#Worldwide #Information #Blogger #LucSchrijvers: #Update: #anarchist #information from all over the #world - 15.04.2020

Today's Topics:

   
1.  Roberto Luzzi: Facing the coronavirus-capitalist epidemic in
      Italy (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
   
2.  France, Union Communiste Libertaire UCL - International, The
      resilience of Rojava, to the challenge of Covid-19 (fr, it,
      pt)[machine translation] (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
   
3.  France, Union Communiste Libertaire AL #304 - International,
      Palestine: a "peace" plan for annexation and capitulation (fr,
      it, pt)[machine translation] (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
   
4.  Spaine, CGT-LKN Euskal Herria: Money talks. Next week they
      make us go back to work (ca) [machine translation]
      (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
   
5.  Communiqué of the communist union Libertarian Nantes on the
      expulsion of the ZAD de la Dune [machine translation]
      (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
   
6.  France, Union Communiste Libertaire UCL - AL #304 - Edito:
      We're here ! (fr, it, pt)[machine translation] (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
   
7.  Britain, Anarchist Communist Group ACG - Women and
      Coronavirus (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
   
8.  US, black rose fed - Life Comes At You Fast: The Stunning
      End of the Bernie Sanders Campaign By Jason E. Smith
      (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)


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Message: 1



Roberto Luzzi, an activist of the Italian trade union SI Cobas ( Sindicati Interaziendali Comitati di Base ), explains how striving to
increase profits has turned Italy into a zone with the world's largest number of people infected with coronavirus. ---- In mid-March, Italy
became the epicenter of the COVID-19 pandemic with a terrifying increase in deaths. By March 25, the number of people who died from
coronavirus infection was 7503, which is about one-third of all deaths in the world and twice as many as in China. In the Lombardy region
(over 10 million inhabitants) almost 4,500 died. people. These data are significantly underestimated, many people who have not been tested
for coronavirus die in their homes or hospices because there are no more beds for patients in hospitals.

This high number of deaths, which increased from 500 to 800 per day over the past week, is due to poor crisis management by the government,
health and civil protection services (testing only seriously ill people and not isolating people who have had contact with them before). It
is further increased by the authorities' submission to entrepreneurs who are lobbying against the closure of non-strategic enterprises.
These activities forced millions of people to stay crowded in trains, buses, cars, factories, offices, warehouses every day, thus spreading
the disease. The cuts made by governments in the public healthcare system caused the outbreak of coronavirus infections to lead to more
deaths due to insufficient availability of respirators (only 5,000 throughout Italy at the beginning of the epidemic), which could help the
most vulnerable patients overcome respiratory failure caused by the virus. Many of them (usually the oldest ones) died, suffocating due to
lack of fans.

It is clear, then, that such a high number of deaths was not necessary and its main cause is a policy that puts profits above human life,
health care system and society. The SI Cobas trade union opposed such a policy. He mobilized employees to defend the lives of themselves and
other people as well as against the actions of the government and the capitalist social system.

Chronology of the crisis

On January 31, the government declared a state of emergency due to a coronavirus, but no specific action had been taken until February 23.
Only then was the "red zone" of ten and then sixteen municipalities isolated in the Lodi province of Lombardy. By the time the area was
closed, however, the virus was already spreading outside its borders, mainly in the bordering province of Bergamo. Mass events were already
banned throughout the country.

In a statement of February 26, SI Cobas called for strict safety measures to be applied in all workplaces and for necessary equipment to
protect against infection (masks, gloves, disinfectants, overalls). This is the responsibility of all employers under Legislative Decree No
81 of 2008 'on safety at work'. If you do not comply, employees should not start work and demand full pay. The union statement also states
that coronavirus cannot be an excuse to suppress employees' freedom to organize and fight for their rights.

Another SI Cobas Milan statement from February 27 reported an employee from GLS Magazine in San Giuliano near Milan who had a positive
coronavirus test. SI Cobas requested that the rooms be disinfected and all employees in the same department be tested before returning to
work. The authorities, although informed, only intervened when employees refused to return to work. The daily number of deaths up to March 1
increased from several per week to almost 40 per day the following week. At that time, hotel workers were no longer invited to work and by
March 4, almost all hotels in Milan were shut down. The same happened to those employed in the entertainment and sports industry. These
employees should receive financial support (see below).

On March 1, the government issued a new decree extending security measures to all of Lombardy and some neighboring provinces. Only on March
5 all schools, universities and kindergartens were closed all over the country. On March 8 restrictions on the movement of people in the
enlarged "red zone" were introduced, and milder restrictions were imposed on services in the rest of Italy. On the same day, 133 deaths were
recorded. The next day, restrictions on the movement of people were extended to the whole country. On March 11, a new decree ordered the
closure of all "less important" companies (however, the list of "necessary" included beauty salons and other). Production and transport
continued operations. On March 11, SI Cobas announced a strike to all employees of the Modena province, protesting in connection with the
death of an employee of a meat packaging factory and the death of 9 prisoners after a protest in a prison in Modena. These protests broke
out in 40 prisons in Italy due to suspension of visits from relatives and lack of protection against infection.

On March 10, employees at the Fca assembly line in Pomigliano strike because of unsafe working conditions. Fca decided to close the plant
for a few days to maintain and improve sanitation. In the week preceding March 15, employees of several warehouses and factories, especially
in areas affected by COVID-19, were on strike demanding their closure.

On March 14, the government, employers' associations and large trade union centers (CGIL, CISL and UIL) signed a "protocol" on workplace
safety. Its purpose was to justify the maintenance of all production activities, even when safety could not be guaranteed.

The facts, however, show a clear link between production activity and the spread of coronavirus: The release of production and transport
from forced restraint resulted in the virus spreading for the next two weeks along with its tragic consequences we are currently
experiencing. In return, the government blames and punishes people walking or running in the countryside ...

On March 16, in a joint statement, SI Cobas and AdL Cobas (these two unions have maintained close cooperation in the transport and logistics
sector for years) called on employees to refrain from work in all industries that are not strategic, while guaranteeing the production and
transport of only food, pharmaceuticals and other health-related products.

The unions distributed the following leaflet:

Stop unnecessary business to stop the virus!

SI Cobas does not agree with the agreement concluded by the government, entrepreneurs and official trade unions (CGIL, CISL, UIL), which
aims to preserve profits by maintaining the operation of factories, warehouses and stores. This agreement therefore threatens the lives of
employees and contributes to the further spread of the virus in society.

Trade unions SI Cobas and ADL COBAS replaced the strike service with a recommendation to employees to stay at home, thus protecting their
health and life. The unions also demand the immediate termination of economic activity which is not necessary and the payment of full wage
rates to all employees.

We demand that the production and services be stopped for at least two weeks, except for the necessary ones, such as food, medicine and
sanitary production, but on condition that all necessary sanitary conditions and protective facilities are guaranteed.

Employees staying at home should receive 100% your pay. During downtime, they can only be called to disinfect the plant, which is necessary
before restarting the business.

Our position is based on a rational analysis of epidemiological data.

Although the reports of the Department of Civil Defense serve to soften the picture of the current situation, the data speak of very strong
progression of the epidemic - up to 3590 new patients and 368 deaths on Sunday, March 15, which gives more than 20,000 confirmed infections
and 1806 deaths. In fact, there are already hundreds of thousands of actual infections, and mortality will exceed Chinese 3 thousand.

