the City of London, to be found here and there throughout the moreover, had introduced universal con- called on the German chancellor Angela state and economic apparatus of power. scription) and the racist exclusion of and Merkel to assume world leadership. Trump, These were the snipers producing the violence against black people. Originally, at all events, seems unwilling and unable to crossfire from behind the scenes against these issues were at least partly additional assume this role, and there is no other world Clinton as the alleged candidate of “Wall factors of politicisation and radicalisation. leader for the moment who could replace Street”. They included business tycoons, However, lacking any political experience him. A dangerous phase lies ahead for the frustrated publicists and leaders of the FBI. of their own, lacking the guidance of an capitalist system and for humanity. For those among them who have lost hope older generation politicised in any prole- of making themselves “great again”, their tarian sense, the new activists harboured support for Trump was above all a kind The weakening of working class enormous illusions about the possibilities of political vandalism, blind revenge on resistance of a rapid social transformation. In par- the ruling elite. ticular, the class movements of the time The weakening of the principle of soli- were still much too weak either to oblige This vandalism can also be seen in the darity clearly indicates that the victory of the government to end the Vietnam War,  International Review 158 Spring 2017 or to protect blacks and other minorities working class identity and solidarity from class antagonism remains. against racism and discrimination (unlike the forefront of the scene is a catastrophe It should also be pointed out that the the 1905 revolutionary movement in Rus- for the proletariat and for humanity. In the resistance within the working class to sia, for instance, which included the revolt face of the present incapacity of either of populism is not in itself a proof that these against the Japanese-Russian war as well as the two main classes of modern society to workers follow the bourgeois liberals and the protection of the Jews in Russia against put forward a credible perspective of their are ready to sacrifice their own class inter- pogroms). Since fractions developed within own, the very essence of bourgeois society ests. Millions of workers at the heart of the the American bourgeoisie which, in its own comes more clearly to the light of day: de- globalised system of production are above class interest, wanted to end its engagement solidarisation. The principle of solidarity all very much aware that their material ex- in Vietnam, and to allow a black Ameri- which was the safety net, more or less, of istence depends on a world-wide system of can bourgeoisie to share in power, many all pre-capitalist societies based on natural production and exchange, and that there can of these young militants got drawn into rather than “market” economy, is replaced be no reverting to a more local division of bourgeois politics, turning their backs on by the safety net of private property – for labour. They are also aware that what Marx the working class. Others, while wanting those who have it. In bourgeois society, called the “socialisation” of production (the to remain committed to the cause of the you have to be able to help yourself, and replacement of individual by associated workers, because they were overwhelmed the means to this end are not solidarity, but labour) teaches them to collaborate with by impatience, stood as left candidates for credit-worthiness and insurance. For many each other on a world scale, and that only state elections, or engaged themselves in decades, in the main industrial countries, on such a scale can the present problems the trade unions in the hope of achieving the welfare state – although an integral part of humanity be surmounted. In the present something immediate and tangible for those of the credit and insurance economy – was historical situation, in the absence of class they claimed to represent. Hopes which used to hide this elimination of solidarity identity and a perspective of a struggle were invariably disappointed. The workers from the social “agenda”. Today the rejec- for a classless society, the revolutionary developed a more and more open hostility tion of solidarity is not only not hidden, but potential of contemporary society takes towards these leftists, who moreover often gaining ground. refuge, for the moment, in the “objective” discredited themselves and the reputation conditions: the persistence of the class of the revolution by their identification with The challenge to the working antagonisms; the irreconcilable nature of brutal, counter-revolutionary, essentially class class interests; the world wide collabora- Stalinist regimes, and by their bourgeois tion of the proletarians in the production manipulative approach to politics. As for The demonstration of millions of people, and reproduction of social life. Only the these militants themselves, they in turn mainly women, all over the United States, proletariat has an objective interest in developed a hostility towards the working against the new president the day after his and capacity to resolve the contradiction class, which refused to follow them – a inauguration, made it clear that large parts between worldwide production and private hostility which often turned into hatred. All of the working population of America sup- and nation-state appropriation of wealth. of this amounted to a large-scale destruction port neither Trump nor the tendency he Since humanity cannot go back to local of political revolutionary class energy. It stands for. However, far from succeeding market production, it can only go forward was a tragedy of almost a whole generation in opposing Trump’s nationalism, these by abolishing private property, by putting of the working class which had begun so demonstrations tended to answer Trump the international production process at the promisingly. What followed was the col- on his own ground by claiming: “We are disposal of the whole of humanity. lapse of Stalinism 1989 (misunderstood the true America”. and misrepresented as the collapse of com- On this objective basis, the subjective munism and of marxism) and the closing These demonstrations show in fact conditions for revolution can still recover, down of whole traditional industries in that the populist policy of exclusion and in particular through the return of the the old capitalist countries (misunderstood scapegoating is not the only danger for economic struggle of the proletariat on an and misrepresented as the disappearance the working class. This young generation important scale, and through the develop- of the working class in that part of the which is expressing its protest, while not ment of a new generation of revolutionary world). In this context (as for instance falling for Trump, is in danger of falling political minorities with the necessary the French sociologist Didier Eribon has for the trap of defending “democratic” and daring to take up now more than ever the pointed out) the political left (which, ac- “liberal” bourgeois society instead. The cause of the working class, and to do so cording to the ICC, is the left of capital, ruling fractions of the bourgeoisie would with the profundity needed to convince part of the ruling apparatus) were among be delighted to enlist the support of the the proletariat of its own revolutionary the first to declare the disappearance of the most intelligent and generous sectors of mission. working class. It is revealing that, during the working class in the defence of the Steinklopfer Late January, 2017 the recent electoral campaign in the USA, present version of an exploitation system the candidate of the Democrats (who used which – even without “populism” – has to claim to represent “organised labour”) long become a menace to the existence of never referred to anything like a working our species, and which moreover is itself class, whereas the multi-millionaire Donald the producer of the “populism” it wants Trump constantly did. In fact, one of his to keep in check. It is undeniable that main electoral promises was to prevent today, to many workers, in the absence the disappearance of the American work- of a revolutionary alternative they can ing class (understood only as blue collar have confidence in, an Obama, Sanders workers) from “extinction”. His working or Angela Merkel can appear as a lesser class is an essential part of the American evil compared to a Trump, Farage, Le Pen nation, and is the one capitalists dream of: or the “Alternative für Deutschland”. But patriotic, hard working, obedient. at the same time, these workers also feel indignant about what “liberal society” has The disappearance, for the moment, of done to humanity in the past decades. The 

Communism is on the agenda of history

The 1950s and 60s: Damen, Bordiga and the passion for communism

Prior to our excursion into the attempts of Spanish anarchism to establish “libertarian communism” during the war in Spain of 1936-39, we had published the contribution of the Gauche Communiste de France on the state in the period of transition, a text based on the theoretical advances of the Italian and Belgian left fractions in the 1930s, while already advancing beyond their conceptions in several respects. The GCF was part of a certain resurgence of proletarian political organisations in the wake of the Second World War, but by the early 1950s, the proletarian milieu was facing a serious crisis as it became increasingly evident that the profound defeat suffered by the working class had not been dispersed by the war – on the contrary, the victory of democracy over fascism had further exacerbated the disorientation of the proletariat. The end of the counter-revolution which had begun in the 1920s was still a long way ahead.

the Socialisme ou Barbarie group around In our book The Dutch and German Left, Cornelius Castoriadis, of which more in particularly chapter 11, “The Commu- a later article. nistenbond Spartacus and the ‘councilist current’ (1942-50)” we looked at the sig- In the same year, a major split took place nificant developments that took place in a between the two major tendencies within part of the Dutch communist left: the at- the Internationalist Communist Party in tempt by the Communistenbond Spartacus Italy – tendencies which had existed more Onorato Damen to open up to discussions with other currents or less from the beginning but which had (such as the GCF) and to re-appropriate been able to establish a kind of Modus version, exemplified by the McCarthyite some of the old positions of the KAPD Vivendi when the party was going through witch-hunts in the USA. In this atmosphere, – this was a turn away from the anti-party a euphoric phase of growth. As the retreat revolutionary organisations, where they ideas developed in the 30s. However, these in the class struggle became increasingly existed at all, were even more reduced in advances were fragile and the basically obvious, the organisation, faced with the scale, even more isolated than they had anarchist ideas which had been adopted demoralisation of many of the workers been in the 1930s. by the majority of the Dutch-German left who had joined it on a superficial activ- in reaction to the degeneration of Bolshe- ist basis at the beginning, was inevitably This period thus marked a profound vism soon returned in force, contributing compelled to reflect on its future tasks rupture in continuity with the movement to a long-drawn out process of dispersal and direction. that had shaken the world in the aftermath of the First World War, and even with the into mainly local groups focused on the The 1950s and early 60s was thus another immediate struggles of the workers. courageous minorities which had resisted dark period for the communist movement, the advancing counter-revolution. As the In 1952, the GCF broke up: partly which faced a real prolongation of the deep economic boom continued, the very idea the result of a mistaken diagnosis of the counter-revolution that had descended that capitalism was a transient system, historic course, leading to the conclusion on the working class in the 30s and 40s, doomed by its own inner contradictions, that a third world war was imminent and but this time dominated by the image of appeared far less evident than it had done to the departure of Marc Chirik, the most a triumphant capitalism which appeared in the years 1914-1945, when the system influential member of the GCF, to Ven- to have recovered – perhaps definitively seemed to be caught up in one gigantic ezuela; and partly due to a combination of – from the catastrophic crisis of the 30s. catastrophe after another. Perhaps marx- personal tensions and unexpressed political It was the triumph, in particular, of US ism itself had failed? This was certainly differences. Marc fought against these dif- capital, of democracy, of an economy which the message being pushed by any number ficulties in a series of “letters from afar”, in passed relatively quickly from post-war of sociologists and other professional which he also tried to outline the tasks of austerity to the consumer boom of the late bourgeois thinkers, and such ideas would revolutionary organisations in the historic 50s and early 60s. Certainly this “glorious” soon penetrate the revolutionary move- conditions they now encountered, but he period had its shadow side, above all the ment itself, as we saw in our recent series was unable to halt the disintegration of the relentless confrontation between the two on decadence. group. Some of its former members joined imperialist giants with its proliferation of local wars and the overarching threat of a All the same, the generation of militants nuclear holocaust. Along with this, in the who had been steeled by the revolution or by the fight against the degeneration of the 1. “In the aftermath of World War Two: debates on how “democratic” bloc, there was a real surge the workers will hold power after the revolution.” in paranoia about communism and sub- . “The post-war boom did not reverse the decline of capitalism”. International Review nº 147 10 International Review 158 Spring 2017 political organisations it had created had into a coherent programme, but also of the During the fascist period he went through not altogether vanished. Some of the key individual militants who have led the way more than one episode of confinement and figures of the communist left remained in this process of elaboration. exile, but he was not silenced, leading a active after the war and into the period of prisoners’ revolt in Pianosa. retreat in the 50s and 60s, and for them, Damen and Bordiga as At this juncture, however, there was a despite everything, the perspective of revolutionary militants difference in the reaction of the two mili- communism was by no means dead and tants, which was to have very long term buried. Pannekoek, though no longer linked In this article, we return to the work of the consequences. Bordiga, placed under house to an organisation, published his book on Italian communist left, which before the arrest and obliged to abjure all political ac- workers’ councils and their role in the con- war, in the shape of the Fraction in exile, tivity (how mild the fascists seemed then!), struction of a new society; and right into had made such an irreplaceable contribu- avoided all contacts with his comrades and his old age he remained in contact with a tion to our understanding of the problems concentrated entirely on his work as an number of the groups that appeared after of the transition from capitalism to com- engineer. He recognised that the working the war, such as Socialisme ou Barbarie. munism. This contribution had also been class had suffered a historic defeat, but did Militants who had broken with Trotskyism constructed on the marxist foundations laid not draw the same conclusion from this as during the war, such as Castoriadis and down by the left current in Italy during the the comrades who formed the Fraction in Munis, maintained a political activity and preceding phase, the phase of imperialist exile. The latter understood that it was as tried to outline a vision of what lay beyond world war and of the post-war revolution- necessary as ever to maintain an organised the capitalist horizon. And Marc Chirik, ary wave; and after the second imperialist political activity, even if it could no longer though “unorganised” for over a decade, war, the theoretical legacy of the Italian left be in the form of a party. Thus at the time certainly did not abandon revolutionary did not disappear in spite of the errors and of the formation of the Italian Fraction, and thought and inquiry; when he returned to schisms that afflicted the Internationalist all through the extremely fertile decade that organised militant life in the mid-60s, he Communist Party. And throughout this followed, Bordiga was entirely cut off from would have clarified his views on a number whole period, whether we are examining these theoretical developments. Damen of questions, not least on the problems of the question of the transition period or other on the other hand maintained contacts and the transition period. issues, it is impossible to ignore the inter- regrouped a number of comrades from We will return to the writings of Cas- action, and often the opposition, of two the Fraction on their return to Italy with toriadis, Munis and Chirik in subsequent leading militants of this current – Onorato the idea of contributing to the formation articles. We think it is valid to talk about Damen and Amadeo Bordiga. of the party. These included militants like their individual contributions even though During the stormy days of war and Stefanini, Danielis and Lecci, who had the work they carried out was nearly always revolution from 1914 to 1926, Damen remained faithful to the essential positions done in the context of a political organi- and Bordiga demonstrated very clearly of the Fraction throughout the 30s and sation. A revolutionary militant does not a capacity to stand against the dominant the war. In 1943, the Partito Comunisa exist as a mere individual, but as part of order that is the hallmark of a communist Internazionalista (PCInt) was proclaimed a collective organism which, in the final militant. Damen was jailed for agitating in the north of Italy ; the party was then “re- analysis, is engendered by the working class against the war; Bordiga fought tirelessly founded” in 1945 following a somewhat and its struggle to become conscious of its hasty regroupment with elements around to develop the work of his fraction inside  historical role. A militant is by definition the Socialist Party and then to push for a Bordiga in the south of Italy. an individual who has committed him or split with the right wing and the centrists herself to the construction and defence of and the formation of a communist party on as a pamphlet by the Internationalist Communist a political organisation, and who is thus solid principles. When the new Communist motivated by a profound loyalty to the Tendency. International itself embarked upon an op- . The practical problems facing Bordiga during this organisation and its needs. But – and here, portunist course in the early 1920s, Bordiga period were certainly considerable: he was followed as we shall see below, we part company was again in the front line of opposition by two police agents wherever he went. Nevertheless there was also a voluntary element in Bordiga’s with the conceptions developed by Bordiga to the tactics of the United Front and the – the revolutionary organisation is not an isolation from his comrades and Damen, in a kind “Bolshevisation” of the CPs; he had the im- of obituary written shortly after Bordiga’s death in anonymous collective, in which the indi- mense courage to stand up at the meeting of 1970, is sharply critical of Bordiga at the level of vidual sacrifices his personality and thus the CI’s Executive Committee in Moscow political comportment: “His political behaviour, his constant refusal to take on a politically responsible abandons his critical faculties; a healthy in 1926 and denounce Stalin, to his face, political organisation is an association in attitude, has to be considered in this particular climate. as the gravedigger of the revolution. That Thus many political events, some of great historic which the individuality of different com- same year, Bordiga himself was arrested importance, such as the Trotsky-Stalin conflict and rades is harnessed rather than suppressed. and exiled to the island of Ustica. Damen Stalinism itself were disdainfully ignored without an echo. The same was true for our Fraction abroad in In such an association, there is room for meanwhile was also active in resisting the the particular theoretical contributions France and Belgium, the ideology and the politics of attempts of the CI to impose its opportun- the party of Livorno, the Second World War and finally of different comrades and, of course, for ist policies on the Italian party, which the alignment of the USSR with the imperialist front. debate around the differences raised by had initially been dominated by the left. Not a word, not a line on Bordiga’s part appeared individual militants. Thus, as we have throughout this historic period which was on a Along with Forticiari, Repossi and others wider and more complex level than the First World found throughout this series, the history  he formed the Comitato di Intesa in 1926. War”. http://www.leftcom.org/en/articles/2011- of the communist programme is not only 01-21/amadeo-bordiga-beyond-the-myth-and-the- a history of the struggles of the working . On Ustica, he encountered Gramsci who had played rhetoric-0. A study of Bordiga’s “years of obscurity” class, not only a history of the organisations a central role in imposing the CI’s line in the Italian has been published in Italian: Arturo Peregalli and and currents that have drawn the lessons party and pushing Bordiga out of the leadership. Sandro Saggioro, Amadeo Bordiga. – La sconfitta e By now Gramsci was already ill and despite their gli anni oscuri (1926-1945). Edizioni Colibri, Milan, from these struggles and elaborated them considerable differences Bordiga didn’t hesitate to November 1998. take up the defence of his basic needs, and to work . See the following articles: “The Second Congress of . https://libcom.org/library/workers-councils- with him in the formation of a marxist educational the Internationalist Communist Party”, International book-pannekoek. See also the article referenced in circle. Review nº 36; “The Italian Fraction and the French footnote 1. . This text was recently re-published in English Communist Left”, International Review nº 90. Damen, Bordiga... 11

