Kez
3rd June 2002, 20:17
Please Read this ALL before you comment:
**********************************
This is a promise, it will give you a tool to discuss with anarchist and convice
them of the uselessness of their ideology. I have been using different sources
but the most important are Engles collected works. If you don’t understand
something tell me (few technical names, Spanish politicians).
I hope you like it,
First of all a brief background:
In 1868 Spain was in a deep crisis. There was a revolutionary ferment. The
monarchy split and there were two factions fighting, in fact there was a civil
war. Unrest in the population was growing .A coup d’etat was organised by the
progrssive forces in the Army. The abdication of the Queen led to a even bigger
inestability. A new King was elected but he couldn’t solve any of the problems.
After two years the king, who was an Italian Prince (Amadeo), abdicated and a
Republic was declared. The Government of the Republic was put in power by
another coup. The new Governemnt abolished slavery in the colonies, stopped the
war in Africa that Spain was holding and started a land reform in benefit of the
poor peasants of Southern Spain. But the revolts continued in others areas…
cantonalist movements developed and the central govt. was under pressure. Under
these conditions the reaction organised another coup and the monarchy was put
back in power, and a regime with a democratic face was ruling the country. The
living conditions of milions of workers and peasants remained the same.
Engels and The First International in Spain. 1873.
He wrote:
As we know, at the time the split in the International occurred the odds were in
favour of the members of the secret Alliance in Spain; the great majority of
Spanish workers followed their lead. When the Republic was proclaimed in
February 1873, the Spanish members of the Alliance found themselves in a
quandary. Spain is such a backward country industrially that there can be no
question there of immediate complete emancipation of the working class. Spain
will first have to pass through various preliminary stages of development and
remove quite a number of obstacles from its path.
The Republic offered a chance of going through these stages in the shortest
possible time and quickly surmounting the obstacles. But this chance could be
taken only if the Spanish working class played an active political role. The
labour masses felt this; they strove everywhere to participate in events, to
take advantage of the opportunity for action, instead of leaving the propertied
classes, as hitherto, a clear field for action and intrigues. The government
announced that elections were to be held to the Constituent Cortes (Spanish word
for Parliament). [May 10, 1873] What was the attitude of the International to
be? The leaders of the Bakuninists were in a predicament. Continued political
inaction became more ridiculous and impossible with every passing day; the
workers wanted "to see things done". The members of the Alliance on the other
hand had been preaching for years that no part should be taken in a revolution
that did not have as its aim the immediate and complete emancipation of the
working class, that political action of any kind implied recognition of the
State, which was the root of all evil, and that therefore participation in any
form of elections was a crime worthy of death. How they got out of this fix is
recounted in the already mentioned Madrid report:
"The same people who rejected the Hague resolution on the political attitude of
the working class and who trampled under foot the Rules of the [International
Working Men's] Association, thus bringing division, conflict and confusion into
the Spanish Section of the International; the same people who had the effrontery
to depict us to the workers as ambitious place-hunters, who, under the pretext
of establishing the rule of the working class, sought to establish their own
rule; the same people who call themselves autonomists, anarchist
revolutionaries, etc., have on this occasion flung themselves into politics,
bourgeois politics of the worst kind. They have worked, not to give political
power to the working class -- on the contrary this idea is repugnant to them --
but to help to power a bourgeois faction of adventurers, ambitious men and
place-hunters who call themselves Intransigent (irreconcilable) Republicans.
"Already on the eve of the general election to the Constituent Cortes the
workers of Barcelona, Alcoy and other towns wanted to know what political line
they should adopt in the parliamentary struggle and other campaigns. Two big
meetings were therefore held, one in Barcelona, the other in Alcoy; at both
meetings the Alliance members went out of their way to prevent any decision
being reached as to what political line was to be taken by the International"
(note bene: by their own International). "It was therefore decided that the
International, as an association, should not engage in an, political activity
whatever, but that its members, as individuals, could act on their own as the,
thought fit and join the part, they chose, in accordance with their famous
doctrine of autonomy! And what was the result of the application of this absurd
doctrine? That most of the members of the International, including the
anarchists, took part in the elections with no programme, no banner, and no
candidates, thereby helping to bring about the election of almost exclusively
bourgeois republicans. Only two or three workers got into the Chamber, and they
represent absolutely nothing, their voice has not once been raised in defence of
the interests of our class, and they cheerfully voted for all the reactionary
motions tabled by the majority."