The government should have taken drastic measures to stop the infection, but it buckled under business pressure and only delayed introducing
limited half measures. Millions of employees in factories, warehouses, transport and even shops (from electronics to drugstores) were forced
to violate doctors' recommendations. They were forced to constantly move and stay in crowded places. Thus, workplaces contribute
significantly to the development of the epidemic. Until this situation changes, the number of infections and deaths will undoubtedly increase.

Employees' lives are more important than business profits!

Workplace safety regulations say that employees can leave the workplace if they are faced with a "serious, immediate threat that cannot be
avoided," such as the current coronavirus outbreak. The current agreement of the government, entrepreneurs and trade unions (CGIL, CSIL,
UIL) suspends this right:
1. It is employers who decide whether production will continue or not.
2. Disinfection of workplaces and implementation of security procedures and facilities remains the responsibility of the employer, outside
public health care control.
3. If an employee develops a coronavirus, no compulsory quarantine is provided for the people with whom he has worked.
4. In the event of unavailability of masks, it is possible to maintain continuity of work, except when it is not possible to maintain one
meter of "safe distance" between employees. Studies, however, confirm that a distance of one meter and the use of masks are not enough as
protection against infection.
5. The agreement also omits the manner in which employees arrive at work. Trains, buses and cars pose a potential threat that has been
omitted in the agreement.
6. The agreement does not dispute an 8 or 10 hour business day, repeated every day, and work without a "safe distance", but at the same time
prohibits employees from meeting to defend their rights and health, even if they comply with all sanitary instructions. We will not allow
the virus to be an excuse to stop employees from organizing!
7. Research confirms that coronavirus can survive on different surfaces for up to two days. Thus, the delivery of ordered goods is another
possibility of contagion. Here's another reason for closing magazines. Goods that are not necessary can wait two weeks!

Several factories in Bergamo and Brescia, even those belonging to the FCA Group, have already been closed due to strikes. In the face of a
dramatic increase in infection and death, the Lombardy authorities postulated a halt to economic activity, which is not necessary for
subsistence.

The agreement of the government, entrepreneurs and trade unions strikes at all workers who have joined the strike in recent days, not
wanting to be cannon fodder and not wanting to risk their lives for bosses' profits. People first, then profits, stop all branches of
production and services that are not a priority in order to stop the virus.

Because the Italian health care only has 5,000 respirators able to save the lives of the most seriously ill, the risk of losing their lives
is considerable. Many people were sentenced to death because they lacked medical equipment. This is the result of budget cuts hitting public
health. Germany has 28 thousand. respirators, it is almost six times more, in a country one and a half times larger than Italy.

One F-35 fighter costs more than 7,000. respirators. It would be enough to buy one less and we would be able to save thousands of people.
Enough with cuts hitting healthcare, invest in life, not death! Especially in times when the destruction of the environment caused by
capitalist production is likely to bring us another serious health crisis.

Expenses for health care for years were limited to such an extent that it did not fulfill its tasks even during a time of calm. Now doctors,
nurses and the rest of the staff are forced to work excessively in high risk of infection. Because safety is not observed, hospitals are
currently the most dangerous centers of the epidemic. It is necessary to immediately fill the shortcomings in medical staff and strict
compliance with safety standards.

We are not facing an ordinary trade union conflict over economic benefits. In this case, it is about health and life, not only of employees,
but also of the whole society.

 From this week on, we are calling for a mass absence from work to defend the health and life of us all.
[March 16, 2020, Milan]
***
SI Cobas organized an absenteeism action in dozens of magazines, which lasted from March 18. It was not an easy campaign, because bosses and
foremen threatened employees with losing their jobs and earnings. The discussion proceeded as follows: our fight is not about money, but
about life. We will fight for money when we are safe. Agreements have been signed with many companies to ensure the transport and
distribution of food and pharmaceuticals.

Hundreds of employees published photos with children and partners and a card saying "I stay at home. I am not cannon fodder. "

On March 16, the government issued a new decree, supporting companies and employees who had to stop working due to the coronavirus crisis
and announcing crisis investments in the public health system of € 25 billion.

On March 20, the Ministry of the Interior, at the request of transport companies, ordered the prefects to intervene in conflicts in the
logistics sector, which caused delays in the delivery of "necessary products". In fact, SI Cobas and AdL Cobas provided transportation of
necessary products, but companies tried to mix them with other products, increasing the number of employees at risk of infection.

The following SI Cobas statement included:

The note the Ministry of the Interior sent to the prefects encouraged them to "prevent distribution blockages resulting from protests by
some trade unions that take the form of mass and coordinated absence from logistics, transport and shipping sectors."
After two weeks of playing the role of Pontius Pilate, the Conte government began to understand that the situation was out of control in a
sector that had never before been so important in terms of supplying necessities and employing over a million employees.

This sector is certainly not out of control as a result of our actions, but because of employers' speculation on the coronavirus crisis.
They put their profits above public interest and employees' health. It also sneaks out because of the refusal to establish security rules to
ensure the flow of necessities.

Employees, employees in the healthcare sector, carers and all citizens should know the truth!

The truth is that SI Cobas together with AdL Cobas have been trying unsuccessfully for two weeks to start negotiations with the government
to guarantee the full operation of the necessity supply chain while stopping the transport of goods not in this category, providing basic
measures to prevent and protect safety in places work.

The government, however, prefers to take care of the profits of international corporations by signing a "safety protocol" that does not
guarantee safety at work and prevention of infections, or prioritizing the supply of necessities. Currently, this protocol is even described
by large trade unions as useless, although they have signed it themselves!
In recent days, hundreds of logistics workers have become infected with coronavirus, because profit-oriented employers required them to work
in crowded warehouses, handling goods deliveries, which in 90% they do not serve to provide public needs (clothes, cosmetics, household
appliances, etc.).

An employee who is infected with a virus in the workplace is a potential seedbed of infections for hundreds of other employees and citizens
... There is only one way to ensure the regular flow of basic goods: imposing an actual ban on doing business that is not necessary and
focusing only on necessary services, avoiding traffic congestion (...).

On March 22, the government eventually ordered the closure of all non-primary businesses, including the production of products that were not
included in the key production list (strategic, i.e. military, production added).

While China has limited the spread of the epidemic and almost defeated the virus by shutting down all non-strategic enterprises, while even
the mayors of Lombardy call for the cessation of all minor activities and to stop the disaster, the misfortunes caused by the actions of the
Italian government and entrepreneurs are already clearly visible. After a month, the number of infected is still growing! Every day, new
death records are beaten (which, given the southern areas of the country, will be even higher). Unfortunately, even the new decree does not
differ from the previous ones, thus postponing the containment of coronavirus expansion. Further mobilization is needed for the real
quarantine of goods not included in basic necessities and to start real consultations in good time with those

The main routes of Italian logistics reach deep into the regions of Emilia Romagna and Lombardy, where the largest clusters of warehouses
are located and where the main national distribution routes diverge. Hundreds of thousands of employees also gather there daily. Including
Veneto, these are regions where the outbreak has reached its greatest proportions.
The first reading of new government regulations still does not explain which industries are necessary and key. Therefore, the new decree
will not bring major changes, which is why we should only produce and distribute all necessary goods in all workplaces and transport,
forcing strict compliance with safety rules.

