At the end of 1998 a pamphlet was brought out by an anarchist publishing house, entitled Council Communism and Autonomous Workers' Struggles. It was dedicated to Cajo Brendel, the last living representative of the German-Dutch left (1). As well as an interview, a bibliography, and several extracts from texts written by Brendel, the collection also contains a number of short extracts from 'basic texts of council communism' by Anton Pannekoek, Otto Ruhle, Hank Canne Meijer and Paul Mattick, as well as a short historical introduction on the origins of this curron on the origins of this current. Furthermore, this pamphlet is in continuity with a previous one published in 1990 by the same publishers, containing 'libertarian texts' by Rosa Luxemburg, Anton Pannekoek and Henriette Roland Holst.
Behind an apparently benign interest in the council communist current, or in the 'councilist' personality Cajo Brendel, the real aim of these pamphlets can be seen clearly in the first words of the introduction:
"The history of anarchism contains a number of sometimes quite important splits with the marxists. There is at least one exception however. In the 1920s we saw the appearance of council communism as a response to Bolshevik state capitalism. Council communist positions developed in direct relation to the autonomous class struggle and the formation of workers' councils outside the state, party, or leaders. They seem to present important points of convergence with anarchism" .
Council communism is thus presented as a libertarian break with the marxist tradition. In fact, by means of the commentaries that appear throughout these collections, and of a skilful selection of the extracts which mix up the authors mentioned above with 'libertarians' like Lehning and Reeves, the following ideas are sold to the reader:
The German-Dutch left was an integral part of the international revolutionary movement
The central aim of this tendentious selection of short extracts, removed from their real context, is above all to convince the reader that these 'prophets' of council communism had made a total break with the rest of the 'old' revolutionary movement, particularly Lenin and the Bolsheviks. In fact nothing could be more false and it is no accident that the historical introduction, which brings in the combat against opportunism and reformism within the Second International, moves rapidly through the period of war and revolution at the beginning of the 20th century. The events of this period are clear witness to the fact that the militants of the German-Dutch left (such as Gorter, Pannekoek and Roland Holst) were, like the Bolsheviks, an integral part of the marxist wing of the workers' movement which was in the vanguard of the gigantic struggle waged by the working class and its political organisations in this period:
in the struggle against the barbarism of war and the betrayal of the social-chauvinists in 1914. Faced with the unleashing of generalised imperialist war and the treason of the main socialand the treason of the main social democratic parties which voted for war credits and called for a 'Sacred Union' with their own bourgeoisies, the marxist left within these parties organised the resistance. From 1914 onwards the positions adopted by Gorter and Pannekoek went in exactly the same direction as the analyses developed by the Bolsheviks, in particular in the definition of the war as imperialist and in the proclamation of the death of the International and of the need for a new one. Very soon, the terrible sacrifices demanded of the workers provoked a wider resistance. In March 1915 Otto Ruhle and Karl Liebknecht voted against war credits in the Reichstag; in September 1915 the Zimmerwald conference took place, with the full support of Luxemburg, Gorter and Pannekoek, and attended by Roland Holst. Through its writings, through its struggle both in Holland and Germany and on the international level, the German-Dutch marxist left was, alongside the Bolsheviks, one of the first currents to engage in a merciless struggle against the opportunists and conciliators, to work actively towards the regroupment of revolutionary forces. Alongside figures like Lenin, Bukharin and Radek, Luxemburg, Pannekoek and Gorter drew out the practical implications of the situation in order to preon in order to prepare the revolutionary struggle ahead;
in the struggle to extend the international revolutionary wave and to constitute the Communist International after 1917. The German-Dutch left unreservedly supported the revolutionary character of Soviet Russia and the internationalism of the Bolsheviks. The Dutch left in particular was foremost in introducing and propagating Lenin's conceptions in western Europe, via Herman Gorter's pamphlet The World Revolution, which appeared in 1918. Fully convinced of the international character of the revolutionary wave that began in Russia, the German-Dutch left took an active part in the insurrectionary movement in Germany and the rest of Europe, as well as in the constitution of the Communist International; "The world war and the revolution it has engendered have shown clearly that there is only one tendency in the workers' movement which is really leading the workers towards communism. Only the extreme left of the social democratic parties, the marxist fractions, the party of Lenin in Russia, of Bela Kun in Hungary, of Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht in Germany, have found this path" (Gorter, The Victory of Marxism, 1920);
in the resistance against the development of opportunism within the CI at the beginning of the 1920s. With the retreat in the revolutionary wave, which was marked in particular by the defeat of the insurrectionary movement in Germany between 1919 and 1923, and the resulting isolation of the Russian fortress, opportunist tendencies took root in the Russian Communist party and the International, along with a growing propensity to subordinate the policies of the CI to the interests of the Russian state. Against this process of degeneration, which was to end in the death of the CI as a proletarian instrument when it adopted the thesis of 'socialism in one country', a bitter resistance developed within the International, and then increasingly outside it as expulsions from the CI and its parties multiplied. Again, while the German-Dutch left undoubtedly played a leading role in this combat, as witness Gorter's Reply To Lenin, which was largely inspired by Pannekoek's World Revolution and Communist Tactics (1920), it was by no means the only current fighting against the degeneration. The whole marxist left, in Russia, Britain, Bulgaria and above Italy around Bordiga, tenaciously defended the acquisitaciously defended the acquisitions of the revolution.
