(en) Canada, linchpin.ca: Mortar #1 - Some Assembly Required: Beyond False Conceptions of Democracy

Democracy is a term of primary importance to liberals and radicals alike, used as a means 
of justifying the legitimacy of their power or political position. Whether the ability of 
all citizens to make decisions extends only to allowing them to periodically vote for 
their leaders, or whether it reaches the perceived-radical level of people directly making 
decisions on issues that affect them, it is democracy nevertheless. Similar to politicians 
who justify the legitimacy of their rule by pointing to a successful election result, the 
left points to our positions being the will of the people ? or at least it would be, 
leftists tell themselves, if the working class ever had the opportunity to make decisions 
for themselves. ---- In this radical race to the most-democratic democracy, anarchists 
claim that directly democratic structures are the best way for the working class to make 
decisions according to their collective class interests.

As anarchist communists, we herald a federated structure of assemblies and councils who
provide delegates carrying directly-determined mandates to higher-scale decision-making
bodies as the ideal decision-making structure, both as a way to bolster the class in 
workers? bodies under capitalism, and the way to run a post-revolutionary society.

With the prevalence of Occupy, and the successes of the Qu?bec student strike being 
attributed to CLASSE?s federated general assembly model, the topic of direct democracy has 
in the past couple years reached beyond the realm of anarchist lip-service, and become a 
more broadly talked about concept in the media, on the left, within universities and 
amongst community organizing bodies. What remains unclear is the political content of 
these discussions. Are leftists just looking to legitimize their positions and actions, as 
any politician does, by saying theirs is the will of the people, or is a true anarchist
position being put forward: a decision-making process that assists in building an 
empowered working class ready for militant direct action, and free of the hierarchies and 
oppressions that are endemic in the current capitalist liberal democracy? One of these is 
revolutionary; the other is not.

As a mobilizing tactic, the general assembly model of CLASSE has been proven effective,
but what we are left to contend with is whether these directly-democratic spaces are 
inherently positive and productive, and if not, how it is that we, as anti-authoritarian 
leftists, are to engage with these bodies. In a context where the working class is 
inculcated with bourgeois, patriarchal, and white supremacist mentalities, it may be that 
people will not make the decisions that we think are right or even in their own best 
interest. The balance that must be struck for any revolutionary anti-authoritarian leftist 
is to remain antiauthoritarian in this context, while confronting and not capitulating to, 
backwards politics. Without either idealizing or condescending to the working class, we
must push for direct democracy while identifying that it is a necessary, but not 
sufficient condition for revolution to occur.

Assemblies in recent and historical times

Occupy

As Occupy spread throughout North America in 2011, the concept of general assemblies 
garnered a lot of attention, and in many places, provided an easy target for those with
the preconceived notion that direct democracy doesn?t work:decisions don?t get made; it?s 
slow and messy; marginalized people and minorities will be bulldozed by those in hegemonic 
positions; and in the end, nothing will get done.

In many ways, the Occupy general assemblies provided a quintessential example of how to
utilize direct democracy in an ineffective way, especially for the development of radical 
politics. Though we want to avoid putting an undue level of focus on rules of order as a 
solution to political or social problems, putting thought into the structural elements of 
decision-making bodies is important - not so that we can avoid confronting more 
fundamental problems, but so that we create the best environment in which to do so.

At its inception, Occupy was a movement based on the assembly as a space of consensus 
decision-making. The idea behind this was that it would facilitate discussion and the 
creation of ideas, and ensure that minority opinions were not being ignored in the 
conversation. Although consensus is often seen as a friendlier and more inclusive way of 
making decisions, what is not being recognized are the often coercive and bullying aspects 
of this process, especially in large groups. People were told that to ?block? or disagree 
with a proposal meant they were willing to leave the movement if that decision was made. 
The social pressure to not express dissent can create a false consensus, rather than 
inspiring the healthy expression of disagreement, and developing a culture of confronting 
reactionary or oppressive ideas. Most manifestations of Occupy soon realized that the 
ability of an individual to block the work of a large group of people was not practical or 
even principled, and switched to a modified consensus where a 90% majority vote was 
required to make decisions.

