Category: Anarchism
Letter to the Peace Movement
| September 13, 2016 | 8:10 pm | Anarchism, Syria, World Peace Council | Comments closed

By: Alfred Marder, President of the U.S. Peace Council

The U.S. Peace Council, recognizing the dangers of World War 3, organized a DELEGATION OF PEACE LEADERS to Syria. We reached out far and wide, inviting participation. The only stipulation was the desire to bring peace to that area, to see for themselves the situation, and to determine for themselves how to bring the facts back to the US peace movement. The participants had to pay their own way. We invited participation from peace organizations, faith-based groups, and outstanding peace activists. We realized from the start that there would be hesitation to go to a war zone, but we hoped that an understanding for the need to break the silence on the issue of Syria would motivate delegates.

Upon return, even prior to any of the participants reporting on their findings, the attack campaign began. Articles impugning the integrity and role of the U.S. Peace Council and the delegation appeared. They dredged up essays in the progressive press, maligning the U.S. Peace Council and accusing the delegation of serving as spokespersons for the Assad regime.

To this date, to the best of my understanding, not one of these outlets has requested an article or statement from a member of the delegation nor from the U.S. Peace Council. Shades of McCarthy in the progressive media. No requests for interviews despite the historic nature of the delegation!

Instead of welcoming the delegates and sharing their insights as a contribution to the struggle for peace, the so-called self-appointed leaders of some of the peace organizations continue the campaign against the delegation, trying to isolate it and the U.S. Peace Council.

In a moment of history, when it is vital that the U.S. peace movement come together in one voice, to mobilize our neighbors against the dangers of World War 3, these attacks are playing into the hands of the Obama / State Department / CIA policies of aggression.

We earnestly hope that all sincere advocates for peace will reject this McCarthy tactic and come together, in our tradition, for peace.

Yours in Peace,

Alfred L Marder
President,
U.S. Peace Council

P.O. Box 3105

New Haven, CT 06515-0205

USA

Reality and dreams
| August 13, 2015 | 9:05 pm | Anarchism, Cuba, Fidel Castro, political struggle | Comments closed
Art by Antonio Guerrero, one of the Cuban 5

Art by Antonio Guerrero, one of the Cuban 5

The leader of the Cuban Revolution insists that we will never stop struggling for peace and the well-being of all human beings, for every inhabitant on the planet regardless of skin color or national origin.

Writing is a way to be useful if you believe that our long-suffering humanity must be better, and more fully educated, given the incredible ignorance in which we are all enveloped, with the exception of researchers who in the sciences seek satisfactory answers. This is a word which implies in a few letters its immense content.

All of us in our youth heard talk at some point about Einstein, in particular after the explosion of the atomic bombs which pulverized Hiroshima and Nagasaki, putting an end to the cruel war between the United States and Japan.

When those bombs were dropped, after the war unleashed by the attack on the U.S. base at Pearl Harbor, the Japanese Empire had already been defeated. The United States, whose territory and industries remained removed from the war, became the country with the greatest wealth and the best weaponry on Earth, in a world torn apart, full of death, the wounded and hungry.

The Soviet Union and China together lost more than 50 million lives, along with enormous material damage. Almost all of the gold in the world landed in the vaults of the United States. Today it is estimated that the entirety of this country’s gold reserves reached 8,133.5 tons of this metal. Despite that, tearing up the Bretton Woods accords they signed, the United States unilaterally declared that it would not fulfill its duty to back the Troy ounce with the value in gold of its paper money.

The measure ordered by Nixon violated the commitments made by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. According to a large number of experts on the subject, the foundation of a crisis was created, which among other disasters threatens to powerfully batter the economy of this model of a country. Meanwhile, Cuba is owed compensation equivalent to damages, which have reached many millions of dollars, as our country has denounced throughout our interventions in the United Nations, with irrefutable arguments and facts.

As has been expressed with clarity by Cuba’s Party and government, to advance good will and peace among all the countries of this hemisphere and the many peoples who are part of the human family, and thus contribute to the survival of our species in the modest place the universe has conceded us, we will never stop struggling for peace and the well-being of all human beings, for every inhabitant on the planet regardless of skin color or national origin, and for the full right of all to hold a religious belief or not.

The equal right of all citizens to health, education, work, food, security, culture, science, and wellbeing, that is, the same rights we proclaimed when we began our struggle, in addition to those which emerge from our dreams of justice and equality for all inhabitants of our world, is what I wish for all. To those who share all or part of these same ideas, or superior ones along the same lines, I thank you, dear compatriots.

Fidel Castro Ruz

August 13, 2015

1:23 a.m.

