Red & Black Revolution (1)

Red & Black

Revolution
A magazine of libertarian communism

Number 4

PDF version
Nov 2000
http://surf.to/anarchism

A
PDF version
Nov 2000
http://surf.to/anarchism

Anarchism
or
barbarism?
The
choice is
yours!

Rebellion
in Ireland

1798

Racism & Class

Struggle

Red & Black Revolution (2)

Comment

Welcome to issue 4 of Red and

Black Revolution.
In this issue, we follow in the
footsteps of the 3 previous issues
with a balance of articles of
historical and present-day interest.
The 1798 rebellion in Ireland has
been marked throughout Ireland
in this, the year of its 200th
anniversary, with the launch of
pamphlets, T.V. programmes,
Summer Schools and reenactments of battles. In the
context of the Irish peace process
and the Good Friday Agreement,
the 1798 commemorations have
taken on added significance. We
look at how 1798 is remembered,
and indeed how large parts of its
legacy are deliberately forgotten
or distorted. We also take a look at
how the left in Ireland have reacted
to recent events in the North and

Back Issues
A limited number of copies of
Issue 1, 2 & 3 are still available.
Send 2 pounds/ 3 dollars for a
single copy. Bulk discount of 1/3
applies for orders of 3 copies or
more.
R & B R 1 featured articles on the
collapse of the left, Russia 1917-21, Marx
& the state, the EZLN & more.
R & B R 2 included Russian Anarchism
today, Chomsky on Anarchism, Two
souls of the unions etc
R & BR3 included Anarchism in South
Africa and Italy, The anti Water Charges
struggle, the early Irish left etc

Reprints
Permission is given for revolutionary
publications to reprint any of the articles
contained in this issue. But please do
two things;
Tell us you are re-printing and send us
a copy of the publication it appears in.
If you are also translating an article,
please send us a copy of the translation
on computer disk so we can add it to our
electronic archive.

the window of opportunity which

has opened up with the silencing of
the guns.
Ireland 1998 has seen a huge
growth in naked racism. The
arrival on the shores of the Celtic
Tiger of a few thousand asylum
seekers has been met by hysteria
about "scroungers" and a naked
attempt by sections of the media
and the political establishment to
whip up racism. This is of course
not a uniquely Irish phenomenon,
so we are delighted to carry an
article from the Workers Solidarity
Federation in South Afica, which
looks at their analysis and
experiences of fighting racism.
Since the launch of Red & Black
Revolution, we have attempted to
analyse past and current
developments in anarchism. In this
tradition, we look at the

Organisational Platform of the

Libertarian Communists, both in
a historical context and in the
context of its relevance today. We
also carry an interview with the
Solidarita organisation in the
Czech Republic about their
experiences in developing
anarchism in the post-Soviet era.
We hope that you will find
something of interest to you in this
edition. We dont claim to know all
the answers, rather we are
attempting to provoke and stimulate
debate on some of the crucial
questions facing us. If there is
anything you agree or disagree with,
we would love to hear from you. It is
through debate and discussion that
ideas can be developed.
This is our contribution to that
development of ideas. Read and
enjoy!

About the WSM

The Workers Solidarity Movement was
founded in Dublin, Ireland in 1984 following
discussions by a number of local anarchist
groups on the need for a national anarchist
organisation. At that time, with unemployment and inequality on the rise, there seemed
every reason to argue for anarchism and for a
revolutionary change in Irish society. This
has not changed.
Like most socialists we share a fundamental
belief that capitalism is the problem. We
believe that as a system it must be ended,
that the wealth of society should be commonly owned and that its resources should be
used to serve the needs of humanity as a
whole and not those of a small greedy minority. But, just as importantly, we see this
struggle against capitalism as also being a
struggle for freedom. We believe that socialism and freedom must go together, that we
cannot have one without the other. As Mikhail
Bakunin, the Russian anarchist said, Socialism without freedom is tyranny and brutality.
Anarchism has always stood for individual
freedom. But it also stands for democracy.
We believe in democratising the workplace
and in workers taking control of all industry.
We believe that this is the only real alternative to capitalism with its on going reliance on
hierarchy and oppression and its depletion of
the worlds resources.
In the years since our formation, weve been
involved in a wide range of struggles - our

members are involved in their trade unions;

weve fought for abortion rights and against
the presence of the British state in Northern
Ireland; weve also been involved in campaigns in support of workers from countries
as far apart as Nepal, Peru and South Africa.
Alongside this, we have produced over fifty
issues of our paper Workers Solidarity, and a
wide range of pamphlets. In 1986, we organised a speaking tour of Ireland by an anarchist veteran of the Spanish Civil War, Ernesto
Nadal, to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the revolution there.
As anarchists we see ourselves as part of a
long tradition that has fought against all
forms of authoritarianism and exploitation, a
tradition that strongly influenced one of the
most successful and far reaching revolutions
in this century - in Spain in 1936 - 37. The
value of this tradition cannot be underestimated today. With the fall of the Soviet
Union there is renewed interest in our ideas
and in the tradition of libertarian socialism
generally. We hope to encourage this interest
with Red & Black Revolution. We believe that
anarchists and libertarian socialists should
debate and discuss their ideas, that they
should popularise their history and struggle,
and help point to a new
way forward. If you are
interested in finding out
more about anarchism or
the WSM, contact us at
PO Box 1528, Dublin 8,
Ireland.

Red & Black Revolution (3)

Contents
Anarchism with a
future - The Czech
Republic

Environmentalism

Racism: Where it
comes from, How we
should fight it

Victor Serge

The 1798 Rebellion

Letters

Kevin Doyle talks to Vadim Bark of the Solidarita organisation in the

Czech Republic about the problems and possibilities facing anarchists in
the process of rebuilding a revolutionary movement.

