Today's Topics:
1. SOLIDARIDAD OBRERAL: NOTICE 73/2020
METROMADRID - OUT OF
DIRECTORS AND USELESS POLITICIANS (ca)
DIRECTORS AND USELESS POLITICIANS (ca)
[machine translation] (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
2. Organização Anarquista Socialismo Libertário - OASL: SP:
30 thousand deaths in the richest state of Brazil (pt) [machine translation] (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
30 thousand deaths in the richest state of Brazil (pt) [machine translation] (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
3. US, black rose fed: Going on the Offensive: Movements,
Multisectorality, and Political Strategy By Lusbert Garcia
(a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
Multisectorality, and Political Strategy By Lusbert Garcia
(a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
4. US, black rose fed: CHOP Analysis: Glimmers of Hope,
Failures of the Left - Tags: Analysis, Black Lives Matter,
Seattle (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
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Message: 1
In these days we have begun to see movements in the management organization chart, on August 24 the new Director of Railway Operations was
appointed , we do not know if to "send" the current Manager or to suppress him, if he is suppressed we suspect that he can go to "Mixed bag
of broken toys" that continue to collect from the public without clear functions. ---- We celebrate this dynamic of change and ask that it
continue without stopping until all unnecessary managers are dismissed, starting with the newly appointed Director of Brand and Media and
former employee of the newspaper ABC who, proclaimed himself Public Enemy number 1 of Metro de Madrid workers with his article of January 4,
2013 entitled "The bargain of working in the Metro", where he branded the labor rights fought for and conquered for decades by the Metro
workers' movement as privileges . The privileged one is him, who becomes a manager by digital appointment, and not the workers that we
access through the SEPE in calls for competition from thousands of people.
Someone like this cannot hold any position in the Metro Directorate. Not only should he be dismissed immediately, but he should ask for
forgiveness and retract his offensive words, in which, distorting reality, he intended to disqualify us from public opinion in a period of
struggle. This person is hardly going to guide and represent the image of Metro and its staff. On the contrary, he will continue to comply
with the dictates of the politicians to whom he owes his position: the last former CEOs, then all of the PP and today some of Vox, who
promulgated the same message in radio interviews, and press conferences accusing us of privileged, lazy and spoilers.
The article by the current Director of Brand and Media was published with the aim of dynamiting the strike called in the General Assembly
for January 5, 2013, the day of the Three Kings Parade, despite being a day with little influx of travelers, the current Chief of the
Operational Area defended the appointment of minimum services of 26 trains on line 2. Currently the tables for September 2020 are published
by the same person: 18 trains at rush hour, a table that will not be able to be fulfilled due to the SCANDAL LACK OF TEMPLATE. It has been
proven, following the designs of those who harass the rights, conditions and jobs allows you to perpetuate yourself in the position at
Metro, even if you do not have any other quality.
As for the changes in the company, we hope that they will lead us to a new "world" with greater understanding at least, something impossible
in recent years, because if we continue the same, we will be forced to join the mobilizations of education and other sectors, if The working
class is not stopped being exposed while the yuppies enjoy their long vacations. One only has to see which are the neighborhoods most
affected by the outbreaks of the pandemic, the working-class neighborhoods in the south of Madrid that suffer from crowds in the Metro every
day to go to work, traveling in crowded transport and without protection measures necessary due to mismanagement, with a lack of staff and
trains, where you circulate with the windows closed, without ventilating the trains, without disinfection during the day, on platforms and
trains that are not gauged.
Of course, for Solidaridad Obrera this situation is only resolved with
CESAR TO MANAGERS THAT FOR YEARS HAVE SHOWN HER BIG DISABILITIES (MARK AND MEDIA included)
HIRE THE NECESSARY NUMBER OF WORKERS SO THAT THE BASIC CATEGORIES MAKE THE METRO WORK CORRECTLY: MACHINISTS (400) HEADS AND HEADS OF SECTOR
(450) MAINTENANCE OFFICERS (650)
Jobs, trains and investment for a QUALITY PUBLIC transport and not as something welfare. The pandemic is here to stay and we cannot allow
Metro to continue to be a place of community contagion due to the negligence of directives and three-to-quarter politicians who now govern
the Community of Madrid.
Madrid, August 28, 2020
By Solidaridad Obrera
THE UNION BOARD
2020 UNION NOTICES IN METRO DE MADRID
https://www.solidaridadobrera.org/confederal/2020/08/31/aviso-73-2020-metromadrid-fuera-directivillos-y-politicos-inutiles/
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Message: 2
It has been 6 months since the first known Covid-19 case in the country, of a man from Italy. The pandemic arrived in Brazil thus, through
tourists who returned from Europe, wealthy people with access to basic sanitation, housing and quality health. ---- If the upper ones
suffered a little at the beginning of the disease, soon the lower ones were the main victims. Hundreds of workers die in essential services
- such as cleaning - and precarious in general. Without adequate conditions to protect themselves, residents of the peripheries paid with
their lives for the neglect of the powerful. The disease also opens up structural racism, since most of the contaminated and dead are black,
living in more precarious neighborhoods or in jobs more exposed to the virus. Quilombos and indigenous villages have also been greatly
impacted by the disease. Even with the pandemic, São Paulo did not fail to carry out repossessions, displacing families that were already in
a precarious situation.
As of Monday, August 31, there are 30,014 deaths in the state of São Paulo alone. The number exceeds the deaths recorded across the African
continent and in countries like Germany, Russia, Iran and Spain, in addition to bringing the number of victims in France and Italy closer. A
real tragedy, especially for the poorest. It is worth mentioning that the official data are underreported: the number of deaths due to
Covid-19 is higher than that which has been published in the last six months - considering that the first known case, in São Paulo, was
registered in February.
Today, the discussion of the state government and mayors is the return to face-to-face classes, absurd given the well-known condition of
many public schools in SP. Before the pandemic, many did not even have soap for students. Teachers have been denouncing the precarious
structure of schools for years. In addition, going back to school would put education workers and students' families at risk.
Research carried out by the city of São Paulo, for example, indicated that at least 70% of children and adolescents who have already had
contact with the virus had no symptoms. In practice, therefore, they can behave as "vectors of transmission" of the disease, affecting older
people around them. We cannot exclude, yet, the fact that some children and adolescents were also fatal victims of Covid-19. Knowing the
serious risks, the state government and city governments have tried to exempt themselves from responsibilities: it will be up to parents and
guardians to sign a term authorizing the return of children and adolescents to schools - bearing any problems that arise, such as
contamination and death by disease.
Meanwhile, "manager" João Doria, in an eternal campaign, announces as a solution a vaccine that is still being tested, as if the pandemic
did not continue to kill hundreds of people every week. Despite speaking differently from Bolsonaro, he had the same death policy, favoring
big businessmen at the cost of 30,000 lives.
Throughout this period, we at OASL continue to strengthen the initiatives of denunciation and solidarity in the communities, and adding to
the resistance against measures that put workers and students at risk. We believe that only the combative organization of those below can
minimize the serious impacts of the pandemic, and also advance the whole of the popular movement towards a process of rupture with this
whole murderous and unjust system!
Anarchist Organization Libertarian Socialism
https://anarquismosp.wordpress.com/2020/08/31/sp-30-mil-mortes-no-estado-mais-rico-do-brasil/
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Message: 3
In an era of pandemic and mass protest we are witnessing an uptick in political militancy, from attacks on police stations and the seizure
of space to wildcat strikes and rent strikes. These are promising developments, but the balance of class forces remains lopsided, evidenced
by the massive corporate bailout package, countless workers being exposed to unsafe working conditions, and mounting unemployment. While
COVID-19 has limited our ability to respond to the crisis, we need to discover creative ways to intervene in the current moment to meet the
urgent needs that have arisen and think through how to prepare ourselves for the post-pandemic period-whenever that may be-to tip the
balance of forces in our favor. We will have to defend ourselves against austerity and other attacks, but we can't limit our activity to a
defensive posture. In this piece, Spanish anarchist Lusbert Garcia offers a framework for orienting our organizing efforts toward strategic
sectors in society and makes the case for linking these sites of struggle over time into a broad-based, multisectoral movement that can put
us on the offensive.
Translation by Enrique Guerrero-López and Leticia RZ
By Lusbert Garcia
By making a brief analysis of current social movements, we can see that they do not work together, that is, in a synchronous way between
movements that operate in different areas of struggle. First off, this article is a complement to the translation of the article "A debate
on the politics of alliances[Un debate sobre la política de alianzas]" where I talk in broad strokes about the numerous areas or sectors of
struggle and think through how to build a multisectoral movement, that is, a broad movement made up of a network of social movements that
work in coordination in different sectors and at the same time are articulated based on the common denominator of autonomy, feminism and
anti-capitalism.
We know that the root of all problems lies in the capitalist system and the modern states that support it, and that this economic, political
and social system supports a production model based on private ownership of the means of production and private benefit as a fundamental
principle. All this constitutes what we know as the structural, and its manifestations in all areas of our lives, which is known as the
conjunctural, of which we could mainly highlight: territory, labor, public services, accommodation and repression. When we analyze the
political-social space, we must recognize the conjunctural problems that manifest as a consequence of the material structure:
The territorial issue would include within it the spheres in which the interests of the class which rules over the territory enter into
conflict with those of the working class. It is the physical space in which all struggles will take place, so we can highlight the following
areas: neighborhood or district if we talk about cities, rural and land struggles if we talk about undeveloped or non-industrialized areas,
and we could even include the national liberation struggles for the self-determination of peoples against imperialism. Environmentalism and
food sovereignty would also fall into this category.
Labor here would constitute one of the main axes of class conflict. It is the battlefield where capital and labor meet most directly. In
this area we can mention the workers' movement that is articulated around unionism. Although we have to differentiate between unionism that
advocates social peace-that model that always leads to class conciliation, betraying the working class-and the revolutionary or class
unionism that advocates the exacerbation of class conflict in the workplace.
The fight for housing is a movement that goes back a little over a century during the rural exodus caused by industrial development and the
creation of working-class neighborhoods. Today, with capitalist restructuring underway again in advanced capitalist countries and those in
development, access to housing is again a social problem that affects the working class as it finds itself with less economic capacity to
face mortgages and rents, as well as access to decent housing. Faced with this problem, movements against evictions have sprung up in many
countries, as did the squatter movement a little earlier.