As a result, the unified party, formed the rule of the party, and in the face of the its struggles remained, at the cost of what around a platform written by Bordiga, was ‘proletarian state’ called for the widest was really needed: a focus on theoretical from the very beginning a compromise democracy in the councils. They did not rule clarification about the necessities and pos- between two tendencies. The one around out the hypothesis, verified at Kronstadt, sibilities of the period. Damen was much clearer on many basic of confrontations between the ‘workers’ The opposing tendency around figures class positions and these were to no small state’ and the proletariat, in the which like Bordiga and Maffi was, in general, extent connected to the developments case the communist party should be on the much more confused about the most im- undertaken by the Fraction – for example, side of the latter: ‘The dictatorship of the portant class positions. Bordiga more or the explicit adoption of the theory of the proletariat can in no sense be reduced to less ignored the acquisitions of the Fraction decadence of capitalism and the rejection the dictatorship of this party, even if this is and advocated a return to the positions of Lenin’s position on national self-deter- the party of the proletariat, the intelligence of the first two congresses of the Third mination. and guide of the proletarian state. The state International, which for him were based and the party in power, as organs of such a In this sense – and we have never hidden on Lenin’s “restoration” of the communist dictatorship, bear the seeds of the tendency our criticism of the profound opportunism programme. An extreme suspicion of op- towards compromise with the old world, a involved in the formation of the party from portunist “innovations” to marxism (which, tendency which as the Russian experience the very beginning - the “Damen” tendency it’s true, were beginning to flourish in the shows develops and strengthens through showed a capacity to assimilate some of the soil of the counter-revolution) led him to the momentary inability of the revolution most important programmatic gains made the notion of the “invariant” programme in a given country to spread, by linking by the Italian Fraction in exile, and even to which had been fixed in stone in 1848 and itself to the insurrectionary movement in take on some of the key questions raised only needed to be disinterred when it was other countries Our party… a) would have within the Italian Fraction and advance periodically buried by the opportunists and to avoid becoming the instrument of the towards a more worked out position. This traitors.10 As we have often pointed out, this workers’ state and its policies…would have was the case with the union question: within notion of invariance is based on a highly to defend the interests of the revolution the Fraction, this had been an unresolved “variant” geometry, so that for example even in confrontations with the workers’ debate, in which Stefanini had been the Bordiga and his followers could both af- state; b) would have to avoid becoming first to defend the idea that the unions had firm that capitalism had entered its epoch bureaucratised, by making its directive already been integrated into the capitalist of wars and revolutions (a fundamental centre or its more peripheral centres a state. Although it cannot be said that the position of the Third International) and yet field of manoeuvres for the careerism of position of the Damen tendency has ever polemicise against the notion of decline as functionaries; c) would have to prevent been totally consistent on the union ques- being founded on a pacifist and gradualist class politics being thought out or carried tion, it was certainly clearer than what ideology.11 out through formalist and administrative became the dominant “Bordigist” view criteria.’” This questioning of decadence had after the 1952 split. important repercussions when it came However, the most crucial insight of the This process of clarification also ex- to analysing the nature of the Russian Fraction – the notion of the fraction itself, tended to the tasks of the communist party revolution (defined as a dual revolution, the form and function that the revolutionary in the proletarian revolution. As we have not unlike the councilist vision), and in organisation must take on in a period of seen in previous articles in his series, the particular when it came to characterising defeat in the class struggle – was entirely Fraction had, despite some lingering no- the struggles for national independence lost on the Damen tendency, as was the tions about the party exercising the dicta- which were proliferating in the former closely connected notion of the historic torship of the proletariat, essentially gone colonies. Mao, instead of being seen for course, the necessity to understand the beyond this position by insisting that a key what he was, an expression of the Stalin- global balance of forces between the classes lesson of the Russian revolution was that ist counter-revolution and a real product that can undergo profound alterations the party should not become entangled with of capitalist decay, was hailed as a great within the epoch of decadence. Unable the transitional state. The Damen tendency bourgeois revolutionary in the mould of to make a real critique of the momentous went even further and made it clear that Cromwell. Later on the Bordigists were to error made in ‘43 – the constitution of a the task of the party was not to exercise come out with the same appreciation of the “party” in one single country in a period of power. Its 1952 platform, for example states Khmer Rouge in Cambodia, and this deep profound counter-revolution – the Damen- that “no time and for no reason should the incomprehension of the national question ists compounded the mistake by theorising proletariat surrender its role in the struggle. was to cause havoc in the Bordigist party the party as a permanent necessity and It should not delegate its historical mission in the later 1970s, with a sizeable element even as a permanent reality. Hence, despite to others or transfer its power to other – not abandoning internationalism altogether. quickly shrinking to a “mini-party”, the even its own political party”. original emphasis of the regroupment of 10. In his preface to Russia and Revolution in 43-45 on building up a presence within the Marxist Theory (Russie et Révolution dans la As we show in our book The Italian Théorie Marxiste, Spartacus 1975, Jacques Camatte Communist Left, these insights, quite logi- working class and giving a decisive lead in shows that the Bordiga of the revolutionary years cally, were linked to certain developments after World War One did not defend the notion of on the question of the state: . See p 163-4 in the English edition. These insights invariance, referring in particular to the first article in into the potential dangers emanating from the the collection, “The lessons of recent history”, which “Much bolder was the position that the “proletarian” state seem to have been lost, judging argues that the real movement of the proletariat can PCInt took up on the question of the state in by the surprise the delegate of the PCInt/Battaglia enrich theory, and which openly criticises certain of Marx’s ideas about democracy and some of the tactical the period of transition, where it was visibly Comunista expressed, at the Second Congress of the ICC, after reading a proposed resolution on the state in prescriptions in the Communist Manifesto “the system influenced by Bilan and Octobre. Damen the period of transition which was based on the insights of critical communism must naturally be understood and his comrades rejected the assimilation of the Fraction and of the GCF. The resolution was in liaison with the integration of historical experience of the dictatorship of the proletariat with eventually adopted at the Third Congress: “Resolution subsequent to Marx’s Manifesto, and, if necessary, in on the State in the Transition Period”, International an opposite direction to certain tactical behaviours by . See in particular Communism Vol. 3, Part 4 Review nº 18. See also “The period of transition: Marx and Engels which proved to be wrong”. – “The 1930s: debate on the period of transition”, Polemic with the P.C.Int.-Battaglia Comunista”, 11. “The post-war boom did not reverse the decline International Review nº 127. International Review nº 47. of capitalism”, International Review nº 147. 12 International Review 158 Spring 2017