Anarchism is often seen as being broadly linked with the radical wing of
the Environmental movement. Ray Cunningham in reviewing
Anarchism and Environmental Survival considers these links and the
influence of these movements on each other.
With racism on the rise in Ireland, it has become more important than ever
for anti-racist activists to examine where such ideas come from and how
they can be fought. In this article, the South African anarchist organisation, the WSF, puts forward its view that the fight against racism and the
class-struggle are inextricably linked.
One time anarchist Victor Serge joined the Bolsheviks in 1918 and is often
quoted by Leninists today to justify their repression of the left. Dermot
Sreenan looks at his later writings and finds a Serge unhappy with many
aspects of Bolshevik rule but unable to break with them because of the
apparent success of the Russian Revolution.
In June of 1795 several Irish Protestants gathered on top of Cave Hill,
overlooking Belfast. They swore " never to desist in our efforts until we had
subverted the authority of England over our country and asserted our
independence". Three years later 100,000 rose against Britain in the first
Irish republican insurrection. Andrew Flood examines what they were
fighting for and how they influenced modern Irish nationalism.
Readers views on some controversy generated with the last issue

The Friends of
Durruti

The Friends of Durruti organisation, which arose from the ranks of

anarchist militants during the Spanish Civil War, condemned the CNT
and FAI members who joined the anti-Franco government. For their
pains they were accused of wanting to establish an anarchist dictatorship. Alan MacSimin reviews the first English language book about
them, and looks at the lessons to be learnt from Spain.

The Platform

So you want to change the world? What next? Unsurprisingly this simple
question has provoked much discussion among anarchists. Aileen
O'Carroll and Alan MacSimin look at the answer provided by some
Russians.

Hobson's choice
The "Good Friday
Agreement" & the
Irish Left

The "Good Friday Agreement" was passed by an overwhelming majority

of voters North and South. The agreement presented something of a
Hobson's Choice for the Irish working-class - which route to an entrenchment of sectarianism do you want to take? Here Gregor Kerr looks at the
reactions to the agreement of the Irish left.

Page 4

Page 7

Page 11

Page 15

Page 18

Page 26

Page 27

Page 29

Page 33

1998 - 99
Red & Black Revolution is published by the Workers Solidarity Movement. The deadline for the next issue is
April 1999. Submissions are welcome and should be sent either as 'text only' files on Mac or PC format computer
disks or typed on plain white paper. Disks are preferred. Letters are also welcome. All correspondence should
be sent to Red & Black Revolution, PO Box 1528, Dublin 8, Ireland.

http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/wsm.html

Red & Black Revolution (4)

Anarchism

with a future
- the Czech Republic Kevin Doyle talks to Vadim Bark of the Solidarita organisation in the
Czech Republic about the problems and possibilities facing anarchists in
the process of rebuilding a revolutionary movement.
Q: Whats your view of the old
Communist system that existed
in the Czech Republic until
1989? Had it any positive
features?
It should be remembered that unlike in
Hungary, Poland and Eastern Germany
where the Communist Party (CP) were
installed into government by the Soviet
military forces, here in Czechoslovakia they
came to power by winning democratic elections with an overwhelming majority of
votes. But what you call the old Communist system had nothing in common with
true socialism. The regime we had until
1989 had all the faults that the Czech
Anarchists at the beginning of the century
predicted it would have. The Communist
Party bureaucracy took over the state power
in the name of workers. They slaughtered
left and right oppositions, destroyed basic
civil and human rights to prevent ordinary
people from organising themselves independent of the Party and from expressing
opinions hostile to the most perfect democracy in the world. Industries were not
nationalised under workers' control but
under central bureaucratic management.
Agriculture was collectivised with brutal
force. The centralised undemocratic planning that became the norm here, fulfilled
the interests of the nomenklatura1 and not
that of the whole society. As time went on
it became more and more inefficient.
Q: Was there anarchist activity
in Czechoslovakia in the lead up
to the Velvet Revolution(1989)?
A: Yes, there was an anarchist minority in
an illegal party called the Left Alternative.
This party was very small and composed
mainly of intellectuals and students who
belonged to various currents of democratic
and revolutionary socialism. They opposed
the Communist regime and pursued a programme of socialism based on workers
self-management and direct democracy.
As freedom of speech and association did
not exist, the LA remained confined to
being a more or less discussional platform,
not an organisation active among working
class people.
During the Velvet Revolution the LA gained
some credibility among ordinary people,

and in Prague - the centre of the revolution

- it made significant steps to becoming a
real working-class alternative. In the first
local elections, 10,000 people voted for the
LA in Prague. But by then the revolution
had been usurped by careerist dissident
intellectuals and former Communist bureaucrats. They took over a movement of
Citizens Forums and the state apparatus,
and by means of a massive propaganda
campaign succeeded in persuading people
that we could not have socialism with democracy - that the only way was the western market economy idea.
This new situation saw the LA once more
in a position of isolated discussional circles. This time it was fatal. Some of its
leading figures were moving towards a
pro-market position, sectarianism occurred
and in the end its internal conflicts destroyed it.
Q: What sort of history do
anarchist ideas have in the
Czech Republic?
Anarchism started here in the 1880s as a
youth section of a patriotic and liberal
movement against the Austro-Hungarian
monarchy. When the Social Democratic
Party was established, its left wing was
represented by Libertarian Socialists, but
after several years they were forced to
break away. Until WW1 the most powerful
current of Libertarianism was AnarchoSyndicalist. A stronghold of Czech AnarchoSyndicalism was in the Northern Bohemian
mining regions. Anarcho-Syndicalists were
soon organising their own union federation, the Czech General Union Federation
(the CGUF). Repression by the state strangled the CGUF in 1908, but could not
destroy the Syndicalist spirit among workers and new Syndicalist unions like the
Regional Miners Unity were formed.
By 1914 the Federation of Czech AnarchoCommunists (the FCAC) was also well
established among Czech workers.
Syndicalists and Anarchists published a
lot of papers such as The Proletarian. Anarchists established some consumers coops. During WW1 there was a general
clampdown on the Czech Libertarian movement - a lot of militants were either jailed
or marched to the front; many were killed.

