US, WSA, ideas and action - Libertarianism is a Type of Socialism, NOT Classical Liberalism By Geoff

en) US, WSA, ideas and action - Libertarianism is a Type of
Socialism, NOT Classical Liberalism By Geoff

Libertarianism is a socialist political philosophy which has its roots in the socialist 
workers' movements of the 1800s and 1900s. It is especially associated with ideas that 
came out of the First International (IWA - 1864-1876), especially those of Joseph 
Proudhon, Karl Marx and Mikhail Bakunin. It was upon these ideas, as well as some of those 
which came later like those of Peter Kropotkin, that the libertarian syndicalists in Spain 
formed the CNT union in the early 1900s, with the goal of creating a libertarian 
(socialist) and workers' self-managed society. What this means is they wanted emancipation 
of the working class, recognizing that class struggle comes as a result of resistance to 
management power over workers, because business owners' aims are profit-based. This means 
that managers will submit workers to rigid control in the workplace, cut corners and 
compensation, heap stress on them, etc., in order to maximize profit.

The inequitable distribution of wealth that comes as a result of wage labor creates an 
economic, political and social power imbalance, since in the market your vote is your 
dollar, and wage labor in the workplace is an apparatus to give a minority of people more 
votes in the market than the rest. Libertarians historically wanted to replace these 
conditions with workers' self-management and create a socialist society where people have 
control over their own work and in all economic planning and decision-making, as arranged 
through popular associations like unions, assemblies, councils and federations. There are 
various concrete proposals for these types of economies from people like Cornelius 
Castoriadis, Peter Kropotkin, GDH Cole and others.

In the 1962 book "Capitalism & Freedom", Milton Friedman says: "The rightful and proper 
label is liberalism...liberalism emphasized freedom as the ultimate goal and the 
individual as the ultimate entity in the society. It supported laissez faire at home as a 
means of reducing the role of the state in economic affairs and thereby enlarging the role 
of the individual; it supported free trade abroad as a means of linking the nations of the 
world...". The word "libertarianism" became associated with right wing classical liberals 
in the U.S. in the 1960s and 1970s who sought to use the word for political opportunism. 
In "The Betrayal of the American Right", Murray Rothbard said, "One gratifying aspect of 
our rise to some prominence is that, for the first time in my memory, we, 'our side,' had 
captured a crucial word from the enemy...'Libertarians'...had long been simply a polite 
word for left-wing anarchists, that is for anti-private property anarchists, either of the 
communist or syndicalist variety. But now we had taken it over..."

An easy way to understand the major differences between libertarians and classical 
liberals is that libertarians prioritize positive liberty whereas classical liberals 
prioritize negative liberty. Positive liberty means having control over the decisions that 
affect you (self-management) and having access to the resources to fulfill your potential. 
Negative liberty means merely absence of external restraint. Because the employer doesn't 
put a gun to your head to take a job, you're supposedly "free" as far as the liberal is 
concerned. But in reality workers face a denial of positive liberty because they are 
forced to work for employers to afford access to resources they need to live their lives, 
and have no direct control over their own work or over economic planning decisions which 
affect their lives.

They also do not have direct control over how negative market externalities, like 
pollution, climate change and systemic risk, affect their lives. The freedom classical 
liberals desire includes the freedom to do things like exploit workers and pollute the 
earth. This contrasts starkly with the freedom desired by libertarians which is to create 
a political economy where people have direct control over their own work and over economic 
planning, as well as access to everything they need to fulfill their own potential.

Classical liberals' prioritization of negative over positive liberty is taken to very 
extreme ends. Murray Rothbard said "...the parent should not have a legal obligation to 
feed, clothe, or educate his children, since such obligations would entail positive acts 
coerced upon the parent and depriving the parent of his rights... the parent should have 
the legal right not to feed the child, i.e., to allow it to die..." It also led Ludwig von 
Mises to be an apologist for fascism: "It cannot be denied that Fascism and similar 
movements aiming at the establishment of dictatorships are full of the best intentions and 
that their intervention has, for the moment, saved European civilization. The merit that 
Fascism has thereby won for itself will live on eternally in history."

Fredrich Hayek, in regards to the dictatorship of Pinochet in Chile, said: "...a 
dictatorship may be a necessary system for a transitional period. At times it is necessary 
for a country to have, for a time, some form or other of dictatorial power. As you will 
understand, it is possible for a dictator to govern in a liberal way. And it is also 
possible for a democracy to govern with a total lack of liberalism. Personally I prefer a 
liberal dictator to democratic government lacking liberalism." Coincidentally, Milton 
Friedman was an unofficial economic advisor to Pinochet as part of the "Chicago Boys" 
economics group.

To conclude, classical liberalism, which prioritizes negative over positive liberty, leads 
to extremely despotic anti-democratic and anti-working class advocacy. This stands in 
stark contrast to libertarianism, which prioritizes positive liberty and has its roots in 
the socialist tradition. The word "libertarianism" in the U.S. was usurped by classical 
liberals for political opportunism, so it is important for actual libertarians, like those 
of us at WSA, to show this opportunism for what it truly is, and reject any and all 
association the word "libertarian" has with classical liberalism.

http://ideasandaction.info/2015/08/libertarianism-type-socialism-classical-liberalism/

US, WSA, Ideas & Actions - We Support the Uprising in Baltimore

This is a war that will not end. It is only growing more deadly. In 2013 767 people were 
killed by police (64 a month, most of the them African Americans); in 2014 1101 people 
were killed by police (92 a month, most of them African Americans); in the 4 months of 
2015 380 people have so far been killed police, (95 a month, most of them African 
Americans). ---- The militarization of the police has had a predictable outcome: the 
police are now behaving like the military would in their policing function. The rules of 
martial law are now (unofficially) in effect and anyone who violates those laws is The 
Enemy; the "insurgents"; the "terrorists" etc. and subject to summary execution. If by 
chance that person happens to be a Black Man, so much the better. The role of the police, 
their true role, has always been to protect the property of the Master Class from any 
defilement by rebel slaves.

Now, thanks to the grassroots organizing of the Black Lives Matter movement, people have 
risen up and are fighting back as best they can. In Baltimore the people are taking the 
fight to the oppressors. We can only hope this flame spreads like wildfire, and that the 
murderous police forces feel the heat in Philadelphia, New York, Memphis and Los Angeles, 
and all the other places they have decided to engage in ethnic cleansing.

In America, the capitalist system was founded on slavery and white supremacy. The only way 
to end the insanity of white supremacy is to end the American capitalist system. We need 
to build a new society, one based on true egalitarianism, where everyone, EVERY ONE, is 
actually and finally equal forever.

http://ideasandaction.info/2015/04/support-uprising-baltimore/

(en) US, WSA, Ideas & Actions - Reply to ISO on Syndicalism By Tom Wetzel

The International Socialist Organization's webzine socialistworker.org recently published 
a critique of revolutionary syndicalism in the form of a review of Radical Unionism by 
Ralph Darlington. The review, by Tom Goulet, makes a number of mistaken claims. ---- The 
claim that "syndicalist unions broke off from mainstream federations to form 'purely 
revolutionary' unions, cutting themselves off from the mass of workers" doesn't hold up, 
though it does conform to the Leninist orthodoxy of Leftwing Communism: An Infantile 
Disorder. There were many countries where the syndicalist unions were the majority - such 
as Portugal, Spain, Argentina, Uruguay, Peru, Brazil. Syndicalist unions in South Africa, 
such as the Industrial Workers of Africa (modeled on the IWW) were the only union that 
organized native African workers, who were excluded from the white craft unions.

At the time of the mass occupation of the factories in Italy in September, 1920, the USI 
was claiming 800,000 members, and the factory councils formed throughout Italy in those 
events were mostly organized by the USI. Moreover, it was the anarcho-syndicalists who 
initiated a militia movement (arditti del popolo) to fight Mussolini's fascist squads. But 
the Communists didn't cooperate and the Socialist Party capitulated to fascism.

Darlington claims the IWW went into decline with government repression in 1917. This claim 
is needed in order to justify the Communist International's orders to its American 
followers to ditch the IWW because supposedly the IWW was in decline. Actually the IWW 
continued to grow in the early '20s, reaching its peak in 1923. The IWW mass unions were 
in industries where there either was no AFL union or a competing AFL union that was no 
larger than the IWW union. Moreover, in industries where IWW was a minority they often 
worked as a "dual card" pressure group within the AFL unions.

Moreover, the claim that revolutionary syndicalism "rejects politics" contradicts the 
criticism that syndicalists have an unrealistic ideal of a highly politicized unionism 
that can play a revolutionary role. The ISO needs to make up their mind which criticism 
they want to make: Did syndicalists advocate a narrow focus on merely economic issues 
("economism") or did they have unrealistic expectations of the political role unionism 
could play? These two traditional Leninist criticisms are logically inconsistent with 
each other.

In Spain at present the two syndicalist unions, CGT and CNT, often work to develop 
alliances with social movements (women's groups, ecologists, housing squatters) as in 
general strike mobilizations. The CGT has separate encuentros for its women members to 
develop campaigns -- as for example their current campaign for free abortion on demand, 
against the right wing government's efforts to criminalize abortion. These are examples of 
how the unions do develop political strategy and focus. The ISO claim that the syndicalist 
unions never developed "a political program" is simply untrue. Moreover, this claim is 
inconsistent with their claim that revolutionary syndicalists are "unrealistic" in seeking 
to develop unionism as a revolutionary movement.