In the 1930s and afterwards, these communist lefts continued their determined opposition to the triumphant Stalinist counter-revolution, seeking to keep alive the political lessons of the revolutionary struggle lessons about parliamentary and trade union tactics, the role of the party and its relationship with the councils. These tiny revolutionary minorities, working in an extremely difficult situation marked by the domination of Stalinism, fascism and democracy, held onto internationalist positions. This was particularly the case with the groups from the German-Dutch left tradition, like the Group of International Communists (GIC) around Canne Meijer, Paul Mattick's group in the US, or the Communistenbond Spartacus after the second world war (of which Brendel was a member). But once again this was in no way a specificity of the German-Dutch left because other proletarian currents also stayed loyal to internationalist positions, for example the Italian Fraction of the Communist Left in the 1930s or the Gauche Communiste de France at the end of the second world war.
Faced with all the attempts to divide the different marxist fractions of the workers' movement, to set them against each other, we insiset them against each other, we insist on their fundamental unity as an active part of the dynamic of the class struggle. Against the abstract and mechanical opposition put forward in extracts taken out of their context, we aim to re-state the real conditions in which polemics and debates took place in the workers' movement, i.e. within one single camp the camp of the proletariat and of communism, to which belonged both the marxist left within the Second International and all the left fractions of the CI which fought against the Stalinist counter-revolution and remained faithful to internationalist principles. This is the method that marxism has always tried to apply and it is in total contrast to the abstract and timeless approach of the anarchists.
The development of revolutionary marxism in opposition to anarchism
The attempt to connect these revolutionaries with anarchism can only be accomplished through an ahistorical conjuring trick. The real development of the class struggle reveals the absurdity of this 'anti-dogmatic' cocktail that mixes Marx with Bakunin.
The development of the Socialist parties and the creation of the Second International was an important step forward for the workers' movement. When reformism took an increasing hold over these parties, anarcho-syndicalism was certainly the expression of a proletarian reaction against it, but its attachment to the old ' revolution at any time' approach made it incapable of understanding the historic origins of the opportunist gangrene in the workers' movement, while its traditional opposition to 'politics' prevented it from defending the political organisations of the proletariat and encouraged illusions in a purely 'economic' revolution led by the unions, by-passing the necessity for the working class to take political power. During this period the really fruitful work of opposition to the development of opportunism within the workers' movement was carried out by the revolutionary left around Lenin, Luxemburg and Pannekoek, who remained loyal to the marxist tradition.
In this context, the outbreak of the first world war was more than ever a test of truth, not only for the right wing of social democracy which betrayed the working class, but also for a good number of anarchist organisations which, like Kropotkin and the French CGT, fell into 'anarcho-chauvinism'. As for those who opposed the war, like Monatte and Rosmer in France, they were only able to develop a consistent struggle against the war by linking up with the vigorous internationalist action of the marxistionalist action of the marxist left and by rallying to the Russian revolution.