The False Identification of Anarchism with the Left
| June 12, 2015 | 10:29 am | Anarchism, political struggle | Comments closed
By A. Shaw
The basic principle of classical anarchism is do not engage in political struggle or, in other words, abstain from politics.
Neo-anarchism says if you must engage in political struggle, then, for God’s sake, you must campaign and vote for a  candidate or party that aims to lose.
Abstention from political struggle results in zero and support of a candidate who aims to lose results in zero.
The ancient law of identity says two different things that are identical to a third thing are identical to each other.
So, classical anarchism and neo-anarchism are identical to a third thing — namely, zero — so, classical anarchism and neo-anarchism are identical to each other.
The gist of classical anarchism is: If you can’t for some reason campaign and vote for a reactionary candidate, then, for God’s sake, don’t campaign and vote at all.
The gist of neo-anarchism is: If you can’t for some reason campaign and vote for a reactionary candidate, then, for God’s sake,  campaign and vote for somebody who aims to lose.
(1) Vote for the reactionary candidate and the result is  reactionary 1 and revolutionary 0.
(2) Vote for the revolutionary candidate and the result is  reactionary 0 and revolutionary 1
(3) Vote for neither the reactionary nor revolutionary candidate and the result is reactionary 0 and revolutionary 0. This is a kind of nothingness or a zero.
(4) Vote for the candidate who aims to lose and the result is reactionary 0 and revolutionary 0, because losing is the ultimate nothingness or the ultimate zero.
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So, the identity is between (3) and (4), above, or, in other words,  reactionary 0 and revolutionary 0 is the same thing as  reactionary 0 and revolutionary 0.
Both classical anarchism and neo-anarchism see campaigning as a greater enemy or foe than voting.
The individual who votes results in only one vote under the rule of one person, one vote.
But the individual who knows how to campaign and who campaigns may result in only one or only one hundred votes or only one thousand votes, depending on his or her degree of skill and kind of skill in campaigning.
So, the campaigner is evil in the eyes of anarchists just as the anarchist is evil is the eyes of those who campaign.
The most extreme expression of anarchism is a dead dog anarchist. He or she is not only an anarchist, but he or she is also dead and a dog.
So, finally, the Left is not anarchism and should not be so identified.
The Left therefore is either A or B or C or anarchism. A or B or C or anarchism differs from anarchism.
Anarchism is by far the largest sector of bourgeois politics. There are more anarchists than all other political creatures combined.
Anarchy or Revolution
| January 25, 2015 | 9:31 pm | Anarchism, Frederick Engels, Karl Marx, police terrorism, political struggle, V.I. Lenin | Comments closed

karl marxBy James Thompson

 

Karl Marx writes in the sixth paragraph of the Preface to A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy (1859):

 

“In the social production of their existence, men inevitably enter into definite relations, which are independent of their will, namely relations of production appropriate to a given stage in the development of their material forces of production. The totality of these relations of production constitutes the economic structure of society, the real foundation, on which arises a legal and political superstructure and to which correspond definite forms of social consciousness. The mode of production of material life conditions the general process of social, political and intellectual life. It is not the consciousness of men that determines their existence, but their social existence that determines their consciousness. At a certain stage of development, the material productive forces of society come into conflict with the existing relations of production or – this merely expresses the same thing in legal terms – with the property relations within the framework of which they have operated hitherto. From forms of development of the productive forces these relations turn into their fetters. Then begins an era of social revolution. The changes in the economic foundation lead sooner or later to the transformation of the whole immense superstructure.”

 

Marx teaches us that “The mode of production of material life conditions the general process of social, political and intellectual life.”

 

In a previous post on this website “Frederick Engels on Bukunin’s School of Anarchy”, A. Shaw notes that Engels made the case that Anarchists view the state as the ultimate evil and routinely abstain from the political struggle in any meaningful way. In short, Anarchists have a phobia of political struggle. They are extremely successful in persuading people on the left, people of conscience and progressives generally from participating fully in the political struggle in the United States. This is easily confirmed by the pathetic numbers of people who vote.

 

According to Time magazine, the 2014 midterm elections voter turnout reached a 72 year low and only 36.4% of eligible voters actually voted. Researchers Martin Gilens and Benjamin I. Page maintained that the US political system has transformed from a democracy into an oligarchy where wealthy elites control most political power. The researchers maintain

“The central point that emerges from our research is that economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy,” they write, “while mass-based interest groups and average citizens have little or no independent influence.”

If this is true, then it is obvious that those people who control the means of production in the United States control the political process as well. The people who control the means of production in the United States, obviously, are the capitalist class, commonly referred to as the 1%.

 

Marx taught us and examination of the current mode of production easily reveals that market economies are anarchistic in form and content. In other words, market economies are ideologically anarchistic.