Our unions are ready to make arrangements with entrepreneurs and state institutions at any time to correct current errors that may affect
key sectors. Rules should be introduced to prevent the spread of the virus in warehouses and among the public, ensuring the appropriate use
of social security networks at this time and after the epidemic is over.

At the same time, we will not allow the use of employee struggles as an excuse to cover up the responsibility of the government,
entrepreneurs and official trade unions, to oppose public health with employees' demands and / or to legitimize repression.

SI Cobas, AdL Cobas
***
The largest trade union centers (CGIL, CISL, UIL), which a week earlier had signed a protocol authorizing any type of production activity,
currently under pressure from employees from several factories (metalworkers' strike in Lombardy and Emilia) threatened a general strike,
which on 25 March after reaching an agreement guaranteeing minor the changes have been canceled.

Conclusions

Through the struggle for health and life against capitalist greed, workers understood the true, anti-social, class nature of capitalism and
capitalist exploitation. In the weeks to come, when most employees stay at home, we try to keep in touch via social media and
teleconferences with factory crew representatives. The turnout is high.

We do not know how long the current situation will last, how deeply the crisis will have on our lives, the level of unemployment and
poverty. The Italian economy has never recovered after the crisis of 2008-2009, while unemployment is still high, almost double the official
rate, which is almost 10 percent. Employees covered by employment contracts of indefinite duration are to receive an allowance of 80%. pay
up to EUR 1,129.66 net per month, up to 9 weeks. Income to survive. Some of those working temporarily and self-employed will receive € 600
for March. Two packages worth EUR 25 billion will increase public debt, which already exceeds 130 percent. GDP.

If Italy gets out of this new crisis, it will be crucial who pays the country's great public debt. After years of increasing wage taxation
and tax breaks for companies, we have already fought for the introduction of wealth tax for the rich. A wealth tax of 10%, imposed on the
richest 10% population (whose estimated sum would be about 400 billion euros) would allow for the repair of our welfare state, in particular
the health care system and reduction of public debt.

We hope that our experience report will be useful to workers and trade union activists in countries where the pandemic has not yet developed
as much as it did with us.
We also suggest organizing conferences via the Internet (e.g. via Skype, Zoom or other channel) to exchange experiences, views and take
joint international initiatives.

Roberto Luzzi on behalf of SI Cobas
No Borders, March 26, 2020

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Message: 2



Lacking of everything, subjected to the blockade, the Autonomous Administration of the North-East of Syria is preparing for the spread of a
virus whose Damascus regime, not with a lie, denies that it has reached the country. Development of screening tests, local manufacture of
respirators, mobilization of the Red Crescent ... Everything possible is done to prevent a disaster. ---- Deprived of international aid and
drugs, lacking qualified personnel, beds, hospitals, the Autonomous Administration of North-East Syria (AANES) is particularly vulnerable to
the epidemic of Covid-19. ---- In Rojava, the daily life of millions of Kurdish, Arab and Assyrian civilians has already been ravaged by war
for nine years. Added to this was the Turkish invasion in October 2019. Currently, nearly 100,000 people are crammed into the IDP camps in
Syrian Kurdistan. The density and the living conditions make it impossible to distance oneself adopted elsewhere in the world. It is only
just possible to envisage quarantine zones under large tents. A spread would be dramatic for Al-Hol camp, for example, where nearly 70,000
prisoners are held, including thousands of children and women affiliated with the Islamic State.

The call of the Kurdish Red Crescent
The Kurdish Red Crescent (Heyva Sor) is sounding the alarm concerning the Kurdish refugees from Afrin in the province of Shehba, and calls
on WHO to help these victims of the ethnic cleansing caused by the Turkish invasion .

Screening operation during a road check.
cc Kurdiska Röda Solen
The situation is all the more precarious as the AANES no longer benefits from the humanitarian aid channeled by the UN since in January
Russia vetoed the renewal of the UN system in place since 2014. The crossing point Al Yarubiyah, on the Iraqi border, through which medical
aid transited, is now closed. Humanitarian aid will now only pass under the control of Damascus, with all the blackmail, embezzlement and
racketeering that can be expected from this corrupt police regime. At the end of 2019, thanks to a Russian-Turkish agreement, Damascus
troops deployed in the area, but relations between the democratic institutions of the AANES and the hated regime are very tense.

The Kurdish Red Crescent donation campaign is available here
A test kit developed in Rojava
On March 23, the Kurdish self-government imposed two weeks of confinement on the territory of the AANES. Nine centers have recently been
equipped to receive and isolate patients and potentially contaminated patients. In concrete terms, three hospitals can accommodate around
forty, with a total of less than thirty intensive care beds, 27 respirators and a total of two doctors trained in their use, in an area
still at war.

Everything is missing: masks, gloves, protective clothing, screening devices ... Not to mention qualified ambulatory units that could go to
villages and countryside. Samples taken from suspected cases are still sent to laboratories in Damascus to be analyzed pending a test.

A Covid-19 detection test developed by Rojava doctors received its IS0 certification for 85% reliability and barely a few seconds of
waiting. This test has been distributed to several doctors in several countries for evaluation, as well as to the WHO. It is notably tested
in China with three different hospitals.

Struggling to import appropriate equipment, AANES began manufacturing respirators to deal with possible cases of Covid-19. A first prototype
has been presented and the tests are conclusive. But each unit requires three days of manufacturing, and there is no indication that there
will be enough in time.

Disinfection operation in Qamislo, one of the main cities in Syrian Kurdistan.
cc Kurdiska Röda Solen
Mutiny in a prison in the Kurdish city of Batman
In Turkey, political prisoners from Batman (Êlih) set fire to their prison to protest their detention. In Turkey, more than 50,000 Kurds are
imprisoned for terrorism. In the midst of the Covid-19 epidemic, Turkish prisons risk becoming a cemetery if they are not emptied.

A call from the Kurdistan National Solidarity Coordination (CNSK, of which UCL is a member), supported by many doctors, organizations and
political figures urges the authorities to release as many detainees as possible before it is too late.

Indeed, due to the pandemic, Erdogan's party has announced the temporary release of 90,000 people out of the 300,000 detainees in Turkey.
But all political prisoners from the HDP, the PKK, combatants, journalists, academics and members of various organizations linked to the
Kurdish left have been excluded from these releases.

A petition for the release of political prisoners in Turkey is available here
First victims: women
Violence against women confined to the home as a result of the coronavirus pandemic continues to increase dangerously worldwide. As in other
countries, the epidemic and containment are a disaster for women , aggravated here by the policy of the Turkish State which is making every
effort to destroy any feminist conquest while maintaining ambiguity since 2012 and the promulgation on March 8 of the law on the protection
of the family and the prevention of violence against women. An adoption presented by the AKP as a "  gift to women  " ... However, in the
past 20 days, 18 women have been murdered by men in Turkey, including 12 in their homes. Turkish authorities call on people to "  stay at
home But took no precautions against violence against women, raising fears of an explosion of feminicides.

Prevention intervention in a refugee camp.
cc Kurdiska Röda Solen
Ankara increases pressure
In addition to being a war zone, Rojava and its population face additional threats during this period of health crisis. The Ankara regime
uses the management of river resources as a water war against Turkish Kurdistan , and against Syrian Kurdistan. Turkey controls part of the
water supply to the AANES, notably the Allouk station at Ras al-Aïn, occupied by the Turkish army. Since March 22, it has stopped pumping,
whereas it normally supplies water to more than 460,000 people ... This interruption in full effort against the spread of the virus makes
the situation even more difficult.

