?Despite the fall of the Soviet bloc, despite the public disclosure of the crimes of
Stalinism and atrocious living conditions (including workers) in the dictatorships of the
Eastern bloc, part of the population still rejects capitalism and offers against all
communist project as an alternative. Who are these activists seem crazy? ---- Some would
say that it is nostalgic old privileged that accommodated the lack of freedom, because
these schemes provided them a quiet life. Yet among the communist militants, much was born
after 1989 and coming from countries which have never been part of the Eastern bloc.
Others will say that they are young idealists who choose the communist project to give a
rebel attitude. "It is true," they will say "me too when I was young I was a Trotskyist,
Guevara, etc., but after I came back to reason." Yet the difficulty in the life of
activist (cost in time, money, police repression, etc.) should have easily overcome the
single would have wanted these young people to go to the rebels.
In reality, the reason for the existence of communist militants (especially among youth)
even today is much simpler: the capitalist system can not provide decent living conditions
for the entire population and the communist project always a viable alternative.
Life under the capitalist system: Democracy and free market? :
At the risk of stating the doors open, let me remember that life under capitalism is a
hell for the majority of human beings. People who have not had the chance to be born into
a wealthy family living in first world countries (ie USA and Western Europe) suffer daily
many unjust situations generated by capitalism. Thus poverty is increasing while the
production of wealth has never been higher. Workers are forced to accept jobs under any
conditions and at any salary to survive. The economic crisis as a pretext to destroy the
receipts of the labor movement, such as social security, unemployment benefits, etc.. As
our lives get worse, the rich always accumulate more wealth to the point that now 10% of
the richest in the world have 85% of world heritage. 1 And woe to those who dare to
challenge this injustice, the states with their policies, their armies and intelligence
services work to suppress any protest movement.
When lots of people not living in the center of the world economy is much worse than the
one we know. While the settlement formally belongs to the past, people are still suffering
the imperialism of large companies (as shown in the service of the Brazilian state in
favor of FIFA) that often act through states imperialists (the French military
intervention in Mali to protect the interests of Areva is a good example). Thus, entire
populations are forced to leave their country to find a better future in the North where
they are exploited by unscrupulous bosses can 2 , hunted by the police, expelled in
violation of the dangers, etc. .
Do not forget that capitalism generates other types of organizations using violence to
oppress and dispossess workers. We can cite the example of organized crime that thrives on
poverty by taking advantage of the poverty in which many people live (via the sale of
drugs in neighborhoods, extortion or trafficking in human beings). For more naive, it is
important to note that the leaders of these mafia organizations work with state elites and
private companies with legal 3 .
This system will even endanger the survival of humanity as a whole since
always greater economic exploitation of our planet necessitated by the need for growth,
may have irreversible consequences on the environment. 4
After this list is not exhaustive can only observe as operation, poverty, and violence are
the daily lot of most people under capitalism.
Reform or Revolution? :
Unless insensitive to the many tragedies that are happening before our eyes beings, it is
obvious that it is necessary to find solutions. But one question remains, "Is it possible
to find solutions within the framework of the capitalist system? "Or simply" The
capitalist system is reformed it? ". The answer to this question can be found in Marxist
analysis of the economy and society.
Marx analyzes the companies through dialectical materialism:
Materialism means that the first cause of everything is material (which is physics, which
can be seen, felt, touched, etc.).
Marx and how to organize a society comes mainly physical constraints (eg the production of
goods, the presence of resources in an area, or the level of change in technology, etc.).
These material conditions derive ideas (political projects, ideologies such as religions,
etc.) which are the consequence and not the cause.
According to Marx, the dialectic is a tool for analyzing the evolution of societies
through its contradictions. Where there are two antagonistic elements (thesis and
antithesis), this generates a contradiction. This will either lead to a destruction of the
thesis and antithesis, or to a merger between the two that creates a synthesis (a new
feature) and its opposite "the antisynth?se" generating a new contradiction and so on.