Though voting models also do not ensure that a culture of debate and the confrontation of 
ideas develop, it provides a better framework for this to happen. As Occupy Oakland 
expressed, ?[t]he bulk of the work of
Occupy Oakland does NOT happen in the General Assembly. It happens in various committees, 
caucuses, and associated groups that report back to the general assembly.? It is outside 
of a general assembly that much of the real work, the real education, and the real debate 
has to take place.

It was those Occupy movements, such as Occupy Oakland, who were willing formulate a more 
explicit and specific political position that were able to create movements capable of 
initiating a port shutdown in conjunction with a one-day general strike, fight against 
foreclosures, and take action against community issues like police brutality. This is not 
to say that Occupy Oakland was a uniform group of people. As with many other Occupy 
encampments, anarchists were singled out as a destructive or divisive element. 
Particularly, the act of property destruction became a point of contention within the 
movement, with certain members of Occupy calling on people to unmask, photograph and 
physically attack anyone seen to be participating in black bloc tactics. In the spirit of 
openly confronting and not capitulating to backwards views, the response on the Occupy 
Oakland website, put forward by the Anti-Repression Committee, did not resort to some 
vague call for a diversity of tactics, but encouraged debate about tactics, while 
cautioning against Occupy Oakland members doing the work of the state to criminalize, 
demonize or persecute fellow activists.

In other Occupy camps, the lack of political direction and action was not just a product 
of the inefficiencies of their assembly model structure, but also of an unwillingness to 
clarify and develop the politics of the group beyond the populist 1% and corporate greed 
rhetoric. Leftists at Occupy Toronto often tried to incorporate their pre-existing 
activist struggles into the 1% rhetoric, as opposed to developing and challenging the 
politics of Occupy itself. Though we are not saying that Occupy Toronto was an ideal or
even worthwhile space to organize in, this leads us to the question of what is the best
way for radicals to push discourse forward in uninitiated organizing spaces.

The Qu?bec student strike of 2012

The politics of the Qu?bec student movement, as put forward by ASSE, involved an 
escalation of radical ideas and tactics throughout the strike of 2012. Embedded deep in
their movement was the fundamental importance of direct democracy, to the extent that it 
became a defining characteristic, and a point of collective pride within their movement. 
It was the strength of this culture that prevented the strike from being demobilized when 
substandard deals presented by the government were brought back to their membership for a 
vote. As we know from labour disputes, a membership is highly likely to vote to accept a 
proposal once it goes to a ratification vote. Union leaderships who are attempting to 
demobilize their membership, and prevent a strike will often claim that they are being 
democratic and deferring to the will of the membership. They are aware, though, that their 
membership is disempowered and has been inculcated with a deference to authority based on 
an executive-heavy workers? institution, and an expertise-modeled grievance process. 
Consequently, this appeal to the will of membership is an act of lip-service with a 
convenient conservatizing effect on the decision to be made. This is not, however, how 
things initially played out with the direct democracy, direct action-based ASSE, who made 
up the core and basis of the coalition CLASSE that was strategically created for the 
purpose of strike mobilization.

In April of 2012, leftists in Ontario were holding their breath after word had come in 
that an offer from the Liberal government in Qu?bec was being brought back to the general 
assemblies of CLASSE for a vote: ?would this be the end of the 2012 Qu?bec student 
strike??, we worried, based on our knowledge of how this power dynamic so often plays out 
in our own worker bodies here. We couldn?t have knowledge of how this plays out in our own 
student organizations, as no such struggle has ever occurred in Ontario. However, after a 
series of assemblies and the CLASSE delegate conference, the vote was unanimous: they 
rejected the government?s settlement. We had underestimated the extent of the political
development that had occurred and the strength of their resolve, bolstered by their strong 
assembly model.

Beginning years earlier, ASSE began their plans to mobilize against an announced tuition 
increase. The idea was to reinvigorate the general assembly model and to increase support 
for the strike through autonomous organizing bodies known as mobilization committees. 
These mobilizing committees generally existed outside the sanctioned structures of their 
student unions or associations. Many students at the time were unaware of the planned 
tuition hike, and especially at the anglo schools, they were unaware or unsupportive of
student strikes as a tactic of resistance. Before a strike could happen, this had to be
dealt with.

