Anarkismo.net: Spain, The concept of the People in anarchism by Ali Bei (ca, pt)

People power is a "empowerment" group. Empowerment is an English word which comes to mean 
awareness of a power that everyone has . It is a power based on the struggle and dignity . 
This is a community " empowerment " as a result of a determined struggle awareness 
achieved . This awareness creates an expectation of new struggles (and we think it will 
also be possible victory) . When joining several fights , with victories or historical 
example , in one movement ( movement or community ) we can speak of a community that has 
generated popular power. ---- Origin ---- In recent years there has been claiming the 
"people power" in various Latin American anarchist movements . Groups is generally linked 
to the libertarian communist current (known as platformists or especifistas ) present in 
many countries, and curiously absent from traditional Iberian anarchism .
 
It is a concept "import" of Latin American Marxism of the 60s and 70s of the twentieth 
century . At that time Marxism in its various facets ( Guevara , Trotskyist , Leninist or 
until Allende 's socialism ) spoke about building a social base tending to socialism. In 
this construction of socialism was talk of people power . The Uruguayan Anarchist 
Federation ( FAU ) and other Argentine groups accepted the term and were integrated into 
the political agenda .
 
The FAU managed to survive the Uruguayan dictatorship (1973-1985) , and the 80 was 
virtually the only American continent anarchist group [1 ] . In the 90s , slowly , begins 
to resurface in various American anarchism, and by then the FAU already had a certain 
social and political background , so it could influence the anarchist political formation 
of several groups of different countries.
 
In recent years is when this development has accelerated generating great libertarian 
organizations as Libertarian Communist Federation ( Santiago de Chile) , the Libertarian 
Students Front (Chile and Argentina ) , the Coordinator or Brazilian Anarchist 
Revolutionary Anarchist Federation of Venezuela [2 ] . These groups and many other 
anarchists do not take the position on the FAU called people power .
 
concept
 
People power is a "empowerment" group. Empowerment is an English word which comes to mean 
awareness of a power that everyone has . It is a power based on the struggle and dignity . 
This is a community " empowerment " as a result of a determined struggle awareness 
achieved . This awareness creates an expectation of new struggles (and we think it will 
also be possible victory) . When joining several fights , with victories or historical 
example , in one movement ( movement or community ) we can speak of a community that has 
generated popular power.
 
People power makes the " people to be strong." The concept of a " strong people " is also 
present in Latin American libertarian communism , and has often been adopted by national 
liberation movements . This is a people empowered , becomes a people or a community , hard 
to bend by state or capitalist powers . A village with people power is a respected village 
. They have reached another stage of social struggle , because we will have to look at the 
future socialist society .
 
The people can be empowered through social struggles, but also for the construction of 
alternatives that arise from the people themselves . In this case the different processes 
of small-scale self contribute to the idea that large-scale self-management is possible 
(ie , the socialization of the means of production : socialism ) . When you combine a 
general politicization in society, with a series of victories that have encouraged people 
to try to go further, with a few self-managed projects show the way , then this collective 
power can be truly revolutionary and held power its holders .
 
It would also have to say that it is a cumulative process. This means that each victory 
will help to achieve the ultimate goal . Every fight becomes an accumulation of 
experience, political training , debates , campaigns that benefit the objective. With 
watching the fights will go clear what political forces contribute to empower the people 
and which hinder it and deviate from your goals.
 
Examples Iberian
 
To understand a little better the concepts of building popular power will set an example 
that is not usually associated with these terms. The Asturian Revolution of 1934, which 
was a process of accumulation of forces of the proletariat Spaniard . It was a process of 
years, who through strikes , boycotts , expropriations , miners and native and foreign 
workers who were waking up to the year 1934 in which all experienced class contradictions 
led to the general strike October revolutionary .
 
The Asturian proletarians had been a whole year full of sharp class conflict which 
witnessed numerous gunfights , partial strikes and insurrections small locally , 
generating an atmosphere of widespread resistance . You could tell that people had lost 
respect for authority, which openly challenged daily, and as the occasion had imposed the 
power of the working class, as in the strike of Gij?n ( September 1934 ) , government bans 
skipping the daily Progress ( Asturian socialist diary favoring the idea of social 
revolution ) or by riots in prisons with inmates who had just armed and large leaks. All 
this in the midst of a widespread weapon of the working class (only in that year there is 
talk that the Asturian workers bought guns 10,000 salary , not to mention the numerous 
thefts of weapons in armories or seizure of dynamite in the mines) . The process that led 
to the Asturian Revolution is a powerful example of how a whole town built grassroots power .
 
What may cost us more to understand is that this power popular Asturias was supported by 
different political actors left ( anarchists , Anarchists , Socialists, Communists and 
Marxists from left ) each in their own way , but all add up . It is therefore remarkable 
that most likely involving some 30,000 people from a working population of about 120,000 , 
which indicates the amount of movement . [3]
 
Role of the Anarchists
 
Traditionally there has been debate within the libertarian movement on how to approach the 
process leading to social revolution (or libertarian communism ) . On one side are those 
who advocate a strong libertarian movement , numerous and well trained to " lead " people 
to the revolution and to convene insurrections and strikes to get it . On the other hand 
also have many anarchists who advocate a libertarian organized so people are aware that 
the community , being large is necessarily plural , and therefore seeks to contribute to 
the set with the methods of the anarchists , but within that people in struggle . For this 
sector, the role of an anarchist organization would be to bring together the different 
members involved in social movements to provide them with coordination and policy 
coherence own for your goals.
 
In the Iberian anarchism , however , anarcho-syndicalism has always prevailed as an 
organizational form of libertarian activism . Unions have always been seen as the backbone 
of all anarchism , with the remaining libertarian organizations in support of ( and often 
subject to ) mass unions .
 
Somehow in many Latin American communities struggling to breathe some of this popular 
power ( Zapatista communities , indigenous people, the MST in Brazil , Oaxaca , 
venezonalas communities , Chilean populations , etc. . ) . When in one of these 
communities have the impression of being in a totally different from ours, governed by 
other rules. Not to say that anarchist communities are involved , they are places where 
"the people in charge." Although some community of this society resembles anarchism 
proposed by even the current libertarian movement has not achieved enough influence on 
people's movements so that communities struggle has inspired libertarian communism . It is 
precisely now when anarchism again heading for a new world .
 
Ali Bei
Llibert?ria Assemblea Bages
 
Originally published in Catalan in ' P?sol negre ' , number 60