Thus, in Holland, faced among other things with the anti-militarism tinged with pacifism of the current around the anarchist Domela Niewenhuis, the left intransigently defended internationalist positions against any idea of pacifism, insisting that the primary task of the SDP (the socialist left which has been excluded from the main social democratic party, the SDAP, in 1909) was the struggle for revolution (resolution proposed by Gorter in the name of the Bussum section at the Utrecht congress in June 1915): "If one day the workers have the power in their hands, they must defend it with arms in their hand as well" And in an article from De Tribune on 19 June 1915 Pannekoek underlined that "it is only as part of the general struggle against capitalism that the struggle against militarism can lead anywhere".
Finally, faced with the tragic degeneration of the Russian revolution and the emergence of the Stalinist nightmare, it wasn't anarchism that was able to explain what had happened and draw the lessons for the struggles of the future, but once again the marxist left: the Italian left around the review Bilan but also the German-Dutch left. And it did so by clearlytch left. And it did so by clearly demarcating itself from anarchism, in particular during the events in Spain which saw the anarchists openly offering their services to the bourgeois state. Far from providing a libertarian socialist cocktail, the GIC, like Bilan, showed throughout the war in Spain how this new ordeal by fire had led the anarchists into the camp of the bourgeoisie. The 'anti-statists' became government parties, "playing the same role in Spain that the left social democrats, the 'Independents' had played in Germany" (PIC no 12, organ of the GIC, 1937).
And in response to certain anarchists 'criticisms' of the actions of the CNT, the GIC underlined how much this was not a betrayal of anarchist principles but their logical outcome:
"the reproaches made by foreign anarchists that the CNT has betrayed its principles is not valid. The CNT could do nothing else with principles that are detached from reality; it had to join one or other of the forces present" (Rate-Korrepondenz no. 22, 1937).
What must be said is that leaving aside the fact that although this or that anarchist may have defended correct positions, and marxist groups may have made this or that error of analysis, what fundamentally distinguishes marxism from ally distinguishes marxism from anarchism is that the former is able to apply a historical and dynamic analysis which makes it possible to grasp the real movement of the proletarian struggle and to draw all its lessons, as opposed to the abstract, timeless and idealist principles of the anarchist approach.
A combat within the proletarian camp
Does this mean that there were no divergences between these great figures and organisations of the revolutionary movement? Of course not. Does it mean that there is nothing to criticise in the positions of the German-Dutch left? Again no.
The ICC has never avoided criticising the opportunist tendencies within council communism, particularly in its later forms (see 'The bankruptcy of councilism' in IR 37). Thus, it has shown how, under the terrible pressure of the counter-revolution, within the German-Dutch left more and more concessions were made on the political role of the proletarian party. Concretely this expressed itself in a retreat towards working in isolated circles and in the retrospective assimilation of the Bolshevism of 1917 with the Stalinism of 1927; concessions were also made to economism, reducing the revolutionary process to a question of forms of economic organisation for the workers, and of the management of the factories by these forms. The ICC has also never abstained from denouncing the patent opportunism of the group Daad en Gedachte which, by putting into question the importance of theoretical reflection as an instrument for defining the perspectives of the proletarian struggle, has sunk more and more into a total denial of the role of revolutionaries, and now is at risk of disappearing definitively into the void since it has suspended publication of its review.
But in order to deal with these ambiguities and opportunist tendencies, it is necessary to know who we are criticising and to understand our common political heritage. Because what unites us is a common class combat, an internationalist combat against all the forces of the bourgeoisie. Council communism is a current within the workers' movement. This is why we say 'hands off!' to all those who are seeking to recuperate the heritage of the German-Dutch left.
Jos
(1) On Cajo Brendel, see the article in WR 228 (and the rectification in this issue).
In the nineteenth century, when capitalism was still developing, creating the basis for a world economy and the possibility of communism, there were instances when revolutionaries such as Marx supported national struggles. For example, the struggle for an independent Poland was backed as a way of creating a check on Russian tsarist reaction. The struggle for German unificationtruggle for German unification and against the domination of Prussian militarism was also supported by marxists. Marx and Engels also supported the movement for Irish independence, seeing it as a way of weakening the power of what was then the dominant capitalist nation, Britain, and its use of the Irish question as a means of controlling its own proletariat.
