issue 1 of the commune published
Nov 13 2008
We are pleased to announce the publication of the first issue of our newspaper The Commune. You can order a printed copy (£1 per copy + postage and packing) by emailing uncaptiveminds@gmail.com or writing to The Commune, 2nd Floor, 145-157 St John Street, London EC1V 4PY.
It includes extensive coverage of the credit crunch and "state socialist" and Keynesian solutions, arguments saying nationalisation has no answers, reports on Unison and PCS actions, a piece on William Morris, arguments for social ownership, and a piece on the class struggle in Iran.
Alternatively, visit http://thecommune.wordpress.com/magazine/the-commune-issue-1/ to read the articles online or download the PDF file
Nov 14 2008
#2
Rob, they're a new political group so it's understandable they want their own press (as much as i'm pro consolidation of resources).
Nov 14 2008
#3
I'm not having a go, but I am interested as to what they're hoping to get out of it that they wouldn't otherwise. I mean if they're bringing it out every couple of weeks as an in-depth journal maybe, as that wouldn't fit into other setups particularly well, but depends on what sort of resources they're putting into it etc.
Nov 15 2008
#4
It's not an anarchist group, so it wouldn't be able to merge with any of the explicitly anarchist operations - Freedom, Black Flag, etc. Not sure what that leaves?
Nov 15 2008
#5
Actually, some of the links and so forth are interesting. While I may not share the views of many of the authors, there seems to be a decent presentation of the broad libertarian socialist left and beyond. I particularly like the stuff on "workers control". That is, having the materials available on-line.
Nov 15 2008
#6
Given that we have started an organisation (3 months ago), with a distinct set of politics, set up a website, and having held five public meetings and produced four pamphlets, producing a newspaper only seemed a natural step. Having been in another organisation (AWL) myself I don't think there was (or is) any other political home for our comrades and the kind of politics we advocate, although obviously we're happy to engage in dialogue and debate.
Nov 15 2008
#7
How far off libertarian communism would you say you fall? I'm asking cos Black Flag in particular (and Freedom as well) are both open to writing from a wide spectrum of libertarian class struggle politics.
Nov 15 2008
#8
I understand David's point here although I don't agree with much of his politics. I think that there is a tendency in anarchism to discount political differences in favour of unity around being 'anarchists' or whatever.
They have laid out their platform: http://thecommune.wordpress.com/1/
and I am sure that they are open to discussing these positions.
On another point:
DB wrote:
Given that we have started an organisation (3 months ago), with a distinct set of politics, set up a website, and having held five public meetings and produced four pamphlets, producing a newspaper only seemed a natural step.
Their work rate seems quite impressive (To compare our organisation was started two and a half years ago, we have our 'distinct' politics, have held numerous public meetings, have produced three pamphlets, produce a monthly newspaper, and a bi-annual review).
Actually what I meant was impressive compared to some of the anarchist tendencies, normal for people who are seriously trying to launch an organisation.
Devrim
Nov 15 2008
#9
Yeah I read that, couldn't disagree with much of it but found it a bit vague, hence asking. Bearing in mind as well, Black Flag is not meant to be a means of drawing everyone together as one happy family, it's meant to be a magazine in which multiple groups in the same vein can be hosted and get exposure - ie. a one-off piece of collaboration.
Nov 15 2008
#10
If this post is a bit trainspotterish forgive me, but there may be some important detail in the minutiae. Rob Ray poses the pertinent questions of why produce a new magazine, rather than contribute to existing ones, and how far off libertarian communism it falls, considering the vagueness of its principles. Dave Broder states that he had been in another organisation (AWL). Now, would AWL stand for Alliance for Workers' Liberty? It's not like I want to start a witch-hunt or anything (but, By jingo...), after all, there's plenty of ex-Stalinists and Trots in the Tory Party and (New) Labour, but I can't help thinking that The Commune is stationed deliberately at the periphery of what one acquaintance who was a member of Socialist Organiser described as the 'anarchist fringe' .
Now, I'm not speculating about the political pedigree of The Commune in order that it be expelled from the 'fold', as I feel pretty alienated from the 'fold' anyway - whatever that is - but I know of many organisations that are keen to lay out their radical credentials and pedigree, so that anyone approaching, say the A(C)F, ICC, IWW, Solfed, etc. will know something of their political/historical antecedents as well as their immediate relationship to ongoing struggles. Such information, while not absent in the case of The Commune, seems a bit vague.