As for state public services, in the face of this phase of capitalist restructuring, markets are increasingly interfering with these
services through budget cuts, outsourcing and privatizations. Here we can mention: Education, Health, water and sanitation, public
transport, and pensions, among others; and the respective social movements that arise in response to cuts and privatizations, such as the
student movement, White Tide[1]and other movements against the privatization of water, the fight against increases in rates on public
transport, etc.
Last but not least, all opposition movements receive state repression; therefore, it is important that we begin to see repression as an
obstacle and a social problem that seeks to curb our social and political activities while serving the ruling class to perpetuate its
dominance. In this regard, we must speak about the anti-repression issue and face repression collectively and outside of our own militant
circles, as yet another social movement.
Within each sector there are also subsectors. For example, within the student movement, those who organize in the University will not be the
same as those from professional training and those from secondary education. In the labor world, the labor movement would be divided between
the various productive branches such as construction, transportation, services, etc. In other words, the substantive demands of the student
movement would be the same regardless of the subsector, even if they differ on particular and specific issues. This is also seen within the
labor movement, where the substantive demands can be the increase in the minimum wage, reduction of working hours, etc., and the particular
demands would be improvements in the collective bargaining agreement, for example.
However, we must not take all these sectors in struggle as isolated elements, but as a set of conjunctural battle fronts that have their
origin in the capitalist system, and therefore, connected to each other. And here comes the main question: how to connect these sectors in
struggle under a common political-social denominator based on anti-capitalism, feminism, anti-racism and internationalism. Looking for the
connection between various sectors is not very difficult. Let's see some examples:
Neighborhoods and the fight for housing as well as the squatter movement.
Food sovereignty, environmentalism and the struggle of the peasantry for their lands.
The student movement and the labor movement. This is already a classic.
The movement against rising public transport rates with women workers in the sector.
Anti-repression fronts with neighborhoods.
In the previous examples, we can see that they have points in common with each other, which can lead them to converge and overcome
sectoriality, that is, working in isolation in a specific area without coordination with the rest. We can even go a little further and
connect neighborhood movements, squatting, anti-eviction with the municipality, with the workers and student movements, constituting a
network of movements that could unite with the peasant and indigenous movement (this would occur in Latin American countries mainly; Europe
or the US would be very difficult). And since all these social movements will suffer repression along with the political-social collectives
and organizations, it is important that the anti-repression struggle be articulated from the neighborhoods, neighborhood associations, etc.
A century ago, in full industrial development, the labor movement occupied the central pillar of class and social conflict. Today we can no
longer use this premise as no front is gaining greater importance than the rest, which leads us to discard the hierarchy of struggles to put
on the table the idea-force of networked movements. When we arrive at this point, it is when we must consider multisectorality, that is,
articulate common discourses that allow the alliance of the various sectors in struggle, respecting their autonomy but maintaining common
bases on which to build broad movements, escalate conflicts and go from resistance, that is, defensive positions, to offense.
The limitations that sectoriality has leads us to think about transcending the struggles of specific scopes to wider movements to articulate
an offense. I developed the issue of multisectorality precisely due to the limitations that each sector in struggle had, and therefore, in
isolation they could not go beyond the defense of social problems that specifically affect that sector. Before talking about the offensive,
we will address the principal limitations of each sector.
The labor sector. In my previous article I pointed out that currently the labor movement is no longer the central axis of struggle, but one
more among the many that exist despite being the one where the capital-labor conflict is most directly confronted. The main limitation in
the labor movement is the economic sphere. Trade unionism itself cannot become a revolutionary movement, since it is limited to the field of
the productive model within the capitalist system. However, unionism can serve to organize the working class and aspire to seize the means
of production and self-manage them. However, if self-managed projects do not emerge from the market economy, it will not be a transformation
at the root.
Student movement. In the educational environment in which they operate, students will find a great limitation in terms of claiming an
alternative model to the current one increasingly oriented towards markets. Thus, the educational models inspired by free teaching within a
capitalist society are very limited precisely by the regulations of the States and the funding they require. Such an educational model is
unthinkable in class society.
Public services. In this area, so controversial among anarchists, the limitation lies precisely in the financing. Like many things in this
capitalist society, if we do not want Health, Education, supplies and such to be privatized, such financing could only come from the general
budgets of the State, without allowing the interference of private companies. Although under their management they may come to carry more
weight in the community, rather than under the State's administration.
The fight against repression. This is the area where the most economic, physical and psychological wear and tear is involved due to the few
results that are achieved despite the great efforts invested. This is a confrontation against a greater force, which is the armed wing of
the State. Its main limitation is the need for very extensive support networks to overcome the isolation and overload of militancy, as well
as the high risks they run.
Rural and peasant movements. Talking about such movements in advanced capitalist countries would not make much sense beyond small organic
farming cooperatives, whose limitation resides in the little weight that the field has in addition to a total absence of peasant movements.
But this is not the case with Latin American countries in which there are strong peasant and indigenous movements. Although the peasantry
fits within the working class, its scope of action is not the same as that of the urban proletariat, in addition to the fact that the
immediate conflicts in the fields are not the same as in the cities. Furthermore, even if the peasant and indigenous movements get land and
constitute autonomous territories, they are on the periphery of the capitalist nuclei that are the cities.
The struggles for housing and neighborhoods. Although one of the strengths of these struggles is the construction of the local social
fabric, its main limitation is the territorial one, since they exist at the local level. However, it has great potential if they connect
with other sectors in struggle.
The limitations that we see in each sector in struggle means that they only adopt a defensive posture, trying only to resist the onslaught
of neoliberalism. If we look at the enemy, we can see how since the 1970s neoliberalism, since it emerged as a way out of the crisis then,
is continuously going on the offensive: attacking the Soviet bloc first and seeking alliances with European states, continuously attacking
labor and social rights, supporting and promoting coups in Latin America and Central America, etc., until today with the implementation of
the euro and the EU, pushing back on labor rights in each labor reform, reaching into state public services such as Education, Health,
pensions, water, etc., and now with the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) that will allow less regulation in
environmental protection, more setbacks in labor rights, more power for multinational corporations and investment funds with private
supranational courts that can judge governments that harm their profit rates, among other things.
That is why we ask ourselves, how can it be that neoliberalism is continuously on the offensive while the social movements are always on the
defensive? And this is a problem that comes mainly from the lack of political alliances between sectors built under a common discursive
denominator, that is, a road map with proposals and demands that allow progress, not just resistance. And this advance can only come through
the articulation of a multisectoral popular movement, because that is the only way we overcome the limitations that come with each sector in
struggle. I want to note that this is only a sketch for the purpose of serving as a contribution towards building future roadmaps and it may
possibly be missing several things. I will put some brief examples below:
So we will start with the student movement, which has many connections to the labor market, since most students will enter the job market
after their training. The line is increasingly blurred between the labor market and training, which is seen in business practices both in
vocational training and University. Furthermore, with this new labor panorama in which continuous training and the concepts of retraining
were introduced, in reality they require the "recycling" of workers to follow the demands of competences in the labor market. That is why
the student movement necessarily has to have connections with (class) unionism.
Now, in the face of job insecurity, unemployment and the diminishing purchasing power of the working class, access to decent housing is also
worsening, as is the problem of evictions, so they will necessarily have to connect with the struggles for housing and also contribute to
building a social fabric that breaks isolation, putting mutual aid and solidarity into practice in neighborhoods. Also, due to the
gentrification suffered by neighborhoods due to real estate speculation and the conversion of neighborhoods into spaces for consumer
leisure, there is a need to open political and social spaces to counteract the consumerist and hyper individualistic culture of capitalist
societies and to constitute focal points of resistance.
And since every protest movement will receive state repression, it is essential that the anti-repression issue be inserted in all sectors
and be made visible as a problem that affects everyone and from which everyone can suffer.
An offensive strategy begins by recognizing that each area of struggle and its problems are not separate and specific problems, but rather
originate from a common material structure, which is capitalism in its neoliberal phase and the modern states that support it. Said
offensive strategy does not consist in attacking the symbols of capitalism and the State nor in the vanguard positions of a militant
minority, but must arise from the political articulation of the entire popular movement, which is not only capable of winning victories in
every sector, but rather have the capacity to materialize alternatives that transcend the sector itself. For example, to be able to start
alternative educational projects, it is necessary not only to seize the centers for community management, but also to have insertion in the
neighborhoods and in the labor market promoting the values of the commons, to keep them from remaining marginal projects. From this point
on, the political articulation of the movements should focus on programs that respond to the needs of the moment and implement them in each
context, based on anti-capitalism, mutual aid and solidarity, autonomy and horizontality, as well as feminism, internationalism and anti-racism.
We are aware that we are still very far from being able to put an offensive strategy in place against the capitalist system, and this is
precisely because, as anarchists in particular, we are not building the social bases that would be the social force that allows us to
articulate ourselves as a political force. For this reason, we must consider social insertion as the first step in the ambitious task of
revolutionary social transformation. We must be able to respond to immediate problems and empower social movements as a short-term strategy
to pull off small victories and draw strength from them in order to aspire to greater objectives. The offensive involves direct
political-social combat against the capitalist system and the sharpening of the class struggle promoted by a broad and politically
articulated popular movement.
For any popular movement to go on the offensive, it is also essential that they have roadmaps and political strategy. What is political
strategy? Strategy, in general, is a set of tactics aimed at achieving a goal in a complex environment where a multitude of factors come
into play. And specifically, political strategy has to start from conjunctural analysis, a tool by which detailed information is extracted
from the environment around us in order to intervene on the political and social stage in order to achieve a series of changes, allowing us
to move toward achieving our ultimate goals. From that necessary conjunctural analysis, we can see that our final goals are currently
unattainable, at least in the medium and long term, which leads us to set intermediate and more achievable goals, that allow us to advance
positions. This is where political strategy enters.
The absence of a political strategy makes it so that movements pull by inertia, that is, they move defensively in the face of the need to
stop the attacks of the ruling class without knowing how to counterattack. In other words, they are forced by the conjuncture and not driven
by a confrontational perspective. The expression "something must be done" perfectly illustrates this problem, which manifests itself in
reality through action-reaction methodologies; that is, of responding only when there is a significant attack, of vague and very generalist
or conservative proposals for wanting to go back to an earlier phase or maintain the current state of affairs The main consequences of the
lack of political strategies are movements becoming disoriented and adrift (in the worst cases), being always influenced by the conjuncture,
encountering dead ends, volatility and routes that lead back to zero. Within the libertarian movement itself, the dynamic is similar,
although efforts are already being made to overcome it with new initiatives that have recently emerged. Lack of political strategy has
condemned us to marginality and isolation.