Marxism historically proposed a division of labor, with "politics" being reserved for the 
party, and the union relegated to "the economic sphere." At the time of the formation of 
the Communist International, the Russian Communists demanded that the revolutionary 
syndicalist unions become mere "transmission belts" for the Communist parties in their 
countries. In practice this division of labor has always been used as an excuse by union 
leaders to avoid mass action around larger political questions. They will tell workers 
they need to vote for the party. This was the role the Communist Party played in 
demobilizing the population in France after the mass general strike in 1968.

The review claims that syndicalists over-emphasize "spontaneity." Although syndicalists do 
emphasize the control by workers of their own struggles, syndicalism has always placed 
great emphasis on preparation and building the capacity of militants. For example in the 
'30s the anarcho-syndicalists in Spain organized dozens of storefront worker schools and 
cultural centers in working class neighborhoods of Barcelona and Valencia. Knowledge and 
organizing skills of rank and file workers were developed through newspapers, workshops, 
study groups and other efforts.

Goulet also offers a mistaken conception of the revolutionary general strike. As Lucy 
Parsons said in her remarks to the founding convention of the IWW, the syndicalist 
conception is an "inside" strike, a generalized takeover of the means of production and 
all the capitalists' assets. The syndicalist idea is that having a grassroots worker mass 
movement in the workplaces provides an organized movement with the skills and position to 
carry out this generalized lockout of the bosses, and to ensure that people's needs are 
met in a situation of rapid change. We have a vivid example of an expropriating general 
strike in the mass seizure of industry and farm land by the syndicalist unions of the CNT 
in Spain in 1936. More than 18,000 companies and 14 million acres of farm land were 
expropriated, according to Burnett Bolloten (a UPI reporter in Spain at the time).

The CNT movement also smashed up the army in many parts of the country and built its own 
proletarian army of about 100,000 to fight the fascists. This is clearly a demonstration 
of the possibility of a union movement playing a revolutionary role.

As Marx put it: "If the Trades Unions are required for the guerilla fights between capital 
and labour, they are still more important as organised agencies for superseding the very 
system of wages labour and capital rule."

http://ideasandaction.info/2015/04/reply-iso-syndicalism/

(en) US, WSA, Ideas & Actions - Why solidarity is necessary - but it's not just about class By Geoff

"An injury to one is an injury to all". This IWW slogan characterizes the solidarity 
necessitated by class struggle. It characterizes the idea that it's necessary for the 
working class to cooperate and work together towards their individual interests, as these 
are also class interests. The interests of gaining control over economic, social and work 
decisions which affect the working class directly is made necessary due to the odious 
nature of our current global economic conditions. ---- But this slogan really goes further 
than just class. It is also an embodiment of the solidarity necessitated by intersecting 
forms of oppression which divide the working class and hinder their ability to fight back 
in the global class war. Intersectional, meaning, issues concerned with intersections 
between forms or systems of oppression, domination or discrimination. These issues also 
create various social hierarchies which marginalize and disempower people. Examples of 
these issues include, but are not limited to, racism, sexism, queerphobia and gender 
essentialism. For instance, sexual harassment in the workplace, workplace discrimination 
on bounds of race or gender, and gender essentialism when it comes to the dignity of 
transgender folks who often experience terrible cruelty from others when they need to use 
public restrooms.

To quote Bakunin, "I am truly free only when all human beings...are equally free...". This 
means that a worker in the USA who gains freedom and control over their own work isn't 
truly free while other workers in, say, China and Africa continue to be brutally repressed 
and exploited. But it also means that, so long as social hierarchies characterized by 
intersectional issues are not addressed and dissolved, that the working class as a whole 
cannot be free. In other words, there cannot be real liberty, equality and solidarity 
where some workers are discriminated against or otherwise disempowered by social hierarchies.

So, for instance, there is no real solidarity expressed by people who are only interested 
in their particular craft's labor fights (because it has no real class 
characteristic)...for instance, IBEW workers crossing USW's picket line during the recent 
refinery strike. But additionally, there is also no real solidarity expressed by people 
who are only concerned with freedom, for instance, for white, male, heterosexual, 
cisgender workers, as these are folks who are not subject to marginalization like other 
workers are, including people of color, women, queer and transgender folks. Because 
different workers are subject to various social hierarchies (like patriarchy, racism and 
queerphobia) and they experience a lack of freedom differently than others of the working 
class.

As a result, it is critical for those of us who believe fighting for another world 
characterized by human dignity, liberty and equality, to understand that such a thing is 
necessitated by solidarity. But also that this solidarity must be characterized by both 
class struggle as well as the recognition of the need to combat and resolve intersectional 
issues and dissolve all their associated social hierarchies. Because these issues 
ultimately disempower and marginalize people, prevent the liberation of the working class 
and throw a wrench in the spokes of libertarian solidarity.

http://ideasandaction.info/2015/04/solidarity-its-class/

(en) US, WSA, Ideas & Action - Anarcho-Syndicalist Organizations – Operating Principles By Ann Kij

Last week I wrote some advice about what to consider if you want to start an 
anarcho-syndicalist organization. That advice concerned mainly focusing on your activity. 
Another important area would be setting out your operating principles in line with 
anarcho-syndicalist practice. ---- Mostly this means writing good statutes for the 
organization. If we look through the statutes of existing organizations, we see many 
different provisions, but some common elements. The common elements rest on the idea that 
the decision making in the organization should come from below and that anybody who is 
chosen to perform a function in the organization should be held accountable, be recallable 
and should be rotated. These ideas are very important, because anarcho-syndicalists aim to 
create a libertarian society and thus, the strive to embody these ideas in the functioning 
of their organizations.

Statutes of an organization can be quite different. Some organizations choose to put some 
of the more detailed rules in some sort of internal document or resolve them but don’t put 
them in the Statutes at all. For example, most organizations appoint a Secretary of some 
sort to answer the mail. The organization may decide what they want done with the mail: do 
they want all correspondence forwarded as it is received, do they want it sent in a digest 
or bulletin, do they want it archived and preserved? And the organization might also 
think, is there any mail which the Secretary cannot answer without a decision of the 
organization? For example, requests for endorsements or mail that concern international 
referenda. In any case, these detailled points may or may not be written in the 
organization’s statutes. The organization may decide to define the mandates of people 
appointed in seperate documents.

When drawing up statutes, it is important that the founding group think about the form of 
the organization at the point of creation and what will realistically be its size and 
scope in the first years. Statutes can and should be defined later, but my the new people 
in the organization and based on experience and need. For example, a larger 
anarcho-syndicalist organization may have regional organizations. And then it might have 
to think of how it functions, whether votes in the organization come from local 
organizations to regions and then organization wide, or directly from local organizations 
to the whole organization. The statute of my organization envisoned regional organizations 
from the beginning and they are in the statutes, but since they never existed, we have 
never had to decide anything about how they function (although I presume we would not want 
to vote through regionals and I also presume if any regionals do appear in the future, it 
will start off in one region and for practical reasons). Once I saw that an organization 
which was forming actually adopted a statute which already should how the organization 
would theoretically function if it had hundreds or thousands of people. It was a good 
exercise in thinking theoretically about how organizations can function – but all of it 
had no application to an organization that barely had local groups in more than one city.

So it is not necessary to get ahead of yourself. As your organization develops, you will 
see what needs to be added to your statutes and maybe what needs to be changed. These 
discussions should take place in the organization from time to time.

What is important to determine are the basics:
How is voting done in the organization? Is it by individual votes, votes of the local 
groups or unions?

What are the organizational units in the organization? Is it a local group, a branch 
union, a workplace union or all of these? How many people does it take to form an 
organizational unit?

Who decides if a new organizational unit can be part of your organization?
What are the rights and responsibilities of members? What about dues? How are they 
affiliated or disaffiliated? Who decides about the affiliation or disaffiliation of a member?

Are there any limitations to membership?

How are decisions made? Which decisions should be the decisions of the local group and of 
the entire organization? Are they made at organization-wide meetings or can they be made 
through referendum? How are motions submitted and within what time frame?
What tasks need to be done by a mandated person in the organization? What are the mandated 
functions of these people, what can they do on their own and what do they need to ask the 
organization about? What is the accountability proceed, the term of the mandate and the 
process for recalling them, if need be?

This is just the very basics. As an organization actually functions, it can get more 
complicated.