I know I'm joining up the dots in what can be described as a 'sectarian' way (which was a word I only heard uttered by SWPers, Mutants and SOers), but wasn't the AWL once Socialist Organiser? Was Socialist Organiser an 'entrist' organisation? SO was regarded (in my vague memory) as one of the more 'open' Trotskyist groups with more sympathy towards the 'libertarian' end of things, but then that impression might have been cultivated by certain of their members to show they weren't 'like all the others'. The principal SO member I knew in town never said he disagreed with me - even to the extent of, one day finding me clutching a copy of World Revolution, saying he agreed with 75% of it.
Nov 16 2008
#11
Quote:
how far off libertarian communism [the Commune] falls, considering the vagueness of its principles
I don't understand - "libertarian communism" is a rather abstract term, which could be interpreted to mean lots of different things, whereas the Commune's politics are laid out for all to see. I don't accept that the politics are "vague": the platform is out of necessity all-embracing and a general statement of principle, but is nonetheless very clearly focused on workers' self-management and self-organisation, as are other pieces on the site and in our paper. I'd call myself a communist, but wouldn't be too offended to be called a libertarian communist or libertarian socialist or whatever, but that's hardly a reason to join a group based on anarchism.
Quote:
I can't help thinking that The Commune is stationed deliberately at the periphery of what one acquaintance who was a member of Socialist Organiser described as the 'anarchist fringe' .
It is not some "deliberate" manoeuvre to capture some piece of political territory. The group reflects the politics of those who have been involved in establishing it, a minority of whom were ever in the AWL.
Indeed the AWL is regarded as open/democratic compared to the SWP, but that's not much of a standard to set yourself. Indeed, Wellclose square, you seem to be claiming that we should either attach ourselves to an anarchist group, or go the other way and be Trotskyists, and submerge our own politics in someone else's "tradition" and their heroes. That is not what we are about.
Nov 16 2008
#12
Well there are certain similarities with some of the anarchist groups in the influence from Solidarity, but it seems the only real practical difference between them and the groups "based on anarchism" is their weird stance on "national self-determination", which is unfortunate as I quite enjoyed their paper and agree with lots of the rest of their politics. The rest is largely branding, it seems.
Nov 16 2008
#13
Again, David I wasn't suggesting you just join another group, but I was wondering why go to the major effort of setting up another tiny magazine rather than running your ideas through existing sympathetic publications - something I aim at most groups in the libertarian communist sphere.
Cheers Django, seemed like there wasn't a lot of difference between their stance and classic libertarian communism, but national self-determination is a bit of a twist...
Nov 16 2008
#14
Rob Ray wrote:
Just out of interest, what prompted you to do your own magazine rather than putting your efforts into building or contributing to one of the several existing ones?
The anti-trot paranoia on this thread seems a bit uneccesary, they have their own organisation so they have their own paper. They're not anarchists and probably don;t think the anarchist movement such as it is has a lot to offer them, certainly theirs nothing about solfed, the iww and afed that would make me for some bizarre reason want to dissolve a political group i was in to join them and i'm saying that as a solfed member.
Likewise the speculation about them being some sort of AWL third column is all a bit unneccesary and again, it comes down to the point that a lot of people only join the SWP for example because theres nowt else out there, or because anarchists get burnt out doing nothing in activisty circles so whinging about them recruiting anarchists would seem to be somewhat futile.
In general i reckon thecommune seems reasonably sound, i'll probly potter along to a few meetings when i move up to london in the new year. I'm not really bothered about the national determination thingy, it seems a minor side arguement. To me my main disagreement with their politics would be the fact that they still seem attached to labour party entrism and parliamentary democracy, hence i'd question inviting the mp for hayes to meetings about workers control and sticking the labour representation committee in your links. I mean i know you'se aren;t anarchists but i don't really see the logic of this particular quirk in your politics which seems to clearly be an unnecessary hangover from the AWL.
