WORLD WORLDWIDE FRANCE News Journal Update - (en) France, OCL CA #335 - OCL? UCL? We do not understand anything anymore! (ca, de, fr, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

A flag that flutters in the wind, the U of UCL (libertarian communist)
in a fold that transforms into an O; a little further from the sellers
of Alternative Current, also a libertarian communist. The confusion is
at its height. Is CA published by UCL? Or vice versa. For some time now
a lot of people have been asking us if it's the same thing and if not
what is the difference... (1) ---- Organization or Union? The question
arises because if the OCL is not quite an organization in the classic
sense of the term and could be called a union, the UCL really wants to
be an organization... but only calls itself a union. So shall we
exchange? No, we'll let it go, let's stick with the libertarian communist.

Historically it comes from the split within the first international
(1864) on the question of how, from the criticism of the capitalist mode
of production, we move towards communism and what the latter will be.
Marxists believe that a period of transition is necessary with a state
led by a revolutionary party responsible for developing the productive
forces to make communism possible. The anarchists, for their part, think
that in this way the forms of domination driven out through the door
would re-enter through the window instead of disappearing and that the
State must be destroyed at the same time as the revolutionary process is
triggered and put into place. forms of direct management of the company.
 From this affirmation a libertarian communist or anarchist communist
current is formed, depending on tastes and countries, as a branch of
anarchism which recognizes the class struggle and rejects individualism
in favor of collective and class action. . A trend which asserted itself
during the Russian and Spanish revolutions in 1917 and 1936.

In France this current exists, but in miniature. He nevertheless
navigated a difficult path between opposition to the war, union splits,
support for the Spanish revolution, and the Resistance. In 1945 a
federation aimed to "synthesize" and bring together the whole family.
But it cannot stick for long between a current which considers anarchism
as a set of positions for a social revolution and individuals for whom
it is more of a moralist philosophy. The FCL is formed, the FA is reformed.

The Libertarian Communist Federation (FCL), whose lineage the UCL still
claims, lasted four years at the end of which it disappeared, undermined
both by the repression due to its commitment against the Algerian war
and by the contradictions of an internal structure of the Leninist type
(it is led by a secret group (organization thought and battle - OPB -
led by a man, Georges Fontenis).

The FCL - and now the UCL - relied on the so-called Archinov platform,
developed between the two world wars by Russian anarchists who
considered that the Bolsheviks had won (therefore the revolution had
failed) because the anarchists did not were not organized enough. The
platform therefore recommends a better structured organization on the
basis of strategic and action units (a majority orientation must be
applied by all members of the organization).
Dissidents of the FCL in 1956 (the magazine Noir et Rouge and the
Anarchist Revolutionary Action Groups - GAAR) consider, like the OCL
now, that it is a copy of the Leninist model dressed up in a more
libertarian discourse.

In 1968 a fraction of the FA (which still does not recognize the class
struggle) formed the ORA (Revolutionary Anarchist Organization) on class
bases. In the dynamics of May 68 the organization, which published
Libertarian Front of Class Struggles, was particularly active in the
publication of company, neighborhood or city bulletins.
Very quickly two sensibilities animated the brand new organization. A
majority approaches the conceptions of workers' autonomy (growing
rapidly in Italy) or council communism while paying particular attention
to the new movements which developed after 68 (women, sexuality,
ecology, regionalism, and worker revolts partly escaping the unions - as
in the steel industry). The latter are considered as intermediaries
between Capital and Labor. The minority focuses more on a classic trade
unionist. She made the construction - with other leftist sensibilities -
of a tendency to seize a CFDT considered then as "self-managing", her
main objective. The split occurred in 1976. The majority became the
current OCL, the UTCL which later became the Libertarian Alternative
(AL) then the UCL, and pursued a path which placed it as an organic
component of leftism.

If the historical debate on the platform is somewhat obsolete, its
consequences lead to a real current divergence on the role of the
organization.
The OCL fights the very principle of avant-gardism and is rather on the
edge of councilism and anarchism. It favors the basic structures of the
social movement, those that the proletarians give themselves. She does
not think that organizational cartels compensate for the weakness of the
social movement itself. The OCL considers that the revolution is not a
question of political organizations but of the autonomy of the basic
structures (action committees, councils, soviets) that the proletariat
gives itself at certain moments of the struggle of the classes. A
revolutionary organization is there to defend this autonomy, make
proposals and discuss them, take initiatives of course, but never seize
places of power, rather destroy them.

The UCL is situated in a more avant-garde logic which practices the
policy of the systematic appearance of its organization by signing
texts, appeals and manifestos, including at the national level with
other left-wing organizations. It is the politics of organizational
cartels which makes it, according to the OCL, a sort of libertarian wing
of leftism.
You only need to read the press from both groups to realize this.
Libertarian Alternative is mainly made up of short texts (like leaflets)
whose propagandistic objective is to highlight the organization by
giving "the right line". Alternative Current is made up of longer, more
analytical analytical texts, which, while obviously giving a political
position, underline its contradictions and intend to provide elements of
reflection to open debates.

Against fascism, the UCL advocates a policy of fronts with a series of
forces, some of which defend policies which are precisely the cause of
the space which is freed up for the forces of the extreme right and
racism. According to the OCL, these are alliances which, by obscuring
social reality, do not fight in any way against the rise of the extreme
right and are always to the detriment of revolutionary affirmation.

UCL activists are trade unionists, OCL activists are possibly unionized.
This means that the former tend to get involved at all levels of union
life, up to the top when they can, to the point of having permanent
staff and representative discharges. OCL activists, when they are
unionized, are mainly active at the level of their basic section, or
even a UL.
The OCL favors the existence and construction of grassroots collectives
made up of individuals in struggle and not representatives of
organizations. UCL tends to only see the expression of the social
movement through all the organizations (even mini...) that make it up
and most often try to take control of it.

Newspaper commission

Note

(1) The best thing is to read the prose of the two CLs and get an idea
directly.

The OCL, forty years of revolutionary anarchism (2008)
https://oclibertaire.lautre.net/spi...
And presentation of the OCL, http://oclibertaire.free.fr/upl/4pa...
And of course on https://unioncommunistelibertaire.org/ for UCL

http://oclibertaire.lautre.net/spip.php?article4020
_________________________________________
A - I N F O S  N E W S  S E R V I C E
By, For, and About Anarchists
Send news reports to A-infos-en mailing list
A-infos-en@ainfos.ca