On the party question, on the errors of and their inspiring description of the the Bolsheviks in the running of the Soviet communist society that will overcome state, it was as if the Fraction had never it, already indicate that Marx had made a existed. The party takes power, wields qualitative break with the most advanced the state machine, imposes the Red Terror forms of bourgeois thought. In particular, without mercy…even the important nu- the 1844 MS, which contain a large sec- ances of Lenin on the need for the working tion devoted to the critique of the Hegelian class to be wary of the bureaucratisation philosophy, demonstrate that whatever and autonomisation of the transitional Marx had assimilated from Hegel in mat- state seem to have been forgotten. As we ters of the dialectic, his rupture with Hegel argue in a previous article in this series,12 - which meant overturning him, “turning Bordiga’s most important contribution on him on his head” - and the adoption of the lessons of the Russian revolution in a communist world outlook, take place the post World War Two period, “Force, at exactly the same moment. Bordiga violence and dictatorship in the class emphasises in particular Marx’s rejection struggle” (1946), certainly contains some of the very starting point of the Hegelian insights on the problem of degeneration, system: the individual “I”. “What is clear but its rather dogmatic anti-democratism is that for Marx Hegel’s error is to build didn’t enable it to recognise the problem his whole colossal speculative edifice, of the party and state substituting for the with its rigorous formalism, on an abstract proletariat (see final note below). Amadeo Bordiga basis, ‘consciousness’. As Marx would say many times, you have to begin from However: even though the Bordiga ten- Bordiga’s reflections about communism, being, and not from the consciousness it dency also never openly put into question in particular two major presentations given has of itself…Hegel is shut in on himself, the formation of the party in 1943, it was at party meetings in 1959-60, which are from the beginning, in the vain eternal able to understand that the organisation had dedicated to Marx’s 1844 Economic and dialogue between subject and object. His entered into a far more difficult period and Political Manuscripts: “Commentaries subject is the ‘me’ extended in an absolute that different tasks were on the order of the on the 1844 manuscripts” (1959-60), and sense…” (p119). day. Bordiga had been sceptical about the “Tablets of stone of the communist theory formation of the party in the first instance. of the party”‘ (page references are to the At the same time, it is evident that for Without showing the slightest understand- first text unless indicated). Bordiga, the 1844 MS provide evidence for ing of the notion of the fraction – indeed, he This is how Bordiga places the 1844 MS his theory of the invariance of marxism, rather buried his own experience of fraction within the corpus of Marx’s writings an idea which we think is contradicted by work prior to the First World War under his the real development of the communist subsequent theorisations about the formal “Another very vulgar commonplace is programme which we have traced through- and the historic party13 - there was a certain that Marx was a Hegelian in his youthful out this series. But we will return to this understanding that simply maintaining a writings, that it was only afterwards that question later on. What we share with routine of intervention in the immediate he became the theoretician of historical Bordiga’s view of the 1844 MS is, above struggle was not the way forward, and that materialism, and that, when he was older, all: the centrality of Marx’s conception of it was essential to return to the theoretical he became a vulgar opportunist. It is a alienation, not only to the MS, but to the foundations of marxism. Having rejected task of the revolutionary marxist school whole of his work; a number of fundamental the contribution of the Fraction and other to make it clear to all its enemies (who elements in Bordiga’s conception of the expressions of the communist left, this work have the choice to accept everything or dialectic of history; and the exalted vision was not completed, or even attempted, with reject everything) the monolithism of the of communism which, again, Marx never regard to the key programmatic positions. whole system from its birth to the death of repudiated in his later work (although he But when it came to certain more general Marx and even after him (the fundamental did, in our view, enrich it). theoretical questions, and particularly those concept of invariance, the fundamental relating to the nature of the future com- rejection the ‘enriching’ evolution of the The dialectic of history munist society, it seems to us that during party doctrine” (p120). this period it was Bordiga, rather than the Here we have both the strengths and Bordiga’s references to the concept of al- “Damenists”, who has left us with the most weaknesses of Bordiga’s approach in ienation in the 1844 MS inform his whole important legacy. one paragraph. One the one hand: the view of history, since he insists that “the intransigent defence of the continuity of highest degree of man’s alienation has been The passion for communism: Marx’s thought and the repudiation of the reached in the current capitalist epoch” Bordiga’s defence of the 1844 notion that the 1844 MS are the product (p124). Without abandoning the under- Economic and Philosophical of a Marx who was still essentially idealist standing that the emergence and develop- Manuscripts and Hegelian (or at least Feuerbachian), a ment of capitalism, and the destruction of notion that has been associated in particular the old feudal mode of exploitation, is a The book Bordiga et la passion du com- with the Stalinist intellectual Althusser and precondition for the communist revolution, munisme, a collection of writings put which we have already criticised in earlier he pours scorn on the facile progressivism together by Jacques Camatte in 1972, is articles in this series.14 of the bourgeoisie which vaunts its supe- the best testimony to the profundity of For Bordiga, the 1844 MS, with their riority over previous modes of production profound exposé of capitalist alienation, and ways of experiencing the world. He 12. “In the aftermath of World War Two: debates even suggests that bourgeois thinking is on how the workers will hold power after the 14. See in particular: “The alienation of labour is the in certain senses empty in comparison revolution.” premise for its emancipation, International Review 13. https://www.marxists.org/archive/bordiga/ nº 70; The study of Capital and the foundations of with the much derided pre-capitalist works/1965/consider.htm Communism”, International Review nº 75. viewpoints. For Bordiga, marxism has Damen, Bordiga... 13 demonstrated that “your affirmations are of humanity and of knowledge in the much What communism is not empty and inconsistent lies, much more tormented homo sapiens is not continuous, clearly so than the most ancient opinions but moves through great isolated leaps Bordiga’s defence of the 1844 MS is, to of human thought which, you, bourgeois, punctuated by sinister and obscure plunges a large extent, a long diatribe against the believe you have buried once and for all into social forms degenerating to the fraud of “really existing socialism” in the under the fatuousness of your illuminist point of putrefaction” (p168). This is no countries of the eastern bloc, which had rhetoric”(p168). Consequently even when accidental formulation: elsewhere in the gained a new lease of life in the wake of both bourgeoisie and proletariat formulate same text he says “the banal conceptions the “anti-fascist war” of 1939-45. His at- their critique of religion, there is again a of the dominant ideologies see this path tack was mounted at two levels: negation rupture between the two class standpoints: (of human history) as a continuous and and affirmation. Negation of the claims “even in the cases (not general) where constant ascent; marxism does not share that what existed in the USSR and similar the ideologues of the bourgeoisie dared this vision, and defines a series alternat- regimes had anything whatever to do with to break openly with the principles of ing between rises and descents, interlaced Marx’s conception of communism, first and the Christian church, we marxists do not by violent crises” (p152). A clear answer, foremost at the economic level; affirma- define this superstructure, atheism, as a one would think, to those who reject the tion of the fundamental characteristics of platform common to the bourgeoisie and concept of the ascendance and decadence communist relations of production. the proletariat” (p 117). of successive modes of production… According to one version of a ubiquitous With such affirmations, Bordiga seems The dialectical vision of history sees joke from the old USSR, an instructor in the to connect his thought with some of the movement as resulting from the clash party school is lecturing Young Comsomol “philosophical” critics of the marxism of – often violent – of contradictions. But it members on the key question: will there the Second International (and, by exten- also contains the notion of the spiral and the be money in communism? sion, of the official philosophy of the Third) “return at a higher level”. Thus the commu- such as Pannekoek, Lukacs and Korsch, nism of the future is, in an important sense, “Historically, comrades, there are three who rejected the idea that, just as social- a return of man to himself, as Marx puts it positions on this question. There is the ism is the logical next step in historical in the 1844 manuscripts, since it is not only right wing, Proudhonist-Bukharinite de- evolution and only requires the “taking a rupture with the past, but a synthesis of viation: under communism, everyone will over” of the capitalist state and economy, everything that was human within it: “man have money. Then there is the ultra-left, so historical materialism is simply the next returns to himself not as he began at the infantile deviation: under communism, no step in the advance of classical bourgeois origin of his long history, but finally hav- one will have money. So what then is the materialism. Such views are based on a ing at his disposal all the perfections of an dialectical position of Marxism-Leninism? profound underestimation of the antago- immense development, acquired in the form It is clearly this: under communism, some nism between the bourgeois and proletarian of all the successive techniques, customs, people will have money, and others won’t world outlooks, the unavoidable necessity religions, philosophies whose useful sides have any money.” for a revolutionary rupture with the old were – if we can be permitted to express Whether Bordiga was acquainted with forms. There is continuity, of course, but ourselves in this way – imprisoned in the this joke or not, his response to the Stalinists it is anything but gradual and peaceful. zone of alienation” (p125). in his “Commentaries” goes in a similar This way of approaching the problem is A more concrete example of this: in a direction. A preface to one of the Stalinist entirely consistent with the idea that the short article about the inhabitants of the editions to the 1844 MS points out that bourgeoisie can only see the social and island of Janitzio in Mexico,15 written in Marx’s text contains a polemic against natural world through the distorting lens 1961, and included in Camatte’s collection, Proudhon’s theory of equal wages, the of alienation, which under its reign has Bordiga develops the idea that “in natural implication being that for the authentic reached its “supreme” phase. and primitive communism” the individual, marxism practised in the USSR, under The slogan “Against immediatism” still linked to his fellow human beings in socialism there must be unequal wages. features more than once in the sub-head- a real community, does not experience the But, in the ensuing section headed “Either ings of these contributions. For Bordiga same fear of death that emerged with the wage labour or socialism”, Bordiga points it was essential to avoid any narrowing social atomisation engendered by private out that in the 1844 MS as well as in other of focus to the present moment of history, property and class society; and that this works such as The Poverty of Philosophy and to look beyond capitalism backwards provides us with an indication that in the and Capital, Marx actually “refutes the as well as forwards. In the current epoch, communism of the future, where the indi- Proudhonist vacuity which conceives of bourgeois thought is perhaps more im- vidual’s destiny will be linked to that of a socialism where wages have been con- mediatist than ever, more than ever fix- the species, the fear of personal death and served, as they are conserved in Russia. ated on the particular, the here and now, “any cult of the living and the dead” will Marx is not hitting out at the theory of the short term, since it lives in mortal fear be overcome. Bordiga thereby confirms equality, but on the existence of wages. that regarding present-day society with the his continuity with that central strand of Even if you could level them, wages are eye of history will enable us to discern its the marxist tradition which affirms that in the negation of socialism. Even more transient nature. But Bordiga also devel- a certain sense “the members of primitive so, not levelled, not equal, they are even ops a polemic against the classical “grand societies were closer to the human essence” more evidently the negation of socialism” narratives” of the bourgeoisie in its more (p175) – that the communism of the distant (p129). optimistic age: not because it was grand, past can also be understood as a pre-figura- 16 And the following section is headed but because the bourgeoisie’s narrative de- tion of the communism of the future. “Either money or socialism”: just as wage formed the real story. Just as the transition labour persists in the USSR, so must its cor- from bourgeois to proletarian thinking is ollary: the domination of human relations not merely another forward step, so history by exchange value, and thus by money. in general is not a straight line going from 15. “In Janitzio they’re not afraid of death.” 16. See also a previous article in this series: “The Returning, to the deep critique of money as darkness to light, but is an expression of Mature Marx - Past and Future Communism”, an expression of alienation between human the dialectic in movement: “The progress International Review nº 81. 14 International Review 158 Spring 2017 beings, which Marx, citing Shakespeare Like Trotsky in the visionary concluding feminism” or an “anarcha-feminism”. But and Goethe, developed in the 1844 manu- passages of Literature and Revolution18 from Bordiga’s standpoint, feminism has a scripts and returned to in Capital, Bordiga – who, in 1924, is unlikely to have had bourgeois starting point because it aims at insisted that “the societies where money knowledge of the 1844 MS – Bordiga then “equality” of the sexes inside the existing circulates are societies of private property; ascends from the sphere of the negation social relationships; and this leads logi- they remain inside the barbaric prehistory of capitalism and its alienation, from an cally to the demand that women should be of the human species” (p137). insistence on what socialism is not, to the “equally” able to fight in imperialist armies positive affirmation of what humanity will or rise to becoming company directors and Bordiga in fact demonstrates that the be like in the higher stages of communist prime ministers. Stalinists have more in common with the society. The 1844 MS, as we pointed out father of anarchism than they would like Communism did not need the addition in an early article in this series,19 are full of to admit. Proudhon, in the tradition of a of feminism or even “socialist feminism” passages describing how relations between “crude communism” which Marx already to have been, from the beginning, an ad- human beings and between humanity and recognises as reactionary at the point that vocate of the solidarity of men and women nature will be transformed under com- he himself embraced communism, envis- in the here and now, but this can only be munism, and Bordiga quotes extensively ages a society in which “annual revenue is realised in the class struggle, in the fight from the most significant of these passages socially divided in equal parts among all against capitalist oppression and exploita- in his two texts, most notably where they members of society, who have all become tion and for the creation of a society in deal with the transformation of relations waged workers”. In other words, this which the “original form of exploitation” between men and women, and where notion of communism or socialism was – that of woman by man - will no longer they insist that communist society will one in which the misery of the proletar- be possible. More than this: marxism has permit the emergence of a higher stage of ian condition was generalised rather than also recognised that the female of the conscious life. abolished, and in which “society” itself species - because of her double oppres- becomes the capitalist. And in response sion and her more advanced moral sense to those – not only the Stalinists, but also The transformation of relations (linked in particular to her historic role in their leftwing apologists, the Trotskyists between the sexes the rearing of children) - is often in the - who denied that the USSR could be a vanguard of the struggle, for example in form of capitalism because it had (more Throughout the 1844 MS Marx repudiates the revolution in1917 in Russia, which or less) got rid of individual owners of the “crude communism” which, while at- began with demonstrations of women capital, Bordiga replies: “The question tacking the bourgeois family, still regards against bread shortages, or more recently where are the capitalists has no meaning. woman as an object and speculates about in the massive strikes in Egypt in 2007. The response has been there since 1844: a coming “community of women”. On the Indeed according to the anthropological society is an abstract capitalist”(p132). contrary: Bordiga quotes Marx that the school of Chris Knight, Camilla Power and degree to which the relationship between others, which identifies with the marxist The polemical target of these essays is man and woman has become humanised tradition in anthropology, female morality not restricted to the overt defenders of the is a measurement of the real advance of and solidarity played a crucial role in the USSR. If communism abolishes exchange the species. But at the same time, under very emergence of human culture, in the value, it is because it has abolished all forms capitalism, woman, and the relation be- primal “human revolution”.20 Bordiga is in of property17 – not only state property as tween the sexes, will remain a prisoner of accord with this way of looking at things in the programme of Stalinism, but also commodity relations. in the section of the “Commentaries” the classical anarcho-syndicalist version headed “Love, a universal need”, when he (which Bordiga also attributes to the con- After resuming Marx’s thinking on argues that the passive function assigned temporary Socialisme ou Barbarie group these questions, Bordiga digresses for a to women is purely a product of property with its definition of socialism as workers’ moment on the problem of terminology, relations, and that in fact “in nature, love management of production): “land to the of language. being the basis of reproduction, women is peasants and the factories to the workers “In citing these passages, it is necessary the active sex, and the monetary forms of and similar pitiful parodies of the mag- to alternate between the word man and the love are revealed to be against nature” nificent programme of the revolutionary word male to the extent that the first word (p156). And he continues with a summary communist party”(p178). In communism indicates all the members of the species... of how the abolition of commodity rela- the individual enterprise must be abolished When a half century ago the estimable tions will transform this relationship: “In as such. If it continues to be the property of marxist Filippo Turati made an enquiry communism without money, love will, as a those who work in it, or even of the local into feminism, that miserable bourgeois need, have the same weight for both sexes community around it, it has not been truly deviation founded on the atrocious sub- and the act which consecrates it will realise socialised, and the relations between the mission of woman in societies of property, the social formula that the other’s human different self-managed enterprises must he responded with these simple words: need is my human need, to the extent that necessarily be founded on the exchange woman… is man. That means: she will be in the need of one sex is realised as the need of commodities. We will return to this communism, but for your bourgeois society of the other”. question when we look at the vision of she is an animal, an object.” (p150) socialism developed by Castoriadis and Bordiga then explains that this transfor- the Socialisme ou Barbarie group. Feminism a bourgeois deviation? This mation will be based on the material and is a position strongly rejected by those social changes introduced by the commu- who argue that there can be a “socialist nist revolution: “This cannot be proposed 17. A rather clear exposition of Bordiga’s conception simply as a moral relationship founded of socialism can be found in an article by Adam 18. “Trotsky and the culture of communism”, on a certain physical connection, because Buick of the Socialist Party of Great Britain, who, International Review nº 111. for all their other faults, have always understood 19. “Communism: the real beginning of human 20.” Woman’s role in the emergence of human culture”, very clearly that socialism means the abolition of society”, International Review nº 71. This article, like International Review nº 150; and “Women’s role in wage labour and money. https://libcom.org/library/ others in the series, also refers to Bordiga’s writings the emergence of human solidarity”, International bordgism-adam-buick. on communism. Review nº 151. Damen, Bordiga... 15 the passage to a higher form of society is sential powers, that all objects become for nature, of an evolving universe, becoming effected in the economic domain: the care him the objectification of himself, objects conscious of itself. of children is no longer just the concern of that confirm and realise his individuality, It is difficult to read the above passages the two parents but of the community.” It is his objects, i.e. he himself becomes the by Bordiga and conclude that he is talking from this starting point that future humanity object.” about something entirely different. And will be able to break through the limitations Bordiga continues: it is important to note that Freud, in the imposed by the bourgeois family. opening sections of Civilisation and its “We have seen that when you pass from Discontents, acknowledged the reality the individual to the species, the spirit, Conscious life at another level of the “oceanic feeling”, this experience this absolute unfortunate, is dissolved into of erotic unity with the world, although objective nature. The individual brain as In an earlier article in this series,21 we ar- he could only see it as a regression to the a poor passive machine is replaced by the gued that certain passages in the 1844 MS infantile state prior to the emergence of the social brain. What’s more, Marx points to only make sense if we see them as anticipa- ego. However, in the same section of the a collective human sense that has gone tions of a transformation of consciousness, book, he also accepts the possibility that beyond the isolated corporal sense.” And of a new mode of being, which communist the mental techniques of yoga can open the he goes on to quote the 1844 Manuscripts social relations will make possible. The door to “primordial states of mind which on the emancipation of the senses, insisting article looked at some length at the passage have long been overlaid”. The question for that this also indicates the emergence of a from the chapter “Private Property and us to raise theoretically - and perhaps for kind of collective awareness – what we communism” where Marx talks about the future generations to investigate more prac- might term a passage from the “common way in which private property (understood tically – is whether the age-old techniques sense” of the isolated ego to the communis- in its broadest sense) has served to restrict of meditation can lead only to regression, a ing of the senses. the human senses, to obstruct – or, to use collapse back into the undifferentiated unity a more accurate term from psychoanaly- What do we make of these conceptions? of the animal or the infant; or whether they sis, repress – human sensual experience; Before dismissing them as science fiction, can be part of a dialectical “return become consequently communism will bring with we should remember that while, in bour- conscious”, a self-aware exploration of our it the “emancipation of the senses”, a new geois society above all, we often take the own minds. In which case the instances bodily and mental rapport with the world ego to be the absolute centre of our being (“I of the “oceanic feeling” point not only to which can be compared with the “inspired” think, therefore I am”), there is also a long the infantile past, but towards the horizon state experienced by artists at their most tradition of thought that insists that the ego of a more advanced and more universal creative moments. is only a relative reality, at best a particular human consciousness. This was certainly the view adopted by Erich Fromm in his Towards the end of Bordiga’s text fraction of our being. This view is certainly study Psychoanalysis and Zen Buddhism, “Tablets of stone” there is a section headed central to psychoanalytical theory, for for example when he writes about what ‘“Down with the personality, that is the which the adult ego only emerges through he calls the “state of non-repressedness”, key!” We will take up this question of a long process of repression and division defined as “a state in which one acquires “personality” later on, but we want first to between the conscious and unconscious again the immediate, undistorted grasp of look at the way Bordiga, in his interpreta- part of ourselves – and is, furthermore, the 22 reality, the simpleness and spontaneity of tion of the 1844 manuscripts, envisages “sole seat of anxiety” because, caught as the child; yet, after having gone through the alteration of human consciousness in it is between the demands of external real- the process of alienation, of development of the communist future. ity and the unfulfilled urges buried in the unconscious, it is constantly preoccupied one’s intellect, non-repressedness is return He begins by affirming that in com- with its own overthrow or extinction. to innocence on a higher level; this return munism we will “have left behind the mil- to innocence is only possible after one has It is also a view that has been put forward lennia-old deception of the lone individual lost one’s innocence.”23 facing the natural world, stupidly called in a number of the “mystical” traditions east and west, although it was probably most 23. Erich Fromm, Psychoanalysis and Zen Buddhism, ‘external’ by the philosophers. External 1960, p 91 of the 1986 Allen and Unwin edition. to what? External to the ‘I’, this supreme coherently developed by Indian philoso- Fromm, a descendant of the Frankfurt School who phy, and above all by Buddhism with its has also written extensively about the early writings of deficiency; but we can no longer say ex- Marx, considers that, taken to its logical conclusion, ternal to the human species, because the doctrine of “anatta” – the impermanence of the separate self. But all these traditions the true goal of psychoanalysis (which could only species man is internal to nature, part of the be attained on a wide scale in a “sane society”), physical world.” And he goes on to say that tend to concur that it is possible, through is not simply to relieve neurotic symptoms or to directly penetrating the unconscious mind, subordinate the instincts to intellectual control, but “in this powerful text, object and subject to make the unconscious conscious and thus reach becomes, like man and nature, one and the to surpass the everyday ego-consciousness – and thus the torment of perpetual anxiety. the non-repressed life. He thus defines the method of same thing. We can even say that everything psychoanalysis in relation to this goal:“ it examines becomes object: man as a subject ‘against Shorn of the ideological distortions that the psychic development of a person from childhood inevitably accompanied these traditions, on and tries to recover the earlier experiences in nature’ disappears, along with the illusion order to assist the person in experiencing what is now of a singular me.”(p190) their most lucid insights do raise the pos- sibility that human beings are capable of repressed. It proceeds by uncovering illusions within oneself about the world, step by step, so that parataxis This can only be a reference to the attaining another kind of consciousness in distortions and alienated intellectualisations passage in the “Private property and com- which the world around us is no longer seen diminish. By becoming less of a stranger to himself, munism” chapter where Marx says as a hostile other, and the focus of aware- the person who goes through this process becomes ness shifts, not merely intellectually, but less estranged to the world; because he has opened “it is only when objective reality univer- up communication with the universe within himself, through a direct and very bodily experience, sally becomes for man in society the reality he has opened up communication with the universe from the isolated atom to the standpoint outside. False consciousness disappears, and with of man’s essential powers, becomes human of the species – indeed, the standpoint of it the polarity conscious-unconscious” (ibid p 107). reality, and thus the reality of his own es- something even more than the species: of Elsewhere (p 105) he compares this method with that of Zen, which uses different means, but also 21. “Communism: the real beginning of human 22. Freud, New Introductory Lectures, London proceeds through a series of smaller realisations society”, International Review nº 71. 1973, p 117. or “satoris” towards a qualitatively higher level of 16 International Review 158 Spring 2017