Nov 16 2008
#15
Yet again cantdo I wasn't suggesting they join up with another group, I was suggesting that if they're pretty much libertarian communist they could save a lot of effort by engaging with existing presses on those lines rather than starting another tiny one from scratch of their own. In their platform they seem to be arguing against vanguard models of power - pro grassroots control etc, but if they're LP entryists that's probably falling a bit into the non-libertarian bracket.
Nov 16 2008
#16
Wow, missed the stuff about labour party entrism. I think the direction they're taking (away from the AWL and towards some form of councilism) should be welcomed, and like I said i enjoyed what I read of the paper, but thats pretty bizarre. Also, the national determination issue is pretty important, I feel, internationalism (in a non-fudged sense) being a non-negotiable part of a communist perspective.
Nov 16 2008
#17
For risk of branching the discussion/the point of this post:
1. We are not "Labour Party entryists", although to be honest I would not rule out that tactic on principle (no more than participation in bourgeois parliaments or standing in elections - the only question is whether you can get a platform to express your ideas openly and honestly). The LRC is half-in, half-out of the Labour Party (e.g. its most important backer is the RMT, while FBU and PCS are also affiliated) and is in some state of flux and a lot of people are rethinking, so tactically we believe it worthwhile to "intervene". If it were just like Compass or some soft-left pressure group, that would not be the case. That does not involve any blunting of our political agenda or principles, and indeed we criticise those who call for a Labour Party Mark II from the left. At the conference we stood on an openly communist platform; our motion was for workers' self management and both in the text and its proposal we attacked social democracy and Old Labour as well as Stalinism.
[edit: another point about "entryism" is that it almost always/historically has involved pretending you're something you're not, e.g. Militant members pretending just to be Labour traditionalists, to the point that their programme and public presence became nothing else]
2. We do not "fudge" internationalism. We do not support any nationalism or any nationalists/"national liberationists". We are not third-worldists. The example mentioned by Posi in the previous discussion of our position is useful: when the workers' councils were set up in Kurdistan at the end of the 1991 Gulf War, we were for Kurdish self-determination because the revolution's survival was dependent on the prevention of Iraqi troops intervening. But that does not imply any support or acquiescence to the Kurdish ruling class and the Kurdish nationalists who played their own role in crushing the working class. Indeed, the only way to stop the Iraqi troops would have been to mobilise Iraqi workers against their "own" regime and sow mutiny in the ranks.
Similarly, I would say that I am in favour of Iraqi self-determination. Not out of support (even "critical" support) for al-Sadr, other Islamist forces, Ba'athists and Iraqi nationalists or whoever, but because the occupation of Iraq distorts that country's class struggle and overlays it with various chauvinisms and nationalisms. The occupation of Iraq is a huge boon to nationalists and religious chauvinists in the region. US dockers going on strike for troops out now and Iraqi dockers striking in sympathy: that's internationalism. It is working-class unity across borders. No doubt plenty of those involved had certain funny ideas, but the action in itself is an expression of internationalism.
We oppose the denial of self-determination because it distorts the organic development of class struggle in all countries involved. Obviously everyone is opposed to national oppression, but surely it is a natural corollary of this that you favour the right to self-determination, i.e. if a plebiscite was held and most people in a given territory voted for independence/federal rights, you would recognise their *right* to do this and oppose attempts to stop them - e.g. opposing Serb efforts to maintain its hold on Kosova.
Nov 16 2008
#18
Quote:
The example mentioned by Posi in the previous discussion of our position is useful: when the workers' councils were set up in Kurdistan at the end of the 1991 Gulf War,
I don't believe that there were workers' councils in Kurdistan after the 1991 Gulf war. The word 'shura' means council. The councils of the post war period were not workers councils, but much more traditional organs, dominated not by workers, but by tribal elders and nationalists.
Devrim
Nov 16 2008
#19
See the leaflet we gave out at LRC - http://thecommune.files.wordpress.com/2008/11/lrcleaflet.pdf
Nov 16 2008
#20
Quote:
I don't believe that there were workers' councils in Kurdistan after the 1991 Gulf war. The word 'shura' means council. The councils of the post war period were not workers councils, but much more traditional organs, dominated not by workers, but by tribal elders and nationalists.