Unlike Syndicalism the FCAC survived

the war.
In 1918, on 14th October, the FCACs militants, together with left Social Democrats,
organised a 24-hour general strike that in
fact marked the end of the Austro-Hungarian empires domination of our nation. This
event made Czech nationalist politicians,
who did not want to break away from the
empire until that moment, start negotiations with the empire about our independence. Strikers were demanding our right to
national independence and a creation of
the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic. After
a day the strike was called off by the Social
Democratic leadership. On 28th October
ordinary people - mainly in Prague - rose
up again to finish off the decaying AustroHungarian authorities.
At that time the leading Anarchist-Communist intellectuals were already moving
towards Leninism. One of them became an
MP in the parliament of the new republic
and another was a minister of the first
government. On the other hand it tells a lot
about Anarchist-Communist influence at
the time. In 1918 the Anarchist-Communists became the left wing of the Czechoslovak Socialist Party (the CSSP). In 1923
Anarchist-Communists were expelled from
the CSSP and their leaders manoeuvred
them into a last step before an open unification with the CP, which had already
been established in 1921 by left Social
Democrats and left Anarchist-Communists,
who openly converted to Bolshevism. (In
fact they were the first here to translate
Lenins works.) This last step led to the
formation of the Independent Socialist
Party (the ISP). In 1925 the ISP, despite
resistance from the last remnants of syndicalism - the Association of Czechoslovak
Miners, which was tied to the AnarchistCommunists - abandoned federalism and
other Anarchist principles and joined the
CP.
Q: Tell us a little about your
formation. Is Solidarita a
completely new organisation or
did you develop from another
organisation?
Solidarita developed from the AnarchoSyndicalist Federation (the ASF), whose
roots reach to the LA. After 1990, in a time
of greatest illusions about the market
economy and consequently the greatest
isolation of the left (no matter whether pro-

Red & Black Revolution (5)

market or socialist), the ASF sank into a

deep sectarianism and dogmatism - which
it has not recovered from yet.

(The NBLF ceased to exist because of a

spilt between syndicalists and green anarchists).

But after this interval, there was a change:

The first union struggles occurred; students fought back against the introduction
of fees for education at universities; there
was more and more support among people
for environmentalist campaigns; in general the discontent of the working population was growing. A minority in the ASF
did its best to be involved in this ferment
and tried to translate its experience from
those struggles into an internal debate in
the ASF. That debate should have changed
the ASF into an active and effective libertarian organisation. However, the majority in the ASF refused to discuss our
proposals and we had to leave. Since that
time (1996) Solidarita has been working to
build itself. Our theoretical and organisational development is not finished yet.
Through continuous involvement in local
as well as national struggles of workers
and young people, and through discussions, we are accumulating experience and
clarifying our ideas. We describe ourselves
either as anarcho-syndicalists or Libertarian Socialists.

The outcome of all this may well be a new

anarcho-syndicalist organisation, which
would be a major step forward for classstruggle anarchism.

Q: What other Anarchist

organisations are there?
In the last while there has been quite a bit
of change. Until about a year ago, there
were three main organisations - the newly
formed Northern Bohemian Libertarian
Federation (NBLF), the Czechoslovak Anarchist Federation (the CSAF) and the
Czechoslovak Federation of Revolutionary
Anarchists (the CSFRA).

Q: What sort of unions exist in

the Czech Republic at the
moment?
We have standard bureaucratic pro-market unions that believe in social partnership. They rely on endless and mostly
fruitless negotiations with the government
and employers. They organise about 40%
of our workforce and are divided into several union federations that come from the
old Communist Revolutionary Union Movement. The CP still has a small union federation, but it is absolutely passive and
unimportant. Now the most powerful federation is the Czech and Morovian Chamber of Trade Unions (the CMCTU). A
smaller federation worth mentioning is
the Trade Union of Agricultural Workers.
All the CMCTUs unions claim to be independent of all political parties, but the
CMCTUs leadership admits that its politics are close to those of Social Democracy.
A good number (of the leadership) also ran
as candidates of Social Democracy in elections to both houses of parliament.
The remarkable exception to all this is
Trade Union Association of Railway Workers (the TUARW), which is really inde-

pendent of political parties and says No!

to the introduction of market principles
into public services and to privatisation of
the railways. In February 1997 the TUARW
led the most important strike in the post1989 period and are surely the most advanced union in our country. The CMCTUs
leadership has accused the TUARW of being Anarcho-Syndicalist! Other living unions in the CMCTU which are getting more
and more able and ready to fight back, are
the miners, steelworkers and teachers
unions.
The rest are dying unions, which still behave like the old Communist unions. Their
only concern is to collect enough money to
feed the bureaucracy and to buy Christmas presents and holiday trips for their
rank and file. For example in Health Care.
Right now the government wants to close
20% of hospitals and decrease wages, but
the Health Care Workers Trade Union
(HCWTU) will not do anything about it.
They will just join the CMCTUs demonstration against the governments austerity politics, but no more. No wonder workers
are deserting them! In fact there is no
tradition of self-activity for decades in the
CP unions - people wait on their leaders to
do something for them and, as I said, the
HCWTU leaders do nothing.
Q: What is Solidaritas position
relative to the unions? Do you
favour the formation of new
syndicalist unions?

The CSFRA derives from the ASF (who I

mentioned above). As far as we are concerned it is an organisation riven with
dogmatists and sectarianism. The CSFRA
doesnt base its politics on reality, so we
dont have much to do with it.
In contrast both the NBLF and the CSAF
were federations that sought to unite various currents of anarchism. This is one
important difference we in Solidarita had
with these groups. Solidarita is an organisation united in its theory and practice.
We are pulled together by a common programme and we are all equally responsible
for implementation of our organisations
politics. But there was some overlap between Solidarita and both of these organisations - the NBLF and CSAF - joint
membership for example.
Last year the CSAF split, giving rise to a
new group called the FSA - the Federation
of Social Anarchists. Since then the FSA
has gone through a significant development. Theyve adopted the Platform2 as an
important part of their political attitudes.
This puts them in a similar position to
Solidarita. The FSA carries out intensive
propaganda work and are currently involved in ongoing discussion with us and
other Czech syndicalists with a view to
uniting. Also involved in these discussions
are a number of ex members of the NBLF

'Free-Market' Madness in the Czech Republic

Increases in rents and the price of
electricity, gas and heating, announced
on July 1st 1998 has put two-thirds of
the Czech population (2m households)on
the poverty line.
Unemployment has now climbed from
zero to 7% (350,000), and is set to worsen

further.
New interest rates forced through by
the Czech Republics IMF managers
earlier in the year will cause the collapse
of 40-60% of Czech enterprises over the
next year.

Red & Black Revolution (6)

200 a month, but 62% of workers get

wages lower than the average and only 5%
get wages higher than 400 per month these are the managers and the directors
of companies.
Q: There has also been a massive
round of privatisation. What
has happened here?