The experience of the working class in the twentieth century, with the global dominance of decaying capitalism, has shown that 'national liberation' struggles are now fought only in the interests of what is now a reactionary capitalist class. The attempt to mobilise the working class behind nationalist slogans is nothing more than an attempt to get workers to die in the service of their class enemies.
Sinn Finn: reactionary from the start
The left pretend that there is no continuity between today's 'ministers of the crown' and the 'honourable' paramilitaries of the past. In Ireland there have been countless examples over the last hundred years of how nationalism, in all its guises, has been used against the working class.
Sinn Fein was founded in 1905.Its initial programme involved the retention of the monarch the retention of the monarchy, import controls to protect Irish capitalism, and opposition to higher wages for, or strikes by workers as they would harm the interests of businesses in Ireland. Its founder, Arthur Griffith, called for strikers involved in the Dublin Lockout of 1913 to be bayoneted. How could it be any other way when,
"Sinn Fein was heavily dependent upon shopkeepers, employers and large farmers for income and [later] Republican county councils for their rates." (Politics and Irish Life 1913-21: Provincial Experience of War and Revolution, David Fitzpatrick 1977)
The Easter Rising of 1916 would only have achieved its nationalist aims if it had gained the backing of German imperialism, which was sought, but did not materialise. As Trotsky said at the time "an 'independent' Ireland could exist only as an outpost of an imperialist state hostile to Britain" (Nashe Slovo 4th July 1916). This has been the fundamental reality behind the Irish national 'liberation' struggle ever since.
In 1919 the IRA was founded. This nationalist body started life while the working class had embarked on a wave of struggles (including Ireland) which profoundly expressed iich profoundly expressed its internationalist nature. There was a
"growing number of strikes, strikers and strike days that Ireland saw between 1917 and the slump which set in at the end of 1920." (The Politics of Illusion: A Political History of the IRA, Henry Patterson 1997).
These strikes were often accompanied "by well-organised picketing, sympathetic action and even active sabotage, and adopting the iconography of 1917, with red flags and even detachments of 'Red Guards'" (ibid) this helped to "strike fear into the heart of republicans" (Fitzpatrick op cit).
"Workers in Cork and Limerick took over some factories ... and set up 'Soviets', so-called in imitation of the Russian ones. These were crushed by local units of the IRA ... and ousted owners were handed back their plants at the points of IRA guns" (Revolutionary Perspectives first series, no.15)
In June 1920 the illegal Irish parliament Dail Eireann, set up by Sinn Fein, issued a proclamation against the class struggle, saying that it was "ill chosen for the stirring up of strife among our fellow countrymen"ong our fellow countrymen". The secretary of the Dail wrote "the mind of the people was being diverted from the struggle for freedom by class war" (quoted in Ireland's Permanent Revolution Chris Bambery). Not surprisingly, workers' struggles come up against the interests of the bourgeoisie.
Sinn Fein: basis for all Irish bourgeois politics
If the early days of Sinn Fein and the IRA established them as part of the capitalist class and against the workers' struggle then nothing has happened subsequently to alter that. Over the years there have been many splits in Republicanism, but nothing that deviated from the defence of Irish capitalism.
For example, take Fianna Fail, the largest Irish political party since the early 1930s. In power for some 50 of the years since then, it has presided over a regime equally as repressive as that in Northern Ireland, and defended the economy with as rigourous austerity measures as any other bourgeoisie. Massive unemployment has only been avoided because of the massive extent of sustained emigration.
Fianna Fail was created by those Sinn Fein members that opposed the 1921 treaty that introduced the 1921 treaty that introduced the partition of Ireland. Among the most important Fianna Fail Prime Ministers were Eamon de Valera and Sean Lemass (serving 28 years between them), both veterans of the Easter Rising and the Civil War. As leaders of the 'liberated' 26 counties they were acting in continuity with their Sinn Fein origins.
The other, most obvious, example of a Sinn Fein split was Cumann Na nGaedheal, made up of those Sinn Fein members who supported the 1921 Treaty. They were the governing party from 1922 until 1932, and, subsequently, one of the main constituents, with the fascist Blueshirts, among others, of Fine Gael, which has, ever since, been Ireland's second largest political party.