The need to overcome "something must be done" involves having a strategic vision; that is, overcoming the defeatist airs that mobilizations
through inertia entail and putting strategies for action and intervention in the political and social scene on the table. For this reason,
we have to ask ourselves something that Lenin once did: "what is to be done?" Adapting it to our situation, that would be: what is to be
done with each sector-wide problem (housing, public services, work, education, territory)? What is to be done in the face of the
ineffectiveness and illegitimacy of rival political forces -which are not our enemies, because the enemies are the political forces of the
dominant one that is in direct confrontation against us? What is to be done in the face of cuts in social rights in general and the
continuous neoliberal offensive? What is to be done in the face of opportunism and the rise of fascism? ... the answers to these would serve
as the basis for preparing roadmaps and programs focused on social intervention. From this strategic vision, we will see the various
political options as forces, whose real strength will reside in the legitimation given to them from the grassroots. One must also keep in
mind that political forces will tend to occupy as much space as they can, meaning, if a political force leaves a space, it will be taken up
by another. Thus, if there are no alternatives proposed outside of institutions, betting on autonomy, confluence and coordination, and the
radicalization of social movements under common discourses that aim at overcoming capitalism and other forms of domination, it will not take
long for these movements to be co-opted by political parties that adapt their discourse to bring social movements to the polls, with their
consequent demobilization and assimilation by the system. And this is what is currently happening.
For this reason, the offensive approach not only involves building a multisectoral movement, but also adopting political strategies that
allow the advancement of the entire popular movement. The offensive is inseparable from the political strategy, in fact, it is from the
political strategy that we consider these premises of offense and multisectorality. And I would even add that strategic vision must start
from the first moment in which we aspire to a radical transformation of society; that it must aim to build, strengthen and promote the
autonomy of social movements; that once this task has been carried out, it must aspire to an articulation of multisectorality and therefore,
to build a political force with real strength capable of achieving changes not only in this situation, but in transforming the structure
(capitalist relations of production, neocolonialism, heteropatriarchy, white supremacy, etc ...). In general, it is focused on increasing
our strength as oppressed social classes.
Before finishing, to better illustrate the concept of political strategy, we could look at a hypothetical scenario in which, on the one
hand, the main unions go through a general delegitimation and go into decline due to loss of membership, the disillusionment and distrust of
the working class, and the loss of its of ability to convene; and on the other, the percentage of unionized workers is relatively low (let's
say around 10%). Given this situation in which a rival force is weakening, we must take advantage of this delegitimation to fill the gaps
they have left. In this case, the best thing to do would be for class struggle unions to position themselves as functional tools for the
defense of the interests of the working class, to encourage the participation of the membership and sympathizers, to know how to respond
swiftly to job insecurity, temporality and subcontracting in all productive sectors, from small businesses to large companies and, above
all, to extract victories, even small ones; achieve them, maintain them and aspire to bigger ones.
We could also escalate this hypothetical scenario and arrive at the confluence of the labor movement and combative unionism with student
struggles and struggles for decent housing as well as with the squatter movement. And another hypothetical scenario, within the libertarian
sphere, would be to put aside as far as possible the ideological confrontation with other political tendencies within the left and opt for
escaping marginality and outnumber them in real force before other tendencies do, which leads us to work in the social field through
insertion in social movements, to respond to immediate social problems and promote struggles, to achieve the necessary social base to really
advance popular movements and give them as libertarian a character as possible, capable of standing up to the capitalist system by creating
confrontational alternatives.
In summary, political strategy aims to push by creating political alternatives that aspire to overcome the existing order. Political
strategy also implies some cunning and a lot of ambition, inserting ourselves into the material reality, taking advantage of the
opportunities that are presented to us and intervening or attacking, not symbolically but in a systematic and planned way; having
consistency in our political and social activities, and not leaving everything to improvisation; accumulating experiences so as to not have
to start from scratch; and not attacking through brute force, but with the force emanating from popular self-organization and its political
articulation. In this sense, political strategy is what gives content to the offensive.
Lusbert Garcia is an anarchist communist writer based in Spain. This article is based on the merger of three articles previously with
Regeneración.
If you enjoyed this piece we recommend another piece by Lusbert Garcia, "Strategy and Tactics for a Revolutionary Anarchism," or Mark Bray's
"Horizontalism: Anarchism, Power and the State."
Notes
1. White Tide was an anti-privatization movement that began in Madrid in 2013 and spread throughout Spain.
https://blackrosefed.org/going-on-the-offensive-movements-multisectorality-political-strategy/
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Message: 4
Out of the national uprising in protest of the racist police murder of George Floyd in Milwaukee emerged a movement occupied space of 8-10
blocks in the Seattle neighborhood of Capitol Hill. The space began "as an accident" when on the evening of June 7 a man drove drove into
the protests and shot a demonstrator. Quickly the crowds set up barricades at several intersections and an occupy style encampment emerged
as the the mayor ordered the evacuation of the East Precinct police statement encompassed within the zone. Originally deemed the Capitol
Hill Autonomous Zone (CHAZ) the space was soon renamed Capitol Hill Occupied Protest (CHOP) and remained in place until July 1 when Seattle
Mayor Jenny Durkan ordered police to clear out the space after a series of late night shootings. Written in late July 2020, this critical
analysis piece was based on discussions and experiences of our Seattle Black Rose/Rosa Negra comrades.
By Black Rose/Rosa Negra - Seattle
The Black Lives Matter movement that erupted in May of 2020 has transformed the American political landscape like no other social movement
in decades. Since the murder of George Floyd by the Minneapolis police department, in what may be the largest demonstrations in American
history, the country has exploded in riots, demonstrations, mobilizations, petitions, corporate campaigns, occupations, social media
activism, and other movement activities. More than 4,700 physical actions have taken place in the last month that included more people -
between 15 to 23 million according to data analytic firms - than any other social movement in US history. Further, the passive support for
movement is overwhelming, with large majorities expressing favorable views of the movement, including even majority support for the burning
of the Minneapolis police precinct, something that has maintained a broader degree of support than either presidential candidate. Again, all
without precedent in American history.
Although the scale, scope, and popular support of the movement is unprecedented, the pattern the movement is taking is a familiar one in
American history. The Black liberation movement has been at the forefront of a broad variety of movements for liberation in the US. For
example, in the 19th century the abolitionist movement gave rise to the movement for women's suffrage, or in the 1960s the civil rights
movement planted the seeds for second wave feminism, anti-war, and LGBTQ movements. The current BLM movement marks a continuation of this
trend, with the potential to further radicalize and empower other oppressed peoples in the United States. We believe this is especially true
as the country faces as series of related but distinct crises from its collapsing empire - on immigration, gender and patriarchy, medical
care and health, jobs and unemployment, the pandemic, policing, poverty, drug addiction, homelessness, housing, climate, higher education,
public schooling, mass shootings, institutional corruption, loss of legitimacy, militarism and foreign wars - the list goes on.
Along with CLR James, we see Black movements in the United States as an important, if not leading form of revolutionary struggle in the US.
James argues that even modest movements for reform from African Americans contain revolutionary potential because of the social position of
Black workers and the nature of their confrontation with concentrated power. Because of their "proletarian composition," James says that
"the struggle for democratic rights brings the Negroes almost immediately face to face with capital and the state," and that because of this
it is "a direct part of the struggle for socialism." This is especially true when a direct aim of the movement is for the diminished
capacity for state policing, criminalization, incarceration, and militarism.
Importantly, the current manifestation of BLM has picked up where the last one dropped off, and this has contributed to the radicalism of
the moment, the impatience and intransigence of the activists, and the level of popular support for it aims, including defunding the police,
and the widespread discussion of police abolition - itself initiated as a revolutionary demand. The peak of the last interaction of the BLM
movement came in 2015 and 2016 when the movement articulated various demands. One set of demands coming from the nonprofit sector looked to
specific legislative change on a broad set of intersectional issues, like reparations, health care, education, and others. Another, coming
from the streets, argued to "Defund, Disarm, and Disband" the police. Unfortunately, with the election of Donald Trump in 2016, movements
were set on a defensive footing and the energy for BLM and other social movements dissipated. However, it was these set of later demands
that the movement picked up almost instantaneously in the 2020 manifestations.
Visitors walk near a sign that reads "Welcome to CHOP," Sunday, June 14, 2020.
The Movement in Seattle
With the current iteration of BLM, we are not in a revolutionary moment, but this moment has the seedlings of revolutionary struggle.
We see this potential playing out and developing in Seattle. Echoing the 2015 demands, on June 6th activists with Decriminalize Seattle
initiated the calls to defund by 50% the Seattle police department. These became a central demand for the movement in Seattle and much of
the rest of the country. This was a strategic leap forward for the movement here, giving clear demands that could be fought for and
potentially won. It gave the movement political direction and enhanced the efficacy of the previous amorphous expressions of anger and
grief. And in the aftermath of CHOP these demands now have majority support on the city council.
Although only a part of a much larger movement, the CHOP - the occupied protest zone of the Capitol Hill neighborhood - was the most
significant advance in the city. Say what we will about its failures, as we will discuss, the CHOP represents the peak of the early
revolutionary potential in Seattle.
For more detailed accounting and analysis, we recommend Arun Gupta's "Seattle's CHOP went out with both a bang and a whimper" and Micheal
Reagan's "In Defense of Autonomy: Seattle's CHOP Advanced the Movement for Black Lives." Here though we aim to present in broad strokes the
political significance of CHOP and break down it's shortcomings.
In short, through force of combat in the streets, after a week and half of nightly demonstrations with increasing violence from the police
and anti-protest actors, the city government was forced to abandon their police station, one of only five for the whole city.
This is a clear movement win with hints of revolutionary possibility. The state was forced to vacate key infrastructure and lost its
capacity to exercise power in one section of the city. This was not marginal either, but in the core governmental institution of policing
and a central neighborhood. As like what happened in Minneapolis when city and government officials admitted that they "lost control" of the
city that led to the destruction of the third precinct, the loss of the east precinct by the SPD represents significant movement power. This
kind of withdrawal of government control and the surge of popular power in the autonomous zone is the definition of a revolutionary
breakthrough. That power, however, was not capitalized on, and where it had potential was lost when the city retook the station in early July.