Some organizations start very modestly. At the beginning stages, it might even be a dozen 
or a few dozen people and many start a mailing list, where opinions tend to be personal 
ones and that’s what discussions look like. As the organization grows bigger, there should 
be a move away from this, as the discussions should be inside the unions and the 
discussion between the member organizations, not the individuals who have the most time to 
discuss on some forums. Talking things out through the unions makes the process longer, 
but we have to think about what we are actually proposing. We are proposing a society 
where decisions are made on one level and brought to another group of people to be made on 
another level. The type of process seen in some informal groups, which usually are not 
many people, is not appropriate when an organization gets larger. But if you are just 
starting an organization, you do not have to take a form of organization that is not 
practical for you yet. However, it is worth being aware of things like this so that you 
are ready to change as your organization develops.

http://ideasandaction.info/2015/02/anarcho-syndicalist-organizations-operating-principles/

US, WSA, Ideas & Action - Want to Build an Anarchosyndicalist Organization? By Ann Kij

The following is based on observations of different organizations, local groups and 
unions. While sometimes different ways work in different circumstances, I feel there are 
some practices which get organizations off track and some that are useful for moving 
forward. In all cases I am speaking about smallish sized organizations which have yet to 
develop as a union but would like to. Organizations which are larger or have certain 
experience tend to have different issues. ---- 1. Establish goals. ---- The most important 
thing is to realize that our (very) long term goal of creating a libertarian society is 
just that – a long term goal. We need to promote and work towards it. But we also need to 
set more immediate goals and shorter-term goals which relate to practical activity. This 
is important because people need to see that anarchosyndicalism is not just a nice dream 
that doesn’t work now.

It is a mistake to think that attracting more people should rely mostly on promoting a 
theory. The best way to attract people is to decide how you can put your theory into 
practice in the here and now and get something working. But in order to do this, you have 
to scale down your theory. Scaling it down does not mean watering it down. In no way do I 
mean depoliticize what your organization stands for. I mean that you have to find a way 
that what you do reflects your goals and can be expanded on.

A scaled down goal then could be to create self-managed unions working on 
anarchosyndicalist principles. These can be of modest size and still can have effect. A 
union can also be of general membership and work in various professions or workplaces; it 
doesn’t need to be only in one. Once they become known or start to have effect, you will 
have to do a lot less work to attract people. People will start to seek you out at some point.

A starting point is to think of some possible project that would be most likely to bring 
attention to your organization and involve people who would like to do something concrete 
in their work place or concerning a more widespread labour problem. Having a project like 
this helps the organization to focus, to learn better organizing skills, to develop skills 
related to critical reflection and to come into contact with more members of the public 
who can sympathize with you or join.

It is important to choose a project or campaign that is realistic given your current 
capacities or some capacity you could reach in the immediate future.
2. Working towards the goals

If you don’t have a realistic short-term goal and projects or campaigns to help you 
realize it, you run the risk of being all over the place. Some organizations meet every 
week, without any really set agenda or working plan and just chat or react to some current 
matters, for example, current matters in politics or campaigns of other organizations or 
on other issues. This is not a good way to stay focused.

Meetings need to be regular. Well-planned meetings set agendas in advance and allow people 
who cannot attend a chance to provide input. It is important to write minutes. Minutes can 
be reviewed regularly, for example, after every 6 months, to see how meeting time is spent 
effectively or not.
It is a bad practice to let everything in the world come up at the meeting. If you don’t 
have your own business to discuss at the meeting and are just waiting for somebody to come 
along and bring their topic, it means you haven’t set out a campaign very well. Setting 
out the campaign means giving concrete tasks to people to do over reasonable periods of 
time, and reporting back regularly on the progress.

In order to stay focused, anarchosyndicalist organizations need to remember that they are 
different than anarchist organizations. While any organization may be interested in some 
other issues, the time you spend in the organization should reflect your main focus and 
goals. In other words, don’t get off on a million topics and don’t spend the majority of 
time on political issues and movement issues that are not related to the workplace if you 
claim workplace organizing is a priority.
3. Talk to people, not to yourself.

The webpage or printed organs of the organization say a lot to people who check you out. 
Since people are all different, ideally things would be geared towards different types of 
people. But it is important for people to know that your anarchosyndicalism relates to the 
here and now, not to some pie-in-the-sky post-revolutionary society.

For this reason, there have to be articles aimed mostly at people who are not from any 
movement, as well as ones that show how our organizations work in reality, not only in theory.
Focusing too much on history or using a lot of notions which are understood only by a 
narrow group of people limits your contact with people and give an impression that these 
things are theoretical, not things to be practiced now.

Webpages and printed organs should be scrutinized in this regard. This doesn’t mean that 
there cannot be more theoretical publications. But without something that focuses on 
practical applications of our ideas, we are less likely to inspire people.

Speaking of inspiring people, it is very important to have face-to-face contact. At the 
beginning, it is more important to have open events and these events again should tend to 
focus on practical organizing rather then things like the Spanish Revolution. Hearing 
tales about revolutions may be very interesting but it doesn’t make the difference between 
whether your organization remains a propaganda group or becomes a functioning union, even 
on a modest scale. Having meetings which allow more interaction and planning ways that new 
people can join in the organization’s activity is very helpful.

This is just for a start and the tip of the iceberg, but maybe these things are most 
important.

http://ideasandaction.info/2015/02/build-anarchosyndicalist-organization/

(en) US, WSA, Ideas & Action - Remembering Sam Mbah

On November 17, the blog administrator for Sam Mbah?s website announced that Sam had died 
on November 6, 2014, ?of complications arising from his heart condition. His recovery had 
appeared to be going well, but then a crisis arose and he was rushed to hospital. He died 
a short time later.? ---- On behalf of the Workers Solidarity Alliance (WSA), we send our 
condolences to the family, friends and comrades of Sam?s. Some of us met Sam when, on very 
short notice, hastily organized his US tour some years ago. We reflect back on the key and 
pivotal role Sam and the Awareness League played in Enugu State, Nigeria in the struggle 
against the then military dictatorship of Abcha. ---- We remember well the WSA?s initial 
efforts at developing relations with the AL, a relationship which was partially successful 
in bring the AL into the fold of the International Workers Association. And, to help 
develop international relations between the AL and countless other anarchist, libertarian 
socialist and syndicalist individuals, groups and unions throughout the globe.

It was delightful and pleasing to read the (then) new AL declaration, proclaiming 
themselves ?a social libertarian organisation inspired by and committed to the ideals, 
principles, objectives, goals, ends and purposes of revolutionary socialism and 
anarcho-syndicalism, characterised as the anti-theses of statism as well as their 
manifestations and institutions thereof.?

Perhaps, just perhaps, the efforts of former members of the US Revolutionary Socialist 
League, Bob McGlynn (of Neither East Nor West) and the WSA have helped our Nigerian 
comrades move from your typical marxian socialist views to that of anarcho-syndicalism and 
libertarian socialism.

The relationship deepened and develop. Many of us worked especially hard to make sure our 
pre-internet and pre-cell phone campaigns to aid AL prisoners, try and purchase a computer 
and other supportive and solidarity oriented activities gained as much support as could be 
garnered. In some aspects, we were successful, in others not. Certainly the campaigns that 
we helped to initiate and push were some of the best that some of us can recall.

Additionally, during this time period, Chaz from See Sharp Press worked hard to publish 
the landmark book ?African Anarchism?.

Sam?s tour to the US was less then stellar. We had two weeks to arrange a national tour. 
Again, this was done pre-internet and pre-cell phone. It was tough, it was uneven, very 
last minute and it was clear to this writer Sam was terribly disappointed and let down. 
His hopes that a big, effective and well financed and oiled movement existing in the US 
were dashed. When dropping him off at the airport, I sensed his disappointment. 
Communications thereafter dropped off precipitously.

After a number of years of not hearing from the AL, in reply to one of our letters, WSA 
get a communication which started off in the most pleasing and satisfying manner: ?It has 
indeed been a long time since the Awareness League last communicated with the WSA. Suffice 
it to say that the AL holds the WSA in special esteem and will continue to. We continue to 
look forward to improved relations and a deepening of our ties through future 
co-operation/collaboration.? (May 2001) I believe that was the last communication we had 
with the AL.

WSA tried to keep up with the AL even after we were no longer part of the IWA. Apparently 
the AL was dissipating in membership and activities due to a number of factors, most of 
all the downfall of the military dictatorship.

As Sam explained in his 2001 letter:

?With the advent of civil rule, many in our ranks have tended to lower their guards. The 
philosophical and ideological underpinning of the struggle for a truly free society 
remains at best, underdeveloped in these parts. And this coupled with the fact that life 
here is an everyday struggle, to be able to eke out a living or survive.

Yet those who were left in the AL continued to have ?high hopes and expectations of 
transition to civil rule give way to frustration, cynicism, despair and discontent 
threatening to boil over. We are gradually and steadily returning to the trenches once 
again.? Whether or not significant numbers returned to the trenches to keep the AL alive 
is unclear. It seems like they were not able to hold the necessary numbers together.

In his last interview in 2012, Sam was clear and sober in making this point, a point
that many in countries that have developed or historical libertarian socialist, 
syndicalist and anarchist traditions oft times never seem to get or understand:

? I want to say a few words to our anarchist friends and groups that in the past 
associated with us, supported us, in one way or another, especially from Europe and North 
America. I say to them that anarchism is not dead in Africa. But it is important for them 
to appreciate that anarchism as a movement, as a political movement, as an ideological 
platform, is still going to take some time to crystallize here.?

The take away being, that anarchism, as many of us in the West know it, will take its own 
path. Perhaps not even a straight one. But we should not sit in judgment, but offer the 
type of solidarity required to help keep comrades connected, even broadly, to the global 
movements.

