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Autonomous Workers’ Nuclei: A New Vision for the Post-Industrial* Labour Movement (A work in progess) awaits critiqueshould have a real first draft by August I Beyond the Proletariat, but not without it The proletariat is not the revolutionary subject. There can be no radical break with the past, no revolution, without the abandonment of this vulgar Marxist pretension. Revolutions are real changes in the material conditions and the lived experience of life. A revolution cannot be abstracted into a linguistic formula with subjects, objects, predicates or whatever and still serve its purpose as a real, lived break with the previous mode of existence and previous historical paradigm. Instead of spending all of our energy trying to locate or develop the revolutionary subject we should be safe in the knowledge that those segments of humanity who partake in revolutions become the subject of the revolution as their desires are realized through the process of the revolution-making. Post-industrial societies have been so thoroughly proletarianized that it is becoming more and more absurd to distinguish between the revolutionary potential of the working class and the revolutionary potential of Humanity as a whole. We have all become slaves to our jobs. Most are wage slaves such as have existed since the birth of capitalism, but more are becoming slaves to workplace technology, slaves to that tiny sense of purpose that exists at work, but has been robbed from all of life’s other aspects, even slaves to the that petty sense of control that one gets from being a middle manager. The proles however remain highly important in that they are in the best position to capture the means of production and hopefully rapidly decommission them, thus draining the bourgeoisie of its productive capacity (which is really just the stolen creative forces of the proletariat.) The proletariat can also, very generally, be a point of union and comparing notes for the multifarious struggles against the oppressions of modernity such as racism, sexism, speciesism and homophobia, as the incredibly diverse proletariat contains within it males, females, transgendered folks, animal liberationists and people of every race and background. This is not to say that these struggles are secondary to the workers’ struggle. It is simply to say that no matter what other oppressions one may suffer under, everyone suffers from working. Work is the universal axis of oppression. We cannot turn the proletarian movement into a simplistic identity politics with the proles cast as the noble protagonist in the world-historical drama. We can not negate all classes while self-valorizing our own. The working-class cannot abolish itself so long as it is comfortable playing the role of the proletariat. II From without unions and within Unions have become the great labour racket, union leadership a gang of squabbling politician wannabes. Like Big Business and Big Government, Big Labour shouldn’t be trusted to have the proletariat’s, or even more importantly, the human species’, best interests in mind. Unions have long given up the role of labour agitator for the role of labour mediator, the failsafe that keeps working class anger from getting out of control and spilling into a social insurgency. The union representative is the self-ruling class within the proletariat. The representative government within the working class is about as effective and liberatory as representative government in national politics, which is to say not effective or liberatory at all. How can it be that so many Anarchists scoff at the idea of voting in a political election, but gladly vote on union issues including union rep elections? That is not to say that one need leave a union that one may have previously joined especially considering that some workplaces force workers to join the union. This is only to say that unions are no longer the form of resistance best suited for creating a revolutionary situation. The Autonomous Workers’ Nucleus, further described bellow and previously discussed by Alfredo Bonanno, unlike a union, is not a formal organization. It has no founding statement, no constitution, no official meetings, no official membership. Therefore it can work within unions or without them, within the workplace or without. If a union shows itself to be reactionary, the AWN can work outside and against the union. One can remain within the union in order to fight for the relatively banal demands of higher wages and better benefits and also fight within the AWN for the abolition of work itself and a life not held subservient to the petty needs of mere survival. The only allegiance the AWN holds is to the specific workers that create it, in other words, only to itself. III Strikes and mediations Strikes are a regular part of the management of Capital. They have been recuperated into the planetary work machine like the unions that organize them. Today, strikes can only be effective when they are unexpected and unplanned manifestations of the rage of the workers. In other words, strikes can only be effective today if they are Wildcats, if they lack corporate (union) sponsorship. Most strikes are used by unions to ensure that the unions maintain their privileged role as the mediators of working-class struggle, removing the direct, unabstracted human element from the conflict between employee and employer. We can no longer allow strikes to be used as a catharsis to alleviate tensions and get everyone back to work. The only goal of a strike should be this: more strikes. IV The Autonomous Workers’ Nucleus The form of the Autonomous Workers’ Nucleus is a rhizomatic collectivity of unique individuals that are joined by a commonality of workplace. It is rhizomatic in the sense that the form can expand and