WORK . COMMUNITY . POLITICS . WAR

[YSR]

Don't know if people have seen this pamphlet, it's pretty fucking awesome.

The text version is okay, it's here: http://prole.info/wcpw.html

But the pdf is fucking beautiful: http://libcom.org.uk/lib/wcpw-prole-manifesto.pdf

Check check it out.

[R_P_A_S]

this is exactly the kind of shit i been talking about. that the world needs! simple STRAIGHT to the point facts and numbers.

YES!!!

[farleft]

Nice, simple but effective, like it.

[Devrim]

I have just read this. It is a bit anarchist, isn't it? It rejects the idea of a class party.
Devrim

[black magick hustla]

Originally posted by [email protected] 09, 2007 02:52 pm
I have just read this. It is a bit anarchist, isn't it? It rejects the idea of a class party.
Devrim
Its an insurrectionist approach to communist politics.

It lacks in the organization side, but otherwise its an effective manifesto.

[which doctor]

I like it. prole.info has some good stuff. Overall, I would classify prole.info as a new type of left communism.

[Pawn Power]

Originally posted by Marmot+November 09, 2007 04:42 pm--> (Marmot @ November 09, 2007 04:42 pm)
[email protected] 09, 2007 02:52 pm
I have just read this. It is a bit anarchist, isn't it? It rejects the idea of a class party.
Devrim
Its an insurrectionist approach to communist politics.

It lacks in the organization side, but otherwise its an effective manifesto. [/b]


I like it. prole.info has some good stuff. Overall, I would classify prole.info as a new type of left communism.

It seems to have a situationist feel to it.

[Everyday Anarchy]

I got a hardcopy of this and other works of prole.info for free from some pretty nice guys at the Chicago Anarchist Theory conference last April.

[which doctor]

Chicago Anarchist Theory Conference?

[Everyday Anarchy]

Yeah, I think "Finding Our Roots" was the 'official' name of it.
http://mayfirst.wordpress.com/

It was pretty cool. Plenty of workshops to choose from, Food Not Bombs meal, and then everyone set up tables with different pamphlets and shit.
Good stuff.

[Devrim]

Originally posted by FoB+November 09, 2007 09:48 pm--> (FoB @ November 09, 2007 09:48 pm) I like it. prole.info has some good stuff. Overall, I would classify prole.info as a new type of left communism. [/b]
I think that they are flirting with our ideas, but it does come out explicitly as anarchist, and against the idea of the party.


Originally posted by Pawn [email protected]
It seems to have a situationist feel to it.

It is the obvious first impression, but I tend to think that it is the way it is presented that gives it. Would you say it had a situationist feel if you had just read the text without the pictures?


Marmot
Its an insurrectionist approach to communist politics.

It lacks in the organization side, but otherwise its an effective manifesto.

Is this insurectionism?

There is also another one, Abolish Restaurants (http://prole.info/ar/index.html).

Devrim

[black magick hustla]

It is the obvious first impression, but I tend to think that it is the way it is presented that gives it. Would you say it had a situationist feel if you had just read the text without the pictures?


Yes, the situationists focused a lot on "work", and the revolutionary refusal of it. It is certainly influenced by situationist theory.

{Quote]Is this insurectionism?[/Quote]

Well, I don't remember where I read this, but I have read of the manifesto being described as "insurrectionary communism". It makes sense, because it refuses coherent organization in the same way insurrectionary anarchists like Bonanno do, while at the same time, embracing class analysis and politics (hence communism)

[Devrim]

Originally posted by Marmot+November 10, 2007 06:44 am--> (Marmot @ November 10, 2007 06:44 am)
[email protected] 10, 2007 05:49 am

It is the obvious first impression, but I tend to think that it is the way it is presented that gives it. Would you say it had a situationist feel if you had just read the text without the pictures?


Yes, the situationists focused a lot on "work", and the revolutionary refusal of it. It is certainly influenced by situationist theory.
[/b]
I don't think so. If you go back to Marx, he talks a lot about work too.

The whole thing about the refusal of work is just a luxury of those who can afford to do it. It had no revolutionary content whatsoever, but I don't get that from this.




Is this insurectionism?

Well, I don't remember where I read this, but I have read of the manifesto being described as "insurrectionary communism". It makes sense, because it refuses coherent organization in the same way insurrectionary anarchists like Bonanno do, while at the same time, embracing class analysis and politics (hence communism)

You may have a point here. I am not actually that sure exactly what the 'insurectionists' are about.

Devrim

[R_P_A_S]

fuck off
on the real.. is this. is that. it lacks this and what not

i dont see any of you writing anything else. so shut the the fuck up. CONTRIBUTE.