Participation by the Seattle local of Black Rose/Rosa Negra in CHOP was individual by our small group but spanned a range of roles such as
medics, night watch, with APOC formations in the zone, monitoring comms, and as participants in mobilizations, GAs, and other activities
happening in the space. From the first morning to some of the last days, our coverage gave us a thorough picture of what the movement looked
like and informs our analysis below.
Demonstrators link arms in front of the abandoned East Precinct police statement within the CHOP zone.
CHOP: Limits and Failures
The movement power came from mobilizations in the streets and direct confrontations with the police, rather than any specific organized
constituency such as tenant or labor unions or neighborhood based assemblies. Instead there was a diverse collection of activists who
nonetheless demonstrated real popular power. And the CHOP helped feed power into movements that made other victories possible. For example,
the vote to remove the Seattle police union from the labor council was broadcast from a rally at the chop, with literally hundreds of people
Zooming into the meeting to pressure the reactionary labor council to do the right thing. Out of this momentum Seattle schools voted to
remove the SPD from their facilities. There were nightly marches from the CHOP zone in the east to the west precinct downtown, which led to
that station being put on lockdown every single night for a roughly 40% reduction of policing capacity in the city. This is a real source of
popular power developing in the streets of Seattle (and elsewhere).
As we said, the movement could not capitalize on the power of the CHOP, however. There are several internal and external reasons for this.
Among the biggest failures we saw were the lack of organization, decision making structure, the substitution of tactics for strategy, the
limitations of horizontal and white ally politics when it came to the political necessities of the space, the need for improved movement
self-defense forces and external propaganda, and inherent limitations of sustainability of this type of mass popular upsurge and occupation.
No Decision Making Process
The first significant problem was the failure of decision making practice and infrastructure in the zone. Although this improved toward the
end of the occupation, we witnessed very poor meeting facilitation and decision making practice. In the first general assembly and for weeks
of subsequent meetings, the GA became a space for anyone to talk about any topic they wished. There was no agenda set, no time frame for
discussion, no way to follow up in a meaningful way on items from other speakers. For most of the occupation, it was an assembly only in
name, functioning in practice more as an "open mic" or "speak out", not a functioning space to carry on political work. As a result, the
GA's were prime space for police infiltrators and right-wing disruptors to run textbook counterintelligence disruption operations. (You can
see one of these, the person who introduces herself as "MamaBird" in the video linked in this paragraph).
We personally witnessed many of these instances. In one, on the night that the mayor announced intentions to retake the precinct, an
impromptu meeting was held to make decisions on what to do. A young Black woman organized the meeting and was attempting to get people to
decide whether to hold the space and if so, how to do it. Repeatedly, an older Black man with a sidearm disrupted and derailed the meeting.
He would take the bullhorn multiple times, talk about his experience of racism in the US and the need for peace, and prevent the meeting
from moving forward with making a decision. This was when it was believed that a police raid was imminent and there were still hundreds of
supporters in the CHOP. It was later revealed that this man was a private investigator with photographs of himself with Seattle PD officers.
Clearly, this lack of structure and experience in large group facilitation not only allowed this type of disruption to take place, but also
enabled a practice of patriarchy where a talented Black woman pushing for political clarity was sidelined. There were many similar moments.
Strengths and Limitations of Horizontalism and Individual Action
This overall lack of decision making also meant that there could be no politics in the space. This we call the problem of horizontalism.
Everyone worked on individual projects, with little to no ability to coordinate between one another, to develop a political agenda for the
occupation, or to even agree on demands or purpose of the occupation. Numerous small formations issued varied sets of demands. Many
questions could not get answered. Was the point to seize and reclaim the precinct or not? Questions as obvious and simple as this could not
even be explored. The result was that hundreds of individual projects emerged contributing to the flowering of movement activity and was
part of the reason we characterize this moment as having revolutionary characteristics. This facilitated the mass participation in that any
one and everyone could bring whatever their passion and interest was into the space. Therefore community gardens, art projects, nightly
marches, music concerts, film screenings, nightly attempts to seize the building, attempts to protect the building from seizure, meetings,
discussion groups, and more were all happening simultaneously. This is not a bad thing. It contributed to movement power. But we argue we
need this diversity, but also that we need a way to cohere these activities in a clear political direction. Not only was a meeting
facilitation practice for the general assembly needed for this, but also we needed the discipline to shut down and remove people who were
disrupting.
Failure of White Ally Politics
The next major problem in the space was the limitations of white ally politics that contributed to this confusion. White activists in the
space literally looked for whatever any Black person would tell them to do, which could mean many things, including everything from random
personal favors, to wearing shirts that read "when the shooting starts, get behind me." This dynamic also led to much tokenization of Black
individuals, as well as inaction by white activists in times of urgency. The vacuum of Black leadership meant that a whole variety of
political traditions and Black perspectives pulled people in different directions. Did deferring to black leadership mean listening to the
liberal Black voices who were making alliances with the police and directing people away from the occupied space? Did it mean following
Black voices who called for developing Black capitalism and buying Black (many of these claims made by local Black business owners)? Did it
mean following the Black voices who rejected the "autonomy" of the cop free zone, or those who supported it? This meant that when Black
people got up, some of them police infiltrators, white activists could not counter harmful narratives and return meetings to more principled
Black leadership and facilitation. This exacerbated the logistic and infrastructural problems in the space. But it is also a clear failure
of white ally politics and highlights that it is the politics that are important to articulate and discuss in that space.
For example, one BRRN member participated in an Autonomous BIPOC grouping within CHOP whose activities were also hindered in this way. Even
with Black members, the group was reluctant to take decisive collective action in the CHOP for want of waiting for Black leadership. This is
not to say that the question of how non-Black radicals should participate in a movement for Black liberation is a simple one. Surely, like
most organizing, it requires not only solidarity, but humility, nuance, respect, and trust. But we have clearly observed the failure (and
weaponization) of "white-ally politics" in practice. As militants, we need to clearly articulate a theory and practice of revolutionary
anti-racist solidarity as an alternative.
Tactics in Place of Strategy
In this political morass, the occupation itself became the point of the struggle. We see this as a clear substitution of movement tactics
for strategy and a continuation of the movement failures before the CHOP to work on questions of political strategy. With no demands, clear
political objectives, or ability to navigate political differences, the CHOP was reduced to its lowest common denominator, and that was
merely holding the space. This was happening elsewhere in the movement in Seattle as well. Nightly marches to occupy the freeway were a
demonstration of movement power, but not part of a larger strategic framework and without a clear goal, target, escalating campaign, etc.
The tactic of the occupation had become a substitution for the hard work of developing a collective political strategy.
Need for Collective Self-Defense and Effective Propaganda
One of the most disturbing and important lessons from the CHOP is the need to develop well-organized and effective collective self-defense.
On the night of Juneteenth, there were literally thousands of people in the space, many of them tourists and party goers. In the early
morning hours, a verbal fight escalated and led to the shooting death of a young man. Later that night, another young Black man leaving the
zone was attacked and shot by a mob of white men yelling racial slurs, and survived. The first shooting was not the result of vigilante
anti-protest political violence but violence that sprang from sources internal to the CHOP zone. In the days that followed, several more
shootings took place in and around the zone. Though the shooters and motives are largely still unknown, it appears likely that a majority of
the shootings were the result of interpersonal violence and gang retaliation. As our comrades in Decriminalize Seattle wrote at the time,
when we live in a profoundly violent and heavily armed society, it was likely that this type of violence would emerge in the CHOP. The last
major incident involved a vehicle which attacked the zone and shot into a crowd. After running a barricade, the driver and passenger were
shot, killing the driver.
There was an informal security team formed at the CHOP, mainly in response to right wing threats, which coordinated volunteers for night
watch, bike brigade lookouts and barricade defense teams. Members of the John Brown Gun Club were a regular presence. From day one there
were constant threats from rightwing militias and racist groups, as well as acts of provocation by the Proud Boys and others. As Trump
threatened to intervene, thousands of "patriots" signed up for a July 4th Facebook event to evict CHOP by force and return the precinct to
the police.
The lack of overall organization in CHOP also led to a separation of this self defense work from the broader political project. This left
CHOP particularly vulnerable to internal conflict, and street brawls which did not always involve a clearly defined threat. This coupled
with a lack of clear parameters for acceptable behavior in the space, led to much confusion and chaos, some of which could have been avoided
if the project had better organization and more political cohesion. While the efforts of the security teams were significant, this
experience (and the string of attacks around the country) has exposed the serious need for our movements to be prepared for effective,
responsible, and accountable self-defense.
In many ways, the shootings spelled the final knell for the CHOP. Firstly, it drove supporters out of the space as few were willing to risk
fatal violence in the support of an occupation with unclear aims. But the violence was also used by the enemies of the movement to discredit
the CHOP and BLM. The violence became a justification for police reoccupation and the role of the police in society in general. It is
possible this could have been countered with better outward facing propaganda and internal inoculation. Decriminalize Seattle tried some
effort in this direction, but the continued violence night after night, the growing chorus in right wing media making use of the violence,
and the political machinations of the mayor to use the violence to reclaim the space were too much to overcome.
Inherent Limitations of Occupations
Another shortcoming of the CHOP was the inherent limitations of the occupation tactic. Street occupations of this type typically have one of
three potential outcomes. The first is to become arevolutionary movement. Like the Tahrir Square occupation, this requires moving the
disruption out of the streets and into workplaces and other institutions to force further crises on the structures of power. The second
option is that they become institutionalized, given over to non-profit management that can tame and redirect the disruptive power of the
movement. The third is that they are crushed with the resurgence of the violence of the state.
Remaining community garden in Cal Anderson Park which was encompassed by CHOP. Taken August 24, 2020.
Buildling Power: A Conclusion
It is important to note that the way to transition a moment with revolutionary potential like we saw in CHOP into a revolution is to take
the power of the movement into the institutions of civil society. Spreading from the CHOP into workplaces, schools, hospitals, and other
sites of governance and administration could have spread the disruptive power of the CHOP and built social power outside of the state.
Although there were moments when organizers tried this (kicking the police union out of the labor council is one, removing SPD from public
schools was another), these were limited and fractured. They largely were coming from activism outside of the space, and indeed, the
majority of the BLM movement in Seattle was engaged in work outside of the CHOP. Its downfall is by no means the end of BLM in Seattle.
Nonetheless the CHOP and other moments like the burning of the Minneapolis police precinct demonstrate high water marks for the BLM movement
in the last month. Our task as anarchist revolutionaries is to build on that power, mostly by providing better meeting facilitation, better
movement infrastructure, and better processes for movement strategy, politics, and decision making, and to spread that movement into the
institutions that govern our lives.