The heavy-lifting of the organizing work done to contend with this was not done through
well-worded interventions in assemblies, though this can be important. Rather, it was done 
through one-on-one conversations, on-the-ground mobilizations, and a concerted, sustained 
effort to argue with, present information, and listen to fellow students.

There was a dedication to honesty about what a strike would entail, and an unwavering 
commitment to argue that these were risks worth taking. This was all essential work that 
happened outside assembly spaces, and was done with the intention of involving as many 
students as possible in the struggle.

The escalation of tactics that occurred was a clear one. They tried petitions; they tried 
rallies; they tried one day strikes, the whole time making the political and strategic 
argument that what they required was an action without a time limit ? an unlimited general 
strike that would end when the tuition hike was revoked. The escalation of ideas that 
occurred was even more ingenious. There was a progression of messaging from the 
mobilization committees depending on the political culture within departments or a 
particular school. The general trajectory went from arguments against this tuition hike, 
to critiques of the austerity agenda, to the role of education as public good, to being
against tuition entirely and ending up in a clear anti-capitalist sentiment. Combining 
this anti-capitalism with their direct action orientation and basis of direct democracy, 
this was a movement made for (and actually, in a large way by) anarchists.

With CLASSE, and even more so ASSE, there was a clear basis of unity. To join, a student 
association must have voted on a strike mandate through a general assembly, ensuring that 
they practice direct democracy, and furthermore, must ensure that their student 
association meets the following criteria: they must have a mandate to resist any increase 
in tuition costs with the goal of free education; the general assembly must be the supreme 
decision-making authority of the student association; the student body must vote to join 
CLASSE in the general assembly or a referendum; a financial contribution is made to 
CLASSE; and that they are willing to hold a meeting to vote on the idea of having an 
unlimited general strike. The reason for these principles was that the goal in creating
CLASSE was to expand the strike beyond just ASSE, without watering down the politics in
such a way to make further participation unhelpful.

What ASSE proved more than anything else was that a smaller association with better 
politics is more valuable than a larger association which lacks political cohesion - or
lacks the will to see things through utilizing militant tactics. With all of this being
done right and with CLASSE reaching such amazing heights of mobilization, what then went 
wrong with the Qu?bec student strike that led to students becoming demobilized when an 
election was called? We would argue that it was a consolidation of strategic and political 
power within the executive of ASSE.

Though they claimed to act only as spokespeople and facilitators, directed by the mandates 
of their membership, there were clear leaders of the Qu?bec student strike of 2012. The
executive of ASSE still possesses a level of power that does not truly meet anarchist 
ideals, and in the end, this was the undoing of the strike. Though this dynamic was 
unclear to many anarchist outsiders during the strike,we finally saw touches of it playing 
out in CLASSE as the strike votes failed, and the elements of the structure that were 
counter to our anarchistic principles became evident.

Word has now spread that the poster child of the Qu?bec student strike, Gabriel 
Nadeau-Dubois colluded early in the struggle with unions and politicians to direct the 
mobilizations of CLASSE towards an electoral end. Rather than argue the facts of this 
case, we should analyze not the details of exactly how this happened, but why it is that 
an individual in a directly democratic institution would even hold such power. This is a 
structural liability from an anarchist perspective: the executive of the institution, 
whose job is to ensure that the mandates of the assemblies are followed, should not also 
be responsible for the strategic orientation of the larger body. In struggles, it is 
essential that there is long-term strategic political planning, but this shouldn?t be 
delegated to those who possess official positions within the institution. Historically, a 
solution to this problem has been the creation of specific anarchist organizations. 
However, this leads to its own particular set of considerations and concerns - a critical 
point being whether the strategies of the anarchist organization are implemented through 
control of power positions, or through argument in open assembly spaces with the 
rank-and-file.

The CNT and the Spanish Civil War

When thinking about the problem of reformism as a current that must be addressed within
assembly-based revolutions, one of the most salient examples for anarchists is the Spanish 
Revolution of 1936. While the CNT succeeded in broadening the anarcho-syndicalist 
conception of sites of production to include neighbourhoods, an anemic anarchist ideology 
persisted within the organization in regards to the state and representative democracy.
What was proposed in 1927 was a separate anarchist organization the FAI (Federaci?n 
Anarquista Ib?rica), which would attempt to direct the ideological development of the CNT. 
This directive did not, however, develop through thorough integration within the CNT 
rank-and-file, but focused instead on taking control within a developing representative
leadership, which ultimately may have been the undoing of the revolution itself.