Against the destruction of the when Bordiga, in 1952, formulated a kind of “invariant” doctrine in the past? In a environment of “immediate revolutionary programme”, seminal text titled precisely “The historical it included demands for halting what he invariance of marxism”,27 he writes: already saw as the inhuman congestion But Bordiga’s theoretical writings during “Consequently, despite the fact that the and pace of life brought about by capitalist this period did not only pose the question of ideological legacy of the revolutionary urbanisation (a process that has reached man’s relationship with nature at this very working class, unlike that of the classes that much greater levels of irrationality since “philosophical” level. He also raised it in preceded it, does not assume the form of then). Thus the seventh point out of nine his far-sighted reflections on the question revelation, myth or idealism, but of ‘posi- calls for “halting construction of houses of capitalist catastrophes and the problem of tive’ science, it nonetheless needs a stable and workplaces in the big cities and even the environment. Writing on contemporary formulation of its principles, and even of the smaller ones, as a starting point for disasters like the flooding of the Po valley its rules for action, that performs the role the uniform distribution of the population in 1957 and the sinking of the liner Andrea and possesses the efficacy that dogmas, in the countryside. Reduction of the speed Doria in the year before, Bordiga again catechisms, tablets of law, constitutions and volume of traffic and forbidding it brings to bear his specialist knowledge as an and guide-books such as the Vedas, the when it is useless” (in a future article we engineer and above all his deep rejection of Talmud, the Bible, the Koran or the Uni- intend to come back to the other demands bourgeois “progress” to show how its drive versal Declaration of Human Rights once in this “programme”, because they contain to accumulate contains the seeds of such performed and possessed. The profound a number of formulations which can, in our catastrophes, and ultimately of the destruc- errors with regard to form and substance 24 view, be strongly criticised). tion of the natural world itself. Bordiga is in those compilations did not deprive them particularly vehement in his articles about It is interesting to note that, when it of their enormous organisational and social the frenzy of urbanisation which he could comes to demonstrating why all this so- power (at first a revolutionary power, then a already discern in the post-war reconstruc- called progress of the capitalist city was counterrevolutionary power, in dialectical tion period, denouncing the cramming of nothing of the kind, Bordiga had recourse succession); what is more, in many cases human beings into ever more limited urban to a concept of decadence which he tends these ‘deviations’ contributed precisely to spaces and the accompanying philosophy to throw out of window in other polemics the creation of this power.” of “verticalism” in construction. He argues – for example in the title “Weird and won- In his Commentaries, Bordiga was that this reduction of human beings to the derful tales of modern social decadence”.25 already aware of the accusation that such level of ants is a direct product of the needs Such a term is on the other hand entirely ideas led him back to the religious world- of accumulation and will be reversed in consistent with the general view of history view: the communist future, reaffirming Marx we noted above, where societies can “de- and Engels’ demand for overcoming the generate to the point of putrefaction” and “When, at a certain point, our banal separation between town and country: go through phases of ascent and descent. contradictor ... says that we are building “When, after the forcible crushing of this It is as if Bordiga, once removed from the our mystique, himself posing as a mind ever-more obscene dictatorship, it will “narrow” world of contending political who which has gone beyond all fideism and be possible to subordinate every solution positions, and obliged to return to the mysticism, when he holds us in derision for and every plan to the amelioration of the basics of marxist theory, had no choice kneeling down to the Mosaic or talmudic conditions of living labour, to fashion but to recognise that capitalism, like all tablets of the Bible or the Koran, to gospels with this aim everything that has come previous modes of production, must also and catechisms, we reply to him… that we from dead labour, from constant capital, enter an epoch of decline – and that this do not consider as an offence the assertion from the infrastructure that the human epoch has long been upon us, regardless that we can indeed attribute to our move- species has built up over the centuries of the marvels of capitalism’s “growth in ment - as long as it has not triumphed in and continues to build up on the earth’s decay” which are smothering humanity reality (which in our method precedes any crust, then the brutal verticalism of the and threatening its future. ulterior conquest of human consciousness) cement monsters will be made ridiculous - the character of a mystique, or, if you and will be suppressed, and in the immense The problem with “invariance” want, a myth. expanses of horizontal space, once the gi- ant cities have been deflated, the strength Myth, in its innumerable forms, was not a and intelligence of the human animal will We must now return to Bordiga’s notion delirium of minds whose physical eyes were progressively tend to render uniform the that the 1844 MS provide evidence for his closed to reality…but was an irreplaceable density of life and labour over the habit- theory of the “invariance of marxism”. step in the single road to the real conquest able parts of the earth; and these forces We have argued on various occasions that of consciousness”(p169). this is a religious conception. In a sting- will henceforth be in harmony, and no Bordiga is right to consider that mythi- longer ferocious enemies as they are in the ing polemic with the Bordigist group that publishes Programma Comunista, Mark cal thought was indeed an “irreplaceable deformed civilisation of today, where they step” in the evolution of human conscious- are only brought together by the spectre of Chirik noted the real similarity between the Bordigist concept of invariance and ness, and that the Bible, the Koran, or the servitude and hunger” (published in “Space Declaration of Human Rights were, at against cement” in The Human Species the Muslim attitude of submission to an immutable doctrine.26 a certain stage of history, authentically and the Earth’s Crust (Espèce Humaine revolutionary products. He is also right to et Croûte Terrestre, Petite Bibilotheque The target of this article was, it’s true, recognise that adherence to such “tablets Payot, p168). It is also worth noting that mainly the epigones of Bordiga, but what of the law” became, at another stage in did Bordiga himself say about the relation- history, counter-revolutionary. But the being in the world ship between marxism and the sources mechanism through which they became 24. See the collection Murdering the Dead: Amadeo Bordiga on capitalism and other disasters, Antagonism counter-revolutionary in new historical Press, 2001. See also our article “Flooding: the shape 25. https://www.marxists.org/archive/bordiga/ circumstances was precisely the notion that of things to come”, World Revolution nº 365, which works/1956/weird.htm. looks at Bordiga’s notion of the role of destruction 26. “A caricature of the Party: the Bordigist Party”. 27. https://libcom.org/library/historical-invariance- in capitalist accumulation. International Review nº 14. marxism-amadeo-bordiga. Damen, Bordiga... 17 they were unchanging and unchangeable. act of genesis – the birth act of its empiri- that enlightenment made the individual Islam, for example, considers its revelation cal existence – is, therefore, for its think- vanish. There is a Zen story which recounts purer than that of the Jewish Torah because ing consciousness the comprehended and how a student approached his teacher after it is argued that while the latter had been known process of its becoming”. hearing that the latter had achieved satori, subject to subsequent revision and editing, the lightening flash of illumination. The And Bordiga adds that the subject of not a single word of the Koran had been student asks the master “how does it feel this consciousness cannot be the individual altered from the moment the angel Gabriel to be enlightened?” To which the master philosopher: it can only be the class party dictated it to Mohammed. The difference replies: “As miserable as ever”. of the world proletariat. But if communism between the marxist view of the communist is, as Marx says, the product of the entire And in the same section of “Tablets of programme and myth or religious dogma movement of history, then it must have Stone”, Bordiga cites the “splendid expres- is that marxism sees its concepts as the begun to emerge long before the appear- sion” from the 1844 MS: that mankind is a historical product of human beings and ance of the working class and its political being who suffers, and that if he does not thus subject to confirmation or refutation organisations, so that the source of this suffer, he cannot know joy. This fleshly, by succeeding historical growth or experi- consciousness must be older than both mortal, individual human being will still ence, and not as a once and for all revelation – just as, within capitalist society, it is exist in communism, which for Marx is from a superhuman source. Indeed, it insists also wider than the political organisations “the only society in which the original and that mythical or religious revelations are of the class, even if they are generally its free development of individuals ceases to themselves products of human history, and most advanced expression. Moreover, be a mere phrase” (German Ideology, “The thus limited in their scope and clarity even since communism can only become clear free development of individuals”) at their highest points of achievement. In to itself, “comprehended and known” when accepting the idea that marxism is itself a These are of course questions for the it becomes proletarian communism, surely kind of myth, Bordiga loses sight of the far future. But Bordiga’s suspicion of the this is further evidence that communism historical method that he is able to use so individual personality has far more im- and communist consciousness is something well elsewhere. mediate implications for the question of that evolves, that it is not static, but is a the revolutionary organisation. Of course it is true that the communist process of becoming – and thus cannot programme itself is not infinitely malle- be invariant. We know that Bordiga made a trenchant able and does have an unchanging core of critique of the bourgeois fetish of democ- general principles such as the class struggle, Individual and species racy, based as it is on the false notion of the transient nature of class society, the the isolated citizen and on the real founda- necessity for the proletarian dictatorship tion of a society atomised by commodity The critique of individualism has a long and communism. Furthermore, there is exchange. The insights he developed in history in marxism, going back to Marx’s a sense in which this general outline can The Democratic Principle and elsewhere criticisms of Hegel and in particular his as- appear like a sudden flash of inspiration. enable us to expose the essential vacuity sault on Max Stirner; and in arguing against Hence Bordiga can write: of the most democratic structures of the the philosophical standpoint of the isolated capitalist order. But there comes a point “A new doctrine cannot appear at just thinker, Bordiga is on solid ground, citing in Bordiga’s thinking where he loses sight any historical moment, but there are certain the The German Ideology’s cutting remark of what was authentically “progressive” in quite characteristic—and even extremely on Saint Max that “philosophy stands in the victory of commodity exchange over rare—eras in history in which a new doc- the same relation to the study of the actual all the older forms of community: the trine can appear like a blinding flash of world as masturbation to sexual love”. And possibility of critical, individual thought light; if one has not recognised the crucial as we have seen, the idea that the ego is in without which “positive science” – which moment and fixed one’s gaze on this terrible some sense an illusory construct also has Bordiga still reclaims as the standpoint of light, in vain would one have resort to the a long pedigree. But Bordiga goes further the proletariat – would not have emerged. candle stubs with which the academic ped- than this. As already noted, the section of Applied to Bordiga’s conception of the ant or the combatant of little faith attempts “Tablets of Stone” (“Tables immuables”) party, this line of thought leads to the to illuminate the way forward” (“Historical which we cited earlier, where Bordiga concept of the “monolithic”, “anonymous” invariance of marxism”) predicts that communist humanity will be and even “totalitarian” organisation – all able to access a kind of species or cosmic Quite possibly Bordiga has in mind which terms have been used approvingly in consciousness, is headed “Down with the the incredibly rich phase of Marx’s work the Bordigist canon. It leads to theorising personality, that is the key!”. It is as if which gave rise to the 1844 MS and other the negation of individual thought and thus Bordiga wants the individual human being fundamental texts. But Marx for one did of internal differences and debates. And to be subsumed in the species rather than not regard these texts as his final words on as with all totalitarian regimes, there is realised through it. capitalism, the class struggle, or commu- always at least one individual who becomes nism. Even though, in our view, he never The experience of a state of awareness anything but anonymous – who becomes abandoned the essential content of these which goes beyond the ego tends to be a the object of a personality cult. And this writings, he regarded them as “first drafts” peak experience rather than a permanent is precisely what was justified within the which had to be developed and given a more state, but at any rate, it does not necessar- post-war Internationalist Communist Party solid grounding by further research, itself ily abolish the personality. Personality as by those who saw in Bordiga the “brilliant closely connected to the practical/theoreti- a mask, perhaps, personality as a kind of leader”, the genius who could (even when cal experimentation carried out by the real private property, personality as the outward he was not actually a member of the party!) movement of the proletariat. face of the illusion of an absolute ego – one come up with answers to all the theoretical could argue that this form of personality problems posed to the organisation. This Bordiga, in the “Commentaries” (p 161) will be transcended in the future. But nature was the aberrant way of thinking attacked also points to a specific passage in the 1844 itself has a need for diversity if it is to move in the GCF’s article “Against the concept MS as proof of invariance. This is where forward, and this is no less true for human of the brilliant leader.”28 Marx writes that “The entire movement of society. Even the Buddhists did not argue history, just as its [communism’s] actual 28. “Against the concept of the “brilliant leader’”, International Review nº 33. 18 International Review 158 Spring 2017