That is what Bakuninist "abstention from politics" leads to. At quiet times,
when the proletariat knows beforehand that at best it can get only a few
representatives to parliament and have no chance whatever of winning a
parliamentary majority, the workers may sometimes be made to believe that it is
a great revolutionary action to sit out the elections at home, and in general,
not to attack the State in which they live and which oppresses them, but to
attack the State as such which exists nowhere and which accordingly cannot
defend itself. This is a splendid way of behaving in a revolutionary manner,
especially for people who lose heart easily; and the extent to which the leaders
of the Spanish Alliance belong to this category of people is shown in some
detail in the aforementioned publication.
As soon as events push the proletariat into the fore, however, abstention
becomes a palpable absurdity and the active intervention of the working class an
inevitable necessity. And this is what happened in Spain. The abdication of
Amadeo ousted the radical monarchists from power and deprived them of the
possibility of recovering it in the near future; the Alfonsists (the main
monarchic faction) the stood still less chance at the time; as for the Carlists
(note the other monarchic faction), they, as usual, preferred civil war to an
election campaign. All these parties, according to the Spanish custom,
abstained. Only the federalist Republicans, split into two wings, and the bulk
of the workers took part in the elections. Given the enormous attraction which
the name of the International still enjoyed at that time among the Spanish
workers and given the excellent organisation of the Spanish Section which, at
least for practical purposes, still existed at the time, it was certain that any
candidate nominated and supported by the International would be brilliantly
successful in the industrial districts of Catalonia, in Valencia, in the
Andalusian towns and so on, and that a minority would be elected to the Cortes
large enough to decide the issue whenever it came to a vote between the two
wings of the Republicans. The workers were aware of this; they felt that the
time had come to bring their still powerful organisation into play. But the
honourable leaders of the Bakuninist school had been preaching the gospel of
unqualified abstention too long to be able suddenly to reverse their line; and
so they invented that deplorable way out -- that of having the International
abstain as a body, but allowing its members as individuals to vote as they
liked. The result of this declaration of political bankruptcy was that the
workers, as always in such cases, voted for those who made the most radical
speeches, that is, for the Intransigents, and considering themselves therefore
more or less responsible for subsequent steps taken by their deputies, became
involved in them.
II
The members of the Alliance could not possibly persist in the ridiculous
position into which their cunning electoral policy had landed them; it would
have meant the end of their control over the International in Spain. They had to
act, if only for the sake of appearances. Salvation for them lay in a general
STRIKE.
In the Bakuninist programme a general STRIKE is the lever employed by which the
social revolution is started. One fine morning all the workers in all the
industries of a country, or even of the whole world, stop work, thus forcing the
propertied classes either humbly to submit within four weeks at the most, or to
attack the workers, who would then have the right to defend themselves and use
this opportunity to pull down the entire old society. The idea is far from new;
this horse was since 1848 hard ridden by French, and later Belgian socialists;
it is originally, however, an English breed. During the rapid and vigorous
growth of Chartism among the English workers following the crisis of 1837, the
"holy month", a strike on a national scale was advocated as early as 1839 (see
Engels, The Condition of the Working-Class in England, Second Edition [1892], p.
234) and this had such a strong appeal that in July 1842 the industrial workers
in northern England tried to put it into practice. -- Great importance was also
attached to the general STRIKE at the Geneva Congress of the Alliance held on
September 1, 1873, although it was universally admitted that this required a
well-formed organisation of the working class and plentiful funds. And there's
the rub. On the one hand the governments, especially if encouraged by political
abstention, will never allow the organisation or the funds of the workers to
reach such a level; on the other hand, political events and oppressive acts by
the ruling classes will lead to the liberation of the workers long before the
proletariat is able to set up such an ideal organisation and this colossal
reserve fund. But if it had them, there would be no need to use the roundabout
way of a general STRIKE to achieve its goal. (…)
This is the tipical anarchist approach to all matters. The text has got 12 pages
more (you can read it at www.marxists.org , Engles works 1873). This is just an
example. But the luck of ideological cohesion destroyed the First International.
Marx knew that but in 1860’s and 70’s the main priority was to put the basis for
an international working class movement. The defeats of the First International
gave the lesson to build the second. An international of mass socialist
parties, but the betray of the leaders force the Bolsheviks to create the third.
Stalin dissolved the third International in 1943. A bit earlier Trotsky was
trying to crate a new international movement based in the experience of the
three previous attempts. But he was assassinated. And now this task is on our
shoulders. So comrade is important to start this essential struggle.
any opinions?