As the more politically developed anarchists aimed to take power within the CNT, they were 
unable to contend with a growing membership that was not averse to narrow economistic 
concerns or reformist politics, which were swelling the ranks as the revolution took root. 
Ultimately, this led to reformists being elected to the CNT leadership, and some of these 
so called leaders joining a popular front government. Though the popular front government 
was largely in ruins after the July days, the CNT reformists decided not to disband it,
and left to recover, it eventually acted to take control of key sites of production and
propaganda through military action. These incidents led to many CNT militants leaving the 
front to fight against newly strengthened republican forces back in Barcelona, and their 
traitorous acts. It is perhaps hyperbole to claim this is the only factor that contributed 
to the fall of anarchist Spain; fascist forces of both Germany and Italy were ready, along 
with Franco, to crush revolutionary forces in Catalonia - but the CNT leadership joining 
the popular front government certainly weakened the revolution, as elements of the CNT 
went back to Catalonia to defend their once secure gains. What is highlighted here, is the 
danger of both structural representational leadership, and the weakness of political 
neutrality, or more precisely a lack of strong political development within the ranks.

What remains interesting about the CNT?s faltering in regards to disbanding the republic 
was that it was not just a byproduct of its reformist leadership, but also its fear that 
this was a form of ?substitutionalism?, as the CNT?s membership represented slightly less 
than half of the working class at the time. Anarchists have always been wary of 
substituting themselves for the class, as this is the hallmark of vanguardism, but the 
nature of the state itself is a form of the very substitutionalism they feared. State 
forms of representation, regardless of their proclaimed political character must never be 
understood as true representatives of the class. This very substitution is a Bolshevik 
turn, which lead to the dismantling of the Soviet system of democracy following the 1917 
revolution.

An anarchist approach to revolution is that the so-called false consciousness of the class 
can never be ameliorated by a vanguard party state, elected or otherwise. No state is 
capable of reorganizing society so that false consciousness is destroyed: it is the very 
process of building assemblies and councils towards collective self-management of the 
economy and all aspects of daily life that ensures revolutionary consciousness. These 
organs of a new society will not necessarily be revolutionary unless their growth is 
integrated with a developing and explicit anarchist politics within their ranks. At the
crucial moment, the state cannot be left as the supposed representative of the class - as 
it is this final hesitation that has led to the downfall of some of the most promising 
revolutionary moments in history.

The Industrial Workers of the World

The IWW in North America exhibits similar flaws to the CNT, but in what is possibly a more 
extreme form. The CNT has a rule in its constitution that no one who is a member of a 
political party can hold an officer position within the union. It is for the same reason 
that the IWW does not allow, in their constitution, to be associated with a political 
group or tendency: to keep out the Socialist and Communist parties. Though there is 
nothing wrong with these declarations, these types of rules are only valuable when they
are at the behest of a rank-and-file who have participated in a political debate around
the subject, and not the attempts of a political vanguard to safeguard themselves against 
co-option through the use of rules instead of rank-and-file development. These political 
tendencies need to be contended with openly, and in a group like the IWW who have 
historically had large turnover in membership, these political debates need to be had often.

Particularly in the United States - where there was a peak membership in the 1920s of 
approximately 40,000 members with a sharp decline in the late 20s - what needs to be 
acknowledged about these membership figures is that people often joined the IWW during 
strikes in their place of work, but didn?t stick around much after that. When their 
militancy saw better results than more institutionalized and conservative labour 
organizations like the American Federation of Labour, people were glad to sign a card, but 
a sustained membership requires sustained political development outside of these struggles 
over immediate material benefit. As radical institutions, we certainly must produce 
results to prove our efficacy, but to continue the struggle we must fight against the 
syndicalist tendency to ignore ideas, instead of contending with them.