There are no perfect souls, only those who try their best.

Sam tried his best at helping to build, develop, nurture and organize an effective 
libertarian socialist and syndicalist movement in the heart of Africa. With no real 
resources, under the iron heel of a military dictatorship he did his best. And the WSA is 
glad that we were able to do our small part aid their efforts.

Sam, comrade, as the slogan of the AL was ?Holding aloft the banner of the struggle?, in 
our memory, you will always be holding that banner aloft. Farewell comrade, farewell.

(en) US, WSA, Ideas & Action - Lessons from the Air Traffic Controllers? Strike of 1981 by A.E. Martinez

?There are no illegal strikes, just unsuccessful ones.? ? PATCO slogan ---- August 3rd, 
1981: Approximately 13,000 air traffic controllers across the United States declare a 
strike through their union, the Professional Air Traffic Controllers? Organization 
(PATCO). Their strike echoed the usual demands of the labor movement: better wages, better 
working conditions, a shorter workweek, and ultimately a greater voice for workers at 
work. Indeed, the PATCO strike was hardly remarkable in any way. In our own decade, we 
have seen public-sector workers walk out several times over grievances basically identical 
to those of the PATCO workers, whether they were Chicago schoolteachers in 2012, New York 
City subway workers in 2014, or Philadelphia subway workers again in the same year.

As public employees, PATCO workers were in an unfortunate position where their employer 
was the same body that writes and enforces the law. The state is predictably hypocritical 
when it comes to dealing with its own employees: while it maintains a general policy of 
non-intervention in allowing private-sector workers to strike, it does not extend the same 
rights to its own employees ? in 39 states, it is illegal for public-sector workers to 
strike. Clearly, the state sees no conflict of interests in an arrangement where the body 
responsible for administering workers? right to strike is also a body which employs workers.

Despite the rather routine pattern followed by the PATCO workers, then-President Reagan 
made it clear that his goal was to break the strike and crush the union. Speaking as both 
the employer and the state executive, Reagan ordered PATCO workers to return to work at 
the threat of termination, on the very same day they had walked out. With only 1,300 air 
traffic controllers heeding Reagan?s warning, the strike lived on. On August 5th, Reagan 
summarily fired the remaining 11,500 workers and called in military air traffic 
controllers to replace them. Finally, on October 22nd, the government formally stripped 
PATCO of the right to legally represent workers as a labor union.

What the State Gives, It Can Take Away

To be clear, the government did not destroy PATCO. It did not raid its union halls, arrest 
its leaders, or murder its organizers. It merely stripped PATCO of the legal title of 
?union:? PATCO could no longer be considered the legal representative of workers. Very 
simply, in the eyes of the state, PATCO was no longer a union. As such, PATCO was only 
?destroyed? inasmuch as it relied on legal recognition for its existence. PATCO as a labor 
organization dissolved not from the result of state aggression, but due to its own 
over-reliance on state recognition.

Labor law has transformed the landscape of labor organizing. Before labor law was 
introduced, labor unions relied exclusively on the collective power of workers to stop 
working. To ?organize? a plant was simply to gain a majority of workers to become union 
members. The union would then approach the employer and declare, ?Either give us better 
working conditions, or we will stop working until you do.? Labor unions were simply bodies 
created by workers to organize and coordinate their collective power. If the union was 
unable to initiate or enforce a work stoppage, it had no power at the bargaining table. 
The bargaining power of the union was thus totally dependent on the active participation 
of the workers.

Nowadays, most labor unions have abandoned the power of united workers for the power of 
the law. Today?s organizing drive has little to do with organizing. Rather, the union 
initiates an election campaign in which they convince the workers to consent to the Union 
?representing?

them. The government will then hold an election and, if the Union wins a majority of the 
votes, the Union is certified to be the legal representative of those workers. In this 
arrangement, unions rarely depend on inspiring workers to act collectively. Indeed, they 
do not depend on the worker or his/her power at all: their legitimacy is derived from 
government recognition, not from workers identifying the union with their interests.

What happens if, like in the PATCO strike, the government takes away the Union?s right to 
legally represent workers at the bargaining table? For a union that relies on the law?s 
power rather than the workers?, this means immediate destruction. But for a genuine union 
of workers, this would make little difference. Genuinely, a labor union is nothing more 
than a coalition of workers uniting to gain power in their workplace. Workers do not need 
state recognition to organize their collective ability to shut down production.

In an analogous situation, the lumber workers of the Industrial Workers of the World came 
to the same conclusion (in 1917, no less):

When workers sign an agreement not to strike, they sign away the only weapon they possess. 
Past experience has shown that employers only respect contracts so long as the workers 
have power to enforce them. When the workers have such power, contracts are unnecessary. 
When they lack power, contracts are useless, for the employers break them whenever it 
suits their purpose?

Where workers are organized enough to demand a union to be recognized as their legal 
representative, they do not need the law in the first place. Where workers are so 
disorganized to the point where they need legal recognition to force the employer to the 
bargaining table, they have no power at the bargaining table to begin with, as the only 
true power workers possess is their collective ability to stop or interfere with work.

By abandoning shopfloor-level mobilization of workers, we are surrendering the only power 
we as workers possess. Now that a union?s bargaining power is tied to state recognition, 
the unions must obey the law to remain ?legitimate? in the eyes of the government: if the 
state rules a strike illegal (as with PATCO), the Union must call it off or be 
decertified. The Union must further turn against its workers when they engage in 
collective activity which has been deemed illegal (sympathy strikes, boycotts and hot 
cargos, slow-downs).

Ironically, it was ?illegal? labor action like that of the PATCO strike which established 
these laws in the first place.

Labor Law: Comfort at the Expense of Power

Labor laws were not passed out of benevolence or good-will on the part of the state. Nor 
was it strategic political lobbying or campaign funding by unions which created these laws 
(no matter how much AFL-CIO leaders would like you to believe otherwise). No ? faced with 
an increasingly militant and powerful labor movement, the state was forced to create a 
system which reigned in unions? power. The laws that govern labor today, in every case, 
were introduced as emergency measure by business interests to halt the progress made by 
organized labor.

The National Labor Relations Act of 1935 (which is the foundational law for collective 
bargaining in the United States, and covers virtually all private-sector workers) is the 
most obvious example. 1934 saw a wave of militant work stoppages across the country: 
workers initiated a general strike in San Francisco while dockworkers up and down the west 
coast

collectively paralyzed shipping; commercial truck drivers shut down the city of 
Minneapolis (and 20,000 construction workers went on strike to support them), while 
factory workers in Ohio occupied their factories in a mass strike supported by leagues of 
unemployed workers.

In the summer of 1934 alone, 12 strikers were killed by police, the National Guard, and 
employer-hired militiamen. One police report from the Minneapolis Teamsters? Strike read 
plainly:

Police took direct aim at the picketers and fired to kill. [...] No weapons were in 
possession of the picketers.1

How did the state go from a policy of shooting strikers in 1934, to ?guaranteeing? their 
right to strike in 1935? In one year, the police and military lined up behind the 
employers; a few months later, the state proclaimed that it cherished workers? right to 
strike, and would defend that right from the employers. The National Labor Relations Act 
and other laws like it disarmed the labor movement and turned organizing into a 
stage-managed reenactment of genuine labor organizing. Thus, the state came to support 
striking, so long as these strikes were conducted within the parameters of laws which 
greatly reduced whatever threat was posed by organized labor to employers or politicians. 
Rather than gain the trust and confidence of workers, unions merely had to collect signed 
authorization cards; rather than rely on a mass work stoppage to enforce a contract or to 
oppose an unjust firing, unions need only to turn to the ?impartial? labor courts.

Labor law makes running a union much simpler for union executives, just as it makes 
dealing with unions much easier for employers and the state alike. Indeed, it would seem 
that labor law is beneficial for everyone except actual workers. Whereas labor law gives 
generously to employers, and concedes much (though conditionally) to unions, labor law has 
only curtailed the power of workers.

Though it may be tempting to make the case that the state will only respond with an iron 
fist to public-sector unions, the truth is that both public- and private-sector unions 
must deal with the price of state recognition. The state regularly breaks strikes in the 
private sector ? after all, it was the state?s iron-fisted response to private-sector 
strikes in 1934 which created these very laws! The trade-off between the comfort and 
security provided by the law, and the power it takes away from workers, is a price that 
all unions must grapple with ? whether they are public or private, and whether they 
operate under the National Labor Relations Act, the Railway Labor Act, or any other labor 
law. Without state recognition, does the labor movement have the degree of workplace-level 
self-organization to survive? Indeed, if we took away state recognition altogether, would 
there be any real ?labor movement? left?

1: 1934 Teamster Strike from the International Brotherhood of Teamsters? official website. 
http://teamster.org/about/teamster-history/1934

(en) US, WSA, Ideas & Action - Property Before People By Mike Kolhoff

"Government has no other end, but the preservation of property." - John Locke ---- The 
granting of corporations the status and protections usually reserved for individuals has 
hammered home a simple message: property is more important than people. Nowhere has this 
been more apparent than in the repression of the radical ecology movement known as the 
"Green Scare"; in every prosecution for civil disobedience or sabotage, the "rights" of 
private property have consistently been demonstrated as superior to those of individual 
human protesters freedom to act on their beliefs. ---- The leveling of felony charges 
against protestors during the Occupy movement and in previous summit protests has been out 
of all proportion to the supposed crimes committed, making it clear that such egregious 
prosecution can only be understood as an act of intimidation.

