The fact that anarchists can’t agree on a unified course of action is a big part of the reason why all these different ways of running society that people have dreamed up remain firmly in the realm of fantasy.
Sure, in initial stages you’ll have many different orgs. This was the case during Russian revolution as well. However, eventually a single unified vanguard emerges and people get on the same page regarding how to move forward. There is no mechanism for creating a unified vanguard under anarchist approach where there is no central authority by design.
I’m not an anarchist but in their defense, while anarchism proper has never had lasting success the Zapatistas are much less centralized than other socialist experiments and have taken a lot of inspiration from anarchist principles. Left unity should mean that we take an earnest and good faith approach to learning about what we have in common, not just seizing any opportunity to dunk on the other “team.”
Also, even MLism still recognizes that different contradictions demand different approaches. Marx doesn’t prescribe a one-size-fits-all approach either. For some revolutions the right move is a guerilla struggle. For others a general strike. For others it’s about landless peasants doing protracted struggle. So on and so on.
I generally agree that there’s no one size fits all approach. However, any effective organization needs to be grounded in material reality. Discussing concrete examples of organization like Zapatistas is useful because they are achieving something tangible, but saying that people dreamed up plenty of ways to organize society is not very useful of itself.
I just don’t want to get into all the nitty gritty if you haven’t done the reading. We could talk about mutualism, anarcho-communism, syndicalism, democratic confederalism, zapatistas, Makhnovshchina, social ecology, library socialism, etc, etc, etc if you want. We can talk about about all of those and specifically HOW they prescribe a society, how they could interact and/or intersect ALL DAY LONG. But anarchists tend to be materialists, and praxis often takes priority over just theory.
I’m not, no. Because most anarchists I know ARE Marxists (at least in terms of economic analysis). But, in my experience, anarchists are the ones that are actually out there preventing fascist cop training grounds from being built, feeding the unhoused, smuggling people across state lines for healthcare, prison outreach, etc. Because (and this is genuinely just my own experience; I’m totally sure this isn’t a universal constant) I see a lot of Marxists and MLs talking a lot about “when the revolution happens” and not a whole lot about the revolution being fought right now, everyday.
I’m not sure who these MLs are that you’re referring to, but the whole point of ML approach is to do all these things you’re talking about and couple that with education that provides a clear theoretical understanding of what the problems are, and what the solutions need to be. The whole contribution of Lenin to Marxism was to provide the structure for organizing a revolutionary movement.
And that was a useful framework in the early 20th century (I’ve at least read the April Theses), but can we not continue to adapt our revolutionary strategy to better combat the forces who opposed us today rather than in 1917?
To date, nobody has shown a more effective approach to organizing that I’m aware of. All the successful movements follow roughly the same formula. The nature of society has not fundamentally changed in a century, so there’s no reason to think that methods of organization need to drastically change as well. Just look at MAS in Bolivia as a very recent example.
Marxists have continued to sharpen our practice over time, a century of revolution provides a wealth of real experience to draw from. I am unconvinced that this strategy needs to be abandoned in favor of Anarchism, mainly because I agree with Marx in how production centralizes over time and thus humanity should master that process and democratize it so that humanity can subordinate Capital, rather than the inverse.
Anarchism on the other hand posits a totally different structute, one based on decentralization at its core, which negates the ability to collectively plan production and movement in order to abolish hierarchy in total, no matter the benefits if properly accounted for.
I’m not anti-Anarchist, I used to be one myself, but I think just as you earlier took issue with people not engaging with Anarchist theory, I think your own admission to having read at least the April Theses means you should dig more into Marxism and Marxism-Leninism if you want to understand your Marxist comrades better.
Because (and this is genuinely just my own experience; I’m totally sure this isn’t a universal constant) I see a lot of Marxists and MLs talking a lot about “when the revolution happens” and not a whole lot about the revolution being fought right now, everyday.
It’s unfortunate that the MLs in your area are that way. I think it’s interesting that I’ve seen the opposite where I am in the global south. Student groups tend to have a lot of wonderful anarchist tendencies and lots of people who have come to understand politics via online forums (I guess that’s partly true of myself, except I sort of ended up on the other side). Meanwhile, when you go to Palestinian solidarity marches, the labor movement, and other things on the ground (well, except for when student groups demand something from the university) it looks a lot more traditional left wing, with the usual Trotskyist groups and some ML.
I guess if I can point to anything in this dynamic it’s that there isn’t really a huge difference in how effective the different groups are at accomplishing their short term goals, so IMO it would just make more sense to figure out which ideological line is most attractive to the people it’s supposed to serve in a given area and stick to that.