Another burden: the military pressure exerted by Ankara and its Islamist auxiliaries from the Free Syrian Army and grouped under the label
Syrian National Army (ANS). Hospital facilities are regularly bombed along the front line, for example the villages of Dildara and Um El
Kêf, near Tall Tamer, on April 6. Turkey ignores calls by the United Nations to suspend all military operations and declare a cease-fire due
to the pandemic.

In the territories they occupy with the protection of the Turkish army, the Islamist gangs practice kidnapping, arbitrary arrests, looting.
In the Afrin region, the properties of the displaced are put up for sale, while those who have not fled are expropriated or imprisoned for "
  communication with Kurdish units  ". A monthly racket is also organized by certain Islamist factions in the form of a levy in stores.

Journalists are also the target of the Ankara regime. A report by Dicle Firat Gazeteciler Dernegi (Kurdish Association of Journalists)
indicates that, since the start of the Covid-19 crisis in Turkey on March 11, harassment of journalists investigating the situation has
intensified on social media. A significant number of articles on the pandemic have been criminalized, and hundreds of arrests have been
made. "  The state does not allow any dissident voice and wishes to silence the whole of society,  " said the association.

After nine years of war which saw it confront the Islamic State at the cost of thousands of deaths, then undergo the Turkish invasion with
the blessing of Moscow and Washington, the Kurdish left must therefore face a new challenge. In the face of adversity, the peoples of
north-eastern Syria have so far shown extraordinary solidarity and resilience. Let us be sure that they will overcome this ordeal, and do
not forget them !

Édouard (UCL Alpes-Provence)

https://www.unioncommunistelibertaire.org/?La-resilience-du-Rojava-au-defi-du-Covid-19

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Message: 3



Presented as "the deal of the century" by Donald Trump, the "peace and prosperity plan" unveiled on January 28 alongside Israeli Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is supposed to definitively resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, without any Palestinian participation and
by reducing to almost nothing. ---- The "peace plan" presented by Donald Trump actually confirms the annexation of all the Israeli
settlements in the West Bank, the Jordan Valley and the counting of Jerusalem declared the indivisible capital of the State of Israel. Once
again, it is their lands, their scarce resources and their symbolic places that are being taken from the Palestinians. In return ? A new
promise of a state within four years, Israeli territories ceded to the Palestinians located in the middle of the Negev desert and a
Palestinian capital located in Abu Dis, dreary and landlocked district located three kilometers from Jerusalem, separated by the wall of
apartheid. This hypothetical Palestinian State would not control its land borders, its maritime borders or its air space, and only tunnels
and bridges would ensure "continuity »Geographic. The plan also provides for the payment of $ 50 billion to Palestinians if Palestine
recognizes the Jewish character of the State of Israel, renounces the right of refugees to return, abolishes the payment of pensions to
families prisoners and disarms Hamas, which currently controls the Gaza Strip. All these proposals violate all of the United Nations
Security Council resolutions, from the famous resolution 242 (1967) to the equally famous resolution 2334 (2016).

Put an end to the Palestinian cause
Behind these Trump administration proposals are hidden electoral goals. The first is to support the electoral promises of his friend
Netanyahu, who is entangled in numerous legal cases and beaten by Benny Gantz in the legislative elections in September 2019. The second is
to "get rid" of 260,000 Israeli Arabs living in one of the areas that would be ceded to the future Palestinian state. Again, the ambition is
electoral because the unified list on the left, highly prized by the Arab community of Israel came third in the same elections and supported
the rival of Netanyahu in the second round.

This plan mainly confirms a reality, that of a very real apartheid in the Middle East which recalls more and more that of South Africa and
its "Bantustans". These landlocked and guarded areas were to resolve the country's political, social and demographic problems by keeping in
one single territory all the black population who did not enjoy the same civil and human rights as the white population. This project,
widely condemned in the world, had provoked a boycott of the South African regime.

If the Arab League, at first hesitant, finally rejected the Trump-Netanyahu plan, the Gulf monarchies, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates,
Bahrain, Oman, have started a process of normalization of their relations with Israel which goes hand in hand. with the surrender of the
Palestinians. The Saudi power, in particular, has a strategy, with its media and intellectual intermediaries, to delegitimize the
Palestinian cause and thus prepare Arab public opinion for a complete reversal putting an end to traditional solidarity, even front, with
its demands. As for the European Union, it timidly and partially rejected it but France distinguished itself by the voice of Jean-Yves Le
Drian in welcoming "the efforts of President Trump" which it will study "with attention" .

France hails President Trump's "efforts"
Finally on the Palestinian side, Mahmoud Abbas, president of the Palestinian Authority, announced the breakdown of relations with Israel and
the United States. Announcement effect aimed at "saving the face" of a government criticized and considered illegitimate by a large part of
the Palestinian population but impossible to actually implement, given the political situation in the Occupied Territories. In this dramatic
context for the Palestinians, the international solidarity of civil societies and social movements is crucial.

Basil (UCL 93 center)

https://www.unioncommunistelibertaire.org/?Palestine-un-plan-de-paix-pour-l-annexion-et-la-capitulation

------------------------------

Message: 4


Next week, millions of workers will be forced to return to work. We will return to the work that those who really command have told the
Spanish government that it cannot indefinitely stop the machinery of producing money and profits. Someone years ago said "It's the economy,
asshole." In fact, he should have changed the word economy to "capitalism", but he was not without reason. We have heard how the great
businessmen and the great world corporations have clearly told the  United States and the United Kingdom that if necessary, it was fully
justified to sacrifice a few thousand lives so as not to negatively affect the economy. With unimaginable cynicism, they added that, in
addition, a large part of these lives are of older people and, therefore, not very productive in capitalist terms.

In our latitudes, no politician or businessman has had the audacity to say the same thing. However,  sometimes it is the facts that speak
and not the words  . Weeks ago we saw how the government was oriented to the  Labor Inspectorate  so that it would establish some very
permissive criteria when it came to requiring protective measures against the spread of COVID19 in many work centers. More recently we have
seen as indicated in the same  Labor Inspectionthat COVID19 is a disease present in the environment and, therefore, a production center
could not be closed due to the risk of contagion from its workers. And finally yesterday we have read again that the government requires
that we prove that we have been infected at work so that the COVI19 of a worker is considered an occupational accident. And they know
perfectly well that although the factors, as well as the sanitary or cleaning personnel have high rates of infection and mortality, it  is
almost impossible to demonstrate where we have caught the disease  . It is about shielding that we are going to work.

Next week the government will send us back to work. While children are not allowed to play in the parks,  workers are required to accumulate
again on public transport and in the workplace  . In most cases without PPE. In the vast majority of cases, employers are not forced to take
real production measures. And at the end of the working day they will send us back home where we will be a contagion factor towards the
people with whom we live.

The resumption of non-essential economic activities endangers many people and, ultimately, the fight against COVID19. A disease that, in
addition, we are already seeing how it  affects the working class much more  than in the part of the population with higher incomes. We see
it in the highest incidence of the disease in working class neighborhoods, here and around the world . Forced to work simply because those
who really rule, the owners of large companies and capitalist corporations, have decided that their freedom to accumulate benefits and
enrich themselves goes beyond the right to health and life of the population as a whole.