In the recent trial of three women for blockading the Endridge Pipeline in Michigan, the 
judge, William Collette, announced in a pre-trial hearing:

""I am tired of people coming in here seeking publicity for themselves...I'm ready to try 
these cases. ... I'm tired of it, and it's going to go to trial...I am unsympathetic to 
people who try to use this courtroom as some place to make a statement about your problems."

He was tired of protestors and civil disobedience. With such a judge, the outcome of the 
trial was a foregone conclusion.

"The trial of peaceful activists ended today with the jury finding Vicci Hamlin, Lisa 
Leggio, and Barb Carter guilty of both charges brought against them: trespassing and 
resisting and obstructing an officer. Supporters are deeply saddened that after 
deliberation for over 10 hours the verdict returned was guilty of all counts. The jury was 
split most of this time, returning to the courtroom several times for clarification. 
Sentencing was scheduled for March 5th and the defendants' bail was revoked and they were 
immediately taken into custody."

Along with ecological dissidents, animal rights activists have also been specifically 
targeted for suppression: "Bills that criminalize whistleblowing on farms have passed in 
over a dozen states so far. Often referred to as "Ag-Gag" bills, they prohibit taking 
pictures or filming on a farm without permission to prevent whistleblowers from exposing 
animal cruelty. Many of the bills are based on ALEC's model legislation, "The Animal and 
Ecological Terrorism Act." The ALEC model bill not only bans taking pictures or video on 
farms, but would also place violators on a "terrorist registry." 
(http://frackthemedia.com/surveillance-political-dissent-part-ii-criminalizing-dissent/)

The price of peaceful protest has been increased exponentially, or rather, the price of 
effectively expressing dissent has increased. Participation in ineffective expressions of 
dissent is still okay, such as participating in elections. With the electoral system owned 
completely by the capitalists, all electoral politics are ineffective politics.

Using the legal system as a stick to beat dissidents with isn't a new development of 
course. You would need to go no further back than the trials of the protesters of the 
Vietnam era to find people being prosecuted not for actual crimes, but for their 
opposition to the status quo. The thing that's hard to digest is that twenty years ago the 
majority of people would have readily agreed that such prosecutions are contrary to the 
spirit of free speech within an open society. Now, if people actually do think this way 
they seem content to be silent on the subject.

(en) US, WSA, Ideas & Action - Evaluating two decades of indigenous resistance in Chiapas - A Reply to Dan La Botz By Steven Fake

Dan La Botz, a long-time labor activist who has considerable familiarity with Mexican 
affairs, marked the 20th anniversary of the Zapatista rebellion by penning a reflection on 
their legacy. His critique reflects his openness to electoral strategies for social 
change. La Botz is a member of Solidarity, one of the handful of Trotskyist-inspired 
groups of any visibility in the U.S. His views may be taken as broadly representative of a 
substantial chunk of the left, particularly Marxists. ---- In his assessment - "Twenty 
Years Since the Chiapas Rebellion: The Zapatistas, Their Politics, and Their Impact," 
January 13, 2014 - La Botz accuses the Zapatistas of "political abstentionism." The phrase 
requires some translation for those not steeped in left historical minutiae. Under this 
logic, political activity refers only to the electoral realm. One may engage in 
occupations, sit-ins, or demonstrations, while still being a political abstentionist.

La Botz holds the orthodox Marxist view that "elections by parties which are genuinely 
independent provide an opportunity for the left to propagandize for its ideas and to use 
elected positions to contribute to the organization of social movements." History 
furnishes few instances to support this supposition.

La Botz recounts how,

"When the 2000 elections approached, the EZLN announced that it would not support either 
of the two rightwing parties--the National Action Party (PAN) and the Institutional 
Revolutionary Party--nor would they support the leftwing Party of the Democratic 
Revolution (PRD) led by Cuauht?moc C?rdenas. C?rdenas, who had been a presidential 
candidate in 1988 and 1994, remained enormously popular on the left. Many hoped that the 
Zapatistas would support him, though organizations of the revolutionary left were divided 
over the issue of whether to support C?rdenas or back some independent socialist 
candidate. The EZLN, however, rejected elections in general and Marcos excoriated Mexico's 
political parties of all stripes as compromised and corrupt."

For La Botz, the problem with this approach is that even illegitimate elections have 
consequences: "the election proved not to be irrelevant to the Zapatistas." This is a 
refrain particularly familiar in the U.S. during the Obama era.

The more consequential error for La Botz, came during the next presidential contest:

"In 2006 when the next presidential elections took place, Marcos and EZLN adopted a 
different approach. Once again, most of the Mexican left hoped that the EZLN would support 
the left candidate, Andr?s Manuel L?pez Obrador of the PRD, who was speaking out strongly 
against NAFTA, neoliberalism, and the corruption of the PRI and PAN. The EZLN, still 
rejecting both elections and the existing parties, had other plans. Marcos announced the 
organization of la Otra Campa?a (the Other Campaign). Unlike other political parties, the 
EZLN would not put forward its own candidates and would not support the candidates of 
other parties, but would instead organize a campaign that would travel around the country 
speaking out against the Mexican government and against capitalism. ....

Meanwhile the PRD's left candidate L?pez Obrador harangued crowds of up to a million, 
mostly working class and poor people, with his populist rhetoric. When it became clear 
that President Fox and the ruling PAN party were violating election law and preparing an 
enormous fraud, which in fact took place on election day in July, there arose an enormous 
protest movement in defense of a fair election and citizens' right to have their votes 
counted. Tens and perhaps hundreds of thousands in Mexico City joined the protests 
blocking the boulevards and occupying public plazas.

Several of the revolutionary left groups involved in the Other Campaign went off to join 
the election protests as a matter of principle; even if they hadn't liked the parties and 
candidates offered up in the election they felt the citizens had the right to vote and 
have their vote counted. Marcos and the EZLN, opposed on principle to elections, refused 
to participate in the defense-of-the-vote protests. So they withdrew and retired to 
Chiapas. The Zapatistas sectarian attitude toward that movement did enormous damage to 
their reputation among those in the broad left and those on the far left. They lost much 
of the moral authority that had clung to them since the 1994 uprising."

The refusal of the Zapatistas to ally with the corrupt political parties is to their 
credit, even if it did lose them prestige within the left, as La Botz claims.

However, this is not to say that one should totally ignore elections. Was the Freedom 
Summer of the Civil Rights movement - now, 50 years hence, sanctified - which attempted to 
register black voters and mount a challenge to the Democratic Party a waste of energy? Or 
the entirety of the suffragist movement? Clearly not. Yet it is important that independent 
social movements, while recognizing the real opportunities presented by voting within a 
system of elite-managed democracy, not lend their credibility to the legitimacy of the 
proceedings.

Should the Zapatistas have participated in the election fraud protests? Quite possibly. 
But the disillusionment La Botz sees on the left with the Zapatista attitude towards the 
whole episode reflects more poorly on the left and its sectarianism than on the EZLN. An 
unhealthy focus on electoral productions as a venue for improving society is not limited 
to the U.S.

Another target that comes in for criticism from La Botz is John Holloway. Holloway 
"suggested that, in part under the influence of indigenous ideas, the EZLN had rejected 
the old Marxist paradigm of the proletariat struggling for state power, putting on the 
agenda a new theory and practice of revolution that seemed to have more in common with 
anarchism: anyone from any social class could begin to make the revolution by asserting 
their dignity and forming a liberated community where they were. The Zapatistas seemed to 
be building such a communitarian alternative to capitalism in the remote communities in 
Chiapas."

There are two things to note immediately in this passage:

1) It is quite clear that Holloway's central thesis, as popularized, is ridiculous. One 
cannot simply ignore the national government and ultimately its power must be overthrown - 
it will not permit any other course of action as no government will willingly tolerate 
threats to its monopoly on the use of violence. Of course, the Zapatistas have simply been 
pragmatic in retaining their autonomy within Chiapas; if they have failed to spark a 
revolution, it was not because they did not desire to do so, as La Botz himself notes in 
his piece. However, those who would follow Holloway and make a virtue out of necessity are 
clearly barking up the wrong tree.

2) La Botz employs an amorphous concept of anarchism and thereby makes it synonymous with 
Holloway's ideas. This is quite unsupportable. Anarchism is a far richer ideology than La 
Botz's reference would imply. Yet this notion of anarchism remains lodged in the minds of 
many on the left; seemingly immovable and unresponsive to countervailing historical 
information.

La Botz wishes the EZLN had "help[ed] to organize--not to insist on controlling--a 
national social movement and a genuinely independent national political party." The first 
part of that admonition is good, though as discussed above, we can drop the last bit. I am 
not able to evaluate La Botz's charge of "sectarianism;" nor his accusation that they "cut 
themselves from other sections of the far left" within Mexico.

Certainly, internationally, the EZLN managed to engage the solidarity movements formed 
around the globe that were instrumental in providing the public prominence that helped to 
protect their autonomy from a full siege by the Mexican state.

