Solidarity Networks as Schools for Communism

[Tim Cornelis]

We see that succesful far-left movements use concrete or immediate political demands (land in the case of the Zapatistas, housing in the case of the Abahlali baseMjondolo, and the Kurdish question in the case of the PKK/KCK) or mutual aid (Again, abahlali baseMjondolo, communist parties decades ago) as a catalyst or stepping stone for radical politics and a platform to politicise the working classes. It is not surprising that communist parties' membership is always outnumbered by its trade union wing*: trade unions fight for immediate interests.
Hence, I think the formation of solidarity networks as constituent structure within a federation of grassroots anticapitalist and libertarian communist political organisations is the best strategy to further communism.

As such I present the following text by the Seattle Solidarity Network, which was formed by IWW members in Seattle.

BUILD YOUR OWN SOLIDARITY NETWORK: A guide to building a successful solidarity network along the lines of the Seattle Solidarity Network, written by SeaSol organizers.
http://libcom.org/files/seasol-pamphlet-expanded-US.pdf

It details how to organise and form a solidarity network and do so successfully.

SeaSol has been active since 2008, now has (if I remember correctly) 150 members and 400 associated folk. Fairly successful I'd say (though not mindblowing) for a city with 500,000 citizens (3,000,000 urban area) in a non-revolutionary situation or environment.
Its website: http://seasol.net/

*See:
Spain. United Left (party): 70,000 members; CCOO (trade union): 1,500,000
Greece. KKE (party): 40,000 members; PAME (trade union): 800,000
Italy. Federation of the Left: 40,000 members; GCIL (trade union): 5,800,000
Incidentally, anarchist mass movements have always been trade unions for the same reason.

P.S.
I proposed the formation of a solidarity network within a constituent organisation of the Vrije Bond/Free Union, in the first meeting I proposed it, in the second we discussed the text, the response was ambivalent. Not enough to form a solidarity network, unfortunately. In the next meeting we will again discuss strategy, and I think this will highlight the hitherto lack thereof, as well as the lack of a compelling alternative strategy, and thus the need for such a solidarity network.