Despite all the problems with the present

unions - some of which Ive outlined above
- we believe in working inside them. We
believe they are real working class organisations. Within them we argue for a
syndicalist alternative of combative and
democratic unions run by workers for workers, where all delegates would be immediately recallable so that workers would
control their own struggles. Unions should
be active not only in a workplace, but also
in communities. They should take part in
struggle against racism and fascism, in
environmental campaigns. Their final goal
should be transformation of this society of
market dictatorship into a Libertarian
Socialist society of social justice, workers
self-management and grassroots democracy.
That kind of union can come into existence
only through our active participation in
present day unions and through a rank
and file movement in these unions for
control over their organisations and fights.
It is also interesting to note that the organisation I mentioned above, the FSA,
has also moved towards a position were it
sees the necessity of working within the
here and now unions. This is an important development.
Q: How has the change to a
market-style economy affected
Czech workers?
The market economy has not fulfilled any
of peoples hopes for a decent and free life.
Sure we can buy more products and now
there are no shortages of essential goods
like bread or toilet paper, but everything is
very expensive. Generally our living standard is worse than it was under the Communist dictatorship. Our wages and pensions
are lower than in 1990 - when economic
transformation started - and we have to
pay high taxes. Besides, now we also have
to pay for many services that used to be
paid for from taxes e.g. a lot of medicines,
textbooks for children, dentist treatment
etc. Till [shop] prices are growing faster
than incomes. An average wage is about

Working class people were persuaded by

pro-market political forces that privatisation would solve all the problems and would
bring about a society where everybody is a
rich share-holder. Everyone was going to
become prosperous and production would
be ecologically harmless! Nothing of that
sort has happened. Privatised companies
either ended up in hands of state-owned
banks or in the hands of foreign investors,
who bought only the best enterprises (i.e.
those which were highly profitable even
under the Communist state management;
e.g. Volkswagen bought Skoda). But many
companies also ended up in the hands of a
new aggressive class of owners. These
people gained enormous wealth from, basically, stealing. The government has been
turning a blind eye on this. I am talking
about the people who were charged with
managing banks, industries and privatisation funds. The amount of stolen property arising from privatisation is estimated
to be in the region of hundreds of billions of
Czech Crowns. Just to give you an idea of
how large an amounts of capital this is, it
should be enough to say that the Czech
GMP is CC1600 billion.
It also needs to be said that the government is following the advice of the IMF to
restrict spending on public services, on
doles, pensions and all social benefits. The
IMF/Government has also cancelled subsidies towards heating, electricity and gas
for households. They have pushed for a
decrease in wages and for structural adjustments of industry. This means that
tens of thousands of public sector workers
will lose their jobs; hospitals, schools and
railways are being closed down; unemployment is growing. No wonder that more
than 50% of the population believe that the
Stalinist economy was bad, but that the
free market one is not much better!
Q: In what way have people
resisted the attack on living
standards
The CMLIU organised a big demonstration against the governments austerity
policy in Nov. 1997. But the attack on
living standards was also one of the principal reasons why this right-wing government of Klaus got kicked out of office earlier
in the year. But while people might be
looking for some solution electorally - it
wont come. The Social Democrats have
abandoned all of its radical promises, and
in fact only just won in the most recent
parliamentary elections despite the huge
dissatisfaction with Klaus. In the aftermath of that election the SDs entered into
an alliance with Klaus and his free-market cronies - which was a huge stab in the

back for those people who had voted for the

SDs in good faith.
There is a long way to go but we see our role
as one of getting involved. Weve been
involved in the initiative for a General
Strike (the IGS) launched by a number of
socialist groups. Weve also been doing
work on the matter of rent increases.
Solidarita has distributed leaflets calling
for the non-payment of higher rents against
government and local councils that are
increasing rents. As we get more of a base
in the larger towns and cities, more opportunities will arise for us to be effective in
this regard. It is important to recognise
that people in communities here are atomised and without any tradition of self-activity - from the years of Stalinism. There
is much work to be done, but we are hopeful
while being realistic.
Q: How is anarchism seen in the
Czech Republic? Are you ever
confused with the old
Communists!
Yes, quite often, but people soon realise
that we are different. But also, now it isnt
so much the big problem it used to be [being
confused with the CP]. Pro-market illusions are heavily shattered here now, and
anti-Communist hysteria is gone. People
are willing to consider your ideas and activities with respect even if they presume
you are a Communist. A lot of people seem
to believe that the only positive thing about
capitalism is its relative freedom, but from
an economic point of view it does not matter whether you live under Communism or
Capitalism. Solidarita believes libertarian socialism is a clear alternative: freedom + socialism We fight hard to get its
ideas of social justice, workers self-management and grassroots democracy over to
ordinary people.
Our colleagues, classmates and neighbours
see the difference: You are active among
us, you really try to do something; the CP
is just sitting in the parliament! We stand
a good chance to gain a leading position for
anarchist ideas if we can be even more
active, doing clear and reasonable libertarian politics.
SOLIDARITA can be contacted at PO Box
13, Cern Hora, 67921, The CZECH REPUBLIC. To obtain a copy of their international newsletter, enclose a donation.

The extended hierarchy of the Communist

Party. The name nomenklatura derives from the
system adopted at the 9th Party Congress of the
CPSU (Bolsheviks) which put in place a system
where the party would keep a list of those whom it
considered suitable for office. In time, the
nomenklatura system came to represent those who
were in the Party and/or followed its orders.
2
The Organisational Platform of the Libertarian
Communists - a pamphlet written in the mid 20s
by anarchists who had fought in the Russian
Revolution. It argues for the unity of theory and
practice in the anarchist organisation, and for
collective responsibility around a definite
programme. (See page 29)

Red & Black Revolution (7)

Guest Writer

Anarchism & Environmental

Survival

Graham Purchase is one of the most prolific writers in the Australian

anarchist movement, and in books such as Anarchist Society & its Practical Realisation, has made a serious contribution to the debate on the
future of the anarchist movement, and how our ideas can best be put into
practice today. Here, we review his latest book, Anarchism and Environmental Survival.
Alongside the classical anarchist structures of unions and traditionally political
organisations, anarchists are increasingly
to be found in the environmental movement. This is hardly surprising given that,
although one wing of the green movement
has entered mainstream parliamentary
politics, there is still a wide base of grassroots activism some of which, in its methods and organisation, is very close to
anarchism. Whats more, the more radical
environmentalists are becoming aware that
their demands cannot be accommodated
by capitalism, and are beginning to make
connections between their campaigns and
other issues. Why then are the links between anarchism and environmentalism
not much stronger? And what are the
issues that still divide them?

Mutineers on the Titanic?