This dynamic of high-turnover rank-and-file membership, and the maintenance of the 
membership of a cadre of dedicated leftists has affected the modern state of the IWW. 
Currently, there is a tendency towards one of two branch dynamics: the first, the 
existence of a small radical wobbly branch who still hold illusions in making large 
numbers of workers and workplaces in their city unionized under the IWW. If they were 
successful in doing so, the likely result would be an intellectual and political vanguard 
within a wobbly branch who would determine the overall strategic orientation of the 
organization, while their rank-and-file members dealt only with organizing within their
own workplace. The second is that the wobblies act as a radical cadre within, more often 
than not, an already unionized environment and push towards workplace councils and more
radical action, while either trying to radicalize their legal union, or acting pretty much 
autonomously from it. The latter is arguably less politically questionable than the 
former, but the real point is that the IWW needs to decide what it wants to be.

Often, anarchists say that the IWW is ?basically? an anarchist union, but we should think 
critically about what we mean by that. It certainly argues for more militant workplace 
action, wildcat strikes, and increased worker control of the workplace, but it also has a 
central executive board that has full power and authority over all IWW publications, 
guides policy, and oversees the organization between yearly conventions. On a local level, 
with its current insular form, there is a significant risk of the creation of an 
unofficial political leadership if their membership does ever swell with rank-and-file 
workers. And as we?ve seen from the example of the CNT and the IWW in the early 20th 
century, the near-apolitical syndicalist idea that through industrial unionism, we will
have a revolution is insufficient. On top of workplace struggle, there must be concerted 
effort put towards the empowerment of the rank-and-file in strategic and political debate. 
As we noted with ASSE, direct democracy hasn?t gone far enough if a membership is only 
ratifying motions or deciding when to take a particular action, but is otherwise absent in 
the highest level of political conversations happening within an organization.

The Movement for Justice in El Barrio

The Movement for Justice in El Barrio is a community group in New York, founded by mostly 
immigrants and low-income people of colour to fight against gentrification and 
displacement in East Harlem, inspired by the structures and organizing methodology of the 
Zapatistas. Based on principles of autonomy, self-determination and participatory 
democracy, they are a perfect example of an organization that is not explicitly anarchist, 
but which works using democratic principles that are so in-line with our politics that we 
should see them as a near-optimal mass organization. Though they largely focus on protest, 
not direct action, and have utilized legal action where it seems beneficial, they have 
taken a strong stance against electoralism as a solution to the problems that they face. 
The fundamental element of their organization is assemblies based out of buildings. In 
order to join the Movement for Justice in El Barrio, they require that 10% of a building?s 
tenants wish to join.

Organizing in a grassroots, non-activist heavy space, they have managed a principled and 
firm position against white supremacy, patriarchy, and hetero and gender-normative 
chauvinism. Particularly, they describe themselves as fighting ?for the liberation of 
women, immigrants, gays, lesbians, the transgender community, people of color, and 
indigenous communities.? Their way of enforcing this within organizing spaces and 
assemblies has not been through policies or equity statements, but by confronting the 
bigotry and chauvinism of people in their community head-on, and prioritizing it as an 
essential part of their struggle. For instance, in buildings with entrenched racism 
between hispanic and black tenants, they have prioritized the creation of mixed race 
committees to deal with the organizing or logistical work of the assembly. Their thought 
being that if people who have reservations about each other based on cultural differences 
or preconceived bigoted notions could work together on projects where they have a common 
goal, their racism or even just racially insular behaviour would be broken down, and a 
collective free of this intra-class expression of racial oppression would be achieved. 
They also readily admit that there is no step-by-step guide on how to deal with oppressive 
behaviour. To do so requires people to be dynamic and responsive. What is clear is that
these issues must be prioritized and contended with; that these won?t be easy to deal 
with; and that to not do so will provide fault lines within our organizing body that will 
be utilized by the ruling class to create cross-class alliances with working class people 
in order to subjugate people of particular races, genders and sexualities.

This is not to say, as the CNT national secretary Galo D?ez Fern?ndez argues in his 
treatise ?The ideological essence of syndicalism? that there is a revolutionary need to
re-educate women because they are a weak point, even a reformist liability, in the class. 
In fact, it?s closer to the opposite. By dealing with issues of white supremacy, 
patriarchy, and hetero and gender-normative chauvinism expressed within the working class, 
it prevents more privileged members of the class from being the easy target for 
cross-class alliances. Consequently, it is the more privileged workers who form the weak 
points in the class, as they are the most likely to both be offered this kind of buy-off, 
and the most likely to sell out their fellow workers - who they anachronistically see as 
lesser, or as a liability in struggle.