Next week, millions of workers in the Spanish State will find ourselves facing the danger of contracting a disease that can kill us, against
our will, we will be agents of contagion and spread of the pandemic.

 From the CGT we want to clearly point out the culprits of this situation: the big businessmen, the owners of the IBEX 35 and their faithful
servants of the different governments. We have memory and we will hold you accountable!

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https://www.cgt-lkn.org/blog/archivos/6530

------------------------------

Message: 5



ZAD of the Dune: deportation in full lockdown ---- In the midst of a health crisis, the authorities found nothing else to do but to remove,
this Wednesday, April 08, the residents of the ZAD de la Dune in Brétignolles-sur-Mer. As we go through a dramatic health and social
situation, Vendée prefecture is mobilizing dozens of police, vehicles and a helicopter (! ) towards the opponent of the destructive project.
The libertarian communist union repeats its support for the occupant. ---- Since October 2019, a ZAD has been created on the site of the
dunes of the Normandelière in Brétignolles-sur-Mer, Vendée. It is a response to the marina project which has been controversial for
seventeen years, but is expected to be delivered in 2023. Such a project continues the political logic of destructive choice for ecology.

The future port will need to cut and bridge the dune, dig a channel, build a bridge, all of this in a natural area of several dozens of
hectares. The zadistes intend to protect this rich wet area, and a rocky foreshore considered exceptional. Ecological emergency leaves no
room in our society for this kind of useless project that will always be more.

However, the evacuation of the dune's dune took place on Wednesday 08 at night, while the Habitant.E.S of the site were held in custody, and
the lockdown prevented any support for the zadistes. For the past several weeks, the people of the have been preparing themselves by
building barricades and strengthening their facilities.
Only where the lockdown seemed to bring the truce, the authorities, in their opinion, improvised an expulsion and destruction of the ZAD de
la Dune, with the help of about 70 civilians called by the Mayor, to carry out the fires cabins. On the one hand, authorities regret the
current pandemic, on the other, they are doing everything to continue the arrival of other pandemics by destroying the natural environment.

In the end almost all of them. quantity were arrested and placé.e.s in custody, while the forces of disorder destroyed their homes, setting
fire to them, without worrying about personal affairs still inside. Vendée prefecture thus puts people on the street, without a solution to
the virus in the cells, showing a cynical cynicism. A cynicism of which Christophe Chabot, President of the Community of communes of
St-Gilles cross of life, has nothing to envy. He declared himself on Twitter "very moved and very happy" of this expulsion, and said he was
considering the start of the construction site in September. Another one who, for lack of dignity, better shut up.

The residents of the ZAD are already calling for a reoccupation of the place as soon as the lockdown is over, let's be in the game

The Libertarian communist Union of Nantes wishes to express its support for the fight for the protection of the Dune. Feel free to contact
them if you are around and have housing solutions. No to the destructive project of the marina, let's continue to fight for the preservation
of biodiversity and our ecosystems!

facebook.com/unioncommunistelibertairenantes/photos/a.743007339126907/2983213328439619

------------------------------

Message: 6



This month, for the first time in almost thirty years, Alternative libertarian is not published in paper format. Because of the coronavirus,
our printer stopped its machines, and we have no guarantee of distribution in kiosks. ---- However, we have completed this issue and are
ensuring the widest possible distribution in digital format . ---- During this period, the activists of the Communist Libertarian Union
remain mobilized. First in mutual aid, with our most fragile neighbors who have trouble getting around to do their shopping, or looking
after the children of those who work in essential sectors. ---- But also in our unions to support the slogan "general right of withdrawal
!"In all nonessential sectors, and facing the bosses ready to sacrifice the lives of others on the altar of their profits. Finally, by
shouting slogans at 8 p.m. on the balconies, or by discussing the situation with relatives, friends, neighbors to forge political ties for
tomorrow.

Because with this pandemic, the system drops the mask. For many people, it is a brutal and immediate awareness of the capitalist impasse and
its violence. We must now anticipate what will happen.

On March 17, then March 25, the Libertarian Communist Union brought together all of its groups during two conference calls to define the
challenges of the period and recall the inescapable need for a political and social revolution.

UCL, March 25, 2020

https://www.unioncommunistelibertaire.org/?Edito-On-est-la

------------------------------

Message: 7



The working class has borne the brunt of the consequences of the coronavirus pandemic (see article on class inequality). However, within the
working class, the gender division of labour has created particular problems for women. Though men are more likely to die from the virus,
women are finding that the kind of work they do both inside and outside the home is causing immense physical and mental hardship. ----
Exposure to the virus at work ---- A study by the think tank Autonomy has highlighted the "deep inequalities at the heart of our economy".
"Frontline key workers are part of the foundations that make our society tick: we rely on them to go to work, to keep basic services running
and to care for us. This study has shown not only that many of these occupations are at a high risk of exposure to the Covid-19 virus, but
that are often paid at poverty wages and are carried out overwhelmingly by women. It is about time we pay these workers properly for the
valuable work they do."

Autonomy notes that out of 3.2 million workers employed in the highest-risk roles, about 2.5 million are women. As many as a million of
those workers - who are considered to be at highest risk because they normally work closely with the public and people with diseases and
infections - are also among the lowest paid. For example, 89% of nurses and 84% of care workers are.

Another source shows that the Health Care workforce "has a high proportion of women workers - almost 80 per cent of non-medical health
service staff are women compared to 46 per cent of the wider workforce. In England, 43 per cent of doctors are women as are the majority of
medical trainees."

Other frontline occupations are largely done by women. Most people working in supermarket check-outs, the most at risk job in the
supermarket, are women. Cleaning is another occupation that has a large proportion of women. These are all jobs that put the workers in
direct contact with the public and therefore makes them most at risk, especially as not enough effective protective equipment is being
provided by employers or by the Health Service.

Loss of work

In other sectors, women have been more likely to lose their jobs. It is mostly women under 25 who are in this situation, working in retail
and the hospitality industry. Again, the gender divisions in society, encouraging women to go into low paid jobs which have contact with the
public means that they are a disadvantage in this situation. Young men may find themselves in IT or construction, jobs which are still being
done despite the pandemic, and are also better paid.

Burden of care at home

It is not just at work for wages that we need to look for inequality. With the lockdown, an incredible burden has been placed on those who
do care work for elderly family members and children. Though increasingly men are taking on these roles, traditionally it has fallen to
women. According to Carers UK:

1) Overall, women are more likely to take on caring roles than men. Of the 6.5 million unpaid carers in the UK 58% - 3.34 million - are women.

2) Carers UK has calculated that the economic value of the unpaid care provided by women in the UK is estimated to be a massive £77 billion
per year.

3) Female carers are more likely to be providing ‘round the clock' care, with 60% of those caring for over 50 hours a week being female.

4) Women are also more likely to be ‘sandwich' carers - caring for young children and elderly parents at the same time.

5) Caring falls particularly on women in their 40s, 50s and 60s. 1 in 4 women aged 50-64 has caring responsibilities for older or disabled
loved ones.

With the coronavirus this role will be even more demanding, with many more jobs to do.

Women and Childcare

Despite more men wanting to be involved in childcare, the traditional roles predominate.

According to one study:  "...while social attitudes have changed, in reality the unequal division of care for children remains stark.
According to the research, women are eight times as likely as men to take the lead in caring for children. The gap closes where there is an
adult in the family who needs care, with women 1.5 times as likely to take the lead as men, but it is clear that women continue to shoulder
the bulk of family care."