Most anarchists have some idea of the
serious state of environmental degradation caused by capitalism. You dont have
to be politically active to know about the
hole in the ozone layer, or the chopping
down of the rainforest, and the pollution
caused by a transport system based on cars
is obvious to anyone who lives in a city.
Anarchist groups rarely see these as issues
to be campaigned on, like womens rights
or trade union struggles. But environmental issues effect the working class disproportionately. They are the least able to
escape the effects of environmental damage, and the most likely to bear the brunt
in terms of disease, malnutrition and so on.
We know that poverty-level wages and
poor housing in the developing world are a
result of capitalism. The fact that the
slums this creates are the hardest hit by
flooding, for example, is another symptom
of capitalism putting profits before people.
But campaigns against this sort of indirect
oppression are thin on the ground.
One possible reason why anarchists dont
campaign as much on environmental issues is the gradual nature of environmental problems. Unlike other struggles where
there is a clear line that is crossed, an
obvious point to focus on - whether it be a
repressive piece of legislation or a strike pollution, for example, is incremental. The
problem is generally not that one factory
opens and suddenly the air is visibly polluted. The level of pollution tends to increase steadily over time, and it is hard to
get excited over a difference that you cant

see. Of course there are exceptions - a few

years ago in Cork a particularly bad toxic
spill led to calls for stricter controls on
chemical production and safety (see Workers Solidarity 41 for details). But, in general, we become accustomed to the
degradation of our environment if it happens slowly enough.
The final, and most important problem, for
anarchists in tackling environmental issues is that we disagree with most of the
solutions on offer. The mainstream green
line on the environment is that we are all,
more or less equally, to blame for its destruction, and we must all, again more or
less equally, make sacrifices if the ecosystem is to survive - this when the poorest
20% of the population produce only 3% of
carbon dioxide emissions. Even more radical greens, though they do realise that
corporations and capitalism are doing most
of the damage, insist that we must all
reduce our consumption and simplify our
lives. They also say that industrialisation,
in itself, is a bad thing, no matter who is in
control. Anarchists, on the other
hand, think that everyone should
have more of what they want,
not less. There are problems
with how production is organised, and certainly if things
are produced for need and
not profit a lot of waste
will be cut out. But most
of the world has a standard of living far below what
westerners would take for
granted and, as an absolute minimum, this has to be addressed.

A World Divided
The history of this century has
been of deepening divisions in humanity. The gap between rich
and poor has widened enormously, today 225 people
own more than the poorest
50% earn in a year. Eighty
four people are together
wealthier than China,
three people wealthier
than the poorest 48
countries. The wealthiest 20% of the
global population consumes 60% of the
energy, 45% of the meat and fish, and
owns 87% of the vehicles1. This is not to
say that everyone in the developed world
is well off, of course. Within the richer

countries the gap between rich and poor is

also growing, with the figures for homelessness, unemployment and malnutrition
rising all the time. In the last decade,
diseases like tuberculosis, caused essentially by poverty, have reappeared, having
been eradicated earlier this century. The
US may be the worlds biggest consumer,
but it also has the highest per capita prison
population, and 16.5% of its population
lives in poverty.
On a global level, the picture is of a southern hemisphere owned, controlled and exploited by the north. Raw materials minerals and food - are produced in the
south and consumed in the north. The
environmental problems in the north/west
are mainly those caused by over a century
of industrial production - pollution has
become a fact of life. The earth, the air, the
rain, all have been contaminated.
The south may not have as long a history of
industrialisation as the north, but as far as
environmental damage goes it is gaining
rapidly. When a corporation shifts production to the developing world, it does so to
escape not just trade unions, but also environmental regulations. Workers in the
south are not just lower-paid, theyre subject to much more dangerous working conditions, and much more damage to their

Red & Black Revolution (8)

gether, and propose a model for a possible

post-revolutionary society. His anarchism
is based on the idea that decisions must
be made by those who are effected by
them. The basic social unit of society,
then, is the community. Your community
is where you live and work, the particular
area you identify yourself with. Depending on the context, this could be your
immediate surroundings - a village or
suburb - or an extended area - a county or
city.

WANT TO HELP OUT?

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a profit making venture. It exists in order to spread ideas and
contribute to the process of changing the world.
If you would like to help out in this work there are a couple of things
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magazine on a commercial basis.

Each community is linked to a particular

place, although the borders of this region
are rarely clearly defined. You could
draw the limits of a town where its buildings end, or include land cultivated by its
inhabitants. Sometimes these are useful
definitions, but the people themselves,
when talking about their land may include nearby forests, lakes or mountains
(and again, since the size of a community
varies depending on the context, this region can also vary in size). Communities
are made up, then, not just of relationships between people, but of the relation-

Whatever you can do, you will be sure of our gratitude. If you want to
help, write to us at Red & Black Revolution, P.O. Box 1528, Dublin 8,
Ireland and indicate how you can help out.

Subscribe to Red & Black Revolution

Send 5 (Europe) or $10 (outside Europe) to the address above
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environment, than workers in the north.

As well as industry, agriculture is made
more damaging. Leaving aside the use of
insecticides and fertilisers that have been
banned in the north, the trend towards
large-scale monoculture farming means
the soil becomes exhausted and prone to
erosion. The need to expand the area of
land under cultivation means the destruction of wilderness areas and deforestation,
which also causes soil erosion. This in turn
causes flooding, which destroys peoples
homes and crops under cultivation, leading to more pressure on the land.
The worldwide increase in the human population and the level of (industrial and agri-

cultural) production means that the potential impact of humanity on the environment continues to grow. At the moment,
this impact is enormous because, often, the
people who are making environmentally
sensitive decisions are shielded from the
results. Whether this is because of money
or distance, the end result is that, no matter how damaging their decisions may be,
they can be sure the damage will be to
someone else, and so are free to continue
their pursuit of profit.