However, this aspect of La Botz's criticism warrants greater attention. How have the 
Zapatista's fallen short in engaging with other Mexican social movements? La Botz recounts 
his observations from the late '90s:

"Living in Mexico in those years, I attended in Mexico City and in Tijuana meetings of the 
Zapatista Front for National Liberation (FZLN) which held a founding of the national 
organization in 1997. The Zapatistas, however, seemed to have no interest in a real front, 
that is, in a coalition of various left organizations and movements. EZLN leaders found 
difficult the give and take of coalition building in a country where there were scores of 
social movements, labor unions, and left political parties. The EZLN's insistence on 
dominating the supposed front that they had created meant that it never grew or became 
popular and never had an impact in Mexican society at large.

The EZLN also attempted at about the same time, with the aid of leftists in the labor 
movement, to organize a Zapatista workers' organization. The labor union activists I knew 
and with whom I spoke told me that the Zapatistas opposed participation in the existing 
labor unions, not only because they believed they were bureaucratic, but also in part 
because the unions held elections and the EZLN didn't believe in elections and voting. 
With an unwillingness to deal with the unions and their existing structures and with 
longstanding rank-and-file labor organizations, the Zapatista labor organization was 
stillborn. The Zapatistas' attempt to turn themselves into a political force in Mexican 
society failed utterly, and they withdrew again to the canyons of Chiapas."

Later, with the Other Campaign - an attempt to engage Mexican society, or at least the 
left - La Botz sees similar problems:

"The EZLN's Other Campaign was joined by several other left groups, from the Trotskyist 
Revolutionary Workers Party (PRT) to the followers of Albanian Enver Hoxa in the Communist 
Party Marxist-Leninist (CPML). The Campaign took place during a period of a number of 
dramatic social conflicts, most important the civil unrest in Sal Salvador Atenco in the 
State of Mexico. When police suppressed flower sellers and other street vendors, the 
Peoples Front for the Defense of the Land called upon the EZLN for support. Marcos and 
EZLN showed up bringing thousands of supporters. During the Other Campaign, Marcos and 
other speakers held moderately successful meetings and rallies around the country, 
sometimes speaking to thousands against the evils of capitalism. Everywhere they went, the 
CPML's giant portraits of Stalin hung in the background, casting doubt in some minds about 
the meaning of it all."

This sounds like a fair criticism. One might hazard a guess that independent trade unions 
and other social movements with some popular membership may have made for a better 
alliance than an outlandish Stalinist sect.

The success of the Zapatistas, though inspirational and far more impressive than anything 
the U.S. has mustered in recent memory, has certainly been limited - they have carved out 
autonomy but not stirred a national revolution. As La Botz summarizes:

"The Zapatistas failure in launching a revolution and the Mexican army's siege of the zone 
in which they operated forced them to retreat and fall back on the indigenous and other 
poor people in the canyons where they had their base. The Zapatistas now did more openly 
what they had been doing clandestinely for years, organizing their indigenous and mestizo 
supporters into communities that constituted a kind of liberated zone--though interspersed 
with other indigenous and mestizo communities that did not support them and surrounded by 
the army which sometimes harassed them."

Certainly, more than mere praise is appropriate in commemorating the Zapatistas. They 
deserve skeptical appraisals as well. Like La Botz, I have long been curious about the 
Caracoles and Juntas de Buen Gobierno that the EZLN has organized as a form of governance 
in territories under their control. And like him I have been frustrated by the failure to 
publicize the details of these apparent organs of self-governance. If they are truly 
models of democracy, then the mechanisms by which they operate and the principles they 
abide by are of universal interest and should be promoted broadly.

It is ironic that the famed Zapatista masks, donned, they claimed, to avoid creating 
distracting personality cults around leaders, nonetheless permitted their most public 
spokesperson to be elevated to celebrity status. True, he was no Hugo Chavez ("Chavez is 
the people!" proclaimed a poster I was once given). But, as La Botz notes, "Many were 
charmed by subcomandante Marcos' sardonic wit and great creativity both as a speaker and a 
writer." The fascination came despite, or perhaps because of, a rhetorical style that is 
offputtingly vague, poetic, and fantastical.

The critique La Botz has presented of the Zapatistas may be largely off the mark, but 
there is considerably need for a more substantial analysis by a less party-focused 
analyst. The 21st year of the Zapatistas public existence provides an excellent 
opportunity for such a look at this movement that still holds global fascination.

(en) US, WSA, Ideas & Action - Lunch Lady Land: reflections on a unionization drive from a radical food service worker By Fnordie

It was sometime in late February, 2011 when we let the cat out of the bag. I was working 
the swing shift in the college?s main cafeteria ? ?The Den? as it was known. It was 
starting to get dark, and I had just clocked out for my lunchbreak and stepped outside 
onto the smoking dock. No sooner had I sat down on an overturned milkcrate, when my 
friend and co-worker Emilio came charging around the corner, panting, wide-eyed and 
grimacing. ---- ?Mallory?s telling everybody, fool!? he hissed at me through clenched 
teeth. ---- Like me, Emilio was a cook (though we sometimes joked our job description was 
?lunch lady?). We were also both on a union organizing committee for our kitchen. We?d 
been organizing ?underground? for months, building the committee in secret. We weren?t 
yet ready to go public.

I spasmed a double-take. ?Are you fucking with me??

?Nah, fool, she in there all like ?AARON wants to start a UNION!?? he wailed in his best 
old woman impression. ?The fuck you tell her??

?Nothing, dude!? I sputtered defensively. ?I just asked if I could meet her after work to 
talk about something important, I didn?t tell her what it was!?

?Shit. Shit. Shit,? he mused, chewing his lip. He settled onto a milkcrate next to me 
and fell silent for a moment. ?Okay, here?s what you?re gonna do,? he said finally. ?You 
get your ass back in there right now, and you tell her you gay.?

?What? I?m not -? I started, but then I got it. ?That?s brilliant. Yeah, OK.?

?Go, fool!?

Minutes later, I found Mallory and pulled her aside. I explained, in as sincere a tone as 
I could muster, that I couldn?t stand living a lie any longer, that I desperately wanted 
to come out of the closet but just didn?t know how, and that I?d asked to meet in private 
because I sought her sage wisdom for advice on how to embrace my sexuality. Mallory is a 
devout born-again Christian. I wouldn?t necessarily say she went ?into shock? per se, but 
all the blood certainly drained out of her face.

I left very pleased with myself. The secrecy of our insurgent labor conspiracy is secure, 
I thought. By any means necessary.

Three weeks later, all pretext of paranoid confidentiality was violently stripped away. 
The organizers called it The Blitz. The students ? our customers ? went away for spring 
break, and everyone but a tiny skeleton crew was laid off. We were all there at that 
night?s committee meeting. There were 20 of us then ? eleven from the Den; five from 
Tchotchke?s, the other dining hall; two cashiers from the company-run convenience store; a 
server from the campus diner; and a cook from their late-night pizza outfit. Emilio, his 
older brother Charlie, and Cesar the pizza cook were already close friends of mine. 
Looking around the crowded room, we realized all but one of the company?s departments was 
represented. A staff organizer began listing names in marker on a big sheet of paper on 
the wall ? mapping out who each of us knew, or rather who was in our ?structure,? as they 
called it. There were almost 160 workers in total. After months (or for some of us, a 
year) of painstakingly recruiting only the most trustworthy social leaders, now we?d 
recruit everyone else, all at once. Each committee member was responsible for visiting 
the people in their structure, spreading the good news of the union drive, and organizing 
them to sign a petition for an election. My list had six names on it; all folks I knew 
pretty well, with whom I bantered and ate ? and from whom I?d been hiding our clandestine 
organization for the six months I?d been on the committee. I had eight days to recruit 
them before spring break ended. ?After that,? a smiling organizer assured me, ?the 
workers and the company will be at war.?

There was one organizer, Eddie, who I got to know pretty well as an accomplice to house 
visits. One day, when I was asking about tactics we might use to punch back after the 
company?s reaction, he quoted Mao Zedong to me: ?The liberal revolutionary is preoccupied 
with combat. The true revolutionary is preoccupied with organization.? I have no idea if 
Mao ever actually said this; I?ve looked and I can?t find it. Still, for anyone waging 
the class struggle, I think the principle bears remembering: tactics are fleeting ? 
they?re only ever as strong as their underlying organization. It?s more a war of position 
than a war of maneuver. As I began to learn in the weeks to come, direct action on the 
job is fundamentally about power.

I took my first stab at building the organization later that morning in a busy westside 
McDonald?s. I had arranged to meet my co-worker Chaquon there. She wasn?t comfortable 
meeting at her house; I think she got weirded out and suspicious when I asked to meet her 
privately for a reason I couldn?t tell her. Chaquon worked next to me every day ? mostly 
grilling chicken, cutting massive quantities of vegetables, and doing other prep for a 
chopped salad station. Then, during the lunch rush, we?d mix salads to order in a 
three-person assembly line. Our customer base was a very health-conscious student body, 
so naturally we were the busiest station in the cafeteria. Our manager often reminded us, 
in a manner much like that of a kindergarten teacher addressing errant children, that we 
were a ?high-volume unit? and therefore must keep our line moving as fast as humanly 
possible. Sometimes we?d serve upwards of 1,000 kids in a single rush. Every day we?d 
pull on gloves, look down, and finally look up four hours later. It was exhausting and 
mind-numbing. On top of that, the dishwasher had been broken for five weeks ? so we were 
tasked with the impossible feat of keeping the line moving while also washing out our own 
mixing bowls by hand after each order. And I had never once heard Chaquon complain.