If you enjoyed this piece we recommend this background article "In Defense of Autonomy: Seattle's CHOP Advanced the Movement for Black
Lives" or this theory piece "Going on the Offensive: Movements, Multisectorality, and Political Strategy."
https://blackrosefed.org/chop-analysis-glimmers-hope-failures-left/
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Failures of the Left - Tags: Analysis, Black Lives Matter,
Seattle (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
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Message: 1
In these days we have begun to see movements in the management organization chart, on August 24 the new Director of Railway Operations was
appointed , we do not know if to "send" the current Manager or to suppress him, if he is suppressed we suspect that he can go to "Mixed bag
of broken toys" that continue to collect from the public without clear functions. ---- We celebrate this dynamic of change and ask that it
continue without stopping until all unnecessary managers are dismissed, starting with the newly appointed Director of Brand and Media and
former employee of the newspaper ABC who, proclaimed himself Public Enemy number 1 of Metro de Madrid workers with his article of January 4,
2013 entitled "The bargain of working in the Metro", where he branded the labor rights fought for and conquered for decades by the Metro
workers' movement as privileges . The privileged one is him, who becomes a manager by digital appointment, and not the workers that we
access through the SEPE in calls for competition from thousands of people.
Someone like this cannot hold any position in the Metro Directorate. Not only should he be dismissed immediately, but he should ask for
forgiveness and retract his offensive words, in which, distorting reality, he intended to disqualify us from public opinion in a period of
struggle. This person is hardly going to guide and represent the image of Metro and its staff. On the contrary, he will continue to comply
with the dictates of the politicians to whom he owes his position: the last former CEOs, then all of the PP and today some of Vox, who
promulgated the same message in radio interviews, and press conferences accusing us of privileged, lazy and spoilers.
The article by the current Director of Brand and Media was published with the aim of dynamiting the strike called in the General Assembly
for January 5, 2013, the day of the Three Kings Parade, despite being a day with little influx of travelers, the current Chief of the
Operational Area defended the appointment of minimum services of 26 trains on line 2. Currently the tables for September 2020 are published
by the same person: 18 trains at rush hour, a table that will not be able to be fulfilled due to the SCANDAL LACK OF TEMPLATE. It has been
proven, following the designs of those who harass the rights, conditions and jobs allows you to perpetuate yourself in the position at
Metro, even if you do not have any other quality.
As for the changes in the company, we hope that they will lead us to a new "world" with greater understanding at least, something impossible
in recent years, because if we continue the same, we will be forced to join the mobilizations of education and other sectors, if The working
class is not stopped being exposed while the yuppies enjoy their long vacations. One only has to see which are the neighborhoods most
affected by the outbreaks of the pandemic, the working-class neighborhoods in the south of Madrid that suffer from crowds in the Metro every
day to go to work, traveling in crowded transport and without protection measures necessary due to mismanagement, with a lack of staff and
trains, where you circulate with the windows closed, without ventilating the trains, without disinfection during the day, on platforms and
trains that are not gauged.
Of course, for Solidaridad Obrera this situation is only resolved with
CESAR TO MANAGERS THAT FOR YEARS HAVE SHOWN HER BIG DISABILITIES (MARK AND MEDIA included)
HIRE THE NECESSARY NUMBER OF WORKERS SO THAT THE BASIC CATEGORIES MAKE THE METRO WORK CORRECTLY: MACHINISTS (400) HEADS AND HEADS OF SECTOR
(450) MAINTENANCE OFFICERS (650)
Jobs, trains and investment for a QUALITY PUBLIC transport and not as something welfare. The pandemic is here to stay and we cannot allow
Metro to continue to be a place of community contagion due to the negligence of directives and three-to-quarter politicians who now govern
the Community of Madrid.
Madrid, August 28, 2020
By Solidaridad Obrera
THE UNION BOARD
2020 UNION NOTICES IN METRO DE MADRID
https://www.solidaridadobrera.org/confederal/2020/08/31/aviso-73-2020-metromadrid-fuera-directivillos-y-politicos-inutiles/
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Message: 2
It has been 6 months since the first known Covid-19 case in the country, of a man from Italy. The pandemic arrived in Brazil thus, through
tourists who returned from Europe, wealthy people with access to basic sanitation, housing and quality health. ---- If the upper ones
suffered a little at the beginning of the disease, soon the lower ones were the main victims. Hundreds of workers die in essential services
- such as cleaning - and precarious in general. Without adequate conditions to protect themselves, residents of the peripheries paid with
their lives for the neglect of the powerful. The disease also opens up structural racism, since most of the contaminated and dead are black,
living in more precarious neighborhoods or in jobs more exposed to the virus. Quilombos and indigenous villages have also been greatly
impacted by the disease. Even with the pandemic, São Paulo did not fail to carry out repossessions, displacing families that were already in
a precarious situation.
As of Monday, August 31, there are 30,014 deaths in the state of São Paulo alone. The number exceeds the deaths recorded across the African
continent and in countries like Germany, Russia, Iran and Spain, in addition to bringing the number of victims in France and Italy closer. A
real tragedy, especially for the poorest. It is worth mentioning that the official data are underreported: the number of deaths due to
Covid-19 is higher than that which has been published in the last six months - considering that the first known case, in São Paulo, was
registered in February.
Today, the discussion of the state government and mayors is the return to face-to-face classes, absurd given the well-known condition of
many public schools in SP. Before the pandemic, many did not even have soap for students. Teachers have been denouncing the precarious
structure of schools for years. In addition, going back to school would put education workers and students' families at risk.
Research carried out by the city of São Paulo, for example, indicated that at least 70% of children and adolescents who have already had
contact with the virus had no symptoms. In practice, therefore, they can behave as "vectors of transmission" of the disease, affecting older
people around them. We cannot exclude, yet, the fact that some children and adolescents were also fatal victims of Covid-19. Knowing the
serious risks, the state government and city governments have tried to exempt themselves from responsibilities: it will be up to parents and
guardians to sign a term authorizing the return of children and adolescents to schools - bearing any problems that arise, such as
contamination and death by disease.
Meanwhile, "manager" João Doria, in an eternal campaign, announces as a solution a vaccine that is still being tested, as if the pandemic
did not continue to kill hundreds of people every week. Despite speaking differently from Bolsonaro, he had the same death policy, favoring
big businessmen at the cost of 30,000 lives.
Throughout this period, we at OASL continue to strengthen the initiatives of denunciation and solidarity in the communities, and adding to
the resistance against measures that put workers and students at risk. We believe that only the combative organization of those below can
minimize the serious impacts of the pandemic, and also advance the whole of the popular movement towards a process of rupture with this
whole murderous and unjust system!
Anarchist Organization Libertarian Socialism
https://anarquismosp.wordpress.com/2020/08/31/sp-30-mil-mortes-no-estado-mais-rico-do-brasil/
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Message: 3
In an era of pandemic and mass protest we are witnessing an uptick in political militancy, from attacks on police stations and the seizure
of space to wildcat strikes and rent strikes. These are promising developments, but the balance of class forces remains lopsided, evidenced
by the massive corporate bailout package, countless workers being exposed to unsafe working conditions, and mounting unemployment. While
COVID-19 has limited our ability to respond to the crisis, we need to discover creative ways to intervene in the current moment to meet the
urgent needs that have arisen and think through how to prepare ourselves for the post-pandemic period-whenever that may be-to tip the
balance of forces in our favor. We will have to defend ourselves against austerity and other attacks, but we can't limit our activity to a
defensive posture. In this piece, Spanish anarchist Lusbert Garcia offers a framework for orienting our organizing efforts toward strategic
sectors in society and makes the case for linking these sites of struggle over time into a broad-based, multisectoral movement that can put
us on the offensive.
Translation by Enrique Guerrero-López and Leticia RZ
By Lusbert Garcia
By making a brief analysis of current social movements, we can see that they do not work together, that is, in a synchronous way between
movements that operate in different areas of struggle. First off, this article is a complement to the translation of the article "A debate
on the politics of alliances[Un debate sobre la política de alianzas]" where I talk in broad strokes about the numerous areas or sectors of
struggle and think through how to build a multisectoral movement, that is, a broad movement made up of a network of social movements that
work in coordination in different sectors and at the same time are articulated based on the common denominator of autonomy, feminism and
anti-capitalism.
We know that the root of all problems lies in the capitalist system and the modern states that support it, and that this economic, political
and social system supports a production model based on private ownership of the means of production and private benefit as a fundamental
principle. All this constitutes what we know as the structural, and its manifestations in all areas of our lives, which is known as the
conjunctural, of which we could mainly highlight: territory, labor, public services, accommodation and repression. When we analyze the
political-social space, we must recognize the conjunctural problems that manifest as a consequence of the material structure:
The territorial issue would include within it the spheres in which the interests of the class which rules over the territory enter into
conflict with those of the working class. It is the physical space in which all struggles will take place, so we can highlight the following
areas: neighborhood or district if we talk about cities, rural and land struggles if we talk about undeveloped or non-industrialized areas,
and we could even include the national liberation struggles for the self-determination of peoples against imperialism. Environmentalism and
food sovereignty would also fall into this category.
Labor here would constitute one of the main axes of class conflict. It is the battlefield where capital and labor meet most directly. In
this area we can mention the workers' movement that is articulated around unionism. Although we have to differentiate between unionism that
advocates social peace-that model that always leads to class conciliation, betraying the working class-and the revolutionary or class
unionism that advocates the exacerbation of class conflict in the workplace.
The fight for housing is a movement that goes back a little over a century during the rural exodus caused by industrial development and the
creation of working-class neighborhoods. Today, with capitalist restructuring underway again in advanced capitalist countries and those in
development, access to housing is again a social problem that affects the working class as it finds itself with less economic capacity to
face mortgages and rents, as well as access to decent housing. Faced with this problem, movements against evictions have sprung up in many
countries, as did the squatter movement a little earlier.
As for state public services, in the face of this phase of capitalist restructuring, markets are increasingly interfering with these
services through budget cuts, outsourcing and privatizations. Here we can mention: Education, Health, water and sanitation, public
transport, and pensions, among others; and the respective social movements that arise in response to cuts and privatizations, such as the
student movement, White Tide[1]and other movements against the privatization of water, the fight against increases in rates on public
transport, etc.