[Leo]

Saying what something lacks is the most valuable contribution RPAS.

[black magick hustla]

Originally posted by [email protected] 10, 2007 07:06 am

I don't think so. If you go back to Marx, he talks a lot about work too.

The whole thing about the refusal of work is just a luxury of those who can afford to do it. It had no revolutionary content whatsoever, but I don't get that from this.


Actually, when I mean "refusal" I mean "ideological refusal", that there is nothing "good" about it as we see it capitalism. Hence, in order to destroy this awfully alienating labor, we have to destroy capital.

It is true marx talked a lot about the alienation of labor, particularly in his first manuscripts.

The whole situationist position actually grew from this analysis. The situationists placed a lot of emphasis in the individualist and subjective side of marxism, and this manifesto takes a similar approach. The situationists, instead of taking the traditional "factory worker" stereotype, they focused more on first world proletarians, like service workers etc, and how awfully alienated they whre.

If you read "Revolution of Everyday Life", which I strongly suggest, you would realize from where I am coming fronm. In fact, prole.info hosts several situationist texts. Guy Debord never talked that much about this individualist aspect of marxism in as much as Vaneigem did. And frankly, I think Vaneigem is much more better, much less of a snob, and much more positive.

[R_P_A_S]

Originally posted by Leo [email protected] 10, 2007 09:41 am
Saying what something lacks is the most valuable contribution RPAS.
i was drunk. and you are right. sorry.

[Devrim]

Originally posted by [email protected] 10, 2007 10:05 am
If you read "Revolution of Everyday Life", which I strongly suggest, you would realize from where I am coming fronm.
I have read it, but it was a couple of decades ago.


It is true marx talked a lot about the alienation of labor, particularly in his first manuscripts.

I think that the points that you mention about work were always a part of the communist programme. I don't think that it is something that is only in the early Marx, but something that is consistent through his work. I can understand that the situationists may have done much to revive this view which was in danger of being lost, especially during the dark years of the Stalinist counter-revolution, but it was something that was always there within the communist left. The work of Bordiga, for example, cries out with the passion for communism.


The whole situationist position actually grew from this analysis.

I still think that most of their politics were picked up from SouB.

Devrim

[black magick hustla]

Originally posted by [email protected] 11, 2007 04:01 pm


I still think that most of their politics were picked up from SouB.

Devrim
I don't think Vaneigem's politics were picked from SouB. He was more of an anarchist than a "left communist".

[Devrim]

Originally posted by Marmot+November 13, 2007 04:12 am--> (Marmot @ November 13, 2007 04:12 am)
[email protected] 11, 2007 04:01 pm


I still think that most of their politics were picked up from SouB.

Devrim
I don't think Vaneigem's politics were picked from SouB. He was more of an anarchist than a "left communist". [/b]
SouB weren't left communist.
Devrim

[YSR]

Ya'll, while Marx definitely hit on it, I think the whole "refusal of work" thing really picks up a lot in the autonomists, particularly Antonio Negri's work. (He was influenced by SouB, so it could be there, I've never read them.) Also the whole Detroit scene, with Johnson-Forrest Tendency and whatnot really hit on it. Those ideas get picked up by Negri and the autonomists a couple of years later and they roll with 'em.

The Situationists were certainly anti-work, but I don't think that they examined it in the same way as the autonomists. They talked about a hatred of work, whereas I think the first time, chronologically, that I've seen the phrase "refusal of work" is in Marty Glaberman's (a Johnsonite) writings.

But I could be wrong. It doesn't really matter that much. Either way, this piece rocks hard.

[black magick hustla]

Originally posted by devrimankara+November 13, 2007 06:20 am--> (devrimankara @ November 13, 2007 06:20 am)
Originally posted by [email protected] 13, 2007 04:12 am

[email protected] 11, 2007 04:01 pm


I still think that most of their politics were picked up from SouB.

Devrim
I don't think Vaneigem's politics were picked from SouB. He was more of an anarchist than a "left communist".
SouB weren't left communist.
Devrim [/b]
I never understood why you thought SouB wasn't left communist. It wasn't probably the best example, but they consciously identified with council communists and embraced the "state-capitalist" analysis".

Castoriadis later rejected trotskyism, (and later rejected marxism as a whole lol), but what about the inbetween?

[Devrim]

Originally posted by [email protected] 14, 2007 12:00 am
I never understood why you thought SouB wasn't left communist. It wasn't probably the best example, but they consciously identified with council communists and embraced the "state-capitalist" analysis".

Castoriadis later rejected trotskyism, (and later rejected marxism as a whole lol), but what about the inbetween?
Castoriadis did reject Trotskyism, but the Marxism went with it. I don't think that there was very much in-between.