Whether based on pro- or anti-treaty Sinn Fein members the two main political parties in Ireland share the same heritage. It could hardly be otherwise. For a small economy with its relatively powerful British neighbour, nationalism is bound to continue to be one of the main strands of the ideology of the Irish ruling class.
IRA: force for capital
Turning to the 'troubles' of the last 30 years, there has been no change in the nature of Republicanism. For example, in Republicanism. For example, in another split, in 1970, the Official IRA was portrayed as 'marxist', but 'reformist', while the Provisionals were 'Catholic', but 'revolutionary'. In fact they both retained programmes for Irish capitalism, two paragons of nationalism. The only practical difference lies in the propaganda they used to mobilise for the nationalist cause. It is true that the Officials were loyal to the Russian-dominated Eastern bloc, while the Provisionals were reliant on American support, but this was not initially important. The Officials were soon eclipsed and went through a number of transformations, while the Provisionals links with US imperialism were not to become important until the break up of the blocs after 1989.
On the estates dominated by either version of the IRA, any differences were irrelevant as their activities were indistinguishable from the loyalist paramilitaries. One of the most important functions of all the paramilitary forces over the last 30 years has been their actions as an auxiliary policing force, providing 'law and order', in the form of beatings, kneecappings, expulsions and executions. The protection rackets, drug-dealing and other businesses are common to all the paramilitaries. As for the 'protection' of the oppressed, in 1988 John Hume was able to point out that Republe to point out that Republicans had killed twice as many Irish Catholics as the security forces.
Hume has, in the past, called Sinn Fein 'Fascists'. For revolutionaries republicanism is a particular weapon of the capitalist class and stands condemned, not just for its indiscriminate terrorism, but as a pillar of the exploitation of workers, and opponents of the class struggle. The leftists who pretend that Sinn Fein or the IRA were ever anything else stand condemned as accomplices of nationalism.
Not only that. In the period since the break up of the American bloc, the US has tried its best to deal with signs of independence from its former allies. In the case of Britain there has been, for example, the backing of different sides in the conflicts in ex-Yugoslavia. Closer to home, the actions of Sinn Fein and the IRA over the last decade have been determined by the needs of US imperialism to put pressure on Britain. This has been more pronounced at some times than others. For example, during the final negotiations that preceded the Good Friday agreement the Sinn Fein delegation, as described in a speech by Martin McGuinness, was in constant, often hourly, contact with leading figures in the US administration, from the White House downwards. It was no surprise todownwards. It was no surprise to find the new Sinn Fein Minister of Education rushing off to the US to consult with Secretary of Education Richard Riley. "Riley spent most of the day with McGuinness, an unusual and very generous allocation of time" boasted Sinn Fein's An Phoblacht (20/1/00). Such contacts by Sinn Fein with leading figures in the American capitalist state have not just started because of the new Executive; they've been going on for years.
So, whether Republicans are bombing Canary Wharf or Manchester, or sitting round the table with leading unionists, they are still serving the same cause. In the case of Sinn Fein we are not just dealing with nationalism, but an arm of US imperialism. Revolutionaries oppose such forces in the same way that they stand against the loyalist terrorists that act in the interests of British imperialism. When the leftists pretend that somehow there can be, or was, in the twentieth century, an 'authentic' national 'liberation' struggle that can break away from the imperialist framework of global capitalism, they have the historical experience of the working class against them.
Tracey 26/01/00
SWPSWP echoes propaganda about 'peace process'
No treatment of the role of leftism in Britain would be complete without a few words on the largest group, the Socialist Workers Party. Their response to the new Executive was distinctive.
"The new Assembly in Northern Ireland has been welcomed by nearly everyone except a tiny minority of hardline Unionists gathered around Ian Paisley. Millions of people are hoping the new Assembly will mean the dawn of a new era of peace in Northern Ireland." (Socialist Worker 4/12/99).
