gaf
12th June 2004, 11:35
FREEDOM WITHOUT SOCIALISM IS PRIVILEGE, SOCIALISM WITHOUT FREEDOM IS
TYRANNY.
AUTHOR: James Hutchings of Angry People (Australia)
NOTE: This article has some specifically Australian references. Also,
people might take issue with my description of the Zapatsitas as
anarchist-inspired.
'Leninism and Anarchism'
There are two kinds of revolutionary socialism: Leninism or
Trotskyism, and anarchism.
Leninists believe in forming a ‘vanguard party’, of the most
‘advanced’ sections of the people. The idea is that the vanguard will
lead the workers to revolution, and take power in their name, setting up
a ‘workers’ State’, which will ‘wither away’ over time.
But anarchists say that no one should take power. Any workers’
State would turn into another tyranny, as in Russia. Instead, we should
abolish inequality directly. Anarchists are against any inequality in
revolutionary groups - no Branch Committees, National Secretaries etc.
Everyone should have an equal say in the group. Anarchists see
revolution as being led not by a vanguard party but by the workers
themselves. An anarchist’s job is encouraging and helping to defend a
revolution - not running it.
Some examples of anarchist-oriented groups are: the I.W.W. (a
revolutionary union), the CNT in the Spanish Revolution (still a major
union bloc in Spain), and the Situationists, influential in the May ‘68
uprising in Paris. Today, the Mexican Zapatistas are the best-known
anarchist-inspired group.
The most common arguments against anarchism are as follows.
Anarchists are Racist, Sexist etc:
Leninists usually ‘prove’ this by finding a quote from Bakunin or
Kropotkin (major anarchist writers).
Neither Bakunin nor Kropotkin were anarchists all their life.
Bakunin started out as a Slavic nationalist. So, there are heaps of
quotes which ‘prove’ that anarchists are nationalists.
Also, anarchists aren’t ‘Bakuninists’ or ‘Kropotkinists’. Anarchist
ideas come from all sorts of people (including Marx). Anarchists don’t
say Bakunin or Kropotkin had it all right: we agree with them on some
things and not on others. People should work out their own ideas, not
follow anyone - Bakunin, Marx or Trotsky.
Anarchists Ignore the Differences Between Trotsky and Stalin:
In 1921, the workers of Kronstadt rose up against the Bolsheviks,
demanding an end to the dictatorship of the Bolsheviks, freedom of
speech for all revolutionary socialists, and so on. They voted to share
their rations equally (the Bolsheviks had a system of different grades
of ration). Trotsky ordered the Red Army to “shoot them down like
partridges”. The Red Army went into battle with guns at their back, for
fear that they would change sides. Trotsky and Lenin said the uprising
was a Tsarist plot!
Trotsky also believed that the government should conscript people to
work gangs- in ‘Terrorism and Communism’, he wrote that compulsory
labour was “quite unquestionable”. He also believed in revolutionary
groups based on “the leadership’s organised distrust of the members,
manifesting itself in vigilant control, from above, of the party”
(quoted in Deutscher’s ‘The Prophet Armed’).
What’s a revolution meant to do - free workers, or shoot them for going
against a dictatorship?
Anarchism is Utopian, Leninism is Scientific:
This is a quote from Bakunin, made in the 1870s -
“But, the Marxists say, this minority [the government of the ‘workers’
State’] will consist of workers. Yes indeed, but of ex-workers
who...cease to be workers. And from the heights of the State they begin
to look down upon the whole common world of the workers. From that time
on they represent not the people but themselves” (from ‘Statism and
Anarchy’).
Isn’t that what happened? It’s utopian to expect a few people to have
so much power and not end up with a tyranny.
Anarchism is ‘Petty Bourgeois’:
Were the I.W.W ‘petty bourgeois? What about the Spanish Revolution?
It’s not bourgeois to want freedom, despite Lenin’s claim that “freedom
is a bourgeois prejudice”.
Anarchism is Disorganised:
Recently, we brought out the anarchist and ex-Black Panther Lorenzo
Kom’boa Ervin on a speaking tour. We held all the talks scheduled, plus
some extra ones, even though the government arrested, bashed, and tried
to deport him. We wouldn’t have been able to do that if we were
disorganised.
Actually, anarchist groups can be more organised. You don’t get the
same kind of power struggles, splits and expulsions that characterise
Leninist groups.
None of us are any cleverer than any of you. We don’t need a Branch
Committee to organise - neither do you.
What about you? Do you think that freedom is bourgeois? Do you
think that Bakunin’s prediction came true? Do you find that everyone
has an equal say in your group, or are there leaders and followers? Is
your group open and democratic, or do they kick anyone out who questions
the party line? And who sets the party line anyway? If we can organise
without a National Committee, why can’t you?
It doesn’t matter what you call yourself - anarchist, socialist,
communist or whatever. What matters is the ideas, not the labels. If
you agree with what I’ve said, or some of it - are you on the right
side?