Both concepts allow Marx to analyze the evolution and architecture companies.
Every economic system depends primarily on the level of technology available to produce
goods at each level of technology is a type of relations of production (slavery, serfdom,
wage labor). Companies are then divided according to the place of human groups in these
reports productions; these are the social classes. The arrangement of these material
conditions shape the infrastructure of economic systems (their material base).
As for institutions, political systems and religions, they form the superstructure of
economic systems. That is to say, they exist and are organized not independently, but in
terms of the organization of the infrastructure. The superstructure is thus directly
dependent on the infrastructure. The role of the superstructure is to ensure the
sustainability of the system. For example, the state will use its police to quell revolts
while all religions, the media and the school will provide an ideological justification to
the system in place to prevent the emergence of dissenting ideas.
The evolution of societies in turn, is rooted in the contradiction is created between the
technological levels of the productive forces and the relations of production which
correspond to them. In fact technology tends to move steadily (we do every day new
research that lead to the invention of new machines, new products, etc.), while the
reports for their productions evolve in stages. Indeed these relations of production can
not adapt constantly to new technologies. Can to can the contradiction between the
technological level of the productive forces and the relations of production become
inadequate, leads to tension in the superstructure that will lead to revolutions. The
French Revolution of 1789 is a typical example: while technology made it possible to begin
the country's industrialization and the transition to bourgeois capitalism, reports
Production (serfdom and guilds) prevented this development. The bourgeoisie has taken the
power to go to capitalist production relations (ie the generalized wage) and set up a
superstructure (transition to a bourgeois state ban on corporations, etc..) Providing its
new dominance.
Nowadays the contradiction between technology and production relations is visible in a
phenomenon called "the falling rate of profit." Indeed, the capitalist relations of
production involve competition between each company. To stay in the race bosses of
companies are forced to invest a share of more and more of their capital in the
acquisition of new technologies. Or only the "surplus labor" is actually producing value.
Indeed, this is the time that the worker provides free his boss (since the worker is
working for his boss more than the time necessary to meet its needs and reproduction).
Because capitalists are investing more and more money in technology and less to hire
workers, their profit rates decrease over the long term. To delay the downward trend in
the rate of profit, the bourgeois use several mechanisms. They can depress wages for equal
work time or reverse; increase the working hours of the workers for the same pay (in both
cases, it is to increase the rate of exploitation of workers). Bourgeois was also used for
settlement (it uses neocolonialism today) to find lead for their products (to address a
lack of demand in the cities) and ownership of raw materials at minimum cost (to reduce
production costs). The financialization of the economy is also another symptom of this
falling rate of profit. Indeed when a sector is not profitable enough, the capitalists
have no choice to invest their money in other areas. Or once every sector can become
profitable, capitalists can not investing in the financial sector (a fictitious economy)
through speculation on future profits. This creates speculative bubbles that inevitably
end up collapsing, creating a financial and economic crisis (as in 2008).
So this falling rate of profit explains the recent economic crisis. So the bourgeoisie has
no other choice but to reduce their production costs and increase the rate of exploitation
by relocating our business by reducing our wages and destroying our working conditions.
The Social Democrats have very well understood, but refused to leave the capitalist
framework. That is why they are willing to implement the employer policies of austerity
and destruction of workers' rights while attempting to mitigate the consequences. The
situation is such that entire sectors of the economy would collapse if they were to
maintain labor laws. Restoration and construction are the most striking examples as these
sectors have no other choice but to use massive moonlighting. The informal economy see
criminal can not even be fought effectively for fear of creating an economic collapse. And
several European states such decided to include in the calculation of their gross domestic
product (GDP) drug trafficking and prostitution 5 .
The capitalist system thus has no economic opportunity to upgrade to a dignified life. On
the contrary to maintain it is obliged to exploit us ever to monopolize over more wealth,
etc. Also any plans for social reform in this system is wishful thinking. A revolution for
the destruction of the wage system is a must to radically and permanently improve the
lives of all who are oppressed.
