A new international movement emerges?
The recent mass actions in Genoa are the latest in a series of impressive mobilizations against 'globalization'.[1] The most radical elements involved, especially here in Britain, have adopted the definition 'anti-capitalism'.
Party, Class and Communism
2001, over a decade has passed since the fall of the Berlin wall, and the announcement then of the “End of History” seems now to be not just ideological, but beneath contempt. Open warfare returns to Europe, not as an isolated episode, but endemic like an ancient disease grown resistant to modern antibiotics. The global economy veers headlong into recession.
Confusion about banking operations and the power of bankers has been in evidence for a long time. It was known before 1848, and that year saw the publication of two works putting opposite points of view. One was Lectures on the Nature and Use of Money in which John Gray outlined a scheme which was the forerunner of the Social Credit Movement founded by Major Douglas in the nineteen twenties. The other was John Stuart Mill’s Principles of Political Economy which contained the following:
This text is taken from chapter 1 of the larger work “The Eclipse and Re-Emergence of the Communist Movement”, first published by Black & Red in Detroit in 1974. This chapter was reprinted in the mid 1980's as “What is Communism?” by Unpopular Books in London. A shorter, revised edition of the whole work was reissued by Antagonism Press in 1997.
This text follows the 1974 edition incorporating the additions from the 1997 version in square brackets.
Communism is not a program one puts into practice or makes others put into practice, but a social movement. Those who develop and defend theoretical communism do not have any advantages over others except a clearer understanding and a more rigorous expression; like all others who are not especially concerned by theory, they feel the practical need for communism. They have no privilege whatsoever; they do not carry the knowledge that will set the revolution in motion; but, on the other hand, they have no fear of becoming "leaders" by explaining their positions. The communist revolution, like every other revolution, is the product of real needs and living conditions. The problem is to shed light on an existing historical movement.
Why do you go to work? Is it because you enjoy what you do? Did you choose to work at what you do in the way you do? Would you do your job were it not for the money?
Written for the International Communist Party. Though Bordiga's vanguardist conception of the party is questionable, his critiques of councilism and so-called "workers control" are essential reading.
Here Bordiga examines the pro-capitalist nature of Proudhonism
Written for the International Communist Party. Though Bordiga's vanguardist conception of the party is questionable, his critiques of councilism and so-called "workers control" are essential reading.
Bordiga examines the weaknesses of purely workplace based orgainisations.
Written for the International Communist Party. Though Bordiga's vanguardist conception of the party is questionable, his critiques of councilism and so-called "workers control" are essential reading.
Compares the features of a Communist society to the visions drawn up by the syndicalists.
The following text is the slightly reworked version of an article which appeared on 21 September 2005 in “Jungle World”, a leftist German weekly newspaper. In a previous issue, Karl Heinz Roth. one of the main German representatives of Operaismo, had argued that some important Marxian categories are not able to grasp contemporary capitalism. The text at hand answers this critique, stressing the difference between Marxian theory and traditional Marxism, emphasizing the “new reading of Marx”, which developed through the last decades. The German text can be found at the website of the author: www.oekonomiekritik.de
Marx has been badly served by disciples who have succeeded neither in assessing the limits of his theory nor in determining its standards and field of application and has ended up by taking on the role of some mythical giant, a symbol of the omniscience and omnipotence of homo faber, maker of his own destiny.
The history of the School remains to be written, but at least we know how it came into being: Marxism, as the codification of a misunderstood and misinterpreted body of thought, was born and developed at a time when Marx’s work was not yet available in its entirely and when important parts of it remained unpublished. Thus, the triumph of Marxism as a State doctrine and Party ideology preceded by several decades the publication of the writings where Marx set out most clearly and completely the scientific basis and ethical purpose of his social theory. That great upheavals took place which invoked a body of thought whose major principles were unknown to the protagonists in the drama of history should have been enough to show that Marxism was the greatest, if not the most tragic, misunderstanding of the century. But at the same time this allows us to appreciate the significance of the theory held by Marx that it is not revolutionary ideas or moral principles which bring about changes in society, but rather human and material forces; that ideas and ideologies very often serve only to disguise the interest of the class in whose interests the upheavals take place. Political Marxism cannot appeal to Marx’s science and at the same time escape the critical analysis which that science uses to unmask the ideologies of power and exploitation.