Last but not least, all opposition movements receive state repression; therefore, it is important that we begin to see repression as an
obstacle and a social problem that seeks to curb our social and political activities while serving the ruling class to perpetuate its
dominance. In this regard, we must speak about the anti-repression issue and face repression collectively and outside of our own militant
circles, as yet another social movement.
Within each sector there are also subsectors. For example, within the student movement, those who organize in the University will not be the
same as those from professional training and those from secondary education. In the labor world, the labor movement would be divided between
the various productive branches such as construction, transportation, services, etc. In other words, the substantive demands of the student
movement would be the same regardless of the subsector, even if they differ on particular and specific issues. This is also seen within the
labor movement, where the substantive demands can be the increase in the minimum wage, reduction of working hours, etc., and the particular
demands would be improvements in the collective bargaining agreement, for example.
However, we must not take all these sectors in struggle as isolated elements, but as a set of conjunctural battle fronts that have their
origin in the capitalist system, and therefore, connected to each other. And here comes the main question: how to connect these sectors in
struggle under a common political-social denominator based on anti-capitalism, feminism, anti-racism and internationalism. Looking for the
connection between various sectors is not very difficult. Let's see some examples:
Neighborhoods and the fight for housing as well as the squatter movement.
Food sovereignty, environmentalism and the struggle of the peasantry for their lands.
The student movement and the labor movement. This is already a classic.
The movement against rising public transport rates with women workers in the sector.
Anti-repression fronts with neighborhoods.
In the previous examples, we can see that they have points in common with each other, which can lead them to converge and overcome
sectoriality, that is, working in isolation in a specific area without coordination with the rest. We can even go a little further and
connect neighborhood movements, squatting, anti-eviction with the municipality, with the workers and student movements, constituting a
network of movements that could unite with the peasant and indigenous movement (this would occur in Latin American countries mainly; Europe
or the US would be very difficult). And since all these social movements will suffer repression along with the political-social collectives
and organizations, it is important that the anti-repression struggle be articulated from the neighborhoods, neighborhood associations, etc.
A century ago, in full industrial development, the labor movement occupied the central pillar of class and social conflict. Today we can no
longer use this premise as no front is gaining greater importance than the rest, which leads us to discard the hierarchy of struggles to put
on the table the idea-force of networked movements. When we arrive at this point, it is when we must consider multisectorality, that is,
articulate common discourses that allow the alliance of the various sectors in struggle, respecting their autonomy but maintaining common
bases on which to build broad movements, escalate conflicts and go from resistance, that is, defensive positions, to offense.
The limitations that sectoriality has leads us to think about transcending the struggles of specific scopes to wider movements to articulate
an offense. I developed the issue of multisectorality precisely due to the limitations that each sector in struggle had, and therefore, in
isolation they could not go beyond the defense of social problems that specifically affect that sector. Before talking about the offensive,
we will address the principal limitations of each sector.
The labor sector. In my previous article I pointed out that currently the labor movement is no longer the central axis of struggle, but one
more among the many that exist despite being the one where the capital-labor conflict is most directly confronted. The main limitation in
the labor movement is the economic sphere. Trade unionism itself cannot become a revolutionary movement, since it is limited to the field of
the productive model within the capitalist system. However, unionism can serve to organize the working class and aspire to seize the means
of production and self-manage them. However, if self-managed projects do not emerge from the market economy, it will not be a transformation
at the root.
Student movement. In the educational environment in which they operate, students will find a great limitation in terms of claiming an
alternative model to the current one increasingly oriented towards markets. Thus, the educational models inspired by free teaching within a
capitalist society are very limited precisely by the regulations of the States and the funding they require. Such an educational model is
unthinkable in class society.
Public services. In this area, so controversial among anarchists, the limitation lies precisely in the financing. Like many things in this
capitalist society, if we do not want Health, Education, supplies and such to be privatized, such financing could only come from the general
budgets of the State, without allowing the interference of private companies. Although under their management they may come to carry more
weight in the community, rather than under the State's administration.
The fight against repression. This is the area where the most economic, physical and psychological wear and tear is involved due to the few
results that are achieved despite the great efforts invested. This is a confrontation against a greater force, which is the armed wing of
the State. Its main limitation is the need for very extensive support networks to overcome the isolation and overload of militancy, as well
as the high risks they run.
Rural and peasant movements. Talking about such movements in advanced capitalist countries would not make much sense beyond small organic
farming cooperatives, whose limitation resides in the little weight that the field has in addition to a total absence of peasant movements.
But this is not the case with Latin American countries in which there are strong peasant and indigenous movements. Although the peasantry
fits within the working class, its scope of action is not the same as that of the urban proletariat, in addition to the fact that the
immediate conflicts in the fields are not the same as in the cities. Furthermore, even if the peasant and indigenous movements get land and
constitute autonomous territories, they are on the periphery of the capitalist nuclei that are the cities.
The struggles for housing and neighborhoods. Although one of the strengths of these struggles is the construction of the local social
fabric, its main limitation is the territorial one, since they exist at the local level. However, it has great potential if they connect
with other sectors in struggle.
The limitations that we see in each sector in struggle means that they only adopt a defensive posture, trying only to resist the onslaught
of neoliberalism. If we look at the enemy, we can see how since the 1970s neoliberalism, since it emerged as a way out of the crisis then,
is continuously going on the offensive: attacking the Soviet bloc first and seeking alliances with European states, continuously attacking
labor and social rights, supporting and promoting coups in Latin America and Central America, etc., until today with the implementation of
the euro and the EU, pushing back on labor rights in each labor reform, reaching into state public services such as Education, Health,
pensions, water, etc., and now with the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) that will allow less regulation in
environmental protection, more setbacks in labor rights, more power for multinational corporations and investment funds with private
supranational courts that can judge governments that harm their profit rates, among other things.
That is why we ask ourselves, how can it be that neoliberalism is continuously on the offensive while the social movements are always on the
defensive? And this is a problem that comes mainly from the lack of political alliances between sectors built under a common discursive
denominator, that is, a road map with proposals and demands that allow progress, not just resistance. And this advance can only come through
the articulation of a multisectoral popular movement, because that is the only way we overcome the limitations that come with each sector in
struggle. I want to note that this is only a sketch for the purpose of serving as a contribution towards building future roadmaps and it may
possibly be missing several things. I will put some brief examples below:
So we will start with the student movement, which has many connections to the labor market, since most students will enter the job market
after their training. The line is increasingly blurred between the labor market and training, which is seen in business practices both in
vocational training and University. Furthermore, with this new labor panorama in which continuous training and the concepts of retraining
were introduced, in reality they require the "recycling" of workers to follow the demands of competences in the labor market. That is why
the student movement necessarily has to have connections with (class) unionism.
Now, in the face of job insecurity, unemployment and the diminishing purchasing power of the working class, access to decent housing is also
worsening, as is the problem of evictions, so they will necessarily have to connect with the struggles for housing and also contribute to
building a social fabric that breaks isolation, putting mutual aid and solidarity into practice in neighborhoods. Also, due to the
gentrification suffered by neighborhoods due to real estate speculation and the conversion of neighborhoods into spaces for consumer
leisure, there is a need to open political and social spaces to counteract the consumerist and hyper individualistic culture of capitalist
societies and to constitute focal points of resistance.
And since every protest movement will receive state repression, it is essential that the anti-repression issue be inserted in all sectors
and be made visible as a problem that affects everyone and from which everyone can suffer.
An offensive strategy begins by recognizing that each area of struggle and its problems are not separate and specific problems, but rather
originate from a common material structure, which is capitalism in its neoliberal phase and the modern states that support it. Said
offensive strategy does not consist in attacking the symbols of capitalism and the State nor in the vanguard positions of a militant
minority, but must arise from the political articulation of the entire popular movement, which is not only capable of winning victories in
every sector, but rather have the capacity to materialize alternatives that transcend the sector itself. For example, to be able to start
alternative educational projects, it is necessary not only to seize the centers for community management, but also to have insertion in the
neighborhoods and in the labor market promoting the values of the commons, to keep them from remaining marginal projects. From this point
on, the political articulation of the movements should focus on programs that respond to the needs of the moment and implement them in each
context, based on anti-capitalism, mutual aid and solidarity, autonomy and horizontality, as well as feminism, internationalism and anti-racism.
We are aware that we are still very far from being able to put an offensive strategy in place against the capitalist system, and this is
precisely because, as anarchists in particular, we are not building the social bases that would be the social force that allows us to
articulate ourselves as a political force. For this reason, we must consider social insertion as the first step in the ambitious task of
revolutionary social transformation. We must be able to respond to immediate problems and empower social movements as a short-term strategy
to pull off small victories and draw strength from them in order to aspire to greater objectives. The offensive involves direct
political-social combat against the capitalist system and the sharpening of the class struggle promoted by a broad and politically
articulated popular movement.
For any popular movement to go on the offensive, it is also essential that they have roadmaps and political strategy. What is political
strategy? Strategy, in general, is a set of tactics aimed at achieving a goal in a complex environment where a multitude of factors come
into play. And specifically, political strategy has to start from conjunctural analysis, a tool by which detailed information is extracted
from the environment around us in order to intervene on the political and social stage in order to achieve a series of changes, allowing us
to move toward achieving our ultimate goals. From that necessary conjunctural analysis, we can see that our final goals are currently
unattainable, at least in the medium and long term, which leads us to set intermediate and more achievable goals, that allow us to advance
positions. This is where political strategy enters.
The absence of a political strategy makes it so that movements pull by inertia, that is, they move defensively in the face of the need to
stop the attacks of the ruling class without knowing how to counterattack. In other words, they are forced by the conjuncture and not driven
by a confrontational perspective. The expression "something must be done" perfectly illustrates this problem, which manifests itself in
reality through action-reaction methodologies; that is, of responding only when there is a significant attack, of vague and very generalist
or conservative proposals for wanting to go back to an earlier phase or maintain the current state of affairs The main consequences of the
lack of political strategies are movements becoming disoriented and adrift (in the worst cases), being always influenced by the conjuncture,
encountering dead ends, volatility and routes that lead back to zero. Within the libertarian movement itself, the dynamic is similar,
although efforts are already being made to overcome it with new initiatives that have recently emerged. Lack of political strategy has
condemned us to marginality and isolation.