Making the Connections

Graham Purchases book, Anarchism and
Environmental Survival, is an attempt to
bring anarchist and green theories to-

Meat n Veg n Microlivestock

Vegetarianism and environmentalism
often go hand in hand. This is partly
because the consumption of large livestock has itself an effect on the environment. It takes seven pounds of grain to
produce one pound of beef - if we were all
to become vegetarian, so the argument
goes, much less land would have to be
used for agriculture. This is true to a
certain extent, but the grain:meat ratio
leaves out many things. For example, a
cow produces not just meat, but milk,
leather and dung (a fertiliser, soil stabiliser, and even fuel source). Wool, feathers and eggs are all useful by-products
of animal husbandry that have to taken
into account.
Even so, raising animals is not the most
efficient use of agricultural land. But a
lot of land is not suitable for other forms
of agriculture. Animals can be raised in
forests, or on the side of mountains, and
in areas where the soil is too poor for crop

production. Many animals can be reared

alongside crops, and others, like poultry, are well suited to small scale farming. Turning over whole prairies to cows
for grazing is certainly inefficient, but
thats not the only way to farm animals.
The tendency in agriculture (as in industry) in the last century has been for
specialisation, and for the production of
smaller herds, made up of larger animals. Purchase goes into some detail on
the virtues of microlivestock - smaller,
more adaptable, and generally hardier
versions of the more common modern
animals. Such animals are more productive - the greater number that can be
raised on a given area of land makes up
for their small size - and it's easier to
match the size of the herd to the land
available. All of these factors make
them ideal for the kind of small-scale
mixed farming he proposes should be

(re-)introduced to our cities.

The question of efficiency is not the only
reason so many environmentalists are
also vegetarian. After all, the battery
farm is perhaps the epitome of efficiency,
and that has few friends in the green
movement. There is also a moral argument, that we should try to reduce the
effects of humanity on the planet, and on
the animals that live alongside us. Purchase quotes Elisee Reclus, a well known
anarchist of the 19th century, for the
great majority of vegetarians...the important point is the recognition of the
bond of affection and goodwill that links
man to the so-called lower animals, and
the extension to these our brothers of the
sentiment which has already put a stop
to cannibalism among men1. You will
have to judge the merits of this argument for yourself, Purchase shows that
it is not necessarily relevant to a discussion of the environment, and that a meateating society can still be green.
1

On Vegetarianism, 1901

Red & Black Revolution (9)

ship between the people and the land.

This, Purchase feels, is the key to environmental protection.
With the globalisation of the economy, and
society in general, the current trend is to
tackle environmental problems on a global
level. This appears to make sense with an
issue like the destruction of the ozone layer,
but it can often become ridiculous - as
when the Earth Summits decision to fix
the level of global emissions merely led to
the creation of a new market. Developing
countries can now sell some of their pollution quota to richer countries. Most problems, says Purchase, are better tackled at
the local level, but this means some changes
in the way production is organised. Earlier
I talked about how money can shield you
from the effects of environmental damage
- the same is true of distance. Those of us
who live in urban areas know the problems
that industrial concentration has caused
locally, but only get second or third-hand
reports of the problems of intensive food
production, for example.

Small is Beautiful?
If you think of the global economy as a
factory, with each worker/community making only one part of a complex machine,
and depending on the others to make all
the other parts, you can see how difficult it
is for one worker/community to change
what theyre doing. Purchase proposes
that we shift from the current, locally specialised and globally interdependent society, to a society made up of more balanced,
self-sufficient communities (individual artisans, if you like). Thus we would immediately deal with some of the problems
overconcentrated production has caused,
like pollution and soil erosion. We would
eliminate some, at least, of the costs of
transport between these production centres. We would also make it easier for each
community to deal with the problems that
arise in their own region.
When Purchase talks of increasing local
independence in this way, he does not
mean these communities would be entirely
self-sufficient. The fact that some areas
are richer in minerals, or more suited to
growing certain foods, means there will
always be a certain degree of specialisation. Nor does it follow that, if there is a
shift towards food production in urban
areas, for example, that each rural area
has to include a certain amount of factories. Finally, self-sufficiency should not be
confused with isolationism - the communities Purchase describes are starting points
for federations, not a return to feudalism.
Even if it is just on the basis of common
environmental influences, a shared river,
or mountain range, or coastline, communities would obviously come together to discuss things that affect them in common.
And in an anarchist society, based on the
idea of our common humanity, there would
surely be an abundance of regional, continental and global projects, covering every
aspect of science and culture.

Cities of the future?

Purchases proposal for more ecologically integrated communities usually
meets with most scepticism when it is
imagined applied to cities. Even a relatively small city, like Dublin, is almost
completely dependent on food from neighbouring regions, and its ecosystem is
made up of cars, people and concrete. If
a city like New York or Mexico was
sealed off from the rest of the world, it
would die within days; the only question
is whether it would be from starvation or
asphyxiation. Given the number of such
large cities around the world, and the
fact that, even if it were possible, given
the size of the earths population, for
everyone to live in small towns and rural
communities, many would not want to,
how can cities be accommodated within
an environmentally sound anarchist society?
Its an obvious point, but cities did not
spring into existence fully formed, with
all their support networks intact. Like
any community, initially they produced
most of their food themselves, but as the
industrial base increased, the demand
for land for industry and accommodation for the workforce grew, forcing food
production into the hinterland. Most
cities, even up to recently, would have
had small farms comparatively close to
the town centre. The supercities of today are only possible because of advances in food preservation (through
chemical additives and refrigeration) and
transport. Before these advances, the
pressure for a city to grow in size was
met by the necessity to have enough
farms, near enough, to produce the food.
Nor is the ejection of agriculture from
the city irreversible - during the Second
World War, for example, food shortages
in Britain led to an immense drive towards small-plot urban farming, something of which has continued to this day

in the allotments scheme.

Cities, in Purchases model would continue to exist, but agriculture would be
reintroduced to the residential/commercial mix. There are different ways of
doing this - you could divide the city into
sectors, with each concentrating on a
particular use of the land, aiming at
sufficiency on a city-wide scale. Or, and
this is more in line with the overall
project, each sector would be a community in itself, diversity being brought
down to a more local level. (Sufficiency
is used here as an ideal, not expected to
be reached. Cities would still be more
densely populated than other areas, and
so more likely to be a base for industry
and other labour-intensive activities, the
aim is to reduce the dependence on other
areas for food.) Food production would
be integrated into the city - cattle grazing on green spaces, lawns turned into
vegetable patches, small neighbourhood
farms. Between the demands of industry and accommodation, argues Purchase, there are spaces which in a
properly planned city could be filled with
life.
The immediate question is whether this
could ever be more than a gesture. Sure,
some farming could be integrated into
urban life, but could it ever come close to
meeting the needs of those who live in
the city? If we are to continue to have the
same population density, and the same
concentration of industry in our cities,
can these urban farms ever be more than
a supplement to large-scale farming elsewhere, a token greening of the city? If
cities were to seriously approach selfsufficiency, wouldnt this necessitate a
huge expansion in their size, or a fundamental change in the nature of urban
life? Do we want, or need, such a change?

