Before specifically answering, I'd like to say that these questions dovetail into a discussion being initiated among members, supporters and friends about the lessons of the last two months and what it would take for #Occupy to move forward. So thoughts, comments and constructive criticism are welcome.
It would be very helpful if they could explain the relationship of revolutionary industrial unionism strategy to how they seek to advance the Occupy movement into a real independent working class mass-fightback movement. Even better if they can give concrete examples of how this is being applied in practice right now.
The #Occupy movement, contrary to what some may think, has managed to draw growing sections of the working class into the movement as a whole. The result is that, more than two months after the first protesters pitched tents at Zuccotti Park, there is a growing workers' current that is, at the very least, open to communist politics and strategies. This, for us, is the starting point.
Unlike traditional protest movements, which are generally dominated by whomever has the largest PA system, the most pre-printed signs, etc., the occupation of territory (even if it as small as a park) becomes not only a focal point for action, but also the fulcrum on which the movement pivots. That is, the movement is no longer something that floats on the winds of chance. From the beginning, there is a tangible base of operations for the movement, an "free space" that can be used as, among other things, a launching pad for expansion and development of the movement itself. This is where, for us, the RIU strategy begins to gather flesh and bone.
From the beginning of the #Occupy movement, we have raised the slogan of occupying workplaces. We did not see this as counterposed to the existing occupations, but as an extension of them. The idea was that the #Occupy encampments, meetings and GAs could develop working groups that would go out from the occupations and organize workers on the job. In turn, as groups of workers became organized in support of #
[email protected] (we'll just use this term for the sake of this discussion), they would, in fact, become de facto local units of an RIU-type structure. They would not only network with other workplaces in the area that are also involved with the #Occupy movement, but also with other similar workplaces in other cities. They could meet regionally, nationally, etc., to coordinate #Occupy-related activity, as well as send delegations to the local occupations. If/when workers at any of these workplaces felt ready to stage an occupation at their job, they would not only already have solid links with other workers in their location, but also through their industry or service ... which is the character of a revolutionary industrial union in the first place: One Grand Union of the working class.
Of course, there are a number of obstacles to overcome to get to this point. First, you have the petty-bourgeois democrats and liberal reformers, who are trying (and, in some cities, succeeding) to turn the #Occupy movement into a vehicle for re-electing Obama in 2012. They are also the same ilk who are using "non-violence" and liberal pacifism as a cudgel against any political current to their left. Second, you have the Ron Paul wolves in sheep's clothing, who also want #Occupy to be an electoral vehicle, but also throw sand in the eyes of participants by mystifying capitalism and blaming everything including the kidnapping of the Lindbergh baby on "the Fed". Third, you have the hippy-dippy pothead "Kumbayah" crowd, who are involved in #Occupy either because they need a place to crash or a more solid weed connection. (Note: I have no qualms about weed myself, but I shouldn't get a contact high from standing next to some twenty-something white boy with dreds and a Bob Marley t-shirt for 30 seconds whose only response to any question is "Uhhh... Wut?") Fourth, and finally, you have a good chunk of the petty-bourgeois socialist movement, who all seem to think that "success = proper management". As long as the movement is under their practical, day-to-day leadership, the movement is an automatic success. And if you don't believe that to be true, just look at the stunning successes they had around the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan, or freeing Mumia Abu-Jamal, or smashing the KKK and neo-Nazis, or....
Seriously, though, because the Party is beginning this discussion, I cannot, unfortunately, point to a particular location where we've begun to implement this element of our strategy ... yet. At the same time, we have been laying the basis for this in some of the areas where the Party has the presence to do it.
The sad reality of moving forward to build this kind of movement is that, in #Occupy groups where any of these four obstacles are to be found, it will probably require at least a "cold split" among participants along class lines to start it (for those unfamiliar with the term, a "cold split" is where a group remains formally united, but each part acts separately around a set of issues; this is different from a "hot split", which involves setting up a separate group). I say this because this is what has happened in the #Occupy group in which I'm currently involved. Some #Occupy groups that work more on the affinity group structure might be better able to avoid a cold split, but I cannot say for certain.
Some Left groups have said that we're now at a critical "turning point" in the Occupy protest movement. So, the question is really, how are we gonna turn this movement where it needs to go? I'm concerned about too much isolation and not enough independent mobilization from the working masses, which give our foes greater ability to counter our efforts and eventually crush and/or co-opt them. Occupying buildings is great, but that won't last long (just like occupying parks couldn't last perpetually) if the movement is left too isolated from the working class masses. How can we expand mass involvement and maximize independent workers' power and organization from here?