This is of interest:
http://libcom.org/library/ten-days-shook-iraq-uprising-1990-1991-wildcat
Nov 16 2008
#21
Just for the record, Devrim PMed me while that discussion was going on, asking me if I thought there was really a workers revolution in Kurdistan in 1991. This was my reply.
I wrote:
Right, having looked over a few articles, it seems my recollections over-emphasised the fact that the Shoras had their own militias - and the articles on libcom are peppered with phrases like "the prospect of the uprising turning into a full scale proletarian revolution" (http://www.libcom.org/history/1991-the-south-iraq-and-kurdistan-uprisings). But while there was not a 'workers revolution' as such, perhaps it is correct to say that there was 'dual power' or some similar formulation.Aside from the question of whether there was actually a revolutionary situation, it is also important that (also contrary to my memory), the Iraqi Ba'athist state was no more important in crushing the Shoras than the nationalist militias. (I had recalled that the nationalists had low levels of popular support, but not that they were nonetheless a real force.) What this means is that it is less likely that the political language of national self-determination, or similar, would have been able to find its own space from a class perspective. We can see that 'The original aim of the uprising was expressed in the slogan: "We will celebrate our New Year with the Arabs in Baghdad!"' - i.e. that it was intended to spread across Iraq. Which is clearly better than (even working class controlled) Kurdish defencism. However, and I think this supports the position I advanced in my post, according to the ICG (http://www.libcom.org/library/journey-to-iraq-testimony-kurdish-icg), the Shoras did use a slogan (one among 20) "Long live self-determination for the Kurdish Nation." I've no doubt that the ICG disagree with that language, but it's evident that this is one of the terms on which a revolutionary struggle defined itself - while being internationalist, committed to the councils, anti-state, etc.
I didn't see the point of my post as saying that 'nationalism is sometimes a good thing' - or as some sort of 'socialism in one country' apologia. I saw it as saying that the demand for 'national self-determination' can have a class character in certain circumstances.
Nov 16 2008
#22
davidbroder wrote:
This is of interest:http://libcom.org/library/ten-days-shook-iraq-uprising-1990-1991-wildcat
Yes, I think it is very dubious.
Devrim
Nov 16 2008
#23
Wildcat wrote:
From the very start the Western media has grossly misrepresented these uprisings. The uprising in the South, centred on Basra, was portrayed as a Shia Muslim revolt. Whereas the insurrection in the North was reported as an exclusively Kurdish Nationalist uprising which demanded little more than an autonomous Kurdish region within Iraq.The truth is that the uprisings in both the North and South of Iraq were proletarian insurrections.
I'm not any kind of expert on Iraq, but this does read as if the writers of the article were determined to make the facts fit in with their theory. I wonder what 'proletarian' is intended to mean here.
Nov 17 2008
#24
What do you think of the ICG report Devrim?
EDIT: Also, can you suggest any source or sources which you think characterise the situation accurately?
Nov 17 2008
#25
posi wrote:
What do you think of the ICG report Devrim?EDIT: Also, can you suggest any source or sources which you think characterise the situation accurately?
I am very sceptical about the whole thing. I think the ICG have a tendency to see proletarian struggle in lots of cases where others wouldn't, for example they see a proletarian element in al-Qa'ida bombings.
I think that the fact that it is only the GCI who wrote about these things tells us something.
I probably know the people who wrote these articles, and I don't want to say that they were actually lying. Nevertheless, you can read a lot into something if you want to.
Devrim
Nov 17 2008
#26
OK, but what about alternative sources?
Nov 17 2008
#27
Well this article; http://www.geocities.com/cordobakaf/blob_kurds.html is based on info from different sources than the ones previously cited, based on direct contact with participants in the shuras. They describe events as a proletarian uprising and the shoras as workers councils, albeit with the weaknesses, contradictions and confusions one would expect.
Nov 17 2008
#28
Are you sure that the base of that source is different, Ret? I am not.
Devrim
Nov 17 2008
#29
Yeah, but still, what are your sources? You must have some?
Nov 17 2008
#30
Posi, I don't have any particular sources. I am just dubious about these as they tell a story that I have heard nowhere else.
Devrim
Just out of interest, what prompted you to do your own magazine rather than putting your efforts into building or contributing to one of the several existing ones?