'Millions' might be hopeful, but that's only because the capitalist media has put a lot of effort into trying to give the impression that there's the possibility of a "new era". Politicians of all colours have presented the new Executive as another step forward in the democratic process. However, the Unionists (who extend rather further than Paisley's gang) are fulfilling their familiar role as a potential fly in the ointment. If they should bring the Executive down no one will blame their backers, the British government, because the Unionists are well established as "hard line bigots" with their "obstacles to"obstacles to [the] peace process" (ibid).
Having shown their commitment to capitalist democracy (against the 'bigots') the SWP give it a left-wing twist. They criticise the fact that "Sinn Fein calls for cutting taxes on big corporations, so they match the low levels of Southern Ireland" (ibid). This is not much of a criticism, but it helps to establish the SWP as a left-wing voice, supposedly above 'communal politics'. In practice, they'll always find a faction of the bourgeoisie that they want workers to support. They always say 'vote Labour' at elections in Britain, for example. And they've never been shy of supporting Sinn Fein or the IRA when it suited them in the past. But when there is a "rejection of sectarianism and the desire for wider change among working class people" the SWP are there because it "opens up the possibility of the re-emergence of class politics." And wherever such a possibility exists, left-wingers like the SWP will be there to divert workers' struggles into trade union actions and campaigns which sabotage the development of the class struggle.
And what a victory it was. Who would have thought, even a year ago, that sixty thousand people would turn up to greet delegates of the World Trade Organisation. Who'd have thought that trade unionists would be marching with environmentalists people dressed as turtles marching with sacked steelworkers, the topless lesbian avengers mingling with farmers. Churchgoers with the anarchist black-block. The mass protests helped focus world-wide attention on what the WTO really stands for and it crumbled under the pressure. Forget all their talk about 'free trade', the WTO is nothing more than a nasty little organisation fighting for the rights of multinational organisations to dismantle every country's labour and environmental laws" SchNEWS website bulletin, 10.12.99
This vision of the Seattle events last December is common to many who see mobilisations of this kind like the June 18 'Carnival against Capitalism' in London or the various events timed to coincide witous events timed to coincide with the Seattle demonstration, including a protest against the privatisation of the tubes in London as a new and effective way of fighting against capitalism. We don't doubt that of many of those who take part in these actions are motivated by a sincere and increasingly widespread disgust with what capitalism is doing to this planet. But those who actually want to get rid of this system need to consider why this view is also being broadcast by the big guns of the bourgeois media. The latter have given enormous publicity to the events in Seattle (and London) and have unfailingly described them as a new form of anti-capitalism, either as a dangerously subversive movement or as a refreshing response of ordinary citizens and of small countries to the monster of 'globalisation', and furthermore, as a movement that can win significant victories even faced with the massive presence of the police. In short, it is time to sniff out the presence of a vast manipulation by the ruling class.
The mythology of globalisation
For a start, the theory of 'globalisation' is basically a product of the huge bourgeois campaigns about the 'death of communism' which followed the collapse of the eastern bloc at the end of the 80s. Essential to this theory is the idea tl to this theory is the idea that with the disappearance of the old 'Communist' bloc, capitalism has become a truly global system. Its more open ideologists those who were already singing the praises of liberalism and free trade in the 80s argued that now the last barriers to the free movement of capital had been removed, and with the generous assistance of the 'computer revolution' and the world-wide web the entire system could look forward to an unprecedented period of growth and prosperity.
The whole theory was deeply anti-marxist, not only because it made the usual false amalgam between Stalinism and communism, but also because it aimed to strike a blow against the marxist conception of the decadence of capitalism, which holds that capitalism is a system in historic decline and has been since the first world war. For marxism capitalism effectively became 'globalised' not at the end but at the beginning of the 20th century, and it was for this very reason that the system reached the end of its progressive function for mankind and became a giant barrier to further development, dragging humanity down in the coils of its mortal crisis. Capital has created a world economy, but because of its inherent contradictions, this can only be the basis for a really unified world through the revolutionary overthrow of capitalism.