Bordiga’s contribution the things “we owe to Bordiga”, above least because it has subsequently been taken all the immense contribution he made in up by others with dubious agendas, such We have sometimes criticised Bordiga’s his “classic” period on the theory of ab- as the “communisation” current (of which idea that a revolutionary is someone for stentionism and the relationship between Camatte was one of the founding fathers), whom the revolution has already happened. party and class. But, as we have seen, he who have used it to produce results which In so far as it implies the inevitability of quite rightly does not spare Bordiga from Bordiga himself would certainly have communism, those criticisms are valid. But criticism over his withdrawal from political disowned. But that will require a further there is also a truth in Bordiga’s dictum. activity from the late 20s to the early 40s, article, and before we get there, we want Communists are those who represent the his refusal to comment on all the economic to look at the other “theories of proletarian future in the present, as the Communist and political dramas that fill this period. revolution” which were being developed Manifesto puts it, and in this sense they Examining his return to political life at the in the 50s, 60s and 70s. end of the war, Damen is also scathing about measure the present – and the past – in C D Ward the light of the possibility of communism. Bordiga’s ambiguities about the capitalist Bordiga’s “passion for communism” – his nature of the USSR. He could have gone insistence on demonstrating the superiority further and showed how Bordiga’s refusal of communism over anything that class to recognise the acquisitions of the Frac- society and capitalism had engendered tion led to a clear political regression on – enabled him to resist the false visions key issues such as the national question, of capitalist and “socialist” progress that the unions, and the role of the party in the were being drummed into the working class proletarian dictatorship. But what is miss- in the 1950s and 60s and, perhaps most ing from Damen’s text is an appraisal of importantly, to demonstrate in practice that the real contribution to our understanding marxism is not in fact an invariant dogma of communism which Bordiga undertook but a living theory, since there is no doubt in his later years – a contribution which the that Bordiga’s contributions on commu- communist left still needs to assimilate, not nism enrich our understanding of it. rhetoric-0 Post-scriptum: As pointed out in a recent article by C Earlier in this article we referred to Derrick Varn on the blog Symptomatic Commentary, Damen’s obituary of 1970, which sought “The brain of society: notes on Bordiga, organic to assess Bordiga’s overall political con- centralism, and the limitations of the party form” , tribution.29 Damen begins by listing all Bordiga seemed reluctant to abandon the notion of the party not only persisting but even acting as the 29. http://www.leftcom.org/en/articles/2011-01- incarnated “social brain” during the higher phase of 21/amadeo-bordiga-beyond-the-myth-and-the- communism. 19

Contribution to a history of the working class in South Africa (iii)

From the Soweto movement of 1976 to the coming to power of the ANC in 1993

In the previous article on the workers’ movement in South Africa (in International Review n° 155) we highlighted the effectiveness against the class struggle of the apartheid system combined with the action of the trade unions and parties up until the late 1960s when, faced with an unprecedented development of the class struggle, the bourgeoisie had to “modernise” its political apparatus in order to preserve its system. It was forced to do this faced with a South African proletariat which, through massive struggles, showed that it was part of the global waves of struggle in the late 1960s and early 1970s. In this introduction we want to draw the attention of the reader to the importance of the questions dealt with. If, in the face of new social movements, the South African bourgeoisie relied on its most barbaric traditional weapons, the police and military forces, the dynamic of the confrontation between the classes carried with it unprecedented developments for this country: the working class had never before shown such combativity and development of consciousness, faced with a bourgeoisie that had never had to develop such sophisticated manoeuvres, including extensive use of the weapon of rank and file unionism animated by the extreme left of capital. In this clash between the two real historic classes, the determination of the proletariat would go so far as to provoke the dismantling of the system of apartheid, resulting in the unification of all fractions of the bourgeoisie with the aim of confronting the surge in the struggle of the working class.

and students whose anger exploded in June 1976 in Soweto. Since then, the popular insurrection hardly knew a lull. The violent police repression (about 500 deaths in the city of Soweto alone, hundreds of others across the country, thousands wounded) united the entire black population in this common fight. “Many of the young people behind the popular movement fell under police bul- lets during non-violent protests or during civilian militia raids in black neighbour- hoods. Adults, struck by the courage and determination of the younger generation, joined them, and followed the slogans raised by their spokespeople: workers’ strikes and boycotts of transport were organised several times in the black areas of Johannesburg and Cape Town. They were massively followed, including by the Coloured populations of the Cape Prov- Students marching in Soweto, June 16th 1976 ince. The destruction of school buildings, drinking places, administration buildings Before that, in 1976, following the wave by the apartheid system. A movement of and means of transport which marked the of struggles that marked the 1973-74 pe- young people was immediately followed beginning of the popular revolt were fol- riod, we witnessed a vigorous continuation by the mobilisation of thousands of adults, lowed by more orchestrated but equally of this episode of struggle: the uprising active and unemployed workers. Shaken successful campaigns. Boycotts of classes of the school pupils. In June of that year by this formidable proletarian explosion, and exams until the release of imprisoned some ten thousand young people took to the regime responded in its customary way youths, general mourning in memory of the the streets to protest against compulsory by unleashing its guard dogs – the forces victims of repression, boycott of drinking education in Afrikaans and more generally of repression – on the protesters and kill- establishments, department stores, Christ- against the bad living conditions imposed ing hundreds of demonstrators including mas celebrations.” children: . We often speak of the years 1973-74 and We are in the presence here of a great pro- ‘76 without referring to 1975. Indeed, that “Since the great strikes of 1973-74, letarian insurrectional movement against year experienced fewer struggles and appeared another front of struggle was opened in as a moment of “pause” before the storm of South Africa: that of black schoolchildren . Brigitte Lachartre, Luttes ouvrières et libération Soweto. en Afrique du Sud, Editions Syros, 1977. 20 International Review 158 Spring 2017 the general misery imposed by one of the Here was a powerful social movement Soweto, and that thanks to their previous most brutal forms of capitalism: apartheid. that crystallised at a high level some of experience, they could play a decisive An uprising of indignation by youth ech- the characteristics of the wave of strug- role in its radicalisation and politicisation. oed the resurgence of international class gles on an international scale. We can see Such potentialities for the development of struggle marked by huge workers’ strikes that the strong combativity of the working militancy and consciousness could only in the early 1970s in countries around the class which lay behind the massive strikes shake the bourgeoisie which, moreover, world. A movement that eventually spread also expressed itself in a strong will for was forced to become fully aware of it at to the major industrial areas of the country, self-organisation, and this explains the the inter-imperialist level. leading to and mixing into a single struggle extraordinary proliferation of “civics”. of workers and people of all ages. Faced To our knowledge this is the first time we The great imperialist powers get with a struggle of this magnitude, with a have witnessed, on this scale, in South involved surge of proletarian anger threatening to Africa (and on the African continent), undermine the system, the barbaric regime such forms of self-organisation, where for The Soweto movement was prolonged by could not hide its panic and responded with several years the social life of neighbour- strikes and demonstrations until 1977 when a bloody terror, even though this aroused hoods was literally in the hands of the police repression still resulted in many vic- widespread outrage in the country and inhabitants themselves who debated every tims, like the teenager Steve Biko, a militant amplified the anger and mobilisation of the subject and took charge of all the problems of the “Black Consciousness” movement. whole population of Soweto and beyond. concerning them. This was the most wor- The murder of this young man in a local Workers, the unemployed and families with rying aspect for the bourgeoisie, which police station refuelled the struggles and children joined the school pupils’ fight and saw its authority slipping away. Certainly amplified the protests, the victim thus be- were also subjected to the batons and bullets one can note that some committees took, coming a “martyr” of apartheid, especially of the forces of order, causing thousands here and there, an inter-classist character in the eyes of all the defenders of the “black of victims in their ranks. or religious connotation, especially to the cause” around the world. Thus, in Africa, extent that bourgeois forces (unions, par- But the savagery of the killings only as in America and especially in Europe, ties, churches, etc.) infiltrated them. How- served to radicalise the movement, which where there were numerous demonstrations ever, it should be clear that the “civics”, continued until 1977 with massive strikes against the apartheid regime, led mainly by despite the ideological heterogeneity that and demonstrations and tended to politicise trade unions and leftist parties, one could characterised them, were fundamentally itself by generating countless struggle com- read (in France) slogans such as: “Against the product of a genuine proletarian class mittees called “civics”, consisting mainly Franco-South African friendly relations struggle. Moreover, the aspect of self-or- (tourism, sport, culture); against French of workers (unionised or not), the unem- ganisation in the Soweto uprising shows a ployed, young people and their parents. emigration in South Africa; against deliv- further step in relation to the politicisation eries of weapons and technology to South “The civics developed rapidly in the that had characterised the South African Africa; against imports of South African proletariat in the powerful movement of Cape at the end of the 1970s. They extended products, etc.” in a certain way the forms of organisation struggle in the years 1973-1974, particu- within the townships which had arisen larly in terms of solidarity and unity in the Conscious of the intensification of the during the movements of June 1976 in the class struggle. Therefore a clear link can movement, in particular with the radicali- Transvaal. There were practically as many be established in the continuity between sation of the proletarian youth of Soweto, specific histories as there were organisa- the two movements of struggle, the second the NATO imperialist bloc increased the tions, since these were very often born taking over from the first to go further in pressure on its South African ally (including out of the particular needs of a township the development of class consciousness, as at the economic level by boycotting South or neighbourhood. Many appeared in the illustrated by the following quote relating African products) to prevent the political form of struggle committees either for the to the balance sheet of the preceding wave destabilisation that threatened its future. boycott of public transport against an of struggles: But above all to deal with the ideological exploitation of the events by the Russian increase in fares or for a boycott of rents “The development of solidarity of black bloc which, not content with arming and against their rise. Some took the form of workers in action and growing conscious- funding the ANC, also began to openly ma- political committees dealing with all the ness of their class unity were stressed by nipulate the various demonstrations around problems of the community. The movement many observers. This achievement of the the world against the apartheid regime. It was infinitely diverse: cultural, religious struggles, though unquantifiable, was is in this context that South African offi- associations, youth, students or high considered by them as the most positive cials finally accepted the “advice” of their school students, students’ parents, were for the progress of the organisation of the Western sponsors by becoming aware of gradually assimilated to the concept of black workers’ movement. (...) These strikes the risks they faced. Thus even among the ‘civics’. Also, there was not just one com- were also political: the fact that the workers most extreme South African leaders there mittee per ward or township but a complex demanded the doubling of their wages is was a change of tone or tactics towards web of activist memberships and areas of not a sign of the naivety or stupidity of Af-  the strikers: intervention.” ricans. Rather, it expresses the rejection of their situation and their desire for a totally “Unless we succeed in creating a strong . Civics or CBOs (Community Based different society. The workers returned to middle class among the blacks, we will Organisations): “Popular associations, often on work with some modest achievements, but have serious problems” (Botha, minister the basis of a geographical area or street, whose they were less satisfied now than they were of defence). “We must give enough to the members organise themselves and decide the  blacks for them to believe in separate de- organisation’s goals”. This definition is from before the strikes.” the book La figure ouvrière en Afrique du Sud, velopment [a euphemism for the apartheid From this fact, we can deduce that system] and so they will carefully protect Karthala, 2008. many of the actors in the 1973-74 strikes . Claude Jacquin, Une gauche syndicale en Afrique what they have from the agitators. Nothing du Sud (1978-1993), Editions l’Harmattan, 1994. The joined the insurrectional movement in will happen to us if we give these people author is a journalist and researcher specialising in the new South African trade unions. . Jacquin, Op. Cit. . Ibid. History of the working class in South Africa 21 enough to be afraid of losing what they regime undertook a major turn by deciding hatred and divergences in order to unite have ... A happy person cannot become a to introduce new political orientations for behind the national capital of South Africa communist.” (Kruger, minister of police nothing less than the (progressive) disman- as a whole. and justice). tling of the apartheid system, which meant This marked a truly historic turning point the dissolution of racial barriers and the The Pretoria government therefore de- in the life of the South African bourgeoisie integration of black nationalist movements cided to make a number of concessions in in general and within the Afrikaner fac- into the (democratic) political circus. But line with the demands of the young people tion in particular. Since the terrible “Boer to get to this point, the apartheid regime in struggle, for example by withdrawing its 12 had to be shaken to its foundations. Every- Wars” of 1899-1902, when the British law to impose on African students educa- thing changed in the mid-1970s due to the crushed the Afrikaners, hatred between the tion in Afrikaans and also by lifting the eruption of the class struggle, but up until descendants of settlers from the two former ban on the inhabitants of Soweto owning then the bourgeoisie had not really been colonial powers remained visible until the or building their own homes, while recog- disturbed by the social question: eve of the end of apartheid, even though nising the right to association implied by they had to govern the country together the existence of trade union and political “The events of Soweto in June 1976 on several occasions. A significant faction organisations. would confirm the political change under- of Afrikaners had long dreamed of taking way in the country. The youth revolt in the In truth, South African capital (its most revenge on the British Empire, as shown Transvaal combined with the rebirth of the “enlightened” sector) had not waited for by the fact that during the Second World black workers’ movement to unleash the the movement of Soweto to start imple- War a good part of the Afrikaner leaders major social and political movements of the menting its plans to relax the apartheid (including the military) openly showed 1980s. After the strikes of 1973, the clashes their support for the Hitler regime which regime in order to better thwart the work-  ers’ struggles: of 1976 ended the period of defeat.” was their ideological reference point, and by the decision of the Afrikaner regime This is a real reversal of the situation, “Society had shifted. The system was no to leave the Commonwealth and change given that apartheid was designed above all longer safe from destabilisation. The gov- the name of the country from the Union against the class struggle with the aim of ernment and the South African employers of South Africa to the Republic of South avoiding the development of a multiracial would therefore make some adjustments, 10 Africa). in order to frame as bureaucratically as working class through segregation and possible the socio-political changes. The the attribution of “rights and privileges” To address this major historical turning Bantu Labour Regulation Act of 1973 thus to fractions of the working class. In other point in the dismantling of apartheid, South completed the arsenal of labour regula- words, the theory of the so-called “su- African capital found a sizeable strategic tions. It established two types of factory premacy” of whites over blacks concretely ally, namely trade unionism, but of a new committees: works committees composed translated into (skilled) jobs and other kind, in this case a “radical”, “rank and file” only of workers’ representatives; liaison benefits reserved exclusively for workers unionism (discussed below), as the only committees made up of employer and em- of European origin, while their fellow one capable, in its eyes, of stemming the ployee representatives in equal numbers Africans, Indians and Coloureds had to tide of struggle that threatened to become (...) And the Urban Training Project played be content with unfavourable conditions more and more dangerous. And this time, 11 the game and tried to use these factory of work, wages and existence. In so given the importance of the stakes of the committees to stabilise the trade unions it doing, the apartheid regime succeeded in epoch, all the decisive principal actors of the South African bourgeoisie clearly assumed coordinated.” corrupting a large part of the working class of European origin by making it voluntar- this new orientation, including the most The implementation of this device well ily or passively adhere to its segregationist reactionary, not to say fascist, apartheid before the outbreak of the Soweto revolt system. And all this succeeded for a very supporters like Botha, Kruger, etc. Simi- clearly expressed the intent of the South long period (between 1940 and 1980) in larly, as will be seen later, it was the latter, African bourgeoisie to take into account the the division of the South African proletariat together with De Klerk (former president), evolution of the situation which threatened which was thus hampered in its capacity to who directly steered the negotiation proc- to escape its control. Indeed, in drawing the develop struggles that might obstruct the ess with Mandela’s ANC with a view to lessons from the first wave of struggles in smooth running of capitalism. dismantling the apartheid system. the years 1972-74, it had been forced to take a number of bold steps, the principal ones A historic turning point in the To save its system of production being to give more “power” to the African apartheid system the bourgeoisie gives birth to new trade unions by greatly increasing their unions number and expanding their “rights” with This reversal of the situation was also the aim of avoiding “political turmoil”. It reflected in a rapprochement between the Faced with the collapse of the old union found, however, that this was not enough to two factions of the bourgeoisie from the apparatus provoked by the explosion of prevent the development of the struggles, two former colonial powers, namely the struggles in the 1970s, and this despite the as shown by the Soweto movement. British and Dutch, who, faced with the rise reinforcement by the state of the means at of the proletariat, and a tendency towards their disposal, the bourgeoisie decided to The proletarian class struggle the unity of all its ethnic components, de- resort outright to what could be called “rank shakes the apartheid system ciding to forget their ancestral ideological and file unionism” or “shop stewards”, taking the form of new “fighting” trade In an apparent effort to counter the pro- . Jacquin, Op. Cit. unions that wanted to be independent of 10. On the basis of apartheid and its harmful effects the large union centres: letarian class struggle, the South African on the working class struggle see the article “From the birth of capitalism to the eve of the Second World 12. On this conflict, with its hundreds of thousands . Ibid. War” in International Review no 154. of victims, and repercussions for relations between . In the words of a South African leader quoted in 11. In fact, the first discriminatory measures were the two former colonial powers, see the article in the article “From the Second World War to the mid- introduced in South Africa in 1924 by the Labour International Review n° 154. 1970s” in International Review n° 155. government, in which the Afrikaners participated. 22 International Review 158 Spring 2017