I wouldn't classify them as 'left communists' because of their rejection of Marxism, and their position on the unions.

Devrim

[I'd Rather Be Drinking]

The point of view from which prole.info is coming is that the vast majority of people who call themselves "revolutionaries" are not. First because most people who call themselves "anarchists" and "communists" are completely reactionary. But also because a revolutionary is someone who is in the process of making a revolution. "A party of the revolutionaries" who are not taking part in revolution is at best self-imortant, and depending on what is meant by a "party", is often completely counter-revolutionary (such as the social-democratic party, or the party as guerilla organization). This of course does not mean that prole.info is against organization, or against formal organization.

Communism is not the people who have read Marx. Communism is a real movement that exists today. It exists in contradictory ways in the struggle of working people. There is no pure ideological line to be traced back throughout history. At various times throughout history, this real tendency has been associated with the lables "communist" , "anarchist" and other names. More often than not it doesn't show up in the ways that the self-described "revolutionaries" thought it would.

[black magick hustla]

Originally posted by I'd Rather Be [email protected] 16, 2007 11:59 pm
The point of view from which prole.info is coming is that the vast majority of people who call themselves "revolutionaries" are not. First because most people who call themselves "anarchists" and "communists" are completely reactionary. But also because a revolutionary is someone who is in the process of making a revolution. "A party of the revolutionaries" who are not taking part in revolution is at best self-imortant, and depending on what is meant by a "party", is often completely counter-revolutionary (such as the social-democratic party, or the party as guerilla organization). This of course does not mean that prole.info is against organization, or against formal organization.

Communism is not the people who have read Marx. Communism is a real movement that exists today. It exists in contradictory ways in the struggle of working people. There is no pure ideological line to be traced back throughout history. At various times throughout history, this real tendency has been associated with the lables "communist" , "anarchist" and other names. More often than not it doesn't show up in the ways that the self-described "revolutionaries" thought it would.
It is true that communism is a movement--more than it is an "ideology".

Communism is pretty much the movement that strives for taking control of our lives--regardless if it was 600 years ago, with the taborites, 400 years ago with the diggers, etc.

However, at the same time, revolutions are done through organization. There is nothing wrong with communists organizing in a world, class party that strives to educate and agitate.

This is the biggest flaw of the insurrectionary approach--it has never really accomplished anything except some few outbursts of freedom.

[Devrim]

For those who don't know the writer above, 'I would rather be drinking' is the author of the pamphlet.


Originally posted by I would rather be drinking'
The point of view from which prole.info is coming is that the vast majority of people who call themselves "revolutionaries" are not. First because most people who call themselves "anarchists" and "communists" are completely reactionary. But also because a revolutionary is someone who is in the process of making a revolution. "A party of the revolutionaries" who are not taking part in revolution is at best self-imortant, and depending on what is meant by a "party", is often completely counter-revolutionary (such as the social-democratic party, or the party as guerilla organization). This of course does not mean that prole.info is against organization, or against formal organization.

I actually agree with this, but I think that it hides some deeper differences. To me it reminds me of what we would refer to as the modernist current (perhaps best represented by Dauvé) who state that the party will be formed by the class in the course of the class struggle. Whilst we agree with this, it is also true that the work that the communists militants do today is an important part of building that party. The modernists seem to think that it will appear out of thin air. We think that formal organisation today is essential.

Devrim

[I'd Rather Be Drinking]

Sorry. I should have been more clear, yeah I am the author of WCPW.

I am not an insurrectionary anarchist. I do not agree with their critique of formal organization, amongst other things (although I do not take it as an insult and have met some very intelligent insurrectionary anarchists). It seems a bit of a stretch to me to identify a communist movement before there is a proletariat, but in any case we can agree that communism is a movement, not an ideology.

Now, on "the party"... In common language, the "party" means a political party who takes part in elections. In that sense only social democrats are for it. I would add to this the critique of a party of militants who believe that theirs is an organization of the conscious workers and they need to introduce their consciousness into the rest of the workers. (Or worse yet that the workers are unecessary and the conscious communist guerillas can make a revolution all on their own). I am not against a "party" if it means just a "formal organization".

Formally organized workers will play a part in any revolution, as will informally organized workers, and even disorganized workers. But the formal organizations are not the revolution. Revolution poses questions about organization, what kinds are needed and where. I don't claim to have a global strategy. I think that specific organizationally strategies are needed in different specific situations. Generally speaking, I would agree that there is a need as a working class movement grows and becomes more powerful, to have more formal organization. That is not to say that the formal organizations are the creators of that movement.

Obviously workers who read Marx and call themselves "communists" (like myself) should do whatever we can today. We should organized as best we can (which is in the present situation, not too well in my opinion).