contract, change shape, change goals, change tactics, gain or lose members and evolve without any internal weakening (see: Deleuze and Guattari.) The content of the Autonomous Workers’ Nucleus is the potentiality towards Gemeinwesen, Gemeinwesen being a truly human community which simultaneously affirms the freedom and unique agency of individuals and the benefits of strong communal bonds. Gemeinwesen is a community that immanently cultivates human agency such as is believed to have existed prior to the rise of civilization, particularly the foundation of city-states and the Greek Polis (see: Camatte.) The AWN agitates around the workplace, but can also agitate outside of it and is united through bonds of political (or more accurately, anti-political) friendship. Exactly what the AWN does is hard to determine. I could only speculate as to what each Nucleus may involve itself in. However, I would suggest that the “homework” assigned by Tyler Durden in the movie Fight Club may be a relative approximation. V The Insurrectionary Workers’ Nucleus The Insurrectionary Workers’ Nucleus is the form that the AWN ascends to during times of more or less open conflict against Capital. At these times stealth not as necessary and it may even be advantageous for morale purposes to operate as publicly as possible. The IWN is an actor on the stage of Social War. Social War is the opening up of the class struggle to all hierarchical social relationships. Social War takes place both publicly and privately, in lived experience and in the semiotic world of popular culture. It is a war of arms and symbols driven be the sheer will to live without constraints. The IWN liberates spaces from the planetary work machine and maintains an armed presence within these free territories. However it is disadvantageous to make insurrection “serious business” and use these weapons against people. As Nietzsche said, “blood hallows any cause.” Given the number of Anarchist martyrs, we should know this quite well and it would be a shame to create martyrs for Capital. The IWN initiates the phase of active nihilism that is a precursor to any revolutionary change. It is the destructive element of radicalism par excellence. VI The Revolutionary Workers’ Nucleus The Revolutionary Workers’ Nucleus fulfills the process initiated by the Insurrectionary Worker’s Nucleus. It consolidates the radical break with history and jump towards Gemeinwesen begun earlier. Unlike the typical conception of what is “revolutionary,” the RWN is not primarily destructive. The revolution is not the destruction of the old way of being, but instead the creation of the new way of being. It was the IWN that cleared stage of the world-historical drama of the obstacles to Gemeinwesen. It is up to the RWN to build over the flaming rubble of the old stage. The RWN is the manifestation of the creative (Erotic) drive of the revolutionary movement. Thus it will freely build new areas in which new ways of living with a new kind of being can emerge. It shall plant and cultivate, educate and spiritualize and will also go about decommissioning potentially dangerous relics of the past such as nuclear reactors. VII Party, Class and Revolution a) History and Gemeinwesen The Gemeinwesen is not the inevitable end of history that an inescapable dialectic has been leading towards. The thesis-antithesis-synthesis progression of ideals exists only within the realm of ideas and is not an intrinsic force in the natural universe. The realization that “progress” is a myth and victory is not the unchangeable end of change within the world historical forces is at once unfortunate and fortunate. Unfortunate because it means we can not rely on the development of the productive forces to lead us to the Gemeinwesen and creating a vanguard party to raise class consciousness wouldn’t be of much help. It is a fortunate realization because it means we do not need to wait for “the full development of the productive forces” or the creation of vanguard party to realize our desires. If we put all of our creative spirit towards it, we can spread anarchy, live communism and abandon this bankrupt civilization at any time. The Gemeinwesen is a viable goal at any time and has nearly been achieved, quite unconsciously, many times throughout recorded history. (see: Perlman) b) The Imaginary Party VIII Tactical Explorations a) A Vindication of Cynical Virtues IX Revolution – Anarchy and/or Utopia I can’t promise that a society without rulers will be a preferable society immediately. It will, for many years, be a confusing society, a difficult society where everyone will have to learn to thrive again, as none of the old social presuppositions will apply. What I can promise is that it will be an emerging Gemeinwesen of Total Potentiality, of Infinite Becoming. The Revolution is not a grandiose End of Times or the beginning of a static age devoid of social or personal changes. Without the constraints of civilized society our personal and communal destinies will be free to take which ever paths they may. Changes will be a common and welcome occurrence, but not fetishized as they are in the paradigm of historical thinking. Some of our wildest dreams will begin to be realized during the revolution itself. We cannot wait for “after the Revolution” to begin actualizing our desires. We must allow our Utopian urges to begin manifesting themselves now. I believe it would narrow our potential means if we were to draw out a step by step blueprint of what our “Utopian” goal may be, however, I personally imagine a rough four stage movement towards the realization of my personal Anti-Civilization World-View. Stage 1- The creation of the Autonomous Workers’ Nuclei for periodic transmutation into Insurrectionary Workers’ Nuclei for strike, counter-summit and riot situation until a critical mass