Yours In the only Struggle
Comrade Kamo
**********************************
This is a promise, it will give you a tool to discuss with anarchist and convice
them of the uselessness of their ideology. I have been using different sources
but the most important are Engles collected works. If you don’t understand
something tell me (few technical names, Spanish politicians).
I hope you like it,
First of all a brief background:
In 1868 Spain was in a deep crisis. There was a revolutionary ferment. The
monarchy split and there were two factions fighting, in fact there was a civil
war. Unrest in the population was growing .A coup d’etat was organised by the
progrssive forces in the Army. The abdication of the Queen led to a even bigger
inestability. A new King was elected but he couldn’t solve any of the problems.
After two years the king, who was an Italian Prince (Amadeo), abdicated and a
Republic was declared. The Government of the Republic was put in power by
another coup. The new Governemnt abolished slavery in the colonies, stopped the
war in Africa that Spain was holding and started a land reform in benefit of the
poor peasants of Southern Spain. But the revolts continued in others areas…
cantonalist movements developed and the central govt. was under pressure. Under
these conditions the reaction organised another coup and the monarchy was put
back in power, and a regime with a democratic face was ruling the country. The
living conditions of milions of workers and peasants remained the same.
Engels and The First International in Spain. 1873.
He wrote:
As we know, at the time the split in the International occurred the odds were in
favour of the members of the secret Alliance in Spain; the great majority of
Spanish workers followed their lead. When the Republic was proclaimed in
February 1873, the Spanish members of the Alliance found themselves in a
quandary. Spain is such a backward country industrially that there can be no
question there of immediate complete emancipation of the working class. Spain
will first have to pass through various preliminary stages of development and
remove quite a number of obstacles from its path.
The Republic offered a chance of going through these stages in the shortest
possible time and quickly surmounting the obstacles. But this chance could be
taken only if the Spanish working class played an active political role. The
labour masses felt this; they strove everywhere to participate in events, to
take advantage of the opportunity for action, instead of leaving the propertied
classes, as hitherto, a clear field for action and intrigues. The government
announced that elections were to be held to the Constituent Cortes (Spanish word
for Parliament). [May 10, 1873] What was the attitude of the International to
be? The leaders of the Bakuninists were in a predicament. Continued political
inaction became more ridiculous and impossible with every passing day; the
workers wanted "to see things done". The members of the Alliance on the other
hand had been preaching for years that no part should be taken in a revolution
that did not have as its aim the immediate and complete emancipation of the
working class, that political action of any kind implied recognition of the
State, which was the root of all evil, and that therefore participation in any
form of elections was a crime worthy of death. How they got out of this fix is
recounted in the already mentioned Madrid report:
"The same people who rejected the Hague resolution on the political attitude of
the working class and who trampled under foot the Rules of the [International
Working Men's] Association, thus bringing division, conflict and confusion into
the Spanish Section of the International; the same people who had the effrontery
to depict us to the workers as ambitious place-hunters, who, under the pretext
of establishing the rule of the working class, sought to establish their own
rule; the same people who call themselves autonomists, anarchist
revolutionaries, etc., have on this occasion flung themselves into politics,
bourgeois politics of the worst kind. They have worked, not to give political
power to the working class -- on the contrary this idea is repugnant to them --
but to help to power a bourgeois faction of adventurers, ambitious men and
place-hunters who call themselves Intransigent (irreconcilable) Republicans.
"Already on the eve of the general election to the Constituent Cortes the
workers of Barcelona, Alcoy and other towns wanted to know what political line
they should adopt in the parliamentary struggle and other campaigns. Two big
meetings were therefore held, one in Barcelona, the other in Alcoy; at both
meetings the Alliance members went out of their way to prevent any decision
being reached as to what political line was to be taken by the International"
(note bene: by their own International). "It was therefore decided that the
International, as an association, should not engage in an, political activity
whatever, but that its members, as individuals, could act on their own as the,
thought fit and join the part, they chose, in accordance with their famous
doctrine of autonomy! And what was the result of the application of this absurd
doctrine? That most of the members of the International, including the
anarchists, took part in the elections with no programme, no banner, and no
candidates, thereby helping to bring about the election of almost exclusively
bourgeois republicans. Only two or three workers got into the Chamber, and they
represent absolutely nothing, their voice has not once been raised in defence of
the interests of our class, and they cheerfully voted for all the reactionary
motions tabled by the majority."