TYRANNY.
AUTHOR: James Hutchings of Angry People (Australia)
NOTE: This article has some specifically Australian references. Also,
people might take issue with my description of the Zapatsitas as
anarchist-inspired.
'Leninism and Anarchism'
There are two kinds of revolutionary socialism: Leninism or
Trotskyism, and anarchism.
Leninists believe in forming a ‘vanguard party’, of the most
‘advanced’ sections of the people. The idea is that the vanguard will
lead the workers to revolution, and take power in their name, setting up
a ‘workers’ State’, which will ‘wither away’ over time.
But anarchists say that no one should take power. Any workers’
State would turn into another tyranny, as in Russia. Instead, we should
abolish inequality directly. Anarchists are against any inequality in
revolutionary groups - no Branch Committees, National Secretaries etc.
Everyone should have an equal say in the group. Anarchists see
revolution as being led not by a vanguard party but by the workers
themselves. An anarchist’s job is encouraging and helping to defend a
revolution - not running it.
Some examples of anarchist-oriented groups are: the I.W.W. (a
revolutionary union), the CNT in the Spanish Revolution (still a major
union bloc in Spain), and the Situationists, influential in the May ‘68
uprising in Paris. Today, the Mexican Zapatistas are the best-known
anarchist-inspired group.
The most common arguments against anarchism are as follows.
Anarchists are Racist, Sexist etc:
Leninists usually ‘prove’ this by finding a quote from Bakunin or
Kropotkin (major anarchist writers).
Neither Bakunin nor Kropotkin were anarchists all their life.
Bakunin started out as a Slavic nationalist. So, there are heaps of
quotes which ‘prove’ that anarchists are nationalists.
Also, anarchists aren’t ‘Bakuninists’ or ‘Kropotkinists’. Anarchist
ideas come from all sorts of people (including Marx). Anarchists don’t
say Bakunin or Kropotkin had it all right: we agree with them on some
things and not on others. People should work out their own ideas, not
follow anyone - Bakunin, Marx or Trotsky.
Anarchists Ignore the Differences Between Trotsky and Stalin:
In 1921, the workers of Kronstadt rose up against the Bolsheviks,
demanding an end to the dictatorship of the Bolsheviks, freedom of
speech for all revolutionary socialists, and so on. They voted to share
their rations equally (the Bolsheviks had a system of different grades
of ration). Trotsky ordered the Red Army to “shoot them down like
partridges”. The Red Army went into battle with guns at their back, for
fear that they would change sides. Trotsky and Lenin said the uprising
was a Tsarist plot!
Trotsky also believed that the government should conscript people to
work gangs- in ‘Terrorism and Communism’, he wrote that compulsory
labour was “quite unquestionable”. He also believed in revolutionary
groups based on “the leadership’s organised distrust of the members,
manifesting itself in vigilant control, from above, of the party”
(quoted in Deutscher’s ‘The Prophet Armed’).
What’s a revolution meant to do - free workers, or shoot them for going
against a dictatorship?
Anarchism is Utopian, Leninism is Scientific:
This is a quote from Bakunin, made in the 1870s -
“But, the Marxists say, this minority [the government of the ‘workers’
State’] will consist of workers. Yes indeed, but of ex-workers
who...cease to be workers. And from the heights of the State they begin
to look down upon the whole common world of the workers. From that time
on they represent not the people but themselves” (from ‘Statism and
Anarchy’).
Isn’t that what happened? It’s utopian to expect a few people to have
so much power and not end up with a tyranny.
Anarchism is ‘Petty Bourgeois’:
Were the I.W.W ‘petty bourgeois? What about the Spanish Revolution?
It’s not bourgeois to want freedom, despite Lenin’s claim that “freedom
is a bourgeois prejudice”.
Anarchism is Disorganised:
Recently, we brought out the anarchist and ex-Black Panther Lorenzo
Kom’boa Ervin on a speaking tour. We held all the talks scheduled, plus
some extra ones, even though the government arrested, bashed, and tried
to deport him. We wouldn’t have been able to do that if we were
disorganised.
Actually, anarchist groups can be more organised. You don’t get the
same kind of power struggles, splits and expulsions that characterise
Leninist groups.
None of us are any cleverer than any of you. We don’t need a Branch
Committee to organise - neither do you.
What about you? Do you think that freedom is bourgeois? Do you
think that Bakunin’s prediction came true? Do you find that everyone
has an equal say in your group, or are there leaders and followers? Is
your group open and democratic, or do they kick anyone out who questions
the party line? And who sets the party line anyway? If we can organise
without a National Committee, why can’t you?
It doesn’t matter what you call yourself - anarchist, socialist,
communist or whatever. What matters is the ideas, not the labels. If
you agree with what I’ve said, or some of it - are you on the right
side?