The need to overcome "something must be done" involves having a strategic vision; that is, overcoming the defeatist airs that mobilizations
through inertia entail and putting strategies for action and intervention in the political and social scene on the table. For this reason,
we have to ask ourselves something that Lenin once did: "what is to be done?" Adapting it to our situation, that would be: what is to be
done with each sector-wide problem (housing, public services, work, education, territory)? What is to be done in the face of the
ineffectiveness and illegitimacy of rival political forces -which are not our enemies, because the enemies are the political forces of the
dominant one that is in direct confrontation against us? What is to be done in the face of cuts in social rights in general and the
continuous neoliberal offensive? What is to be done in the face of opportunism and the rise of fascism? ... the answers to these would serve
as the basis for preparing roadmaps and programs focused on social intervention. From this strategic vision, we will see the various
political options as forces, whose real strength will reside in the legitimation given to them from the grassroots. One must also keep in
mind that political forces will tend to occupy as much space as they can, meaning, if a political force leaves a space, it will be taken up
by another. Thus, if there are no alternatives proposed outside of institutions, betting on autonomy, confluence and coordination, and the
radicalization of social movements under common discourses that aim at overcoming capitalism and other forms of domination, it will not take
long for these movements to be co-opted by political parties that adapt their discourse to bring social movements to the polls, with their
consequent demobilization and assimilation by the system. And this is what is currently happening.
For this reason, the offensive approach not only involves building a multisectoral movement, but also adopting political strategies that
allow the advancement of the entire popular movement. The offensive is inseparable from the political strategy, in fact, it is from the
political strategy that we consider these premises of offense and multisectorality. And I would even add that strategic vision must start
from the first moment in which we aspire to a radical transformation of society; that it must aim to build, strengthen and promote the
autonomy of social movements; that once this task has been carried out, it must aspire to an articulation of multisectorality and therefore,
to build a political force with real strength capable of achieving changes not only in this situation, but in transforming the structure
(capitalist relations of production, neocolonialism, heteropatriarchy, white supremacy, etc ...). In general, it is focused on increasing
our strength as oppressed social classes.
Before finishing, to better illustrate the concept of political strategy, we could look at a hypothetical scenario in which, on the one
hand, the main unions go through a general delegitimation and go into decline due to loss of membership, the disillusionment and distrust of
the working class, and the loss of its of ability to convene; and on the other, the percentage of unionized workers is relatively low (let's
say around 10%). Given this situation in which a rival force is weakening, we must take advantage of this delegitimation to fill the gaps
they have left. In this case, the best thing to do would be for class struggle unions to position themselves as functional tools for the
defense of the interests of the working class, to encourage the participation of the membership and sympathizers, to know how to respond
swiftly to job insecurity, temporality and subcontracting in all productive sectors, from small businesses to large companies and, above
all, to extract victories, even small ones; achieve them, maintain them and aspire to bigger ones.
We could also escalate this hypothetical scenario and arrive at the confluence of the labor movement and combative unionism with student
struggles and struggles for decent housing as well as with the squatter movement. And another hypothetical scenario, within the libertarian
sphere, would be to put aside as far as possible the ideological confrontation with other political tendencies within the left and opt for
escaping marginality and outnumber them in real force before other tendencies do, which leads us to work in the social field through
insertion in social movements, to respond to immediate social problems and promote struggles, to achieve the necessary social base to really
advance popular movements and give them as libertarian a character as possible, capable of standing up to the capitalist system by creating
confrontational alternatives.
In summary, political strategy aims to push by creating political alternatives that aspire to overcome the existing order. Political
strategy also implies some cunning and a lot of ambition, inserting ourselves into the material reality, taking advantage of the
opportunities that are presented to us and intervening or attacking, not symbolically but in a systematic and planned way; having
consistency in our political and social activities, and not leaving everything to improvisation; accumulating experiences so as to not have
to start from scratch; and not attacking through brute force, but with the force emanating from popular self-organization and its political
articulation. In this sense, political strategy is what gives content to the offensive.
Lusbert Garcia is an anarchist communist writer based in Spain. This article is based on the merger of three articles previously with
Regeneración.
If you enjoyed this piece we recommend another piece by Lusbert Garcia, "Strategy and Tactics for a Revolutionary Anarchism," or Mark Bray's
"Horizontalism: Anarchism, Power and the State."
Notes
1. White Tide was an anti-privatization movement that began in Madrid in 2013 and spread throughout Spain.
https://blackrosefed.org/going-on-the-offensive-movements-multisectorality-political-strategy/
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Message: 4
Out of the national uprising in protest of the racist police murder of George Floyd in Milwaukee emerged a movement occupied space of 8-10
blocks in the Seattle neighborhood of Capitol Hill. The space began "as an accident" when on the evening of June 7 a man drove drove into
the protests and shot a demonstrator. Quickly the crowds set up barricades at several intersections and an occupy style encampment emerged
as the the mayor ordered the evacuation of the East Precinct police statement encompassed within the zone. Originally deemed the Capitol
Hill Autonomous Zone (CHAZ) the space was soon renamed Capitol Hill Occupied Protest (CHOP) and remained in place until July 1 when Seattle
Mayor Jenny Durkan ordered police to clear out the space after a series of late night shootings. Written in late July 2020, this critical
analysis piece was based on discussions and experiences of our Seattle Black Rose/Rosa Negra comrades.
By Black Rose/Rosa Negra - Seattle
The Black Lives Matter movement that erupted in May of 2020 has transformed the American political landscape like no other social movement
in decades. Since the murder of George Floyd by the Minneapolis police department, in what may be the largest demonstrations in American
history, the country has exploded in riots, demonstrations, mobilizations, petitions, corporate campaigns, occupations, social media
activism, and other movement activities. More than 4,700 physical actions have taken place in the last month that included more people -
between 15 to 23 million according to data analytic firms - than any other social movement in US history. Further, the passive support for
movement is overwhelming, with large majorities expressing favorable views of the movement, including even majority support for the burning
of the Minneapolis police precinct, something that has maintained a broader degree of support than either presidential candidate. Again, all
without precedent in American history.
Although the scale, scope, and popular support of the movement is unprecedented, the pattern the movement is taking is a familiar one in
American history. The Black liberation movement has been at the forefront of a broad variety of movements for liberation in the US. For
example, in the 19th century the abolitionist movement gave rise to the movement for women's suffrage, or in the 1960s the civil rights
movement planted the seeds for second wave feminism, anti-war, and LGBTQ movements. The current BLM movement marks a continuation of this
trend, with the potential to further radicalize and empower other oppressed peoples in the United States. We believe this is especially true
as the country faces as series of related but distinct crises from its collapsing empire - on immigration, gender and patriarchy, medical
care and health, jobs and unemployment, the pandemic, policing, poverty, drug addiction, homelessness, housing, climate, higher education,
public schooling, mass shootings, institutional corruption, loss of legitimacy, militarism and foreign wars - the list goes on.
Along with CLR James, we see Black movements in the United States as an important, if not leading form of revolutionary struggle in the US.
James argues that even modest movements for reform from African Americans contain revolutionary potential because of the social position of
Black workers and the nature of their confrontation with concentrated power. Because of their "proletarian composition," James says that
"the struggle for democratic rights brings the Negroes almost immediately face to face with capital and the state," and that because of this
it is "a direct part of the struggle for socialism." This is especially true when a direct aim of the movement is for the diminished
capacity for state policing, criminalization, incarceration, and militarism.
Importantly, the current manifestation of BLM has picked up where the last one dropped off, and this has contributed to the radicalism of
the moment, the impatience and intransigence of the activists, and the level of popular support for it aims, including defunding the police,
and the widespread discussion of police abolition - itself initiated as a revolutionary demand. The peak of the last interaction of the BLM
movement came in 2015 and 2016 when the movement articulated various demands. One set of demands coming from the nonprofit sector looked to
specific legislative change on a broad set of intersectional issues, like reparations, health care, education, and others. Another, coming
from the streets, argued to "Defund, Disarm, and Disband" the police. Unfortunately, with the election of Donald Trump in 2016, movements
were set on a defensive footing and the energy for BLM and other social movements dissipated. However, it was these set of later demands
that the movement picked up almost instantaneously in the 2020 manifestations.
Visitors walk near a sign that reads "Welcome to CHOP," Sunday, June 14, 2020.
The Movement in Seattle
With the current iteration of BLM, we are not in a revolutionary moment, but this moment has the seedlings of revolutionary struggle.
We see this potential playing out and developing in Seattle. Echoing the 2015 demands, on June 6th activists with Decriminalize Seattle
initiated the calls to defund by 50% the Seattle police department. These became a central demand for the movement in Seattle and much of
the rest of the country. This was a strategic leap forward for the movement here, giving clear demands that could be fought for and
potentially won. It gave the movement political direction and enhanced the efficacy of the previous amorphous expressions of anger and
grief. And in the aftermath of CHOP these demands now have majority support on the city council.
Although only a part of a much larger movement, the CHOP - the occupied protest zone of the Capitol Hill neighborhood - was the most
significant advance in the city. Say what we will about its failures, as we will discuss, the CHOP represents the peak of the early
revolutionary potential in Seattle.
For more detailed accounting and analysis, we recommend Arun Gupta's "Seattle's CHOP went out with both a bang and a whimper" and Micheal
Reagan's "In Defense of Autonomy: Seattle's CHOP Advanced the Movement for Black Lives." Here though we aim to present in broad strokes the
political significance of CHOP and break down it's shortcomings.
In short, through force of combat in the streets, after a week and half of nightly demonstrations with increasing violence from the police
and anti-protest actors, the city government was forced to abandon their police station, one of only five for the whole city.
This is a clear movement win with hints of revolutionary possibility. The state was forced to vacate key infrastructure and lost its
capacity to exercise power in one section of the city. This was not marginal either, but in the core governmental institution of policing
and a central neighborhood. As like what happened in Minneapolis when city and government officials admitted that they "lost control" of the
city that led to the destruction of the third precinct, the loss of the east precinct by the SPD represents significant movement power. This
kind of withdrawal of government control and the surge of popular power in the autonomous zone is the definition of a revolutionary
breakthrough. That power, however, was not capitalized on, and where it had potential was lost when the city retook the station in early July.
Participation by the Seattle local of Black Rose/Rosa Negra in CHOP was individual by our small group but spanned a range of roles such as
medics, night watch, with APOC formations in the zone, monitoring comms, and as participants in mobilizations, GAs, and other activities
happening in the space. From the first morning to some of the last days, our coverage gave us a thorough picture of what the movement looked
like and informs our analysis below.
Demonstrators link arms in front of the abandoned East Precinct police statement within the CHOP zone.