Communism, an unworkable utopia? :
One last question then. If it is necessary to overthrow the capitalist system to finally
have a decent life, what new system should take its place? In other words, what would
replace capitalism? At first, fight for a communist society seems to be a bad choice. Do
not we all learned in our history classes or in the media that all attempts to establish
communism inevitably lead to inhumane dictatorships? Yet, pushing further our research,
it's obvious that this argument does not stand the test of reality.
First, note that contrary to popular belief no diet (even the Stalinist regimes) never has
claimed apply communism in his country. This is impossible since communism can only be
applied after the triumph of the revolution in the world, the disappearance of social
classes, and after the emergence of a generation of humans who have been elevated to the
values of solidarity, equality and sharing. Our generation can therefore never live in a
communist society because we were raised under capitalism, and we have therefore
internalized standards.
To answer the question of the transition from capitalism to communism, several types of
solutions have been tried throughout history. There is first of all experiences from
orthodox Marxist-Leninist currents advocating passage through a transitional phase before
reaching communism. According Leninists, before reaching communism, companies should go
through a phase called "socialism." During this phase, the state would be maintained, it
would become the instrument of domination of the proletariat over the bourgeoisie, and
would be given ownership of the means of production and economic planning. In practice,
all these experiences have led to the creation of an authoritarian state oppressing the
workers it is supposed to defend. The reason for these failures is that the Leninists had
an absolute belief in Marx's thought without seeing the gaps. Indeed, without denying
anything of substantial theoretical contribution of the philosopher to understand our
societies, we must not forget that dialectical materialism is above all an analysis
paradigm that by definition can not be imperfect. So one of the biggest mistakes of Marx
was not to consider that there may be reports of domination are not directly derived from
material conditions (infrastructure). This led him to be in some of these writings a
deterministic view of history where revolution is inevitable and all would result in the
material conditions of society. Leninists have meanwhile favored a scientistic view of
biblical reading Marx, never criticize or use input from other authors. They concluded
that "the Marxist science" used by an enlightened vanguard (organized in a party taking
power in the state) would allow them to deduct miracle solutions to achieve communism 6 .
Inevitably, the party elites were initially denied any independence of thought to the
workers, and then turn into an oligarchy controlling the state in his own interest. The
socialist experiments are the best known and this caused a great twist to the communist
cause as most people now associate USSR or Maoist China the concept of communism.
Fortunately, all revolutionary movements did not commit these mistakes. And other
experiences inspired libertarian designs, have resolved more successfully the issue of
transition from capitalism to communism. The communist-anarchists do not see the
revolution as a transition between two predetermined in advance by the march of history
systems. They believe instead that it is an ongoing process that lives with all the
oppressed. Thus, libertarians refuse to wait for the abolition of capitalism to begin the
fight against all forms of oppression (gender, race, and class) and to experiment with
alternative modes of organization. That is why in their daily practice, libertarians
attempt to apply and learn for themselves the principles that should underpin the future
communist society.
Statism versus self
This difference in practice led libertarians lead more successful experiences in the
territories they were able to control the course of history. Libertarians have always
refused to abdicate their power to a "workers' state controlled by an omnipotent vanguard"
enlightened. " They preferred to take their destiny in hand and organize production and
the political and social life for themselves. This is why libertarians have always fought
for self-management.
Self-management means decisions (whether economic or political) are taken democratically.
Specifically, people gather in popular assemblies (or factory committees for the
organization of production) to discuss, and then if no consensus is reached, a vote on the
action. Decisions can not be made at the local level are made by representatives elected
by the assemblies via a binding mandate. Unlike the representative mandate applied in
"democracies" bourgeois, where the people leave all decision-making power to
representatives without control options between elections. Elected to the imperative
mandate is revocable at all times, they must be the spokesman of the decisions of their
bases to which they are regularly accountable. In summary, self-management is the
application of direct democracy to economic and political level.