“During the 1970s, several union the strike movements of the 1980s.”14 This was a union created exclusively by currents developed and differentiated and for black workers, hence its opposition themselves amid the resurgence of social This was a very “radical” and “critical” to all other unions (even those that were conflicts. Their stories intertwine to the trade union group vis-à-vis the union and 99% black). But this orientation was par- rhythm of splits and unifications. Three political apparatus, but it was an unprec- ticularly pernicious because it gave the im- union projects thus developed on the basis edented development in the period of pression of creating “positive segregation” of some distinct political and ideological apartheid in that it was able to join together by claiming to fulfil legitimate objectives assumptions. black and white workers and intellectuals, such as improving the knowledge of black radical political opponents of various kinds. workers, or promoting their qualification. “The first was constituted (or reconsti- In short, it was a new union apparatus called And in doing so it was able to “seduce” a tuted) around the union tradition of the to play a major role in South African politi- large number of class consciousness work- South African Congress of Trade Unions cal life. As was the case for the bourgeoisie ers. In other words, it acted as an obstacle (SACTU) and its link to the African Na- of the large European industries, faced to unity in the struggle between workers tional Congress (ANC). The second was with the radicalisation of the workers’ of all ethnic origins. Besides this, to drive formed from the new Black Conscious- struggle, South African capital was forced the point home, the BAWU immediately ness Movement, forming in particular the 15 to use “base unionism”. Similarly, as approached the “Black Consciousness Council of Unions of South Africa (CUSA). in Europe, in these “radical unions” was Movement”: The last, finally, appeared in an original usually found a large number of leftists; way, with no apparent link to a known this was the case with FOSATU, which “This position reflects the general atti- political current. It was founded in 1979 was led more or less openly by elements tude of the various organisations that made as the Federation of South African Trade close to the “Unity Movement”, that is to up the black consciousness movement, in Unions (FOSATU).”13 say, Trotskyists. We will come back to this particular of black students (South African Students’ Organisation – SASO – which This was a radical reorganisation of the later. How would the new base unions, once formed, accomplish their dirty work was separate from the National Union of trade union system with the function of neu- South African Students (NUSAS) in order, tralising the workers’ struggles if they could at the head or inside of the movements of the Soweto struggle? according to its militants, to escape the not be prevented. But what this shows first paternalism shown by all whites vis-à-vis is that the leadership of the South African blacks.”17 regime was fully aware of the danger of The struggles of Soweto poisoned the development of the class struggle from by the trade unions and the Thus the groups in the student milieu 1973 up to the Soweto movement in 1976 ideological confusions of the adopted openly and without difficulty the proletariat and beyond. It realised that the apartheid orientation of the BAWU union; that is, system in all its forms was no longer becoming openly racist and playing the adapted to the rise of the workers’ grow- As might be expected, the regime’s con- same role of division of the workers’ ranks ing militancy and consciousness. Clearly, cessions could not really calm the Soweto as the most racist white unions. In short, the bourgeois regime had to take note of movement; on the contrary they merely it was far from defending the common the fact that the system of unionisation served to radicalise it, but also to divide its interests of the South African proletariat, based on the division of workers accord- participants, both in the schools and among and even those of the black fraction of the ing to their ethnic origins was no longer the workers. For example, some organisa- working class. And indeed, behind this appropriate and that the apparatus of the tions more or less satisfied themselves with regroupment or alliance between workers large unions, such as TUCSA (Trade Union the government’s concessions while others and students we can see the harmfulness Council of South Africa) were no longer with a more radical appearance demanded of the race question, especially when it is credible among the combative workers, more. In fact there was a division of labour couched in terms of “black consciousness” especially the younger generation. Hence in the work of the unions. Besides FOSATU as opposed to “white consciousness”, rather the emergence of these new unions to play (among the new radical unions), the Black than the consciousness of the proletarian the role of a “fighting”, “base” unionism, Allied Workers’ Union (BAWU) played class. And this even as the conditions “independent” of the union apparatus. an important role. Created in 1973 in the were largely met for unity in the struggle wake of the major strikes in Johannesburg, as shown by the strike movements taking The following passage relating to FO- it campaigned for the exclusive regroup- place in the country where many sectors SATU (Federation of South African Trade ing of black workers of all categories and of workers were fighting for class and not Unions) is eloquent about the reality of industrial sectors: racial demands, which were in fact often these new unions: “Its aims were primarily: ‘To organise successful. Moreover, to the difficulties of “Our study is particularly devoted to and unify the black workers in a power- the alliance between workers and students this union current (FOSATU), which was ful workers’ movement, able to gain the linked to racial and trade union divisions formed from networks of intellectuals and respect and recognition of the employers was added the corporatism and petty bour- students, themselves the products of a spe- and the government to improve the work- geois spirit of the intellectuals who were cific phase of the socio-economic evolution ers’ knowledge through general and spe- strongly present in this struggle movement. of the country. cialised educational programmes, in order As a result, despite the strong momentum created by the general resurgence of the “(…) Thus, in barely ten years, a group to promote their qualification to represent struggle in the early 1970s, the combativ- of intellectuals (mainly white) and black black workers and their interests in the 16 ity of the workers and youth of Soweto workers would create a new form of union workplace.’” was diverted into a dead end: the move- organisation. It would initially present itself ment was diverted and divided by ethnic as a point of reference independent of the rivalries between ethnic, corporatist and ANC and radically opposed to the Com- 14. Ibid. petty bourgeois cliques, which ultimately munist Party. It would lead a large part of 15. See the ICC pamphlet Unions against the working class, which widely addresses the issue of “base stifled every purely proletarian attempt at unionism” and its nature. 13. Jacquin, Op. Cit 16. Lachartre, Op. Cit. 17. Ibid. History of the working class in South Africa 23 orientation of the struggle: they were suppressed. For this there was Birth and characteristics of FOSATU: an ANC prison camp in Mozambique, Founded in 1979, it was the result of a “One of the important and not least the Quatro, where torture was used trade union re-organisation following surprising aspects of the creation of African 19 the disappearance or self-dissolution trade unions in Natal is the role played by against recalcitrant internal opponents.” of the main former trade unions in the groups of academics, students or white Clearly, even before coming to power, aftermath of the vigorous strike action teachers. The importance of the role of the the ANC already conducted itself as an of 1973, which shook the entire country. handful of intellectuals who made a deep executioner of the working class. But what commitment to the African workers does the Trotskyist group Lutte Ouvrière, which This new union current gave birth to not mean that the South African university we have just cited, does not say is that the the most important unions in industry was the vanguard of protest and combat party of Mandela was involved in the war (except the mines): automobiles, metal- for the liberation of the black masses. Far in Angola in the 1980s on behalf of the lurgy, chemicals, textiles, etc. The same from it. The conservatism and racism of Russian imperialist bloc, where it received year that FOSATU was founded, the South Afrikaner youth, the recklessness of An- support from neighbouring countries (op- African state facilitated its role by decid- glophone students and the corporatism of ponents of the NATO bloc): Mozambique, ing to grant the title of “employee” 21 to all professional intellectuals were the general Angola, Zimbabwe, etc. This was the period blacks including those in the Bantustans, rule. As for black students, having volun- when the ANC and CP articulated their followed soon after by African workers tarily left the white student organisations struggle for “national liberation” with con- from neighbouring countries. This hugely (in 1972), it seems that their struggle for frontations between the imperialist powers promoted the unionisation of workers in their own survival as a group and their of the east/west blocs, clearly relying on all sectors of the country, amply benefiting participation in the Black Consciousness the support of Moscow. Similarly, while FOSATU by allowing it to create its own Movement captured their entire militant internally the struggle was being broken “development project”: energy.”18 militarily, externally South Africa was “In the early 1980s [this union move- playing the role of “deputy gendarme” of Clearly, in these conditions the real ment] developed an original trade union the western imperialist bloc in southern proletarian vanguard could hardly put project, based on a conception explicitly Africa, hence its military involvement, itself forward because it was tied down independent of the main political forces, like all its rivals, in the war in Angola and and corralled by the nationalist or racist formed from networks of intellectuals other neighbouring countries. trade unions, and sometimes by the cor- and students, themselves produced from poratist factions of the intellectual petty a specific phase of the socio-economic bourgeoisie, manipulated by various po- From FOSATU to COSATU, South evolution of the country; it corresponded litical groups like the CP, ANC and leftist African trade unionism at the to a real social and economic change in elements. From this point on, we can see service of the national capital the country and accompanied the gradual more clearly the limits of the development transformation of the organisation of the of class consciousness, especially among Since the entry of capitalism into decadence labour market.”22 the young people of Soweto, whose strug- (marked by the first imperialist world con- gle was their first experience as members flict in 1914), trade unionism has ceased to It was, therefore, in this context that this of the proletarian class. be a real organ of struggle for the working trade union movement was propelled by class, and even worse, has become a coun- its desire to be both a “trade union left” ter-revolutionary instrument in the service and a “political left”, and that many of its The ANC diverts the youth of the capitalist state. This is illustrated by leaders were influenced by Trotskyist and struggle of Soweto towards the Stalinist ideology: imperialist armed struggle the history of the class struggle in South 20 Africa. But the study of the history of “Towards the end of the 1920s, militants Having infiltrated the various organs of trade unionism in the case of the Federation adhering to Trotskyist critiques split from the working class youth of Soweto, the of South African Trade Unions (FOSATU) the Communist Party. Some of them were ANC extended its control over a large and COSATU (Congress of South African leaders of a broad movement in the 1940s number of radical youths coming from Trade Unions) shows us the power of a called the Unity Movement. Furthermore, a the “civics” and managed to enrol them new unionism capable of simultaneously renowned trade unionist in the thirties and in the armed struggle by sending them to exerting influence on a highly combative forties, Max Gordon, was a Trotskyist. proletariat and on the archaic apartheid military training camps in neighbouring “This current fragmented and greatly countries. The ANC especially targeted regime. FOSATU made use of its “genius” for organising, to the point of being simul- weakened in the late fifties. But there still the most active elements of the Soweto existed in Cape Town, in the seventies, a movement, those who were seeking to taneously heard by both the exploited and the exploiter in order to astutely “manage” strong presence of these groups, mainly escape the police repression of the South among Coloured teachers.” African regime, promising them “training” the conflicts between the two antagonists to better fight against the apartheid regime. – which meant, in the final analysis, serving “(…) In interviews done in Cape Town And once there, many critical youths were the bourgeoisie. Similarly, it played the role in 1982 and 1983, we were able to verify systematically punished by imprisonment of “facilitator” in the “peaceful transition” that the leader of the municipal workers’ or even death: between the “white power” and the “black union, John Erentzen, had been a member power” resulting in the establishment of a of the Unity Movement. Marcel Golding, “Those ANC soldiers unhappy with this “national unity” government. before entering the union leadership of policy did not have the right to discuss it in the name of discipline. In 1983, the 21. Under apartheid a South African black worker, ANC participated in the Angolan civil war, 19. “L’Afrique du Sud: de l’apartheid au pouvoir even if they had worked for decades in the country, sending protesting soldiers there to get rid de l’ANC”, Cercle Léon Trotsky http://www.lutte was not considered an “employee” because this term ouvriere.org/documents/archives/cercle-leon-trotsky/ was reserved for “rights-holders”, that is essentially of them. And when hundreds of survivors article/afrique-du-sud-de-l-apartheid-au-9666. . white workers (and to a lesser degree Mestizo and who returned mutinied the following year, 20. See the articles in the International Review n° Indian workers). 18. Ibid. 154 and 155. 22. Jacquin, Op. Cit. 24 International Review 158 Spring 2017 the miners becoming one of its leaders, The thread is pretty similar to what the hostility or reluctance of other trade union was part of a study group of Trotskyist leaders of the FOSATU thought about the movements before convincing or marginal- orientation.” South African process: industrial growth, ising them, like the Union of Mineworkers little improvement of the workers’ status, (NUM) or some unions close to the “Black “(...) Alec Elwin (First Secretary of FO- repression, control of demand, internal Consciousness” Movement. SATU) said he was influenced initially by differentiation in the union and the evolu- the French Althusser and Poulantzas. He tion of the Walesa group ... And the article mentioned the importance for people like FOSATU prepares to integrate ends: ‘the struggle of Polish workers is an him of the debate that existed in Britain itself into the political apparatus inspiration to all other workers in struggle’. in the seventies on the question of shop (...) In 1985, issues 39 and 40 published stewards, that is to say, workshop delegates At its origin in 1979, FOSATU consisted a long article reporting on the Workers’ and rank and file organisation. Another 26 of three registered (legal) trade unions and important factor for this generation of Party of Brazil (PT).” nine unregistered unions,28 which meant radical intellectuals was the contribution Here we can clearly see the similarities that the latter were dominant and their of a renewed Marxist analysis of apartheid in the approach of unions like FOSATU weight was reflected in the Federation’s (by people like Martin Legassick) regard- and those of Walesa and Lula, especially ideological and strategic choices. This was ing capitalist relations of production. Thus in terms of their preparations to accede to until the moment when FOSATU decided there gradually emerged an alternative the highest levels of the state. to initiate a shift towards its institutional theory to that of the Communist Party.” integration, that is to say, by becoming Thus armed with its experience of more and more involved in power, albeit From these quotes we can see clearly politico-trade union manoeuvring in the remaining “radical”: the role played historically23 by the struggles of the 1970s and 1980s, FOSATU Trotskyist current or its “nebula” in the could openly put itself in the service of “The debate on registration took the form unions in general and in base unionism in South African national capital by taking of a sharp polemic against the unions of FO- particular. We have seen previously that advantage of its “aura” to work for the SATU that were registered. The attack came the Trotskyist current was involved in the constitution of a new trade unionism rid of from the GWU (pro-Black Consciousness) formation of new radical unions in the the archaic apartheid trade union apparatus, and, in a much more virulent way, from the wake of the struggles of the 1970s. In this making its hazy union doctrine prevail SAAWU (pro-ANC). The arguments were context it is worth noting a specific facet by relying essentially on the industrial roughly similar: loss of independence of the contribution of Trotskyism to the workers, as indicated in the text of its first vis-à-vis the state and obstructing a true counter- revolution, namely “entryism”24 congress: democratic functioning of the trade unions into the social democratic parties (and trade which had to comply with the constraints “The federation will essentially consist of official control, etc.” unions); that is, joining (clandestinely) of unions of industrial branches to the these bourgeois organisations supposedly extent that this is, within the framework of “(...) Other debates were conducted dur- to seize (in due course) their leadership existing industrial structures, the best way ing negotiations. And it was the shape of the (for the revolution). In fact, this practice to promote workers’ unity and the interests future confederation which most troubled is anti-proletarian and expresses a clear of workers, and as far as this is also the the FOSATU leadership. It was convinced contempt for the working class in whose best way for it to concentrate on the areas that the model of FOSATU was best suited name its (hidden) practitioners claim to to its company union sections, its industrial 25 of workers’ concerns. This, however, does act. Another consequence of this practice not reflect support for current industrial branch unions, regional structures (inter- is that it is impossible to positively identify relations.” professional, in the terminology of French “entrists”, to know, even approximately, unionism), its grassroots democracy based the number of FOSATU leaders who were “(...) The absence of racial divisions on shop stewards, etc.” under Trotskyist influence at one time (non-racialism), workers’ control, trade or another during their stay in the South union branches, grassroots organising, “(...) The leadership of FOSATU finally African Trade unions. international workers’ solidarity, trade convinced the majority of its partners on union unity.”27 these union issues. But it is important Here we can put forward the idea that the to note here that the unification process leaders of the “trade union left” embodied If we situate FOSATU’s politico-union towards the foundation of COSATU was by FOSATU/COSATU were marked by manoeuvring in the context of apartheid, finally clarified when the SAAWU changed various bourgeois ideological influences: we can understand the relative ease with position, in our opinion, after the leaders in ranging from Trotskyism to Social-Democ- which the Federation was able to attract a exile of the ANC and the Communist Party racy through Stalinism, “Solidarnosc” trade number of workers struggling or conscious themselves decided to change their attitude. unionism (Poland), the “Workers’ Party” of the need for unity in the struggle across And also when the NUM, the mining union of Lula (Brazil): ethnic boundaries. Besides its status as the member of CUSA and by far its biggest af- first union in the industrial sector, it made filiate, decided in December 1984 to break “In October 1983 the newspaper ‘FO- particular use of its combative image in the SATU Work News’ published a double page with its federation and participate fully in eyes of many workers from the struggles the launch of COSATU.”29 centrefold article on Solidarity and Poland. in the 1970s-80s to earn their trust. With 23. See in this regard the articles in International its well-organised apparatus of “fighting By integrating the mining union (NUM), Review, no 154 and 155. unionism” it entered into discussions with FOSATU definitively imposed itself 24. The infiltration of the left parties (SP/CP) was all the other unions which had retained an in the decisive sectors of the national theorised by Trotsky in 1930. For more on this see the ICC pamphlet in French Le trotskisme contre la influence, with a view to federating them, 28. Under apartheid, registered unions were unions classe ouvrière. although not without great difficulties, recognised by the state, while those not registered 25. It is certainly no accident that many of these especially with those under control of the were tolerated up to certain limit but not recognised grass roots leaders (including Marcel Golding) left ANC/CP. It also had to contend with the by law. unionism at the end of the apartheid regime to become 29. The NUM was created in 1982. It claimed 20,000 rich businessmen and influential politicians (discussed 26. Jacquin, Op. Cit. members in 1983 and 110,000 in 1984. Initially it was in the next article). 