The point of demonstrations and protest.

[apathy maybe]

In the thread on Ultra-Leftism in learning http://www.revleft.com/index.php?showtopic=61036&st=0, it was brought up that they avoid participating in "real struggle".


Originally posted by Luís Henrique
"Ultra-left", to me, are the people who use seemingly radical excuses to avoid participating in real struggle.

Leftist: - Let's go to demonstration against imperialism in front of the American embassy?

"Ultra-leftist": - No, you are just going to chant and walk in circles. Call me when you are ready to storm the Embassy by force.

I raised the point that I didn't think that chanting and walking in circles was real struggle at all any way. But seeing as my point was not responded to, I thought that I would raise it again here.

What does such a demonstration achieve? Can it be considered "real struggle" in a "liberal democratic" society? (Such as the US, UK, Australia or most of Europe.)

As I mentioned, I consider demonstrations of the type: peaceful, lots of slogans and maybe a bit of street blocking, to be non-productive. They can be fun, they might raise a bit of media interest in the issue (though obviously not from the protesters perspective the majority of the time), and might cost the state and some capitalists a bit of money. Protests involving a bit more violence, direct confrontation of the police for example might have the added disadvantage of making the movement look bad to outsiders.

Is protesting "real struggle"? And should we actually bother?


(Note: I support both peaceful and more "violent" protest, though as mentioned, I doubt that it does much in the long term.)

[bcbm]

Unless its massive and widespread, I doubt it does much of anything. Of course, it also depends on what is being protested.

Still fun though.

[apathy maybe]

Take refugee concentration camps, US embassies, a WTO meeting, G7/G20 meeting or whatever. Will the people in charge stop what is they are doing because of a protest?

The Iraq War saw the biggest protests in Australia since the 70's (I think), but the Australian government still went to war. I do agree that large masses of people are more likely to do something than smaller numbers.

Can you give examples of what you mean by "depends on what is being protested"?

[midnight marauder]

They tend to raise consciousness. Doesn't that alone make them worthwhile?

[bcbm]

Originally posted by apathy [email protected] 23, 2007 03:57 pm
Take refugee concentration camps, US embassies, a WTO meeting, G7/G20 meeting or whatever. Will the people in charge stop what is they are doing because of a protest?
No, but protests can be useful in shutting certain events down.



Can you give examples of what you mean by "depends on what is being protested"?

Protesting specific corporations, or union pickets, can have an effect.

[Severian]

Originally posted by apathy [email protected] 23, 2007 01:27 pm
I raised the point that I didn't think that chanting and walking in circles was real struggle at all any way.
As opposed to what? It's often symbolic, sure. A public relations excercise if you like.

But so are the various window-smashing ultraleft protests - when they occur at all. (Luis is right that ultraleft rhetoric is often an excuse to do nothing at all.)

A few smashed windows has no significant economic effect on the ruling class. And its symbolic message is less likely to positively influence most people.

If a protest starts becoming a real mass action - drawing in more than the usual suspects so to speak - I'd say that's when it becomes "real politics." One, substantial numbers of working people are beginning to get some experience in active politics. Two, you start having the possibility of becoming strong enough to have more than a symbolic impact.

Sometimes smaller actions help build towards that.

[Vargha Poralli]

I raised the point that I didn't think that chanting and walking in circles was real struggle at all any way.


"An ounce of Action is worth A ton of theory" - Engels.

Ok we take your own argument chanting and walking in circles is not real struggle in any way so what is your alternative to that ? It is easy to go on talking about "Struggle" but it is hard doing some action.

[Luís Henrique]

Originally posted by apathy [email protected] 23, 2007 07:27 pm
I raised the point that I didn't think that chanting and walking in circles was real struggle at all any way. But seeing as my point was not responded to, I thought that I would raise it again here.
I didn't respond to it, because, in that context, it was irrelevant; it was just an example to show how it is possible to conceal a refuse to do something under the coat of that something not being enough of a thing.


What does such a demonstration achieve? Can it be considered "real struggle" in a "liberal democratic" society? (Such as the US, UK, Australia or most of Europe.)

It, of course, depends. It depends of what the actual level of mobilisation and struggle in such society is. If you are amidst a general strike to topple the government, then a proposal to demonstrate in front of the American Embassy is obviously useless at best, and an attempt to deflect the actual struggle at worse. If there is no sign of struggle in the late period, no strikes, no demonstrations, just ox-minded obedience to the authorities in charge, then it could be helpful, if only to point out that there is some divergence within society. Heck, if under a brutal dictatorship, it could even be an adventurist proposal, that would get workers and militants jailed for no good reason. Don't take bourgeois democracy for granted, it is a foolish thing to do.

In less words, it depends. There is no magical formula, the actual situation must be taken into account.


Is protesting "real struggle"? And should we actually bother?

Sometimes it is, sometimes it is not. A revolutionary should know the difference, and refrain from trying to stablish general, sweeping, useless, formulas.

Luís Henrique

[Luís Henrique]

Let me give a practical example.

In the beggining of 1968, a French students organisation, FER-Revoltés, had stablished a target of building a huge protest against government policies for education; their aim was to build up a 3,000 demonstration in front of the Education Ministery, at the end of the class season.