I guess if I can point to anything in this dynamic it’s that there isn’t really a huge difference in how effective the different groups are at accomplishing their short term goals, so IMO it would just make more sense to figure out which ideological line is most attractive to the people it’s supposed to serve in a given area and stick to that.
The fact that anarchists can’t agree on a unified course of action is a big part of the reason why all these different ways of running society that people have dreamed up remain firmly in the realm of fantasy.
There are at least six feuding Marxist orgs where I live, I don’t think this is a valid critique of anarchism.
Sure, in initial stages you’ll have many different orgs. This was the case during Russian revolution as well. However, eventually a single unified vanguard emerges and people get on the same page regarding how to move forward. There is no mechanism for creating a unified vanguard under anarchist approach where there is no central authority by design.
Good point.
I’m not an anarchist but in their defense, while anarchism proper has never had lasting success the Zapatistas are much less centralized than other socialist experiments and have taken a lot of inspiration from anarchist principles. Left unity should mean that we take an earnest and good faith approach to learning about what we have in common, not just seizing any opportunity to dunk on the other “team.”
Also, even MLism still recognizes that different contradictions demand different approaches. Marx doesn’t prescribe a one-size-fits-all approach either. For some revolutions the right move is a guerilla struggle. For others a general strike. For others it’s about landless peasants doing protracted struggle. So on and so on.
I generally agree that there’s no one size fits all approach. However, any effective organization needs to be grounded in material reality. Discussing concrete examples of organization like Zapatistas is useful because they are achieving something tangible, but saying that people dreamed up plenty of ways to organize society is not very useful of itself.
I just don’t want to get into all the nitty gritty if you haven’t done the reading. We could talk about mutualism, anarcho-communism, syndicalism, democratic confederalism, zapatistas, Makhnovshchina, social ecology, library socialism, etc, etc, etc if you want. We can talk about about all of those and specifically HOW they prescribe a society, how they could interact and/or intersect ALL DAY LONG. But anarchists tend to be materialists, and praxis often takes priority over just theory.
Are you implying this is somehow different from Marxists?
I’m not, no. Because most anarchists I know ARE Marxists (at least in terms of economic analysis). But, in my experience, anarchists are the ones that are actually out there preventing fascist cop training grounds from being built, feeding the unhoused, smuggling people across state lines for healthcare, prison outreach, etc. Because (and this is genuinely just my own experience; I’m totally sure this isn’t a universal constant) I see a lot of Marxists and MLs talking a lot about “when the revolution happens” and not a whole lot about the revolution being fought right now, everyday.
I’m not sure who these MLs are that you’re referring to, but the whole point of ML approach is to do all these things you’re talking about and couple that with education that provides a clear theoretical understanding of what the problems are, and what the solutions need to be. The whole contribution of Lenin to Marxism was to provide the structure for organizing a revolutionary movement.
And that was a useful framework in the early 20th century (I’ve at least read the April Theses), but can we not continue to adapt our revolutionary strategy to better combat the forces who opposed us today rather than in 1917?
To date, nobody has shown a more effective approach to organizing that I’m aware of. All the successful movements follow roughly the same formula. The nature of society has not fundamentally changed in a century, so there’s no reason to think that methods of organization need to drastically change as well. Just look at MAS in Bolivia as a very recent example.
Marxists have continued to sharpen our practice over time, a century of revolution provides a wealth of real experience to draw from. I am unconvinced that this strategy needs to be abandoned in favor of Anarchism, mainly because I agree with Marx in how production centralizes over time and thus humanity should master that process and democratize it so that humanity can subordinate Capital, rather than the inverse.
Anarchism on the other hand posits a totally different structute, one based on decentralization at its core, which negates the ability to collectively plan production and movement in order to abolish hierarchy in total, no matter the benefits if properly accounted for.
I’m not anti-Anarchist, I used to be one myself, but I think just as you earlier took issue with people not engaging with Anarchist theory, I think your own admission to having read at least the April Theses means you should dig more into Marxism and Marxism-Leninism if you want to understand your Marxist comrades better.
It’s unfortunate that the MLs in your area are that way. I think it’s interesting that I’ve seen the opposite where I am in the global south. Student groups tend to have a lot of wonderful anarchist tendencies and lots of people who have come to understand politics via online forums (I guess that’s partly true of myself, except I sort of ended up on the other side). Meanwhile, when you go to Palestinian solidarity marches, the labor movement, and other things on the ground (well, except for when student groups demand something from the university) it looks a lot more traditional left wing, with the usual Trotskyist groups and some ML.
I guess if I can point to anything in this dynamic it’s that there isn’t really a huge difference in how effective the different groups are at accomplishing their short term goals, so IMO it would just make more sense to figure out which ideological line is most attractive to the people it’s supposed to serve in a given area and stick to that.
I 100% agree