is reached, allowing transubstantiation into the endgame formation of Revolutionary Workers’ Nuclei. The RWN will take charge in the dismantling of the factory system and sabotage of the key infrastructure needed to operate the Global Work Machine. This will be a “Great Punchout” precipitating the final end of Work. This is the great weak point of civilization: it is in a constant state of entropy and requires non-stop production and reproduction in order to maintain itself. Without producer and reproducer cells the civilized social body quickly dies. Stage 2 – Pathfinder tribes who have re-learned the skills necessary to thrive in the wilderness will prepare the way for the rewilding of humanity returning to the communes sporadically to confer with the communards and educate more people about earth skills as part of “The Great Remembering.” I imagine the communes resembling a mixture of Bookchin’s Social Ecology, PM’s “Bolo’bolo” and William Morris’ society in “News From Nowhere.” Permaculture will be the primary mode of food procurement. Vasectomies may be prudent to mitigate potential population pressures upon the return to hunting and gathering. Stage 3 – A society perhaps resembling Iroquois village society. The dissolution of mass society. The end of animal domestication. A mixture of hunting and gathering and horticulture. Stage 4 – Immediate return hunter-gatherer band society. It must be stressed that this is my personal hope for the actualization of my own world-view, not a political programme that I wish to establish. X Final Thought Imagine walking down an unpaved sidewalk, where the only differentiation between pathway and wilderness is an honor guard of wildflowers. You look up and all you see is clear blue sky. There are beautiful crumbling skyscrapers wrapped in vines on the horizon. You laugh… Postscript: A Call to Arms for Young Workers Come on young workers, let us leave this world that has left us with no future, no place or purpose, no hope for improvement. A world that has given us nothing of interest, but has the audacity to expect us to bare the burden of millions of our baby-boomer parents and grandparents as they go into retirement. I say, hell no! The only thing we owe to them is the knowledge that they were the architects of the bankrupt consumer society that will destroy them. We will not allow ourselves to be destroyed so easily. Will shall be an anti-capitalist shrugging Atlas and leave their society to stagnate and rot as we, we free spirits, we creators, go on to build the world of our dreams. Will shall undermine and invalidate the whole project of modernity as we emancipated young workers, from the waiter and barista to the writer and the artist, pull ourselves, the very column of capitalist continuity from mass society, to create our own nation of free spirits to encircle the society that made us its lost children and destroy it from all sides. So to arms I call you young workers of the world! We have a world to set aflame and nothing to lose but our embarrassing uniforms. Young workers of the World, enjoy! Human strike after human strike, I know you're out there. I can feel you now. I know that you're afraid... you're afraid of us. You're afraid of change. I don't know the future. I didn't come here to tell you how this is going to end. I came here to tell you how it's going to begin. I'm going to hang up this phone, and then I'm going to show these people what you don't want them to see. I'm going to show them a world without you. A world without rules and controls, without borders or boundaries. A world where anything is possible. Where we go from there is a choice I leave to you. *Note on the term “Post-Industrial” and the applicability of the forewritten The forms of resistance and terrain of struggle described above were created under the presupposition that they would be applied in a region were the productive forces had reached the so-called “post-industrial” paradigm. The term post-industrial is used to describe an economy with a minimum of manufacturing jobs and a maximum of retail and service jobs. I feel, with certain cultural, historical and geographical differences taken under consideration the general Autonomous Workers’ Nucleus form of resistance can be modified and successfully implemented in regions still based in primarily agricultural or industrial based economies. However, it is apparent that particular tactics must be created on a case by case basis depending on the eccentricities of the region and the needs of region’s populace. Recommended Reading This World We Must Leave and Other Essays by Jacques Camatte Supplementary Literature The Revolution of Everyday Life by Raoul Vaneigem |
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Did you write this? This is
Did you write this? This is an awesome piece. I'll definitely ponder it. When you do manage to complete the final draft, I would be happy to upload this into the Anarchist Library.
Some light criticism though (or rather, just plain thinking out loud):
The "revolutionary subject", as vulgar a term as it is, is not entirely false when looked at in un-fetishistic/un-mystified terms. I would agree that the proletariat is not inherently the revolutionary subject, this is to say the whole of the working class does not possess revolutionary agency ("revolutionary potential"); but in Marxian discourse, the proletariat is defined as such (again, disregarding mystification and fetishization) because of it's proximity to the means of production, which you correctly point out: "The proles however remain highly important in that they are in the best position to capture the means of production and hopefully rapidly decommission them, thus draining the bourgeoisie of its productive capacity (which is really just the stolen creative forces of the proletariat.)"