27. Ibid. hostile to its state registration (Jacquin, Op. cit.). History of the working class in South Africa 25 economy and became from that moment ganisation of the black population, the “(...) More and more violent polemics the obligatory partner of the regime. It civics, or community associations. This developed at the rhythm of major social thus reinforced its control over the most term was often used to group all asso- conflicts: a general strike, a local or combative sectors of the working class and ciative forms emerging in the townships. regional stay-away, or even a boycott of took the initiative to successfully unite the white-owned businesses, indiscriminately “Considerable work remains to be done main trade unions. This was a remarkable aimed at factory employees and the popula- on these movements because they have not journey for FOSATU, which managed to tion of the townships; and in these areas, received the same attention as the trade bring together the major influential trade such as Port Elizabeth or East London, unions on the part of researchers. unions in a great confederation throughout where at least 50% of the unemployed were the country, leading to the creation of the “(...) It seems that the development of already at that time, it was not possible Congress of South African Trade Unions the civics started mainly in the Cape un- to organise movements of this magnitude (COSATU). der the impact of two competing political without relying on the complementarity of currents at the time in this region: one of the civics and the trade unions. Each party Once again, FOSATU showed its “politi- the independent political left (nebulous obviously had such a unitary conviction. cal genius” and organisational expertise by political heir to the “Unity Movement”) But the political stakes were such that each evolving from a radical opposition of the and the other related to or influenced by sought to exert hegemonic pressure on left to a union alongside the great nation- the ANC. Networks of associations were the other. There were all sorts of conflicts alist bureaucratic apparatus with the aim divided according to political sympathies. including between associations controlled of acceding to bourgeois power; and this Thus, in the Cape, militants of the Unity by AZAPO (the People’s Organisation of without any openly hostile working class Movement formed with the associations Azania) and certain unions. reaction. It is notable that these “pimps” they controlled the Federation of Cape of the working class for the left bourgeois “(...) Examples abound of cases of physi- Civic Associations and militants of the ANC apparatus had to proceed methodically step cal violence. FOSATU leaders complained and the Communist Party formed their own by step. First: by opting for a left political that, because there was no real centralisa- Cape Area Housing Action Committee (CA- and union “radicalism” to better seduce the tion, groups of young people linked to the HAC). This cartelisation then developed combative workers; second: by unifying the civics sometimes attacked workers carrying at the national level with, in addition, the union apparatus, and third: by promoting out their normal work. Bus drivers could activity of the Azapo party (heir to the Black the constitution of a broad trade union and be attacked or even killed by young people Consciousness Movement) and of militants political front in order to “wisely” govern who did not understand or simply ignored and supporters of the PAC (Pan Africanist the post-apartheid country. the trade union opposition to this or that Congress). In the mid-eighties the majority 31 Of course, in its quest for trade union of the political currents appeared publicly appeal.” and political unity, COSATU could not under the banner of the groupings of the In short, this is how the “civics” were integrate two currents close to the “Black civics they controlled”. 30 scuttled by the various trade union, na- Consciousness” movement and the PAC. tionalist and democratic forces vying for We can only share the opinion of the Both of them preferred to remain in opposi- control. In other words, we see that the author of the quote that the “civics” have tion with their own unitary federation, the ANC and its rivals did not hesitate to train not received the same attention from re- National Council of Trade Unions (NAC- many young people to kill each other or searchers as the unions and that much work TU). There were also other small white or to attack and kill active workers like bus remains to be done on these movements. corporatist unions. However, they had no drivers. And this for the greater good of This being said, the other major point to decisive influence on the organisation of the common enemy, namely the national emphasise is the relentlessness with which struggles compared to COSATU. capital. Certainly, the ANC reached the the union and political vultures attempted to pinnacle of crimes committed against the It is through this that the ex-FOSATU neutralise the organisations resulting from youth of Soweto for having enlisted a large leaders would continue to pursue their the insurrectionary struggles of Soweto. number of former civic members into an “trade union mission”, to the point that In order to catch up with the movement imperialist camp and sending them to the many are now playing their role of manag- they had not initiated, all these bourgeois slaughter for so-called “national liberation” ers in charge of South African capital, as forces proceeded by infiltration and sordid (see previous section). ministers or big business owners. maneuvers to sabotage the various com- mittees under the name of “CIVICs” and Control of the struggle finally managed to control them and use The strikes return in the midst of committees (civics) at stake in them as instruments in their struggle for an economic recession the bitter struggles of the union/ influence in order to gain power. In 1983, political apparatus we saw a series of demonstrations and In 1982/83, strikes broke out in many areas strikes mobilising more and more people, against government austerity measures, By becoming widespread and taking over especially in Soweto but also in other re- particularly in the mines and automobile the whole of social life in the main districts gions. This was the moment chosen by the industry, mobilising tens of thousands of of the industrial cities over a period of ANC to intensify its control over the social workers and seriously hitting the factories time (generally between 1976 and 1985), movements by creating an organisation of General Motors, Ford, Volkswagen, etc. the civics eventually became the central called the “United Democratic Front”, a Like many other countries at this time, prize for all the organs of power in South kind of “forum” or simple “net” in which South Africa was hit by the economic crisis Africa and the struggle for control over Mandela’s party managed to catch many that plunged it deep into recession. them provoked bitter clashes between of the “CIVICs”. And the ANC’s rivals “The recession that opened in 1981-82 union/political gangsters: were not slow to respond by chasing the was marked by a shortness of breath of the same autonomous groups, accompanied by whole system including at the institutional “One of the major problems fac- criminal violence on both sides: ing the new union movement was the level. Between 1980 and 1985, corporate development of another form of or- 30. Jacquin, Op. Cit. 31. Ibid. 26 International Review 158 Spring 2017 bankruptcies rose by 500%. The interest class terrain by refusing to submit without lasted 5 days) and representing 5.25 mil- rate went from 9.5% to 17% in 1981; it responding to the economic attacks of the lion days lost. (...) The NUM threw all its reached 18% in 1982 and 25% in August bourgeoisie. Of course, it was clearly no- strength into this battle which was its big- 1985. In 1982, the country still enjoyed a ticeable that the workers in struggle were gest challenge since its creation in 1982. net inflow of 662 million rand; in 1983, it strongly under the control of unionism, It demanded a 30% wage increase, a risk had a deficit of 93 million rand. The rand particularly base unionism, which took premium, 5 years’ salary given to families which was worth $1.09 in 1982 was worth the lead in the movement in order to take of miners killed in accidents instead of two less than $ 0.37 at the end of 1985. The control of it, eventually scuttling the strikes years’, 30 days paid leave and June 16, total of investments went from 2.346 mil- before they compromised the interests the anniversary of the uprisings in Soweto, lion rand in 1981 to 1.408 in 1984. That of South African national capital. In this designated as a paid holiday. same year, the external debt reached $24.8 sense, it is remarkable that during the strike “Mining companies lost 17 million billion, including 13 billion short term. The movements in 1982, no role was assigned rand in this conflict but yielded on almost volume of manufacturing output fell, labour to the “civics”, on the contrary everything nothing. The coordination of the Chamber costs increased, unemployment grew, the was the work of the trade unions, in par- of Mines proved effective. Their leaders 32 ticular of FOSATU, which could rely on its volume of exports decreased.” remained extremely firm, led by those of radicalised base organisations to ensure the 34 “Faced with the scale of the recession, supremacy of its version of militancy, and Anglo-America.” the South African government had to take deter any attempt at autonomous organisa- Once again the working class dem- drastic measures against the living condi- tion outside the apparatus constituted as onstrated its will to fight, even if this tions of the working class - mass lay-offs the negotiator with the state. was clearly not enough to force back the and wage cuts, etc. For its part, despite its bourgeoisie, which refused to yield on the enormous weakening resulting mainly from In 1984-85, important strikes broke out main demands of the strikers. Moreover, the struggles for control waged by the ANC in the Transvaal/Port Elizabeth, mobilising employers and the state knew they could and rival cliques, the working class could tens of thousands of workers and involving count on the unions to keep control of the not remain arms crossed and therefore had the population by combining multiple de- workers, that the unions might have been to go into struggle, showing once again that mands (wages, education, housing, right to “radical” but were very “responsible” its combativeness remained intact. In this vote, etc.). In parallel to the miners’ strikes when it came to protecting the interests respect, as an illustrative example, one can and those of other employees, businesses of the national capital. Yet despite this, the take the year1982 when most of the conflicts owned by whites and public transport were working class refused to give up, returning concerned wage claims (170), followed by actively boycotted, and thousands of young to the fight massively in the following year problems of lay-offs and downsizing (56), people refused to serve in the military. (1988), when there were almost 3 million whereas conflicts for trade union recogni- Faced with the protest movements, the workers on strike, from 6 to 8 June. tion resulted in only 12 strikes. This last South African regime responded by offer- aspect is important because it means that ing a “small carrot” in one hand and a “big But at the political level, the most sig- the workers clearly did not feel the need stick” in the other. It decided, on the one nificant event of this period took place in to unionise to enter into struggle”. hand, to grant citizens of colour (Indians 1986. This was the year that saw the real political change that marked the end of the In the period 1982-83 South Africa and Coloureds) and blacks the right to elect apartheid regime, embodied chiefly by the was marked by an uninterrupted growth their own MPs or municipal representatives Afrikaners who had made it their mode of of strikes. In this context, once again the from their communities. On the other hand, government. After definitively settling the anti-working class role of radical trade its only response to demands for higher “union question” by integrating the main unionism was notable: wages and better living conditions from the protesters was the declaration of a state unions into the bosom of the state (cf. “It was the unions of FOSATU which of emergency, and it used the opportunity the case of FOSATU/COSATU), those in were responsible for the most strikes, to go after the strikers it accused of con- power decided to implement the policy including those in metalworking and au- ducting “political strikes” to help justify a of constitutional reform. In this context, tomobiles. It was therefore in the regions meetings were held (in secret) between barbaric repression that led to the dismissal 35 where these industries were particularly of 20,000 miners, the murder of a large the white South African leaders and ANC present which recorded the most conflicts. number of workers and the imprisonment officials, including Mandela who, from The Eastern Cape region, notably the of thousands of others. prison, between 1986 and 1990 regularly cities of Port Elizabeth and Uitenhage, received emissaries of the Afrikaner gov- experienced the highest strike rates: 55,150 ernment with a view to the reconstruction 1986-90, strikes against the strikers in 1982, of whom 51,740 were in of the country on a new non-racial basis the automobile industry. It was in the East backdrop of political manoeuvring within the bourgeoisie and in accordance with the interests of the Rand that there were the most movements national capital. The negotiations between in metalworking: 40 with a total of 13,884 the African nationalists and the South strikers. These figures can be compared Between 1982 and 1987 the country African government continued until 1990, with 30,773 strikers throughout the Johan- experienced an uninterrupted growth of the year of Mandela’s release and the end nesburg region, all sectors combined (...) strikes, protests and deadly clashes with the forces of order: 34. This company, whose boss (Oppenheimer) was Such comparisons allow us to measure, at one of the biggest supporters of the unionisation of this time, the relative weight of FOSATU “On 9 August 1987, the NUM unleashed Africans, was particularly fierce when faced with the in the whole independent trade union a strike in the mines. 95% of the unions demands of employees, unionised or not (Jacquin, movement...”33 consulted by law voted in favour of the Op. Cit.). 35. A delegation of South African employers went to Even when corralled, the working class strike. This affected all the mines where Zambia in 1986 to meet with the ANC leadership. An remained combative and struggled on a the NUM was implanted, 28 gold mines exchange of correspondence developed from 1986-90 and 18 coal mines. The conflict was by between Mandela and Botha, head of state of South far the longest strike in the South African Africa, then with De Klerk who succeeded him in 32. Ibid. 1989. This all led to the release of the ANC leader in 33. Ibid. mines, lasting 21 days (the 1946 conflict 1990, which announced the end of apartheid. History of the working class in South Africa 27 of apartheid, the lifting of the ban on the training our members and encourage them to gle between the black nationalist cliques South African CP and ANC. It goes without join the ANC and the Communist Party’.”36 merely confirmed once more the bourgeois saying that the international context had (and backward) nature of these gangsters, something to do with this. From then on, the whole of the South who thus expressed their readiness to African bourgeoisie was united in a new so- comply with the state’s orders to prove On the one hand, the fall of the Berlin called “democratic” era and of course the their ability to manage the best interests Wall heralded the sudden and brutal col- whole population, including the working of South African capital. Besides, this was lapse of the main ally of the ANC/CP, the class, was invited to unite behind the new the central objective of the bourgeoisie’s Soviet bloc, and a loss of prestige for the leaders in the construction of the demo- project when it decided the process which “Soviet model” that the ANC had adopted cratic multiracial state, and the “party” led to the dismantling of apartheid and up until then; this forced the ANC to recon- could begin… to the “national reconciliation” of all the sider its previous “anti-imperialist” stance. bourgeois factions that had been killing On the other hand, the disappearance of “Co-option has only just begun, but each other under apartheid. the Soviet bloc meant that the prospect of already there is not a single big company the ANC’s arrival in power was no longer that is not looking for a certain number of This project would be implemented a threat, on the imperialist level, for the ANC managers to integrate into its lead- faithfully by Mandela and the ANC be- pro-Western South African bourgeoisie. ership. A veritable ‘Mandela generation’ tween 1994 and 2014, including the mas- And this sheds light on the announcement has been absorbed into public or private sacre of workers resisting their exploitation by the South African president, Frederick structures quickly losing their fidelity to the and repression. de Klerk, in February 1990, before Parlia- old doctrines. The call for ‘civil society’ has Lassou ment, of his decision to legalise the ANC, become the keystone of all discourse in or- the CP and all the banned organisations, in der to bridge the gap between the still strong a perspective of global negotiation. The fol- social movement and the arrangements at lowing are the reasons for his decision: the top. But for those who remember the political themes of the eighties there is no “The current dynamic in international doubt that the terminological shift is not politics has also created new opportuni- a mere form.” 37 ties for South Africa. Significant progress has been made, among other things, in Ultimately, by virtue of its bourgeois our external contacts, particularly where class nature, the political-trade union left there were previously limitations of an could absolutely not go against the capi- ideological order. (...) the collapse of the talist system, despite its ultra-radical and economic system in Eastern Europe is also anti-capitalist, workers’ verbiage allegedly a signal (...) Those who seek to impose for the “defence of the working class”. In on South Africa such a bankrupt system the end, the trade union left proved to be a should engage in a full revision of their simple and formidable pimp for the left of point of view.” the capital. But its main contribution was undoubtedly the fact of having succeeded And indeed, “those who sought to in knowingly constructing the “democratic/ impose on South Africa such a bankrupt national unity” trap in which the bourgeoi- system” (the coalition that governs South sie was able to imprison the working class. Africa today) then decided to engage in Moreover, taking advantage of this climate a full revision of their point of view by of “democratic euphoria”, largely as a result entering definitively into the ranks of the of the liberation of Mandela and company managers of the national capital, starting in 1990, the central power could rely on its with COSATU: “new union wall” consisting of COSATU “In early 1990 the debate on the work- and its “left wing” to systematically divert ing charter in COSATU finally turns to the the struggle movements into demands for development of a set of basic rights (...) “democracy”, “civil rights”, “racial equal- accompanying the constitutional proposals ity “, etc. And this even when workers went of the ANC. It is no longer a question of a on strike for wage demands or seeking to “political programme”(...); improve their living conditions. Indeed, between 1990 and 1993, when a transi- – In 1990, nationalist figures of NUMSA tional government of “national unity” was (unions affiliated to COSATU) join formed, strikes and demonstrations became the Communist Party. Among others, scarce or had no effect on the new govern- Moses Mayekiso is elected member of ment. The poison of democratic illusions the provisional leadership of the newly was compounded by a terrible tragedy in legal party; the black working class when, in 1990, the – In July 1991 the fourth congress of troops of Mandela and those of the Zulu COSATU confirms an alliance between chief Buthelezi clashed militarily for the the union of the miners (NUM) and control of the populations of the townships. that of the automobile-metalworkers This conflict lasted four years and caused (NUMSA). They together account for more than 14,000 deaths and massive 2,000 delegates of the 2,500 present; destruction of workers’ dwellings. For revolutionary marxists this bloody strug- (...) One of the resolutions adopted at the union congress says: ‘We are in favour of 36. Jacquin, Op. Cit. 37. Ibid. 28 International Review 158 Spring 2017