I?d already heard plenty of horror stories about other people?s first visits. I was 
prepared for the worst. From the sound of it, house visits were trials by fire. People 
slammed doors in your face; they cussed you out; they kicked you out of their houses; they 
freaked out and pulled knives on you. Being asked to organize and fight your employer is 
scary, and fear makes people do all kinds of things. Chaquon had a conservative 
disposition and a proper, almost saintly demeanor, and at work she seemed to identify with 
the company. She virtually oozed team spirit. Sitting and waiting for her in the 
McDonald?s with Eddie, I was nervous about how someone like her might react.

People have a way of surprising you. Chaquon arrived, I introduced her to Eddie, and I 
told her we were forming a union. She was interested, and not hostile, but at first she 
replied with a noncommittal ?oh, really?? I tried to guide the conversation through 
steps-of-organizing they?d taught us in committee meetings. The first, of course, is 
agitation ? and according to the union, the key to that was simply sharing stories. ?You 
know the dishwasher?s been broken for more than a month now?? I started. ?I asked Chef 
Ferdinand when they?d fix it ? you know what he said? He was like ?we don?t have the 
budget for that right now.??

I didn?t get to step two. That was all it took. For the next half hour, Chaquon launched 
into an impassioned rant about how every day brings a new humiliation, how we?re treated 
like animals, how to the company we?re nothing but pieces of equipment made of meat. It 
blew me away. This was poetry. I?d worked with this woman for a year, and I?d never seen 
her so much as roll her eyes at the chef. Suddenly, her fury at the company was animating 
an impromptu call to arms. We got some weird glances from other customers, and she didn?t 
care in the least. It was as if by giving her permission to vent about our exploitation, 
we?d opened a floodgate that might never close again. Significantly, our actual working 
conditions and the broken dishwasher were secondary concerns to her ? far more important 
was the lack of dignity and respect these things represented. She signed the petition and 
proudly took a union button on the spot, and she remained a staunch union partisan for the 
duration of the year-long conflict that was to come.

I think that?s what I miss most about being in the midst of an organizing drive. More 
than the thrill of sticking it to the boss; more than the frantic catharsis of attacks and 
counterattacks; more, even, than the deepening of bonds that turns friends into comrades ? 
it?s the stuff you hear people say. Melodramatic stuff. Hollywood stuff. Declarations 
that under any other circumstance might be ridiculously corny, but when spoken with 
absolute conviction are anything but. Organizing is a transformative experience. It 
forces people to take sides, and consequently shows you who they really are. ?This fight 
is forever,? Emilio told me after we won recognition. ?The minute you stop fighting is 
the minute you lose.?

By the end of the blitz, we had collected signatures for more than 80 of our co-workers, 
in addition to our 20. I encountered a lot of different reactions in visits that week. 
Chaquon?s instant fervor was the most positive. The other five ranged from guarded 
curiosity to frightened confusion to panicked hostility. The procedure was the same for 
everyone: listen closely; share stories; ask pointed questions; agitate people around 
their issues; ?inoculate? them, or prepare them for retaliation (?I won?t lie to you, the 
company might fire us. But they might fire us anyway.?) Anyone who?s been to an IWW 
Organizing 101 training will note the parallels with AEIOU. The last step was always the 
?push?: issuing a specific personal challenge, daring someone to be brave enough to do 
something for the campaign. Eddie would often tell me ?Organizing is the art of bringing 
out the best in people.?

Eventually, I got five signatures: one from each person, with the exception of the last 
one. The last one was a crotchety older cook ? let?s call him ?Archie Bunker? ? who?d 
taken me under his wing since my first day. We were both transplants from east coast 
rustbelt cities, and we?d bonded over football and feeling out of place in this fake-ass 
west coast Babylon. One time, after a night of heavy drinking at a cook-out in his 
backyard, my mother called me. Realizing I was talking to my mom, Archie Bunker grabbed 
my phone away from me and bellowed, ?I?m gonna look after your boy. I promise. I got his 
back.?

It had been difficult to keep the campaign secret from him ? not only were we close 
friends, but he was as agitated as they come. There were constant problems with his 
paychecks, either arriving late or coming up short. He agreed with me that the company 
was a bunch of shady motherfuckers, and payroll probably committed wage theft on purpose. 
He?d been working there for going on 10 years and scarcely made more than when he 
started. He hated all the chefs and practically every other manager. I was sure he?d be 
a shoe-in. Of everybody I knew in that kitchen, he was the one I was most eager to 
recruit. So when I confidently walked into his dining room, handed him a petition, and 
glibly said ?Archie, we?re forming a union. We?re gonna fix that place. You down?? ? I 
was in for a disappointment.

?What the fuck?!? he roared in my face. His wife started to say something conciliatory 
from behind him, but he cut her off with a snarl. ?Man, I thought you were better than 
that! Get the fuck out of my house!? I did just that, more than a little shaken. He 
followed me onto his porch. There was a vein bulging in his forehead. ?What put that 
shit in your head, man??

?I don?t know, Archie. Mostly stuff you told me,? I lied. That just threw fuel on the 
fire. He made a fist and pulled his arm back like he was going to throw a punch. I 
flinched. He didn?t swing. He was still fuming, obviously, but he looked me in the eye 
and spoke very softly.

?I promised your mama I was gonna look after you,? he muttered. And then, confusingly, ?I 
care about me, my wife, and my daughter. Get out of here and keep that racist shit away 
from me.?

For this man to object to something because it was racist was, to say the least, rich. 
That was the one thing that had always made me uncomfortable about him. Sometimes he was 
so ridiculous it was almost funny ? he?d once commented, philosophically, ?Fidencio?s a 
good dude. But they oughta ship him back to Mexico.? Months later, he finally told me 
he?d worked in an auto-plant in his youth, and, because he was black, the UAW had refused 
to protect him. The experience had turned him against the labor movement for 40 years. 
I?m still not sure, but I think he called a manager and blew our cover that same night. 
People have a way of surprising you.
The world is a messy place. You can never take anyone?s support for granted, no matter 
how strong a relationship you have with them. There are no shortcuts; no substitutes for 
the careful, maddeningly slow process of organizing. Rank-and-file militants ignore this 
truism at their peril.

Two days after we went back to work, we marched on the boss. It would be the first of 
seven such confrontational actions. The organizers euphemistically called it a 
?delegation,? but having spent my teen years in various anarchist organizations, I knew 
the traditional name. Months later, we did some polite, conversational delegations to 
management ? but when we went public, we clapped and chanted and didn?t let the bastards 
talk back.

We had a committee meeting the night before to prepare. They showed us footage of other 
food service workers going public, some who worked for our employer in different shops. A 
few of the videos were of restrained delegations that ended in dialogue with a manager, 
but others showed workers chanting and doing ?Si Se Puede? claps (the in-unison slow clap 
that originated in the farmworker struggles of the UFW). Some people were more 
apprehensive than others. In general the older folks were more hesitant, but that wasn?t 
true across the board ? one otherwise gentle baker in his 60?s was especially itching for 
a fight. I thought he might have been radical politically, but his English and my Spanish 
were bad enough that our conversations never got that complex. To conclude the meeting, 
we did a sort of dress rehearsal. We each prepared a personal grievance we would tell 
Cruella, the general manager, and we decided the order we would speak in. The only fully 
scripted part belonged to Charlie ? at the end, he would say ?We are asking for a 
neutrality agreement to allow us to organize without retaliation. You have 36 hours to 
give us an answer.? An organizer played the GM, and we crowded into her office and ran 
through the motions several times. After some discussion, we agreed ours would be an 
aggressive delegation ? if the boss tried to interrupt us, we would chant to drown her out.

The big day also happened to be St Patrick?s Day. I remember being vaguely put off that 
our glorious moment would have to take place against the backdrop of paper shamrocks and 
plastic green hats that littered the college, but now I like to think my Irish trade 
unionist ancestors would have approved. The plan was to clock out at 3:30pm, meet at the 
campus chapel, and march to Cruella?s office from there. We would be accompanied by a 
priest, a rabbi, and a student-labor solidarity group (no, that?s not the set up line for 
a joke). These outside allies were a crucial element of our strategy: we needed them to 
pressure the administration of the school, which could then pressure our employer, its 
subcontractor. An organizer and some of the committee had been meeting with a member of 
the student group for a couple months. The clergy were from a city-wide solidarity group. 
As far as I could tell, its sole purpose was to lend out religious figures to unions to 
give their campaigns an air of moral authority. I scoffed at the idea at the time. In 
retrospect, I think it worked like a charm. The company had recently had its contracts 
cancelled at other universities after another union tarnished its image. The threat of 
bad publicity was the best leverage we had.