The impact of these facts for women in the current situation could be horrendous.  With schools closed there will be no break from looking
after children. Children's studies need to be supervised, with the online lessons schools are providing. For those in crowded housing and
with poor internet facilities, this will be very difficult. Children also need to be entertained and the lockdown makes this very difficult.
Again, more difficult in less well-off households.

However, it could also mean changes in this division of labour. It may actually give men the chance to be more involved in childcare if they
are working from home and the women are going out to work.  It all depends on how deep-seated the division of labour is in a family and
habits will be hard to change. Many women could well suffer issues of poor mental health as they struggle to balance all the jobs they need
to do.

Women are also experiencing domestic violence, on the increase since the lockdown (see separate article on website on domestic violence).

What to do?

Women's situation at work could be dealt with if there was the political will. Protective clothing and higher wages for all those in
low-paid front line jobs would be of great benefit to all, not just women. Any moves to protect the pay of low paid workers who have lost
their jobs will also benefit everyone. Support is also needed for unpaid carers. However, many of the changes needed are so fundamental that
it is hard to see things changing immediately. Attitudes and habits are ingrained through years of socialisation. The gender division of
labour both outside and inside the home will require a revolution in the way we see the roles of men and women. But that doesn't mean we
can't start thinking and acting differently. Solidarity and mutual aid must be the principles we practice- at work, in the community and at
home.

https://www.anarchistcommunism.org/2020/04/09/women-and-coronavirus/

------------------------------

Message: 8



The surprising announcement by Bernie Sanders this week that he will end his 2020 Democratic Party presidential primary bid offers us a
critical moment to reflect on the strategic moment we face - especially given the dramatic economic and social crisis of Covid-19 that
continues to unfold. ---- This piece critically assesses the core claims of pro-Sanders writers associated with Jacobin magazine and the
"class struggle election" strategy put forward by the Bread & Roses Caucus within DSA. While we don't share the optimism of the author that
the hard questions raised will force these voices to rethink or renounce their assumptions around power, movements, and electoral politics -
we do think others may. -- BRF ---- On March 3, a full two weeks before its scheduled meeting on March 17-18, the Federal Reserve announced
a surprise interest rate cut of half a percent, down to 1.25 percent. It was the first emergency rate cut since October 2008, in the midst
of the worst economic crisis since the 1930s. The markets were caught off-guard, and far from reassured. Equities indexes tumbled in
response, and have continued to do so ever since, at a rate more precipitous than 2008, even. Just over two weeks later, on a Sunday
afternoon, the Fed slashed rates still again, essentially setting them at the zero lower bound. Once again, the move triggered a massive
sell-off the following day, as the Dow plunged almost 13 percent in a single session.

As I write this, the Dow has lost almost a third of the "value" it had at recent all-time highs. The bottom is nowhere in sight. As recently
as March 16, China gave the world the first glimpse of what happens to a functioning economy during a severe public health crisis. In
January and February, industrial production was down 14 percent; retail sales, 21. Analysts summed up the findings: "devastating." The worst
is yet to come. As the prospect of hundreds of thousands, even millions, of coronavirus-related deaths dawns on American politicians, many
have begun to use the term "depression" to describe the anticipated economic fallout, as entire sectors shut down and tens of millions of
workers are let go.

Life Comes At You Fast
Given this dire and ongoing deterioration of the situation on the public health and economic fronts, it makes perfect sense that the
stunning and definitive defeat of the Bernie Sanders campaign has been demoted to an afterthought for most, as actual historical events have
upstaged the carefully plotted drama of the primary season. As the saying goes, life comes at you fast.

The Sanders campaign will continue to fade in interest and importance as people's lives and livelihoods are put at risk. Who knows where
we'll be in a month? Chance would have it that Fed Chairman Jerome Powell's rate cut would happen on and overshadow the most important day
of the Democratic primary, March 3, when Sanders' fate was sealed. Biden's earlier commanding performance in South Carolina was the writing
on the wall, but Super Tuesday, the fatal blow. (Michigan? The nail in the coffin.) Politics, like American football, is a game of inches.
The arcane machinations of electoral politics provide endless opportunity to play "What if?" (What if the Iowa caucus results hadn't been
bungled? What if Warren had dropped out and endorsed Sanders before March 3?, and so on.) One thing is for certain, however: the Sanders
campaign is finished, for good. The millions of voters who looked to him for direction, and as a transformative force of the American scene,
will have to look elsewhere. Most likely, in the mirror.

There is an irreducible gap or hiatus between the different and often conflicting forms of power exercised by mass movements-mass direct
action-and power set in motion by the state. So, too, a world of difference between throwing oneself into a popular mobilization and
attempting to win a state-sanctioned election.
In fact, the Sanders campaign had any number of advantages in the primary contest. It was much better-funded than other campaigns, with a
broad base of donors no other candidate could match; it ran a well-organized, innovative campaign that took advantage of their candidate's
particular appeal[1]; it was able to mobilize an enormous and highly energized army of volunteers to canvas and phone bank across the
nation; it demonstrated unprecedented strength among young and Latino voters. Sanders's persona is also unusually compelling and
charismatic. Despite having held public office for the past four decades, he could credibly present himself as an outsider, even an
activist, something other than a political hack.

Above all, the campaign had one decisive edge over all others: having never stopped campaigning after 2016, Sanders had a four-year head
start to develop his fundraising networks, refine and expand its organizational structure, win over voting blocs that stayed away in 2016,
and add new wrinkles to its platform (most dramatically, the so-called Green New Deal). It didn't matter. By midnight, March 3, the campaign
had been bested by easily the worst candidate on the field in recent memory. Biden had never won a primary and, after stinging defeats in
early caucuses and primaries, was a dead man walking. He couldn't raise money and his organization was laughable. A train wreck on the
microphone and an irrepressible plagiarist and groper-no one took the longtime also-ran seriously. And yet, by the time the Michigan primary
results came in, Biden was the favorite among Black voters by a margin of forty percent-a blowout-and he had the nomination in the bag. A
strange turn of events for the party of Hillary Clinton, and the era of #MeToo.

Crashing the Electoral Stage
I have no interest, in these few lines, in criticizing the Sanders campaign itself or figuring out "what went wrong." My intention is not to
criticize those who participated in the campaign. (My wife and 12-year-old son both canvassed and phone-banked for Sanders; I did not.) My
concerns are more narrow, even parochial. I want to look briefly at how the "socialist" left in the US has approached this campaign, and
where it is likely to go from here.

The gravity of the situation currently unfolding has, understandably, left little room for leftists involved in the Sanders campaign to
digest just how devastating a loss this was. Despite the advantages he brought into the 2020 campaign, the defeat this time around was more
cut-and-dried than four years ago, against a much weaker adversary. Socialists do not yet seem ready to reckon with these results. Now is
the time of palliatives, of moral victories and consolation prizes. "We won the war of ideas," one hears in places; "five million people
voted for socialism," in others. In retrospect, the electoral process, which has consumed so much energy and time over the past four years,
has been transformed into an opportunity for the promotion of a social democratic program, the Democratic Party primary a platform to win
hearts and minds.[2]

The losses at the polls can be chalked up, these voices suggest, to the uneven development of the socialist insurgency, the lag between
winning over millions to a platform featuring bold ideas like Medicare for All, debt forgiveness, and a wealth tax on the richest Americans,
and the dismal science of convincing voters, district-by-district, to pull the appropriate lever. It is nevertheless the case that Sanders's
defeat this time around means more than the end of his campaign. After four years in which the electoral process has been the only game in
town for the socialist left, there is no plausible argument for continuing down the same path.