I happen to agree that we are at a "turning point" with #Occupy. Left to its own devices, I can see only two realistic alternatives for it: 1) the movement becomes a traditional protest movement, meaning that it withers on the vine and ultimately dies, or 2) it becomes something of a neo-squatting movement, becomes isolated and dies.
The C.C. of the Party is proposing that the central slogan for the moment be "Reorganize! Rebuild! Reoccupy!" It's a fine slogan and a decent call to arms, but the key issue at this point is what to do after reoccupation.
I think that one of the main mistakes of the first period of #Occupy was that there was little thought put into the idea of extension. In New York City, extension was seen more as expansion, in the respect that it seems the only time the idea of taking over another space was discussed was when Zuccotti Park became overcrowded. This also seems to have been the pattern nationally. For nearly two months, the #Occupy movement seemed content with the small patches of territory they initially overtook, and were rather timid about extending their control. While it is true that the capitalist state violently resisted the occupation of any area, the fact that the occupations were able to go through the initial period of expansion as quickly and relatively painlessly as they did is important to note.
Both our Party and the IWW use the formulation, "organizing the new world within the shell of the old". What does this mean concretely? In our view, it means organizing all of the basic structures for the workers' republic and using them to squeeze the life and perceived legitimacy out of the bourgeois regime and its state. The revolutionary industrial union, with its workplace committees and workers' councils, forms part of the base of that structure. Another part is the occupation of the "cracks" within the bourgeois system.
I recently saw an image online with the tagline "Occupy Petrograd: The Original Mic Check". Whoever made that had no idea how correct s/he was. During 1917, Petrograd saw a wave of occupations: the Bolsheviks occupied the Smolny; the Petrograd Soviet occupied the Tauride Palace; the unions and other parties also occupied buildings and spaces in the Russian capital. Every "crack" in the Russian capitalist system that emerged was quickly filled by radicalizing workers, students, soldiers, anarchists, socialists, etc. The more these fissures appeared, the more they were occupied by revolutionaries, to the point that those in the "cracks" were able to displace and dispossess the old organs of capitalist rule.
Today, we see small but similar "cracks" forming in the edifice of American capitalist rule. What we don't see is an occupation movement attempting to capture these areas for the purposes of expanded and extended organizing -- into workplaces, into neighborhoods, into schools, etc. More to the point, we don't see an occupation movement initiating, supporting and linking together these networks of occupations for the purposes of continued extension into places where they are most needed. For example, in Detroit, there are a large number of abandoned houses and buildings within a very short walking distance of the half dozen auto plants still in the city (and I would figure it's similar in some of the suburbs, too). #Occupy participants could take over one of these houses or buildings and use it as a staging area for, first, making contacts in these plants, second, holding meetings with those contacts and, third, coordinating activity between those inside and outside of the plant. Something like this could be done in every city in the U.S., Canada, Britain, etc.
Extension -- turning and looking outward -- is what can revitalize and reshape #Occupy into a movement capable of more than sterile protests and a mass urban camping experience.
If we're going to wage class war and aim for victory, we need our army to take the field and fight like an army, and we need independent credible organs of actual workers' class power to be established in all the working class neighborhoods, workplaces, schools, etc. Waiting for the existing union bosses to bring their tiny organizations to do this job will leave us waiting forever.
Agreed. In fact, trying to bring the union officials into #Occupy to offer some kind of "leadership" is a betrayal of workers' interests. These loyal labor lieutenants would only come on board for one reason: they knew they could turn #Occupy into an auxiliary for their 2012 electioneering. If they knew for certain they could do that, they'd already be there. Oh, wait! They already have ... on the evening of November 17!
Seems to me that we need a much larger, much wider, much deeper and much more governed democratically 'from below' sort of organized working class movement, and this class movement must remain fully independent of the bourgeois system and all its servants. Why would I want to join any 'vanguard party' that wasn't proving its worth and its commitment to the proletariat by exerting itself to build and develop and advance such an independent mass class movement in the real world today? Words are too cheap and the cappies often like to posture populist for a bargain, but workers like me want to to be shown revolutionary proof in deeds like this.
Just remember, it's ugly, unglamorous and often anonymous work to organize. You get very little media "face time". That's why few organizations actually do it. They'd rather be "activists" that get to mug for the cameras and wave their pretty little signs.
Is revolutionary industrial unionism essentially what I'm describing, or is it something else? How does it really get applied, from the beginning, in practice?
If you find yourself nodding at what I've been describing above, then you're definitely thinking and describing revolutionary industrial unionism. One way or another, let's keep talking.