CHOP: Limits and Failures
The movement power came from mobilizations in the streets and direct confrontations with the police, rather than any specific organized
constituency such as tenant or labor unions or neighborhood based assemblies. Instead there was a diverse collection of activists who
nonetheless demonstrated real popular power. And the CHOP helped feed power into movements that made other victories possible. For example,
the vote to remove the Seattle police union from the labor council was broadcast from a rally at the chop, with literally hundreds of people
Zooming into the meeting to pressure the reactionary labor council to do the right thing. Out of this momentum Seattle schools voted to
remove the SPD from their facilities. There were nightly marches from the CHOP zone in the east to the west precinct downtown, which led to
that station being put on lockdown every single night for a roughly 40% reduction of policing capacity in the city. This is a real source of
popular power developing in the streets of Seattle (and elsewhere).
As we said, the movement could not capitalize on the power of the CHOP, however. There are several internal and external reasons for this.
Among the biggest failures we saw were the lack of organization, decision making structure, the substitution of tactics for strategy, the
limitations of horizontal and white ally politics when it came to the political necessities of the space, the need for improved movement
self-defense forces and external propaganda, and inherent limitations of sustainability of this type of mass popular upsurge and occupation.
No Decision Making Process
The first significant problem was the failure of decision making practice and infrastructure in the zone. Although this improved toward the
end of the occupation, we witnessed very poor meeting facilitation and decision making practice. In the first general assembly and for weeks
of subsequent meetings, the GA became a space for anyone to talk about any topic they wished. There was no agenda set, no time frame for
discussion, no way to follow up in a meaningful way on items from other speakers. For most of the occupation, it was an assembly only in
name, functioning in practice more as an "open mic" or "speak out", not a functioning space to carry on political work. As a result, the
GA's were prime space for police infiltrators and right-wing disruptors to run textbook counterintelligence disruption operations. (You can
see one of these, the person who introduces herself as "MamaBird" in the video linked in this paragraph).
We personally witnessed many of these instances. In one, on the night that the mayor announced intentions to retake the precinct, an
impromptu meeting was held to make decisions on what to do. A young Black woman organized the meeting and was attempting to get people to
decide whether to hold the space and if so, how to do it. Repeatedly, an older Black man with a sidearm disrupted and derailed the meeting.
He would take the bullhorn multiple times, talk about his experience of racism in the US and the need for peace, and prevent the meeting
from moving forward with making a decision. This was when it was believed that a police raid was imminent and there were still hundreds of
supporters in the CHOP. It was later revealed that this man was a private investigator with photographs of himself with Seattle PD officers.
Clearly, this lack of structure and experience in large group facilitation not only allowed this type of disruption to take place, but also
enabled a practice of patriarchy where a talented Black woman pushing for political clarity was sidelined. There were many similar moments.
Strengths and Limitations of Horizontalism and Individual Action
This overall lack of decision making also meant that there could be no politics in the space. This we call the problem of horizontalism.
Everyone worked on individual projects, with little to no ability to coordinate between one another, to develop a political agenda for the
occupation, or to even agree on demands or purpose of the occupation. Numerous small formations issued varied sets of demands. Many
questions could not get answered. Was the point to seize and reclaim the precinct or not? Questions as obvious and simple as this could not
even be explored. The result was that hundreds of individual projects emerged contributing to the flowering of movement activity and was
part of the reason we characterize this moment as having revolutionary characteristics. This facilitated the mass participation in that any
one and everyone could bring whatever their passion and interest was into the space. Therefore community gardens, art projects, nightly
marches, music concerts, film screenings, nightly attempts to seize the building, attempts to protect the building from seizure, meetings,
discussion groups, and more were all happening simultaneously. This is not a bad thing. It contributed to movement power. But we argue we
need this diversity, but also that we need a way to cohere these activities in a clear political direction. Not only was a meeting
facilitation practice for the general assembly needed for this, but also we needed the discipline to shut down and remove people who were
disrupting.
Failure of White Ally Politics
The next major problem in the space was the limitations of white ally politics that contributed to this confusion. White activists in the
space literally looked for whatever any Black person would tell them to do, which could mean many things, including everything from random
personal favors, to wearing shirts that read "when the shooting starts, get behind me." This dynamic also led to much tokenization of Black
individuals, as well as inaction by white activists in times of urgency. The vacuum of Black leadership meant that a whole variety of
political traditions and Black perspectives pulled people in different directions. Did deferring to black leadership mean listening to the
liberal Black voices who were making alliances with the police and directing people away from the occupied space? Did it mean following
Black voices who called for developing Black capitalism and buying Black (many of these claims made by local Black business owners)? Did it
mean following the Black voices who rejected the "autonomy" of the cop free zone, or those who supported it? This meant that when Black
people got up, some of them police infiltrators, white activists could not counter harmful narratives and return meetings to more principled
Black leadership and facilitation. This exacerbated the logistic and infrastructural problems in the space. But it is also a clear failure
of white ally politics and highlights that it is the politics that are important to articulate and discuss in that space.
For example, one BRRN member participated in an Autonomous BIPOC grouping within CHOP whose activities were also hindered in this way. Even
with Black members, the group was reluctant to take decisive collective action in the CHOP for want of waiting for Black leadership. This is
not to say that the question of how non-Black radicals should participate in a movement for Black liberation is a simple one. Surely, like
most organizing, it requires not only solidarity, but humility, nuance, respect, and trust. But we have clearly observed the failure (and
weaponization) of "white-ally politics" in practice. As militants, we need to clearly articulate a theory and practice of revolutionary
anti-racist solidarity as an alternative.
Tactics in Place of Strategy
In this political morass, the occupation itself became the point of the struggle. We see this as a clear substitution of movement tactics
for strategy and a continuation of the movement failures before the CHOP to work on questions of political strategy. With no demands, clear
political objectives, or ability to navigate political differences, the CHOP was reduced to its lowest common denominator, and that was
merely holding the space. This was happening elsewhere in the movement in Seattle as well. Nightly marches to occupy the freeway were a
demonstration of movement power, but not part of a larger strategic framework and without a clear goal, target, escalating campaign, etc.
The tactic of the occupation had become a substitution for the hard work of developing a collective political strategy.
Need for Collective Self-Defense and Effective Propaganda
One of the most disturbing and important lessons from the CHOP is the need to develop well-organized and effective collective self-defense.
On the night of Juneteenth, there were literally thousands of people in the space, many of them tourists and party goers. In the early
morning hours, a verbal fight escalated and led to the shooting death of a young man. Later that night, another young Black man leaving the
zone was attacked and shot by a mob of white men yelling racial slurs, and survived. The first shooting was not the result of vigilante
anti-protest political violence but violence that sprang from sources internal to the CHOP zone. In the days that followed, several more
shootings took place in and around the zone. Though the shooters and motives are largely still unknown, it appears likely that a majority of
the shootings were the result of interpersonal violence and gang retaliation. As our comrades in Decriminalize Seattle wrote at the time,
when we live in a profoundly violent and heavily armed society, it was likely that this type of violence would emerge in the CHOP. The last
major incident involved a vehicle which attacked the zone and shot into a crowd. After running a barricade, the driver and passenger were
shot, killing the driver.
There was an informal security team formed at the CHOP, mainly in response to right wing threats, which coordinated volunteers for night
watch, bike brigade lookouts and barricade defense teams. Members of the John Brown Gun Club were a regular presence. From day one there
were constant threats from rightwing militias and racist groups, as well as acts of provocation by the Proud Boys and others. As Trump
threatened to intervene, thousands of "patriots" signed up for a July 4th Facebook event to evict CHOP by force and return the precinct to
the police.
The lack of overall organization in CHOP also led to a separation of this self defense work from the broader political project. This left
CHOP particularly vulnerable to internal conflict, and street brawls which did not always involve a clearly defined threat. This coupled
with a lack of clear parameters for acceptable behavior in the space, led to much confusion and chaos, some of which could have been avoided
if the project had better organization and more political cohesion. While the efforts of the security teams were significant, this
experience (and the string of attacks around the country) has exposed the serious need for our movements to be prepared for effective,
responsible, and accountable self-defense.
In many ways, the shootings spelled the final knell for the CHOP. Firstly, it drove supporters out of the space as few were willing to risk
fatal violence in the support of an occupation with unclear aims. But the violence was also used by the enemies of the movement to discredit
the CHOP and BLM. The violence became a justification for police reoccupation and the role of the police in society in general. It is
possible this could have been countered with better outward facing propaganda and internal inoculation. Decriminalize Seattle tried some
effort in this direction, but the continued violence night after night, the growing chorus in right wing media making use of the violence,
and the political machinations of the mayor to use the violence to reclaim the space were too much to overcome.
Inherent Limitations of Occupations
Another shortcoming of the CHOP was the inherent limitations of the occupation tactic. Street occupations of this type typically have one of
three potential outcomes. The first is to become arevolutionary movement. Like the Tahrir Square occupation, this requires moving the
disruption out of the streets and into workplaces and other institutions to force further crises on the structures of power. The second
option is that they become institutionalized, given over to non-profit management that can tame and redirect the disruptive power of the
movement. The third is that they are crushed with the resurgence of the violence of the state.
Remaining community garden in Cal Anderson Park which was encompassed by CHOP. Taken August 24, 2020.
Buildling Power: A Conclusion
It is important to note that the way to transition a moment with revolutionary potential like we saw in CHOP into a revolution is to take
the power of the movement into the institutions of civil society. Spreading from the CHOP into workplaces, schools, hospitals, and other
sites of governance and administration could have spread the disruptive power of the CHOP and built social power outside of the state.
Although there were moments when organizers tried this (kicking the police union out of the labor council is one, removing SPD from public
schools was another), these were limited and fractured. They largely were coming from activism outside of the space, and indeed, the
majority of the BLM movement in Seattle was engaged in work outside of the CHOP. Its downfall is by no means the end of BLM in Seattle.
Nonetheless the CHOP and other moments like the burning of the Minneapolis police precinct demonstrate high water marks for the BLM movement
in the last month. Our task as anarchist revolutionaries is to build on that power, mostly by providing better meeting facilitation, better
movement infrastructure, and better processes for movement strategy, politics, and decision making, and to spread that movement into the
institutions that govern our lives.
If you enjoyed this piece we recommend this background article "In Defense of Autonomy: Seattle's CHOP Advanced the Movement for Black
Lives" or this theory piece "Going on the Offensive: Movements, Multisectorality, and Political Strategy."
https://blackrosefed.org/chop-analysis-glimmers-hope-failures-left/
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