 

Dictionary definitions of anarchism include components such as “rejection of authority” and “absence of government and absolute freedom of the individual, regarded as a political ideal.” Synonyms of anarchy include “lawlessness, nihilism, disorder, chaos, mayhem, tumult, turmoil.” It should be pointed out that nihilism, particularly that form of nihilism expressed by Friedrich Nietzsche, was the dominant ideology of Nazi Germany.

 

Few would argue that there is no worship of the “absolute freedom of the individual” in the US today.

 

Few would argue that the distribution of wealth in the USA is not uneven and that the market economy of the US is not chaotic.

 

An examination of current social relations in the USA reveals absolute anarchy in social, intellectual and political life. Mainstream media conceals the reality of the conduct of the US government every day. Low voter turnout hands elections over to the 1% without a fight. Movies, video games and the Internet have produced a culture based on violence and chaos never before seen in the history of mankind.

 

Lawlessness, including police terrorism, is rampant across the nation.

 

The US military violates international law and terrorizes working people around the globe.

 

Economic warfare waged by the US ruling class creates chaos, anarchy, terror and psychological dysfunction domestically and internationally.

 

Bizarre behavior among humans in the USA has become the new norm. All of this is a reflection of the chaos and anarchy of the mode of production, i.e. the market economy.

 

In his “Letters on Tactics”, Lenin defined revolution as the passing of state power from one class to another.Lenin

 

People on the left in the United States give a lot of lip service to “revolution.” However, all too often people on the left equate revolution with anarchy. They don’t seem to have a clue about how to acquire state power. Of course, by playing into the hands of the anarchists, people on the left play into the hands of the capitalists.

 

Anarchists, because of their phobia of political struggle, routinely abstain from meaningful political activity. Abstention from political activity is abstention from the struggle to acquire state power. Abstention from political activity is therefore abstention from revolution. Abstention from revolution means a free ride for the 1%. Anarchy is therefore antithetical to revolutionary struggle.

 

People in the US have a choice in front of them. They can continue to worship individualism and anarchy and abdicate their political power to the 1% or they can unite, organize and fight for the interests of working people which include accessible education, healthcare, housing, legal justice and freedom from oppression, exploitation and racism in all its forms. So, working people must choose between anarchy or revolution.

Frederick Engels On Bakunin’s School of Anarchism
| January 23, 2015 | 8:48 pm | Anarchism, Frederick Engels, political struggle | 3 Comments

engelsBy A. Shaw

 

Today, in 2015, there must be at least 5000 brands of anarchism. Some of these brands attack the proletariat from the Left and others from Right. Leftwing anarchism was the first ideological current that substituted intrigue, splitting of sects, and rampant sectarianism for political struggle.

 

Leftwing anarchism abstains from political struggle, but wallows in sectarianism.

 

Now, 120 years after Engels’ death, Bakunin’s brand of anarchism, with certain minor modifications, still exemplifies leftwing anarchism.

 

THE MAIN EVIL

 

“As for Bakunin, the state is the main evil, nothing must be done which can maintain the existence of any state, whether it be a republic, a monarchy or whatever it may be,” Engels writes in a Jan.1872 letter to Theodor Cuno.

 

To anarchism, the form of the state — that is, “a republic, a monarchy or whatever it may be” — does not alter the evil character of the state. Moreover, to anarchism, the content of the state — that is, whether it be a slaveholding state, a feudalist state, bourgeois state, or proletarian state — does not alter the evil character of the state.

 

The state is evil, the anarchist insists. Case closed.

 

The regime in the USA has a democratic form, and bourgeois content. The regime in Saudi Arabia has monarchical form and bourgeois content. The government of North Korea has monarchical form and proletarian content. The government of Cuba has democratic form [based on multi-candidate elections — not multi-party elections – at the municipal level] and a proletarian content.

 

Form reveals HOW state power is exercised and is often laid out in the constitution of the state.

 

Content tells us WHO or what social class chiefly exercises state power and for whom is power chiefly exercised.

 

The anarchist condemns the state as the “main evil” whatever its form and content, so nothing must be done to maintain or defend the existence of any state.

 

Anarchism and Marxism agree that the state is the organized power of one class for oppressing or holding down another, as Marx and Engels argue in the Communist Manifesto.

 

In others words, the principle function of a state, regardless of form, is oppression. Again, this is common ground between Marxism and anarchism.

 

In ancient Greece, the so-called master class oppressed the class of slaves, using the slaveholding state as an instrument of oppression whether the regime’s form was democratic or undemocratic. During the feudalist era, the landowners oppressed peasants, using the feudalist state. In bourgeois society, the capitalist class oppresses or holds down the working class, using the bourgeois state, no matter how democratic is the form of the state. In a socialist society, the working class uses the proletarian state, which may be either democratic or undemocratic to hold down the bourgeoisie ousted from power by revolution.