Of course, self economically implies that the means of production are collective. However,
libertarians believe that producers should associate freely according to their interests
and not undergo forced collectivization from above.
Libertarians therefore a truly democratic conception of revolution, because they believe
that they are the oppressed themselves who are best able to make informed decisions
related to their interests. Therefore, unlike the authoritarian socialist, libertarian
refuse to take possession of the state and prefer to abolish since the advent of the
revolution. Indeed, the state is the ultimate bureaucratic body that aims to perpetuate
domination. Any group who would therefore take the same control whether claims to act in
the public interest so would inevitably use his power (police and army) to enforce its
decisions and act in its own interest. Analysis of authoritarian socialist experiments
shows the correctness of this conclusion. Thus, during revolutions, libertarians have
always advocated non collectivization and nationalization of the means of production, the
organization of production by the factory committees (instead of entrusting it to the
technicians of the party), and finally replacing the police and the military (armed arm of
the state) status by popular militias where officers were elected democratically. History
shows that when these measures were actually implemented, better results were obtained
both in terms of respect for freedoms in terms of production efficiency.
Among the numerous experiments of socialism libertarian, one example is Makhnovism of
1918-1921 in Ukraine include the libertarian experiment conducted by the CNT in Spain
during the civil war of 1936-1939 7 or territories controlled by the EZLN in Chiapas,
Mexico, from 1994 to the present day 8 . While these examples are a minority compared to
the many socialist experiments attempted, but do not forget that the bourgeois
"democracies" they remain a minority even in the capitalist world. It is also clear that
these experiences are not free from defects and that is why it is absolutely necessary to
study them, to make them known to then criticize them better. However, they have the merit
to show that there are viable alternatives to capitalism self-management.
It is for all these reasons that libertarian communist militants or left self-management
in general are not dreamers engaged in a futile struggle. On the contrary, they are
realists about the nature of capitalism who refuse to live in a world of exploitation and
misery and struggling for a concrete project for the improvement of the human condition.
The only thing missing from the implementation of these utopias is you! We need all
available forces to finally overthrow capitalism and establish a new system that will
allow us to live in freedom and dignity.
Note: This article is many times call for Marx simply because it is in my view a good
basis for introducing communist ideas to people that have never been exposed. However it
can not be the only theoretical basis for developing revolutionary and a proposed
alternative company strategies. Especially when it comes to addressing the issue of
transition from capitalism to communism. That's why I particularly recommend reading "A
project of libertarian communist society" (edited by Libertarian Alternative) which
provides a sketch of the future society for which we are fighting. I also recommend
reading "Anarchism" by Daniel Guerin that analyzes the actions, strategies and experiences
of libertarians in the various revolutions of the 20th century.
1 http://www.inegalites.fr/spip.php?article1393
2
http://www.rtl.be/info/belgique/societe/1108750/de-plus-en-plus-de-sans-papiers-exploites-en-belgique-un-jour-mon-patron-na-plus-voulu-me-payer-
3 http://blogs.mediapart.fr/blog/cadtm/190614/hsbc-a-bank-to-heavy-and-pass-the-present-sulfur
4
http://www.lalibre.be/actu/planete/rechauffement-climatique-agir-avant-2030-sinon-52da9d9f357029ad9fc8bd16
5
http://bigbrowser.blog.lemonde.fr/2014/06/04/doper-leconomie-la-belgique-integre-drogue-et-prostitution-au-calcul-de-son-pib/
6 And despite the rhetoric about the state of democratic workers' Lenin in "State and
Revolution", which are in total contradiction to his actions during the Russian Revolution.
7 Reference is made to the documentary "Living Utopia" on the Spanish anarchist experience
8 See "Mexico, Chiapas and the Zapatistas' file produced by international solidarity
(en) Alternative Libertaire AL Brisel, Communism viable project or unrealistic utopia? By Mario Lafaye (CAL-BXL) (fr)
[machine translation]