That could be reasonable in January; in May, hundreds of thousands of students were taking to the streets, to protest much more than the government educational policies. Yet FER-Revoltés was still campaigning to gather 3,000 students to protest educational policies in the coming months. By that time, it was nothing short of ridiculous, and showed that FER-Revoltés had no idea on how to deal with a revolutionary crisis.

Luís Henrique

[apathy maybe]

Originally posted by JUICE+--> (JUICE)They tend to raise consciousness. Doesn't that alone make them worthwhile?[/b]They can, but they can also alienate workers from the movement because of bad press coverage.

black coffee black metal: They hardly ever are successful at actually shutting down events, but I take your point about pickets.


Originally posted by [email protected]
A few smashed windows has no significant economic effect on the ruling class. And its symbolic message is less likely to positively influence most people.

If a protest starts becoming a real mass action - drawing in more than the usual suspects so to speak - I'd say that's when it becomes "real politics." One, substantial numbers of working people are beginning to get some experience in active politics. Two, you start having the possibility of becoming strong enough to have more than a symbolic impact.

Sometimes smaller actions help build towards that.I agree, but how many protests have lead to real mass action? We had the anti-war demos in Australia against the Iraq War, did fuck all to stop the Australian Government from going in anyway.


g.ram
Ok we take your own argument chanting and walking in circles is not real struggle in any way so what is your alternative to that ? It is easy to go on talking about "Struggle" but it is hard doing some action.My alternative is actual action on the ground to improve and raise the knowledge level of workers.

Luís Henrique: I take your points, and I pretty much agree. This is what I was talking about.

What I was talking about was "professional" protesters. Party members or activists that go to this sort of event (protesting outside the US embassy). The majority of workers do not do this sort of thing. Strikes are different, I think that they are real struggle, they are trying to achieve something that may well actually be achieved. They are by the workers for the workers, not by some elite activists.

Protesting the G8 or the G20 or the WTO does not draw workers into the movement, this is because there are two different movements. The workers movement, trying to get better conditions for workers, which may lead to a struggle to get rid of the bosses. And the activist movement, who do stunts and try and shut down events or protest outside the US embassy. Stunts can be fun of course, and they do point out that not everyone is happy with the system. But they don't lead to better conditions for workers, nor to getting rid of the bosses. They are an outlet for frustration.

I don't oppose blockades and so on. I think it is important to actively oppose the state and to demonstrate this opposition, but I also recognise that outside a minority of the population, activist activities are view either neutrally or negatively.

TAT made the point in regards to what happened after the G8 in Scotland, the activist centres became ghettos. Activists reminisced about what had happened, rather then going out and doing real work trying to oppose in day to day life the activities of the bosses and the state.

If you know what I mean?


(And actually the practical example that you give Luís Henrique is a good one. I would say that the attempt to protest education policy was an activist stunt, which may well have changed things sure. But when there were large amounts of people on the streets, generally protesting the government, things changed.)

[Organic Revolution]

In my opinion, the reason for protests is symbolic. Usually they are there to show that a part of the population is unhappy with a decision, but really what they serve to do is to show people that there ideas aren't isolated to just them, and it serves organizing purposes. The peaceful "sit-down and sing" tactic is nothing more than liberals trying to boost there own self-worth by being were people care about something enough to organize against it.

So, in my opinion, protests serve to show people in the community that they are not alone.

[Fawkes]

"Ultra-leftist": - No, you are just going to chant and walk in circles. Call me when you are ready to storm the Embassy by force.
How do they expect to storm the embassy by force if they have no popular support? How are they going to get that popular support, by sitting on their asses all day?

[rouchambeau]

I would hesitate to say that demonstrations are a form of stuggle, but I would dismiss them as useless either. So long as demonstrations "wake people up" or get them involved in greater actions I don't think that they should be rejected.

So, no, they aren't "real struggle", but we should bother.

[peaccenicked]

To me there are weak protests, and strong protests. A weak protest is isolated, and not part of a wider campaign, a weak protest has no momentum and has no ability to move on to a strong protest.
A strong protest sets out to win its objectives, and as based on the real possibility of winning, that requires vision and democracy in the movement.

The trouble I see where I am that protests are called as a matter of routine. They are regarded as a place to make recruits to the party. None of the speakers talk about the next step, only point to the next routine protest. Planning meetings are controlled so as to keep routines and almost everything is opposed that has not already been rubber stamped by the dominant central committee, that is using the protest as a front organisation.

Sometimes I wonder, if the secret services are in on this act, or is it a well established psyop against the resistance? I despair.

[chimx]

I am reminded of a protest held in Modesto California. DAAA, a RAAN collective at the time participated in a liberal protest that was obviously not accomplishing much. There was an official quarantined protest zone on the sidewalk where the demonstrators were easily marginalized and ignored. DAAA members were able to convince the broader liberal crowd to begin a spontaneous illegal street protest. 50 folk left the side walk, stopped traffic, and did there thing. I wasn't there, but from what I heard, it allowed for a degree of radicalization in the liberal camp.