The Appropriate Revolutionary Anarchist Orientation

Of the examples above, we argue that revolutionary anarchist principles of democracy are 
most active within the Movement for Justice in El Barrio. A troubling conclusion for us, 
in that the others are almost universally granted a distinct democratic standing by 
anarchists. More troubling is anarchists uncritically aspiring to democratic standards 
that, upon further examination, leave much to be desired, and the prospect of being 
blindsided time and again by the inherent deficiencies born of a refusal to take on the
sacrosanct standing of historical movements that, while they achieved much, ultimately 
fell short of victory for similar reasons. Assemblies are often used by political 
vanguards or executive committees to validate their positions, and to increase the 
mobilization of the masses to benefit the organizing of radicals, without the true 
empowerment of the rank-and-file through political development, debate and 
decision-making. This is evident structurally, through the consolidation of intellectual 
and strategic work in executives and political vanguards; in the end, this leaves 
movements open to co-option by less radical groups or individuals, and vulnerable to 
state-initiated demobilization via the presentation of electoral solutions.

If we insist on seeing the downfall of the CNT or the failures of ASSE as products of 
unique circumstance, and refuse to criticize them because they got closer to success than 
we have in Ontario, we fall into the same trap as state communists and Stalinists who 
claim that the downfall of the Soviet Union was exceptional, and not a clear product of
their politics or the logical end-result of a particular trajectory. We identify the flaws 
of their political orientation, not to be armchair revolutionaries and shit on everything 
from the sideline, but so that we can do things right by identifying the best way forward. 
If and when we fail, we should critique ourselves just as harshly, because the goal here 
isn?t just to pat each other on the back, but to have a revolution.

We must fight to break down formal and informal leadership structures as they develop 
within directly democratic bodies. We need to be constantly vigilant about the formation 
of an intellectual elite, or political vanguard who keep higher level strategic concerns 
away from the rank-and-file. Strategic political planning is required for success, but 
should not be delegated to those in official positions, carried out behind closed doors
and out-of-reach of the general membership. Here is where we see the value of specific 
anarchist organizations to participate in strategic conversation, but who can only have
these plans enacted if they win the battle of ideas in an open, democratic forum. We must 
constantly remind ourselves that even though taking control through power positions may
lead to short term gains, if the development of the general membership hasn?t reached the 
same level, it will most definitely lead to long-term failure.

Anarchists need to question more deeply whether the groups we label anarchist actually 
are. The problem with the CNT isn?t that they didn?t call themselves anarchist, but in 
critical ways and at critical times, they didn?t act like anarchists. Similarly, with 
ASSE, we see that groups that run in a directly democratic fashion and who espouse direct 
action as their main tactic may still exhibit a consolidation of power and a deference to 
authority that will be their undoing. So even though what they did was better ? even much 
better ? than other political organizations, the weaknesses of these movements are clear, 
and in fact, are almost too politically convenient for us anarchists. They failed because 
they weren?t anarchist enough.

A reader of this piece may be forgiven if they conclude these to be the uninvested 
criticisms of hair-splitting armchair revolutionaries... it is not. As organizers, the 
concerns and conclusions herein should and do intimidate us. History has time and again
attempted to clarify for us that there are no shortcuts to an informed, empowered working 
class movement, and there are no revolutionary tricks or slights of hand that will lead to 
revolution. Anarchist communism is a long haul that need necessarily build and root itself 
in popular institutions capable of mounting a truly democratic resistance that can take
power on its own behalf. It follows that we can?t take comfort in a moderately attended
rally of activists or the removal from office of a particularly vicious politician. The
temporary satisfaction we derive from a victorious power grab within our unions or 
militant one-off actions involving confrontations with police or the destruction of 
property are simply that ? temporarily satisfying. Therein is what intimidates us. The 
small victories and misconceptions we afford ourselves may, in fact, be our undoing. The 
truth is, the revolution is a far way off and it will be a struggle every step of the way. 
We put forward this perspective not to be demoralizing or to put off action till later,
but because if we can get past spinning our wheels in this type of short-term, satisfying 
work, we can begin to move towards the kind of organizing that will actually build 
something revolutionary.