Red & Black Revolution (10)

Equal Wealth, not Shared

Poverty
There is still a clear sticking point in any
attempt to integrate anarchist and environmental positions, and that is the question of levels of production. Depending on
how far down the path of self-sufficiency
you go, you rule out more concentrated,
specialised production, and so reduce the
possible output. (Or at least, reduce efficiency - you can build a train in a workshop, but its a lot easier to do it in a
factory). In an anarchist society, a lot of
work will be recognised as socially unnecessary, and its hard to overestimate how
much effort goes into keeping the apparatus of international capitalism and the
nation state going. When money goes, we
get rid of the banking industry and financial exchanges. Without states, there is no
need for armies and the whole weapons
industry - a sizeable part of most western
economies - becomes defunct. When production is based on need, we will be rid of
most advertising, and the useless duplication of identical goods it was created to
hide. There will be no more built-in obsolescence, because who would build something they know is going to fall apart rather
than something that will last, if it wasnt
for their bosss desire for higher profits.
The production that remains will be
changed. No rational society would base
their transport system on cars. A good
public transport system would improve
the quality of most peoples lives immeasurably. The benefits in terms of lives
saved, public health, and countless other
areas are obvious, and well-known. Overdependence on cars is a result of the pursuit of profit, and it is profit that makes our
industries so polluting. Cleaner sources of
energy, like solar and wind power, are
available but not profitable. Scrubbers
and filters for chemical outflows, biodegradable, recycled and non-toxic materials, all of these could be used in most of our
factories. But as long as control of production is in the hands of those who do not feel
the effects of pollution, they will be overlooked in favour of the cheaper, more profitable alternative.
By eliminating, or greening, all of these
processes, we would go a long way to reducing our ecological footprint. But eliminating useless production is only part of the
story, an anarchist society would also increase useful production. Even in the developed West, far too many fall below the
poverty line - we need more homes, more
schools, more hospitals, enough to meet
everyones basic needs - and then we must
go further. An anarchist society will want
to have more than just the bare essentials,
surely we want to improve everyones standard of living. Some may choose to live a life
of austerity, but most of us want a new
world because we want more of the good
things in life, not less.
In the developing world, the gap between
what people have and what they need is

even bigger. The southern hemisphere has

been exploited ruthlessly by the north, one
of the first priorities for an anarchist society must be to redress that balance, and
the enormity of that task cannot be underestimated. Millions of people dont even
have a clean source of drinking water, we
want everyone to have a standard of living beyond the current average for an industrialised country. There is no way this
can be accomplished without increasing
current levels of production.
These are major problems with the idea of
self-sufficient communities. On the one
hand, we need a globally integrated
economy, for the foreseeable future at least,
because of the vast gap between the wealth
of a community in Namibia, for example,
and one in Oregon. At the same time, we
cant afford the relative inefficiency that
small-scale, localised production implies.
Even if we decide that decentralising production is a good thing, it cant be our first
priority. And is it necessary?

A World Without Borders

Anarchism has always been international,
has always stressed the importance of our
shared humanity over all those things nationality, language, race, religion, gender - the ruling class tries to use to divide
us. We stress the importance of democracy, of people having a say in the decisions
that affect them. We also realise that some
decisions are too far-ranging in their effects, too intertwined with the situations of
others to be made at a local level. That is
why large anarchist groups often operate
as federations, and a lot of thought has
gone into creating structures - like mandating delegates, rotating positions, minimising the need for full-time bureaucrats that allow decisions to be made democratically, with mass participation, involving
thousands, or millions, of people.
After all, there will always be a clash between the needs of society and the needs of
a particular area, the only question is about
how to balance them. Factories have to be
built, and food grown, somewhere. Nuclear power may be unnecessary, but gold
isnt2, and you cant mine it without damaging the local environment. We will always have to walk the line between
decisions being made by groups far-removed from their effects, and the NIMBY
tendency - do what you like, but not in my
backyard. The difference, in an anarchist
society, is in who
makes the decisions, and why.
Capitalism is notoriously shorttermist,

decisions are made based on their immediate profitability, thinking even a few years
ahead is unusual. What other kind of
society would build nuclear power stations
without knowing how to dispose of the
waste safely? Why else would the economy
be based on non-renewable fossil fuels,
when the only question is when, not if, they
will run out? If the earth is an uninhabitable wasteland in 100 years, what does it
matter, as long as the profits are good? All
the green consumerism in the world wont
fix this insane system, if we want a rational economy were going to have to run
it ourselves.
Agriculture and industry need not be as
damaging to the environment as they are
at the moment - we already know of cleaner
and safer ways of doing things, that arent
used because they arent profitable. How
much can we change things if, as well as
using the technology we know of now, science is directed towards cleaning up pollution instead of weapons research? If
research was done on minimising the damage of intensive farming, instead of developing Terminator genes? We dont have
to believe that science has all the answers
to know that there is a lot of room for
improvement.
As anarchists we have always argued that,
from union struggles to environmental
protest, from community organising to revolution, the best way to victory is through
mass participation and democracy. Whenever they seize the opportunity, people are
well capable of organising their own lives,
and their own movements, better than any
wise leader, or benevolent dictator. We
should be more confident that a free and
democratic society will handle the problems of environmental damage, and the
questions of local autonomy and global
interdependence, in a just and fair way.
After the anarchist revolution, do we really need a green revolution?

United Nations Human Development report,

1998
2
ibid
3
Gold is not just decorative, it has many
important industrial uses, but you must use
cyanide in the mining and purification process.

Red & Black Revolution (11)

Racism &
Class struggle
Racial oppression remains a defining feature of the modern capitalist
world. It is manifest most spectacularly in violent attacks on immigrants
and minorities by fascist gangs. More important to the fate of these
communities has been the systematic and increasing discrimination by
capitalist states, manifest in attacks on the rights of immigrants, cuts in
welfare services, and racist police and court systems.

How can racism be defeated?

An answer to this question requires an
examination of the forces which gave rise
to, and continue to reproduce, racism. It
also requires a careful analysis of which
social forces benefit from racial oppression.
By racism is meant either an attitude denying the equality of all human beings, or
economic, political and social discrimination against racial groups.