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Editorial Editorial 100 years after the First World War, the struggle for proletarian principles is as relevant as ever The birth of totalitarian democracy Propaganda during World War I World War I 1914: Why the Second International failed First World War: Zimmerwald conference The centrist currents in the political organisations 2014 Extraordinary Conference of the ICC of the proletariat News of our death is greatly exaggerated Contribution to the history of the working class in Communism is on the agenda of history South Africa (II) The war in Spain exposes anarchism's fatal flaws. From the Second World War to the mid-1970s Part 2: Dissidents in the anarchist movement

Contribution to a history of the working class in South Africa From the birth of capitalism to the eve of the Sec- ond World War

International Review 156 International Review 157

21st Congress of the ICC Introduction to the Review 40 years after the foundation of the ICC What balance sheet and perspectives for our Brexit, Trump activity? Setbacks for the ruling class, nothing good for the proletariat Report on the role of the ICC as a "fraction" The idea of the fraction in the history of the On the question of populism workers' movement Conference of the ICC sections in Germany Resolution on the international situation Switzerland and Sweden Report on the situation in Germany Report on the class struggle 100 years since the Dublin Easter Rising The national question 100 years after the Easter Rising IRA: Soldiers of imperialism (1978) BASIC POSITIONS OF THE ICC

The International Communist Current reactionary. All the so-called ‘workers’, goals of the proletariat’s combat. defends the following political positions: ‘Socialist’ and ‘Communist’ parties (now ex-’Communists’), the leftist organisations OUR ACTIVITY * Since the first world war, capitalism has (Trotskyists, Maoists and ex-Maoists, been a decadent social system. It has twice official anarchists) constitute the left of Political and theoretical clarification of plunged humanity into a barbaric cycle of capitalism’s political apparatus. All the the goals and methods of the proletarian crisis, world war, reconstruction and new tactics of ‘popular fronts’, ‘anti-fascist struggle, of its historic and its immediate crisis. In the 1980s, it entered into the final fronts’ and ‘united fronts’, which mix up conditions. phase of this decadence, the phase of de­ the interests of the proletariat with those Organised intervention, united and composition. There is only one alternative of a faction of the bourgeoisie, serve only centralised on an international scale, in offered by this irreversible historical to smother and derail the struggle of the order to contribute to the process which decline: socialism or barbarism, world proletariat. leads to the revolutionary action of the communist revolution or the destruction * With the decadence of capitalism, the proletariat. of humanity. unions everywhere have been transformed The regroupment of revolutionaries * The Paris Commune of 1871 was the into organs of capitalist order within the with the aim of constituting a real world first attempt by the proletariat to carry proletariat. The various forms of union or­ communist party, which is indispensable out this revolution, in a period when the ganisation, whether ‘official’ or ‘rank and to the working class for the overthrow of conditions for it were not yet ripe. Once file’, serve only to discipline the working capitalism and the creation of a communist these conditions had been provided by the class and sabotage its struggles. society. onset of capitalist decadence, the October * In order to advance its combat, the revolution of 1917 in Russia was the first working class has to unify its struggles, OUR ORIGINS step towards an authentic world communist taking charge of their extension and revolution in an international revolutionary organisation through sovereign general The positions and activity of revolutionary wave which put an end to the imperialist assemblies and committees of delegates organisations are the product of the past war and went on for several years after elected and revocable at any time by these experiences of the working class and of that. The failure of this revolutionary wave, assemblies. the lessons that its political organisations particularly in Germany in 1919-23, con­ * Terrorism is in no way a method of struggle have drawn throughout its history. The demned the revolution in Russia to isolation for the working class. The expression of ICC thus traces its origins to the successive and to a rapid degeneration. Stalinism was social strata with no historic future and contributions of the Communist League not the product of the Russian revolution, of the decomposition of the petty bour­ of Marx and Engels (1847-52), the but its gravedigger. geoisie, when it’s not the direct expression three Internationals (the International * The statified regimes which arose in the of the permanent war between capitalist Workingmen’s Association, 1864-72, the USSR, eastern Europe, China, Cuba etc states, terrorism has always been a fertile Socialist International, 1889-1914, the and were called ‘socialist’ or ‘communist’ soil for manipulation by the bourgeoisie. Communist International, 1919-28), the left were just a particularly brutal form of Advocating secret action by small mi­ fractions which detached themselves from the universal tendency towards state norities, it is in complete opposition to class the degenerating Third International in the capitalism, itself a major characteristic of violence, which derives from conscious and years 1920-30, in particular the German, the period of decadence. organised mass action by the proletariat. Dutch and Italian Lefts. * Since the beginning of the 20th century, * The working class is the only class which all wars are imperialist wars, part of the can carry out the communist revolution. Its deadly struggle between states large revolutionary struggle will inevitably lead ICC postal addresses and small to conquer or retain a place the working class towards a confrontation Write to the following addresses without in the international arena. These wars with the capitalist state. In order to destroy mentioning the name: bring nothing to humanity but death and capitalism, the working class will have to destruction on an ever-increasing scale. overthrow all existing states and establish Spain, France, Brazil The working class can only respond to the dictatorship of the proletariat on a Mail Boxes 153, 108 rue Damremont 75018 Paris them through its international solidarity world scale: the international power of the and by struggling against the bourgeoisie workers’ councils, regrouping the entire Mexico, Venezuela, Peru, Equador in all countries. proletariat. Apartado Postal 15-024, * All the nationalist ideologies - ‘national * The communist transformation of society CP 02600, independence’, ‘the right of nations to by the workers’ councils does not mean Distrito Federal, Mexico. self-determination’ etc - whatever their ‘self-management’ or the nationalisation pretext, ethnic, historical or religious, are of the economy. Communism requires the Belgium, Holland a real poison for the workers. By calling conscious abolition by the working class BP 94, 2600 Berchem, Belgium on them to take the side of one or another of capitalist social relations: wage labour, faction of the bourgeoisie, they divide commodity production, national frontiers. Great Britain, Australia, United States workers and lead them to massacre each It means the creation of a world community BM Box 869 other in the interests and wars of their in which all activity is oriented towards the London WC1 N3XX exploiters. full satisfaction of human needs. Great Britain * In decadent capitalism, parliament and * The revolutionary political organisation elections are nothing but a mascarade. constitutes the vanguard of the working India, Phillippines Any call to participate in the parliamentary class and is an active factor in the generali­ POB 25, NIT, Faridabad, 121001, circus can only reinforce the lie that sation of class consciousness within the Haryana, India presents these elections as a real choice for proletariat. Its role is neither to ‘organise the exploited. ‘Democracy’, a particularly the working class’ nor to ‘take power’ Italy CP 469, 80100, Naples, Italy hypocritical form of the domination of the in its name, but to participate actively in bourgeoisie, does not differ at root from the movement towards the unification of Germany, Switzerland, Sweden, other forms of capitalist dictatorship, such struggles, towards workers taking control Turkey as Stalinism and fascism. of them for themselves, and at the same Postfach 2124 * All factions of the bourgeoisie are equally time to draw out the revolutionary political CH-8021 Zurich, Switzerland