The appropriation of the means of production, their coming under working class control, and their subsequent "decommission" - their abandonment - is what will make liberation possible. This is not meant to be interpreted as an essential statement, as so many Marxists and various dialecticians would have other pro-revolutionaries believe. It is simply an analysis that both you (in many extents, judging by this essay) and I can agree on. Having read what I could of Nihilist Communism, I can agree that what may be defined as the "essential proletariat", or the "vital proletariat" presents itself as the most severe threat to the economy, as they literally have their hands on the levers of vital capitalist industries. But it is problematic, and your essay comes as a (perhaps, unwitting) response to this problem. It is problematic because vital capitalist industries are embedded in factory labor - industrial labor. But post-industrial capitalism is the predominant arena in which modern work is set in. Post-industrial labor is unessential to capitalism, and is, in fact, nearly entirely superfluous to capital. It merely lingers on as a social discipline. Your thoughts on the the worker's nucleus may solve this problem. This response may be superficial however. I don't want it to appear like I'm dogmatically latched onto the revolutionary subject.
As I said, I'll think on this some more. I'm sure I'll have more rambling comments for you later. Thanks for the good read.
:)
Oh, and I'm gonna post this
Oh, and I'm gonna post this on Anti-politics (assuming you don't mind).
Oh, be my guest. I'm still
Oh, be my guest. I'm still working on sections VII and VIII.
Indeed. The Revolution will
Indeed. The Revolution will probably have what Marx would call a "subject" I just feel that this component will most likely evolve throughout the revolutionary process, as opposed to being its precursor. I agree that the "essential proletariat" could attack Capital with the greatest ease, however this component seems to be most enraptured with trade union consciousness or the "repressive consciousness" (to use Camatte's term) of vulgar Marxism. That is why I primarily addressed this text to the younger, more disenchanted tertiary industry workers, those who reproduce the system and facilitate consumption. Perhaps in VII I will discuss the differences and possibilities for cooperation between the "essential" and "peripheral" proletariat.
I would have to agree with
I would have to agree with you on the "subject". The essential proletariat's proximity to capitalist production power presents it as the most formidable threat to capital, but revolution could come about through a myriad of other ways. The totality of capitalism, as I see it, cannot be understood fully. Our size and scale does not permit us such omniscience. So revolution could be stumbled upon at any time. And when it does occur, it's subject will necessarily have to evolve and make self-interested decisions. It would be a tragedy (seriously...) if we came so close to revolution, only to fall back into the lap of another bourgeois regime - another form of production relations.
I'm going to have to return to Camatte, however. I barely managed to understand his words when I first read them. But that essay from GA you provided helped! Thanx for that.
Oh, no problem. :)
Oh, no problem. :)
WWWA I FUCKING LOVE YOU! if
WWWA I FUCKING LOVE YOU!
if i have any insights on this i shall let you know.
great piece so far.
I kind of like the direction
I kind of like the direction you are going here, but find what I consider some fatal flaws here.
1) You are setting out a plan of action here and I think this kind of step-by-step procedural thinking is a remnant of what got us into this mess in the first place. You've taken mostly Marxist thought (history/economics), mixed in some Deleuze (biologically inspired organizational ideas) and redirected them towards anarcho-primitivism (hunter-gatherer band society). Not sure that will really work so well, but at least you're making an effort which is commendable. The idea of a "roadmap" to the future with set goals and mileposts along the way seems a bit forced and frankly, naive.
2) "Party, Class and Revolution" - 3 terms that should be jettisoned due to their ideological weight and vapid meaning where you are headed. To draw so much on the identity of "worker" is a bad foundation to any movement away from production. Your "worker" also sounds too much like "soldier" in the battle against production. Without a fundamental break from these identities, your roadmap will most likely get bogged down from moving onto later stages due to the affiliation with "the struggle" and not the goal. Soviet-style war communism comes to mind and I don't think this is what you desire at all.
3) It hits closer to home when you spell out "why" your thoughts are worth paying attention to, not "how" to achieve the goal that you are assuming readers will want. You won't be preaching to much of a choir out there!
For what it's worth,
bloodyknuckles
Yes, this text does seem
Yes, this text does seem quite insular and self referential as well captured by old terminology. Such is the danger of addressing a text so specifically to those who are already well versed in Anarchist theory. Perhaps sometime I shall condense these ideas in a text that is more relevant to those outside the Anarchist scene.
I was listening to Zerzan's
I was listening to Zerzan's radio show and this text got discussed on June 21.
I'm about 2, maybe 3 days
I'm about 2, maybe 3 days away from posting the finished version.
sweet.
sweet.