That is what Bakuninist "abstention from politics" leads to. At quiet times,
when the proletariat knows beforehand that at best it can get only a few
representatives to parliament and have no chance whatever of winning a
parliamentary majority, the workers may sometimes be made to believe that it is
a great revolutionary action to sit out the elections at home, and in general,
not to attack the State in which they live and which oppresses them, but to
attack the State as such which exists nowhere and which accordingly cannot
defend itself. This is a splendid way of behaving in a revolutionary manner,
especially for people who lose heart easily; and the extent to which the leaders
of the Spanish Alliance belong to this category of people is shown in some
detail in the aforementioned publication.
As soon as events push the proletariat into the fore, however, abstention
becomes a palpable absurdity and the active intervention of the working class an
inevitable necessity. And this is what happened in Spain. The abdication of
Amadeo ousted the radical monarchists from power and deprived them of the
possibility of recovering it in the near future; the Alfonsists (the main
monarchic faction) the stood still less chance at the time; as for the Carlists
(note the other monarchic faction), they, as usual, preferred civil war to an
election campaign. All these parties, according to the Spanish custom,
abstained. Only the federalist Republicans, split into two wings, and the bulk
of the workers took part in the elections. Given the enormous attraction which
the name of the International still enjoyed at that time among the Spanish
workers and given the excellent organisation of the Spanish Section which, at
least for practical purposes, still existed at the time, it was certain that any
candidate nominated and supported by the International would be brilliantly
successful in the industrial districts of Catalonia, in Valencia, in the
Andalusian towns and so on, and that a minority would be elected to the Cortes
large enough to decide the issue whenever it came to a vote between the two
wings of the Republicans. The workers were aware of this; they felt that the
time had come to bring their still powerful organisation into play. But the
honourable leaders of the Bakuninist school had been preaching the gospel of
unqualified abstention too long to be able suddenly to reverse their line; and
so they invented that deplorable way out -- that of having the International
abstain as a body, but allowing its members as individuals to vote as they
liked. The result of this declaration of political bankruptcy was that the
workers, as always in such cases, voted for those who made the most radical
speeches, that is, for the Intransigents, and considering themselves therefore
more or less responsible for subsequent steps taken by their deputies, became
involved in them.
II
The members of the Alliance could not possibly persist in the ridiculous
position into which their cunning electoral policy had landed them; it would
have meant the end of their control over the International in Spain. They had to
act, if only for the sake of appearances. Salvation for them lay in a general
STRIKE.
In the Bakuninist programme a general STRIKE is the lever employed by which the
social revolution is started. One fine morning all the workers in all the
industries of a country, or even of the whole world, stop work, thus forcing the
propertied classes either humbly to submit within four weeks at the most, or to
attack the workers, who would then have the right to defend themselves and use
this opportunity to pull down the entire old society. The idea is far from new;
this horse was since 1848 hard ridden by French, and later Belgian socialists;
it is originally, however, an English breed. During the rapid and vigorous
growth of Chartism among the English workers following the crisis of 1837, the
"holy month", a strike on a national scale was advocated as early as 1839 (see
Engels, The Condition of the Working-Class in England, Second Edition [1892], p.
234) and this had such a strong appeal that in July 1842 the industrial workers
in northern England tried to put it into practice. -- Great importance was also
attached to the general STRIKE at the Geneva Congress of the Alliance held on
September 1, 1873, although it was universally admitted that this required a
well-formed organisation of the working class and plentiful funds. And there's
the rub. On the one hand the governments, especially if encouraged by political
abstention, will never allow the organisation or the funds of the workers to
reach such a level; on the other hand, political events and oppressive acts by
the ruling classes will lead to the liberation of the workers long before the
proletariat is able to set up such an ideal organisation and this colossal
reserve fund. But if it had them, there would be no need to use the roundabout
way of a general STRIKE to achieve its goal. (…)
This is the tipical anarchist approach to all matters. The text has got 12 pages
more (you can read it at www.marxists.org , Engles works 1873). This is just an
example. But the luck of ideological cohesion destroyed the First International.
Marx knew that but in 1860’s and 70’s the main priority was to put the basis for
an international working class movement. The defeats of the First International
gave the lesson to build the second. An international of mass socialist
parties, but the betray of the leaders force the Bolsheviks to create the third.
Stalin dissolved the third International in 1943. A bit earlier Trotsky was
trying to crate a new international movement based in the experience of the
three previous attempts. But he was assassinated. And now this task is on our
shoulders. So comrade is important to start this essential struggle.
any opinions?
Yours In the only Struggle
Comrade Kamo