The end of the Sanders campaign also means the demise of this current's overarching political strategy, which has relied almost exclusively
on the prospect of a Sanders nomination as the Democratic Party's presidential candidate, and eventual victory over Trump, to bring about
its social democratic vision (national health insurance, large-scale Keynesian fiscal initiatives, a modest wealth redistribution program,
and so on). After Corbyn, after Sanders, the electoral path to 21st-century social democracy is dead. If we have at most a decade, as Daniel
Denvir recently wrote, "to stave off climate catastrophe," we certainly do not have four years to waste waiting for the next election cycle.[3]

This rhetorical device that casts the Sanders campaign in the rearview mirror, as a socialist crashing of the electoral stage-part of a
broader, longer-term offensive to reshape common sense-was anticipated all along, in fact, by a slightly different hedging technique used by
socialists during the campaign itself. Knowing full well that Sanders's path to victory was narrow at best, and with a healthy if apparently
repressed distrust in the electoral process to begin with, this discursive stratagem had the function of situating the self-identified
socialists backing Bernie both in and outside the political process, so as to have it both ways. The rhetoric took, in turn, two slightly
different forms.


Two Rhetorical Turns
Throughout the campaign, it was not unusual to hear, in the casual give-and-take within the socialist milieu, and especially on social
media, leftists argue that the "grassroots" dynamism of the campaign, its micro-donations, newly mobilized voters, and wave of enthusiastic
volunteers was testimony to the fact that Sanderism, broadly speaking, was not merely an electoral campaign but a mass movement whose
objectives extended well beyond the circumscribed aim of winning political office. Typical in this regard was this claim made by one
prominent Sanders advocate as recently as March 2, a day before Super Tuesday: "The movement that's organized around Bernie Sanders right
now is unlike anything that's been seen in modern electoral history...We have a mass...movement to...elect[Sanders]."[4]

This claim was shadowed, however, by another, more sophisticated theory advanced by many of the campaign's most visible supporters online,
but also by the campaign itself. Since the social and political landscape in the US-in contrast with, say, France (the Gilets Jaunes) or
Hong Kong (the anti-extradition movement)-has produced no sizable mass movements in recent years, it would take the election of Sanders to
the presidency to launch them. In a notable interview at a high point in the campaign, Sanders himself claimed that as president he would
not simply be commander-in-chief, head of the state apparatus, but more importantly, "organizer-in-chief," able to call into being
broad-based social movements that would take to the streets to pressure recalcitrant legislators from both parties to line up behind his
sweeping policy reforms.[5]

This interpretation of the campaign does not claim that the electoral machine Sanders has put in place is itself a mass movement; it argues
instead that a successful political campaign alone will provide the impetus and energy required for the rebirth of a new wave of mass
struggles, picking up from where the Occupy movement, or Black Lives Matter, left off, though now reoriented toward the implementation of
Sanders's agenda.

In a January article published in In These Times, Daniel Denvir imagines a Sanders presidency whose governing effectiveness would rely on a
positive "feedback" loop between mass movements and what he calls, following Frances Fox Piven, a Sanders-aligned "electoral bloc." The
vision here is of a friction-less dynamic in which the forms of power wielded by movements and the state mutually reinforce and replenish
one another, as they take on a host of enemies across American society (fossil fuel companies, say) and within the state itself (the
non-Sanders-aligned electoral bloc: i.e. almost everyone outside a few junior congresswomen).[6]

A similar scenario is put forth by Meagan Day, whom I cited above as equating the Sanders fine-tuned political apparatus with a broad-based
mass movement. In a piece written a year ago, before the primary season got underway, Day, like Denvir, notes that Sanders both "values
extra-parliamentary politics on principle" and "insist[s]that extra-parliamentary movements are the key to political success." But where
Denvir's friction-less feedback loop assumes the existence of both a Sanders presidency and autonomous mass movements, Day assumes the risk
of predicting that these mass movements will not emerge on their own, with their own motivations and objectives, but will have to be
convoked by the organizer-in-chief who, with his enormous personal charisma, can call them into existence. The inherent tensions lurking in
this claim are highlighted by Day's own formulation, as when she envisions a head of the US state who "call[s]for mass political activity
from below."[7]

Bernie, Movements and Momentum
The title of Day's piece, "Bernie Sanders Wants You to Fight," encapsulates a line of thinking running through these pieces, which are
ubiquitous on the pro-Sanders socialist left, not to mention endorsed by Sanders himself. Rather than having confidence in the "masses" to
take up their own fight, on their own terms, this vision imagines them waiting to be called into action; rather than imagining these
movements putting forth their own objectives and demands, some of which might come into conflict with Sanders's program, these arguments
anticipate these movements' own, autonomous demands obediently subordinated to the initiatives of the US state, or at the very least the
head of its executive branch. Any inkling that these movements might have a politics of their own, one at times at odds with the
social-democratic platform put forth by Sanders, and that would disturb the positive feedback loops between state and movement this current
within the socialist left takes for granted, is left unstated.

This pattern of thought, which assimilates divergent categories of political experience, or folds them into a seamless continuity by
subjecting mass movements to the state or its benevolent leader, finds its blueprint or parallel in similar approaches to the Corbyn
campaign in the UK. In an article published as far back as March 2016, some months after Corbyn was unexpectedly elected Labour leader,
Hilary Wainwright, editor of Red Pepper magazine and well-known socialist feminist, published a programmatic essay, "The Making of Jeremy
Corbyn," which predicated his success on what she rightly called a "revers[al]of the traditional logic of electoral politics." Corbyn's
politics are a "new politics" insofar as they depend not on the translation, in political and statist terms, of movement demands, but
instead on "using the platform of the state to empower popular forces."[8]

Wainwright's claim regarding the newness of Corbyn's politics echoed the founding manifesto of Momentum, a self-styled "grass-roots"
organization established in the aftermath of Corbyn's ascension to Labour leader, whose full title was "Momentum: A New Kind of Politics."
The group's name explicitly likens its activity to a movement rather than a political organization; its clear organizational separation from
the Labour Party underlines its desire to "build grassroots power now" and develop new forms of "participatory democracy," of the kind
practiced by mass movements (and not, precisely, by political parties).[9]

The manifesto even summons the image of 19th-century anarchism, promising to conduct itself according to the "the principle of mutual aid,
empathy and collective action." But the ultimate purpose of this cultivated grassroots power is, according to the manifesto's authors, to
"help Labour become the transformative governing party of the 21st century." On the one hand, its authors "want, in particular, to encourage
a diverse range of people to join the Labour Party"; on the other hand, they want to cultivate "a new politics of bottom-up, participatory
democracy." They are straightforward about the source of this new politics: "Corbyn put forward a new politics of bottom-up, participatory
democracy." "Corbyn," they conclude, "personally and politically, represented something different." It is not simply that he put forward a
new politics, around which a proper movement might be formed. He alone, it is implied, could bring about this new politics, whose horizon
remains, however, a new Labour party, primed for state power.[10]

In a certain sense, the confusions and reversals I am tracking here have still deeper roots, extending as far back as the 1984 Jesse Jackson
campaign for the Democratic nomination (he would lose, of course, to Democratic party insider and standard-bearer, Walter Mondale.) The
Jackson campaign enlisted any number of veterans of the mass movements of the 1960s and 1970s who, as those movements broke apart and
decomposed, found different avenues for their politics (others found academia, non-profits, the Green movement, and so on). Those who came
out of the women's and black power movements, for example, increasingly gravitated around electoral campaigns and, as one observer noted at
the time, "justified this tactic either by claiming to use these campaigns to organize mass struggles, or simply by construing the campaigns
themselves as mass movements."[11]

To be sure, earlier 20th-century mass movements, first in the 1930s, then in the 1960s, brought about significant political reforms in their
aftermath. But these reforms, as Robert Brenner has argued, were forced upon Democratic Party politicians by means of "mass direct action"
by the working class, in an uncertain process of translation required by the structural incompatibility between the types of activities
undertaken by movements and the range of action available to elected officials working within the framework of state power.