 

Of course, communism, which follows socialism by hundreds of years, gradually makes the state superfluous. Classes based on relations to the means of production and income disparities begin to die out. The state, which oppresses classes, withers away as these classes fade away.

 

 

COMPLETE ABSTENTION

 

Engels writes “Hence therefore complete abstention from all politics. To perpetrate a political action, and especially to take part in an election, would be a betrayal of principle …  To preach that the workers should in all circumstances abstain from politics is to drive them into the arms of the priests or the bourgeois republicans.”

 

The principle, above, to which Engels refers is the anarchist principle of political abstention. This is the benchmark principle of anarchism.

 

In the mid-term U.S. elections of 2014, the abstention of the working and middle classes reached astounding proportions and bourgeois reactionaries grew more powerful in the bourgeois state which oppresses other classes.

 

Engels calls the Left anarchist a swindler when the Left anarchist urges workers to drop out of the political struggle.

 

Engels says something like you can fool workers sometimes but not all of the time, here “But the mass of the workers will never allow themselves to be persuaded that the public affairs of their country are not also their own affairs; they are by nature political and whoever tries to make out to them that they should leave politics alone will in the end get left in the lurch.”

 

If anarchist identity is determined by political inactivity rather than anarchist consciousness and theory, then anarchism may be the largest tendency within the U.S. working class.

 

THE MECHANICS OF THE ANARCHIST SWINDLE

 

Let’s assume a race between candidate A and candidate B for some office.

 

Let’s further assume you support candidate A.

 

There are two ways you can help candidate A:

 

(1) give support directly to candidate A or

 

(2) block support going to candidate B

 

No. (1) — that is, give support directly to candidate A  — is the politics of participation

No. (2) — that is, block support going to candidate B  –  is the politics of abstention

 

 

Let’s assume you argue that you are evenhanded between candidate A and B because you urge voters and operatives not to support either candidate.

 

Say a constituency votes 90% for a candidate like B [e.g., like in some African American districts] and 10% for a candidate like A.

 

If the leftwing anarchist persuades voters and volunteers to abstain, candidate B will suffer a blow nine times harder than his opponent.

 

That is not evenhanded. That is two-faced.

 

 

 

HEAP ABUSE UPON THE STATE

 

What does the anarchist do while he abstains from politics?

 

“The thing to do is to conduct propaganda, heap abuse upon the state, organize until all workers are won over …,” Engels says about the anarchist.

 

In other words, the anarchist talks as he waits.

 

When it comes to conducting propaganda against the state, many anarchists are phenomenal. Many of them have a knack.

 

When either the ruling bourgeoisie [e.g., USA] or the ruling proletariat [e.g., Cuba] exercises state power in the wrong way, anarchists have a knack of finding out what happened and making propaganda about the transgression.

 

A presupposition of anarchist propaganda is: If there were no state, then state power could not be exercised in the wrong way.

 

AUTHORITY

 

According to Engels, anarchist society will not tolerate authority.

 

“In this society there will above all be no authority, for authority = state = an absolute evil. (How these people propose to run a factory, work a railway or steer a ship without having in the last resort one deciding will, without a unified direction, they do not indeed tell us.) The authority of the majority over the minority also ceases. Every individual and every community is autonomous, but as to how a society, even of only two people, is possible unless each gives up some of his autonomy, Bakunin again remains silent,” Engels writes.

 

Apparently, anarchists believe the state is the main evil or the absolute evil because the state has more authority than other institutions.

 

So, “every individual and every community is autonomous.” This proposition has generated thousands of intrigues, splits, and savage sectarianism within the anarchist movement.

 

“Every individual … is autonomous.” is a favorite proposition of rightwing anarchism.

 

“Even if this authority is voluntarily bestowed it must cease simply because it is authority,” Engels observes

 

CONCLUSIONS

 

Anarchists want to abolish the state today. Marxists are willing to wait hundreds of years for the state to wither away.

 

Both anarchists and Marxists believe the state, even in a democratic form, is an instrument by which one class oppresses another.

 

Anarchists want to abstain from the struggle for power. Marxists struggle for power.

 

Anarchists say nasty things about the ruling class whether it is bourgeois or proletariat. Marxists truthfully defend the proletarian state.

 

Anarchists are intolerant of authority. Marxists greatly uses authority, especially during socialism, the stage of development between capitalism and communism.

 

“Here you have in brief the main points of the swindle,” Engel writes.

 

By swindle, Engels means anarchism.