[Fawkes]

^^ What were they protesting?

[chimx]

I don't remember. It was a few years ago. Either Iraq or homelessness probably.

[SPK]

Symbolic protests have their purposes, and they’re obviously limited – if you’re engaging in too many purely symbolic events, then that’s likely a problem. Direct, militant action is more worthwhile, even if it usually can’t be done on a routine basis.

The real benefit to demonstrations is that, optimally, people involved in the planning process sharpen their politics and hone their skills as organizers as a result. Groups should preferably distribute tasks with some equity, let people take on new responsibilities that they haven’t had before, get as many folx involved as possible, and engage in debate and struggle over the political questions involved – not just the purpose of the action, but also the political aspects of the process as well, such as democratic decision-making. Organizations should come out of an major event with stronger cohesion, more members, and a greater commitment by those members to its overall political project. When that happens, it makes it easier for other people mobilized by the action to plug in and become involved, thus growing the mass movements.

Obviously, that rarely happens these days, and it is a reflection of the weakness of the organizational and decision-making philosophies prevalent on the left right now.

[RGacky3]

If you have people out there on the streets protesting, its a show of solidarity and a show of force, even small protests, because people will see the small protests, and maybe gain the courage to protest as well, and perhaps more will join, then it might turn into a larger protest, which might turn into boycotts and strikes which might go further. Protests are alwasy worthwhile, leaderless ones.

I do not think that big rallies and protests lead by polititians are healthy at all, as its usually just the leader using the people as a tool, and trying to unite them under him.

[apathy maybe]

(While reading the following, take into account that I still believe that generally (with the conditions that I have mentioned in earlier posts), protests are not "real struggle".)


So I've been doing so thinking, based on what people have written and other things. There are two or three 'main' types of protests it seems (this is partly from personal experience and partly from reading).

Note: When I use 'protest' here, I mean an attempt to get a mass of people somewhere to demonstrate against or about a particular issue. I don't mean a mass demonstration against a government generally, this is because this is a different type of protest less widely seen and more likely to be actual 'struggle'. (Also note that I use 'socialist' a lot, in this context I mean organised socialist (narrow sense) parties who contest elections or who otherwise work within the system to try and change it. In my experience they claim to be Marxist-Leninist generally.)


There are small, single party protests, about what ever issue is chosen that week or month. These tend to be small (5-20 people), non-confrontational and serve as a moral booster for those involved. "We did stuff." To my mind these are defiantly almost useless, sometimes they serve as recruiting opportunities for the party. The most of obvious of these to my mind is the Socialist Alternative in Hobart. Every week (or month, I can't remember) they would try and get out and stand around with placades and wave to passing cars. These never got media.

A second sub category of this is Critical Mass. In my experience in Hobart, we rarely got more then 10 people (which was sufficient to block any roads we chose though!). However, this wasn't a protest, it was an activity to show solidarity between bike riders, a social event and an opportunity to have fun. These events aren't about protesting at all, they aren't out to get media.


Beyond these small single party protests there are bigger ones, but dominated by 'liberal' or 'socialist' elements. Good examples of these are the anti-logging protests in Tasmania, where the Greens and other parties got together thousands of people to march or to rally. The point of these was to show popular support for the cause (anti-old growth logging). An other example is the anti-war movement. Thousands and thousands of people protested in Australia against the Iraq war, I don't recall seeing any violence at all on the media.

The above two types of protest are against a single issue, not against the system as a whole. This is generally why they are dominated by more liberal or 'socialist' elements.


The third type of protest is the major protest against more then a "single issue". These are major multi-organisational, thousands of people protests. People coming to these have a variety of agendas, some of which conflict. There are the "liberal" and "socialist" agendas which mostly want a peaceful, non-confrontational perhaps a little bit radical, but not too much. Then there are those who want a direct confrontation with the police and authorities. They are more likely to be radical and expect the possibility of being arrested.
Good examples of these are the anti-G20, anti-Forbes protests held in Melbourne and Sydney respectively (2006 and 2005). While the main stream of the protests were generally anti-economic globalisation, you had a lot of more radical types who generally wanted an end to the whole economic system. You had direct confrontation with the police and fuck the media.

Personally I find these sort of protests almost as useless (at actually achieving anything) as the first type I mentioned. These are protests about the very economic system we live in, and the rich and powerful aren't going to change soon. They do serve are places to recruit people into more radical politics, but they often turn people away because of the media coverage of violence or whatever.


So given the three types, do I want people to not protest? Fuck no. As I said earlier, it can be fun, it can tie up shit loads of police resources and cost the state and capitalists lots of money and so on.

[Fawkes]

There are small, single party protests, about what ever issue is chosen that week or month. These tend to be small (5-20 people), non-confrontational and serve as a moral booster for those involved. "We did stuff." To my mind these are defiantly almost useless, sometimes they serve as recruiting opportunities for the party.
"Some of the most famous demonstrations only had ten people, while some of the ones with thousands are barely remembered." - Abbie Hoffman

It's not always how many people are partaking in a protest, it's what the protest is doing. Obviously, the more people there are, the better of a message it sends, but just because there are not many people does not mean that one cannot get their point across.