If the Sanders campaign echoes the 1984 Jackson campaign, at least in the way some socialists understand their own participation in it, the
differences are just as stark. After all, the Sanders campaign follows upon a decade in which a rebirth of mass movements indeed took place,
but only on a modest scale, relative to what occurred in the US in the 1960s and 1970s, or even in Greece and Spain during and after the
2011 squares movement.

Indeed, one of the defining features of the Sanders campaign, beginning as far back as late 2015, is that its prominence coincides with the
receding of the movements that occurred in the first half of the decade, in rapid if uncertain succession: emblematically, the Occupy
movement, then Black Lives Matter. It could be that the rise of Sanderism just after the withering away of those earlier movements is what
makes the connection, in the minds of many, between the movements and his campaign so vivid, so strong. But if it is argued as much by
Sanders himself as his advocates that the success of a Sanders presidency would have depended on his being able to "call for mass political
activity from below," it can also be wagered that the fortunes of his campaigns in 2016 and 2020 depended on the absence of vibrant mass
movements from the American scene; even worse, that the enormous resources mobilized for the campaign siphoned off precious resources-money,
time, energy, morale-that could have been used more effectively elsewhere, like mass organizing in communities, in workplaces and in the
streets.

Conflicting Forms of Power
There is an irreducible gap or hiatus between the different and often conflicting forms of power exercised by mass movements-mass direct
action-and power set in motion by the state. So, too, a world of difference between throwing oneself into a popular mobilization and
attempting to win a state-sanctioned election.

The latter's constraints are clear enough: win over 51 percent of voters, by any means necessary, and get them to the polls. The logic of
mass movements is shaped by the fact that, though they bring thousands and even millions of people into struggle, they are almost always
minoritarian in nature, at least for most of their often short lives. Their fundamental principle and ethos is the refusal of delegation or
representation-no one will call them into being-and, consequently, the activation of the power people have when they act collectively to
take their lives into their own hands.

There is a very good reason that no mass movement has emerged that advocates for this or that feature of Sanders' social-democratic
political program, like Medicare for All or a "Green New Deal." The demands put forth by mass movements are most often negative, even
destructive, in nature. They do not propose legislation, or enter into the details of policy. They call, instead, for the immediate end of
this or that feature of the prevailing order: the end of Jim Crow and segregation, the abolition of prisons and the police, US forces out of
Vietnam, the withdrawal of an extradition bill. Because mass movements are not organized-they swarm with competing organizations, as well as
informal groupings and tendencies-their unity can only be won by the establishment of a clear and unequivocal objective, often formalized in
a simple slogan: "the people want the regime to fall," "I can't breathe," "if we burn, you burn with us." Their strategic and theoretical
poverty is compensated for by extraordinary innovations in tactics, which easily spread across geographic distance and national or cultural
divisions. Above all, mass movements find themselves confronted with the necessity to test their strength against the forces of the state;
they operate, by their very nature, on the edges of legality, and will be challenged with state violence at some point in their development.

All of these features distinguish the logic of mass movements from the mechanics of electoral politics. Thinking the relation between them
requires keeping them separate, and posing the question of their translation. This translation is always uncertain. Far from meshing
together in a seamless continuity, or mutually reinforcing one another in friction-less feedback, socialists in the US (and the UK) will
have to start again, this time from the structural and radical incompatibility or contradiction between these two forms of power.

With the defeat of Sanders (and Corbyn), and with the necessary historical and strategic considerations that such defeats compel, they will
most likely have to renounce the assumptions that permitted their participation in these failed electoral campaigns to begin with. These
campaigns did not bring into being a "new politics," one that reversed the order of historical effectivity, subordinating movements
initiated by broad masses of people to the call and command of elected politicians. Reforms brought about in the political sphere will be
imposed on the state by years and even decades of confrontations with movements that are willing to fight for themselves: at their own
initiative, for objectives they themselves formulate. The current course of events, disturbing as it is, will provide ample opportunity for
such efforts.

Jason E. Smith lives in Los Angeles and writes primarily about contemporary politics, art, and philosophy. This piece was originally
published by Brooklyn Rail under the title "Life Comes At Your Fast" and has been lightly edited for formatting.

If you enjoyed this piece we recommend our more in depth reader on left electoralism which includes fourteen articles with contemporary and
international analysis, "Socialist Faces in High Places: Elections & the Left."

Notes
1. Media stories on the Sanders campaign emphasized, for example, its use of so-called "distributed organizing." See, for example, Ryan
Grim, "How Bernie Sanders Accidentally Built a Groundbreaking Organizing Movement," The Intercept, May 28, 2019.

2. In the early years of Social Democracy, of course, elections were treated solely as platforms to promote socialist ideas. Social
Democratic parties understood themselves as "propaganda parties," "whose main objective[was]the dissemination of information about Social
Democracy...since participation in elections is a good vehicle for agitation, the Congress recommends participation." Cf. Adam Przeworski,
Capitalism and Social Democracy (Cambridge University Press, 1985), p. 9. This book's first chapter is a devastating historical account of
social democracy in power.

3. Daniel Denvir, "What a Bernie Sanders Presidency would look like," In These Times, January 7, 2020.

4. "The Future of Left Politics: An Interview with Meagan Day," Harvard Political Review, March 2, 2020.

5. See the interview Sanders gave, alongside Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, to The Intercept, published October 20, 2019:

6. "What a Bernie Sanders Presidency would look like." The article is tantalizing subtitled "the possibilities of an ‘organizer-in-chief.'"

7. Meagan Day, "Bernie Sanders Wants You to Fight," Jacobin, March 12, 2019. My emphasis.

8. Hilary Wainwright, "The Making of Jeremy Corbyn," Jacobin, March 9, 2016.

9. Wainwright herself, in conversation with The Economist, asserted (in the magazine's paraphrase) that "Momentum is more like an organism
than a machine: it grows from the bottom up and constantly evolves in new directions." "An evening with Momentum at the Labour Party
conference." September 26, 2017;

10. "Momentum, a new kind of politics." To be clear, I am not arguing that this is in fact what Momentum was, or how it conducted itself per
se. I am simply noting the claims made for it by the manifesto's authors, Adam Klug, Emma Rees, and James Schneider.

11. Robert Brenner, "The Paradox of Social Democracy: The American Case," first published in 1985.

https://blackrosefed.org/life-comes-at-you-fast-end-of-sanders-campaign/

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