But just as the bourgeois drug of fascism engenders the equally bourgeois side-effect of anti-fascism, so globalisation ideology gives rise to a bourgeois anti-globalisation ideology. This latter points to the undoubted ravages of capitalism especially the accelerating destruction of the environment and the savage exploitation of workers in the poorest countries and then erects a wholly false alternative between, on the one hand, global corporations owing allegiance only to their own profit margins, and, on the other hand, the national rights of peoples and small countries (and even big ones). A radical version of this ideology is provided by the Schnews report mentioned at the beginning:
"We want a new millennium based on economic democracy, not economic totalitarianism. The future is possible for humans and other species only if the principles of competition, organised greed, commodification of all life, monoculture, monopolies and centralised corporate control of our daily lives enshrined in the WTO are replaced by the principles of protection of people and nature, the obligation of giving and sharing diversity, and the decentralisation and self-organisation enshrined in our diverse cultures and national constitutions" (Vandana Shiva).
/i> (Vandana Shiva).
The key to this statement isn't the parts that are true like how capitalism turns everything into commodities, goods for sale, but the part at the end about preserving "our national constitutions". This same commitment to defending the rights of the nation against unpatriotic international capitalism was emphasised by Clinton who said that he was in deep sympathy with the Seattle protesters, and by the US trade unions who shared his abiding concern about the vicious exploitation of children in the poorer countries as a pretext for advocating US trade embargoes on the products of such exploitation and thus protecting the American economy and American jobs. But it was also demonstrated by the French delegation at the WTO which distinguished itself with its anti-American rhetoric on issues such as GM foods and ecology, and by the French 'peasant leader' Jose Bove who was filmed by the French media promoting French cheese outside MacDonalds Seattle. This is bourgeois anti-globalisation in a nutshell.
The real reasons for the failure of the Seattle WTO conference
These apparently absurd contradictions are a perfect expression of the fact that while global capital is indeed a real power, it exists only as the al power, it exists only as the product of the clash between national economies, between what the Bolshevik Nikolai Bukharin once described as the national "state capitalists trusts" which dominate the planet. The so-called 'multinationals' do not constitute another power standing over all the national economies in the final analysis these companies are merely a subordinate expression of the state capitalist and imperialist leviathans. Neither are the different countries divided into a protectionist camp and a free trade camp: those who advocate free trade for their own products abroad are the most fervent defenders of protectionism for their own domestic economies. And it's this ceaseless rivalry between the great national capitalist predators, not the protests on the Seattle streets, that is the real reason for the failure of the latest WTO talks.
In fact, from the beginning the WTO was itself a spawn of these very rivalries. Its predecessor, the GATT, created in 1947, had been an instrument of the USA, its function being to express and strengthen America's commercial domination of its imperialist bloc through preferential customs duties. After the break-up of the Russian bloc it was the European states, now striving to escape US hegemony, which took the initiative of replacing the GATT with a more 'flexible' and morT with a more 'flexible' and more 'equal' structure. This led to the formation of the WTO in 1994. What the 1999 WTO summit showed was the sharpening of the trade war between the USA and the European states: its failure to adopt new rules of functioning at this conference expressed the fact that the conflicts of interests it seeks to regulate are becoming more and more irreconcilable.
The only movement against capitalism is proletarian and communist
The bourgeoisie has every reason to hide the real reasons for the failure of the Seattle conference, because they show the impossibility of capitalism ever overcoming its anarchic and dismembered nature. At the same time, the exploiters in every country have a common interest in selling the idea that capitalism can be tamed or even threatened to the core by a 'movement' made up of any number of different classes, categories and causes in which the working class appears as just one pressure group among many, duly identified with the trade unions, a 'movement' which propagates the notion that national interests are somehow a more democratic and human alternative to the impersonal global power of capital. A real 'anti-capitalism' would have to turn this inverted logic right side up: moribund capitalism cannot be reformed or tamed, and it can only be threatened and overthrown by an international movement of the internationally exploited class, the proletariat, which has rediscovered its programme of constituting a world-wide communist society.
Amos
Links
[1] https://en.internationalism.org/tag/political-currents-and-reference/council-communism
[2] https://en.internationalism.org/tag/general-and-theoretical-questions/terrorism
[3] https://en.internationalism.org/tag/recent-and-ongoing/northern-ireland
[4] https://en.internationalism.org/tag/5/50/united-states
[5] https://en.internationalism.org/tag/political-currents-and-reference/anti-globalisation