Democratic Confederalism starts from a specific context: Kurdistan in
the 90s, after the definitive collapse of Real Socialism, after theassimilation or annihilation of the vast majority of National Liberation
movements. Precisely part of a socialist national liberation movement
born in the 70s, with some particularities: in the face of very hard
conditions due to being between 4 states in the Middle East, the PKK had
been forged with the blood and particularly heroic dedication of
militants, connecting with a very lively tradition of struggle that the
Kurdish people have. In addition, Kurdish culture also influences the
rooting of a particularly deep form of criticism and self-criticism,
inseparable from camaraderie, bases of its organizational culture.
Entering the 90s, they began to ask why their role models failed and why
they also had similar problems, and from there they faced the need to
rethink their ideological foundations: first, there was the rejection of
the Nation-State, not only rethinking the construction of a "Kurdish
socialist state", but also removing the internal dynamics of the party
to avoid becoming a State. Studying pre-state societies from their
particular vantage point of Civilization that are the Taurus-Zagros
mountains, they realized that every modern society has been colonized
but still possesses a very strong communal memory, a liberating
potential that is blocked by the mechanisms of genocide and assimilation
of Capitalist Modernity. Given this
understanding, the revolutionary party is no longer the one who
must blaze a trail of liberation, but rather the one who
must open the doors to the self-organization of society, so that it
can deploy its liberating potential.
Democratic Confederalism is the proposal for how to
do this deployment. Understanding that society is diverse by nature,
and that this diversity is wealth. In opposition to the State, which is
homogenizing in essence, the CD assumes that the different
expressions of this diversity (ethnic groups, religions, genders, etc.) have
also developed their resistance mechanisms over the years (although they
have also been assimilated in part), and therefore
have great potential to contribute to this deployment. In order
to unite all this force, it is necessary that the different social
groups organize themselves as such in specific organizations and at the
same time participate in the confederal organization of
society, based on communes.
As you can see, although this paradigm has been developed in the context
of the
Middle East, it tells us a lot about our social reality. It invites us
first of all to deepen the look that we take at our history, to find
that thread of
resistance of society against its colonization. It also calls on us to
observe the many forms of resistance to the system that exist in our
reality (some very different examples:
trade unionism, environmentalism, popular community culture,
feminisms...) in a positive light, and to provide a healthy framework to
come together and build an alternative to the system, defend it from its
attacks, and in a not-so-distant future to be able to propose
disputing the hegemony of Capitalist Modernity.
DEMOCRATIC CONFEDERALISM, THE LAYOUT
OF A REVOLUTIONARY PATH
We know that the multidimensional crisis that is ravaging us has its roots
in the framework of institutions and values that constitute what we
call the "system," and that therefore it is necessary to carry out a
process that replaces it in its entirety with another structure
radically different, based on mutual support, self-management and
direct democracy. A revolutionary process is necessary...
However, how do we concretize it in a feasible strategy for our
geographic and historical context?
Today is a time of collapse and therefore of opportunity
to take the revolutionary commitment more seriously. In this
process we realize how little we have clarified the path. Having a clear
horizon and intuitive steps toward it
is essential, but it is not enough. We need to trace a path that guides
those steps and directs us toward that horizon. This is where the
contributions of Abdullah Öcalan are decisive, a synthesis of 50 years
of revolutionary experience of the millions of people who make up the
movement promoted by the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).
Retracing the necessary path, Öcalan starts from the question of why the
State does not disappear in the revolutionary attempts of the so-called
Real Socialism, as predicted, but rather the opposite. He realizes that,
from its origins in Sumeria, the nature of the State is the separation
of society in order to dominate it; the State cannot serve for anything
other than to concentrate power. Therefore, expecting a State to serve
to undo domination is like asking for pears from an elm tree.
Consequently, the overthrow of a State for the foundation of another,
even if it is called a "socialist State", will never be a revolution...
at most an evolution of the system.
Knowing that the path does not pass through the construction or "taking"
of any State, it is necessary to build an alternative to this one, which
allows a qualitative change in all its facets, from materiality to
mentality: Democratic Confederalism. If the State is that which
separates itself from society in order to dictate
how to live, that which sets itself up as a subject in order to treat
society as an object, the alternative is that society as a whole
considers itself both subject and object; a subject
which does not believe itself to be in opposition to any object to be
dominated.
While, in the logic of the State, domination, a subject has to
be homogeneous, in the logic of the revolution the subject is a unity
in diversity: it needs diversity to be able to express itself in order
for there to be real unity. Furthermore, since we have grown up immersed
in the logic of the State, and we depend on it and reproduce it,
we need mirrors to deconstruct ourselves, so we need
doubly the organization of the voices that come from the
margins. Therefore, in order to articulate a counter-power that can
overthrow the State and replace it, Democratic Confederalism reminds us
that it is necessary for each expression of social diversity
(gender, culture, religion, age, etc.) to be able to organize
autonomously to contribute its voice to the whole of society. At the
same time, it is necessary that there be umbrella structures where
all these voices meet: that these structures start from the
community, that area where diverse people know each other,
affect each other in order to live and know that they are part of the same
territory in order to understand that they need to live together; and
that these
communities as a base confederate in order to manage
supra-local problems. Retracing this path that has been traced more
towards the present,
Democratic Confederalism shows us how the construction
of this counterpower, which is the articulation of a "subject of subjects",
can begin now, if we overcome the reactive struggle of going
only against the forms of oppression: to unite and destroy
that which we are still dependent on, it is necessary to propose a
project to build a system of self-organization of society, a common element
to the different struggles.
Understanding this provides a very good orientation
in order to propose concrete steps for the coming months and
years.
https://apoyomutuoaragon.net/download/679
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