It was 3:20pm. The lunch rush was over and I was covering my line with plastic wrap. My 
gaze darted back and forth across the cafeteria, scrutinizing the other committee members 
closing their stations. I searched their faces for some hint of resolve, or of cowardice, 
but found nothing. Is this thing really going to happen? I thought. Will anybody really 
come through? I could hear my own heartbeat. I was so tense that when somebody socked me 
in the shoulder from behind, I jumped and dropped a cutting board. Emilio chuckled.

?You scared, bitch?? he asked. He wasn?t just talking about my skittishness.

I looked at the clock. It was 3:25. ?Yeah, a little.?

?Well just think about that last time Dante yelled at you,? he said, suddenly very stern. 
Dante was a sadistic supervisor who rode my ass more than anyone else, and Emilio knew I 
hated him. I realized he was trying to agitate me. Then I realized it had worked. I was 
too pissed off to have doubts. ?Come on,? he said, motioning towards the timeclock. I 
silently chided myself for lacking faith in my fellow workers. We clocked out, hurriedly 
left the cafeteria, and, because I?m a total dork, I started humming the Spanish anarchist 
anthem A Las Barricadas. Contra el enemigo nos llama el deber.

We met in the campus chapel. I think 17 or maybe 18 of the committee were there. An 
organizer and a few students were waiting for us, one with a video camera. We held hands 
in silence, and then the two clergy led everyone in a prayer. The concluding line was 
something like ?God bless the working men and women of all countries. The work of 
organizing together is holy work. Amen.? We walked back up the hill into the Den, where 
the GM?s office was. The organizer said she couldn?t come inside with us. We entered 
from a back door and marched single file up a narrow staircase leading straight to the 
office door. The older baker started clapping and chanting first, and gradually everyone 
else joined in: ?Que queremos? Justicia!? (most of the committee spoke Spanish as their 
first language). The kid with the camera was the first to try to go inside. He opened 
the door, and standing right in front of us was a squat, wide, fireplug of a man: Benito, 
the district manager. He was above Cruella in the company hierarchy, and we?d had no idea 
he was going to be there. He slammed the door shut, smacking the student and his camera. 
Everyone in front pushed against the door, forcing it back open and flooding into the 
office. We barely all fit. The secretary looked up from her computer, mouth agape. 
Cruella and Benito were literally backed up into a corner, both trying to shout over us. 
As rehearsed, we kept chanting until they quieted.

One by one, each of us stepped forward and said our piece. Workers went first, then 
students. Some people called out abusive managers by name; some said they?d been with the 
company for over 20 years and still made the same wage as new hires; some listed promises 
management had broken. One young line cook said ?You know I respect you both,? and, 
rolling up his sleeves to display burns on his arms, ?but these have the company?s name on 
them.? When I spoke, I just talked about my station?s workload and the damn broken 
dishwasher. Cruella got the message early on that this was our turn to talk, but Benito 
kept trying to butt in ? which was great, because then we could chant at him again at 
point-blank range. That must have happened upwards of 10 times. Some of us, including a 
few macho, stoic men, were moved to tears.

After Charlie wrapped it up with the neutrality demand, we did a Si Se Puede union clap, 
and walked back out into the kitchen. Pandemonium ensued. Everybody was crowded around 
the door trying to listen in, and when we walked out and mingled with them there was an 
uproar that was audible from the dining area. Some people were ecstatic, some were 
terrified, but everyone was interested. I maneuvered my way out of the kitchen and walked 
up to Tuesday, a cashier I was friendly with, to tell her what had just happened. ?You 
look like you floating!? she exclaimed.

When I came into work at 7am the next morning, there was already a technician there fixing 
the dishwasher. Chef Ferdinand was doing the dishes. Benito emerged from the office 
wearing an apron and crawled on his hands and knees to clean out the floor drains. More 
than one manager made a point of going around to each station and complimenting everyone?s 
work. It was immensely satisfying to watch. Their desperation was palpable.

Sure enough, no less than 36 hours after D-day, the company signed a neutrality agreement. 
Pressure from the students had yielded pressure from the administration, and if they 
wanted to keep their contract with the school, they really had no choice (I suspect the 
fact that we had video of Benito slamming a door on a student might have helped encourage 
them, too). This meant it was now illegal for them to run an anti-union campaign. They?d 
ignore it and campaign against us anyway, but they had to be a little more covert about 
it, so I think it bought us a measure of breathing room. The union submitted our 
petitions to the labor board. At the next committee meeting, they told us the election 
was scheduled for the end of April. The managers kept trying to garner ?no? votes, 
putting on happy faces and wooing us with newfound kindness. The supervisors did their 
dirty work: intimidation, surveillance, and just generally being cops. We continued to 
organize around issues. It felt good to finally be out in the open about it.

At first it baffled me that we?d won our first demand without firing a shot, so to speak. 
What kind of second-rate, off-brand class war was this? Why build power if not to wield 
it? With one possible exception during the contract fight later that year, we never did 
anything to inflict direct economic damage on the company. And yet we were winning 
concessions. How?

Saul Alinsky ? certainly no revolutionary, but nonetheless a brilliant tactician ? once 
wrote, ?The threat is usually more terrifying than the thing itself.? Capitalists the 
world over know this well. Fear greases the wheels of production everywhere; every wage 
worker is driven by perpetual negative reinforcement. Employers can coerce us without 
resorting to disciplinary action because we know they have power. Turnabout is fair play.

There was nothing special about our campaign. Compared to other organizing drives against 
the same company, it was utterly unremarkable. Some of those were bitter, protracted 
conflicts that culminated in strikes, boycotts, lockouts. Our militancy never exceeded a 
handful of rowdy delegations. Management?s reaction never extended beyond a few bullshit 
layoffs and firings. We won our election, got some managers fired, kept agitating for a 
year throughout negotiations, and ended up with affordable healthcare and a reasonably 
good first contract. But our negotiator settled for a raise of $1.50 over three years: 20 
cents less than the minimum offer we had agreed we?d accept. There was at least one 
private meeting between the union and the company that I know of. For all the organizers? 
efforts to involve and mobilize us, the union was still profoundly undemocratic: shop 
stewards were not elected, but appointed. Eventually, I got fired for being late. By 
then I didn?t have the heart to fight for my job back.

Full of surprises as ever, Archie Bunker?s had a change of heart since I?ve been gone. 
Last I heard he was on the committee. Woe to whichever manager is first in his line of fire.

I don?t mean to hold up this campaign as a model for comrades to emulate. There was 
nothing revolutionary about our fight. It depended on the NLRB. It ended when we got a 
contract. It was extremely reliant on paid staff, who, while they may have performed 
admirably, did not equip workers with the skills that would make them obsolete. I wish I 
could say we bossnapped the GM, we occupied the dining halls, we pushed the level of 
struggle past its limit?but I can only write about what actually happened. My hope is 
that fellow workers can learn something from our modest achievements, and go on to 
accomplish more marvelous feats of rebellion.

If there?s a moral to my story, it?s this: all genuine organizing transforms people. Even 
the most restrained, mediated campaign takes intensive relational work to get off the 
ground ? and once it has, can awaken workers to our own power. This should be even truer 
for struggles with revolutionary aspirations.

US, Solidarity Callout - Domino's Pizza Drivers Dispute

September 15, 2012 north american Day of Solidarity with Aussie Dominos Pizza Drivers.--
Dear friends: ---- The Workers Solidarity Alliance (WSA)*, in solidarity with the
Australian General Transport Workers Association and the Anarcho- is appealing to you and your members to support the delivery drivers
employed by Domino's Pizza Enterprises in Australia. ---- The Domino's drivers have been
engaged in a dispute with management since 9th of April. The key issue in this struggle
has been an overnight 19% wage reduction. Meanwhile, the drivers have been sold out by
their current union, the SDA, which has done nothing to fight the cuts. The GTWA and the
ASF-IWA are calling for an International Day of Solidarity with the Domino's Drivers on
Saturday, September 15, 2012.

The aim of the Day is to alert Domino's management that workers and members of the
community in North America and elsewhere stand in solidarity with the Australian delivery
drivers in their struggle against the wage cut and in support of their right to organize
under the banner of the General Transport Workers Association (GTWA). The GWTA Facebook
page can be viewed here:

http://www.facebook.com/GeneralTransportWorkersAssociation

The Australian friends are asking that folks engage in informational picketing,
informational leafleting and other peaceful activities aimed at informing local management
and workers about the Australian dispute. It is hoped that the local stores will report to
corporate headquarters about the informational activities and this would put pressure on
the company.

The goal is informational actions with the main point to have Domino's restore the 19%
wage reduction and recognize the GWTA as the drivers union. Please contact us if you are
interested in participating with us in a coordinated effort to support the Brisbane and
Adelaide drivers.

We can be reached at: dominosworkersolidarity[AT]gmail.com

Our campaign has also set-up a Face Book page:

http://www.facebook.com/dominos.workersolidarity

We look forward to your positive reply and cooperatively working together to make this
Domino's Drivers Solidarity Day a success here in North America.

Bron :

Yours in solidarity,
Workers Solidarity Alliance
Related Link: http://www.facebook.com/dominos.workersolidarity
==========================================
* Anarchosyndicalist Federation