The roots of racism

Capitalism developed as a world system
based on the exploitation of workers, slaves
and peasants - black, brown, yellow, and
white. In the sixteenth and seventeenth
centuries, the young capitalist system centred mainly on western Europe and the
Americas. In the eighteenth and nineteenth
centuries Africa and Asia were brought
increasingly into the ambit of capitalist
power.
In the Americas, vast plantation systems
were set up. Based on slavery, they were
capitalist enterprises exporting agricultural goods.
It was in the system of slavery that the
genesis of racism is to be found. In the
words of Caribbean scholar, Eric Williams,
Slavery was not born of racism: rather,
racism was the consequence of slavery1.
Initially, the slave plantations were not
organised on racial lines.
Although the first slaves in the Spanish
possessions in the Americas were generally native Americans, slavery was restricted (at least officially) to those who did
not convert to Christianity.
The native Americans were succeeded by
poor Europeans. Many of these workers
were only enslaved for a limited period, as
indentured servants serving contracts of
up to ten or more years. Others were convicts sentenced for crimes such as stealing
cloth, or prisoners of war from uprisings
and the colonisation of areas such as Ireland and Scotland. However, there were

also a substantial number of life-long European slaves, and even amongst the indentured a substantial number had been
kidnapped and sold into bondage.2
Conditions on the Middle Passage (the
trip across the Atlantic) for these indentured servants and slaves were, in Williams
words, so bad that they should banish any
ideas that the horrors of the slave ship are
to be in any way accounted for by the fact
that the victims were Negroes3.
More than half the English immigrants to
the American colonies in the sixteenth
century were indentured servants4, and
until the 1690s there were still far more
unfree Europeans on the plantations of the
American South than Black slaves5.
Racist ideas were developed in the context
of the slave trade of the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries. In this period, African people came to be the main source of
slaves for the plantations.

The systems of social control established

for American and European unfree labour
was now applied to the Africans.
The main reason for this shift to African
slaves was that such slaves were obtained
cheaply enough, and in sufficient numbers, to meet the expanding needs of the
plantation capitalists 6. African ruling
classes played a central role in the highly
profitable slave trade: The trade was ... an
African trade until it reached the coast.
Only very rarely were Europeans directly
involved in procuring slaves, and that
largely in Angola 7.
It in the seventeenth century that racist
ideology began to be developed for the first
time by such groups as British sugar planters in the Caribbean, and their mouthpieces in Britain who fastened onto
differences in physical appearance to develop the myth that Black people were subhuman and deserved to be enslaved: here
is an ideology, a system of false ideas serving class interests8.
Racism was used to justify the capture and
perpetual enslavement of millions of people for the purposes of capitalism. The
enslavement of native Americans had been
justified as being on the grounds of their
heathen beliefs; European servitude
was justified as
being the lot of

Red & Black Revolution (12)

to reach a deal with capitalism and imperialism.

However, although these struggles removed the formally racist structures of
slavery and empire they have not buried
racism.
Racism -as an idea and as a practice- continues to serve two key functions under
capitalism.
First, it allows the capitalists to secure
sources of cheap, unorganised, and highly
exploitable labour. Key examples are immigrants and minorities. Subject to racist
discrimination, they form a segment of the
working class that has been described as
super-exploited, providing high levels of
profit for capitalists. In times of capitalist
crisis (such as today) these segments are
most readily deprived of political and social rights, the first to fall in the overall
assault on the working class that takes
place.
inferiors; Black slavery was justified
through racism.
Once developed, racist ideas came to be
used more broadly as a justification for
oppression. Jewish people, for example,
came to be oppressed as a racial minority
rather than as a religious group.
The beneficiaries of slavery were not Europeans in general, but the capitalist ruling
classes of western Europe. African ruling
classes also received substantial benefits.
There were of course the vast numbers of
Europeans indentured or enslaved. There
were also the sailors on the Middle Passage whose conditions, according to
Williams, were themselves scarcely distinguishable from slavery. Finally, there were
vast numbers of poor White peasant farmers of the Americas (some of whom were
former indentured servants) who were outcompeted and driven to the margins by the
giant slave plantations.9 The vast majority
of Europeans never owned slaves: only 6
per cent of whites owned slaves in the
American South in 1860.10 There were also
African-American and native American
slave-owners.

need for cheap sources of labour and raw

materials, and by the need to find new
markets to sell manufactured goods.

Secondly, racism allows the capitalist ruling class to divide and rule the exploited
classes.

Racist ideas were again pressed into service to justify the process of imperial conquest and rule. Imperial control was
justified on the supposed grounds that
Africans and Asians (and for that matter
other colonised peoples such as the Irish)
were unable to govern or develop themselves, and needed to be ruled by external
forces - namely the ruling classes of western Europe and Japan12. Equal rights were
not seen as even being possible in this
world view.

Across the planet, billions of workers and

peasants suffer the lashes of capitalism.
Racism is used to foster divisions within
the working class to help keep the ruling
class in power.

Empire did not benefit workers in the colonies, nor in the imperialist countries. The
profits of empire accrued to the capitalist
class13. Meanwhile, the methods and forces
of colonial repression were deployed against
workers in the imperialist countries (most
notably, the use of colonial troops to crush
the Spanish Revolution), whilst lives and
material resources were wasted on imperial adventures. Today, multi-national companies cut jobs and wages by shifting to
repressive Third World client regimes.

A river, a mountain, a line of small

monuments suffice to maintain foreigners and make enemies of two peoples,
both living in mistrust and envy of one
another because of the acts of past generations. Each nationality pretends to
be above the other in some kind of way,
and the dominating classes, the keepers
of education and the wealth of nations,
feed the proletariat with the belief of
stupid superiority and pride to make
impossible the union of all nations who
are separately fighting to free themselves
from Capital.

Race and Empire

Racism today

Racism was thus born of the slavery of

early capitalism. However, having been
once created, subsequent developments in
capitalism would sustain and rear this
creature of the ruling class.

Clearly, capitalism gave birth to racism.

Racism as an idea helped justify empire
and slavery. Racism as a form of discrimination or oppression facilitated high levels
of exploitation, and has thus been an important factor in the development of capitalism.

The extension of capitalist power over Africa and Asia took place largely from the
seventeenth century onwards in the form
of imperialism11. Initially, imperial conquest was often undertaken directly by
large corporations such as the British East
India Company (in India) and the Dutch
East India Company (in South Africa,
among other places). Later capitalist governments took a direct hand, notably in the
conquest of most of Africa from the 1880s.
Imperialism in this period was driven by
the search for profits: initially, profits from
control of trade; later by big corporations

Today, both slavery and the formal empires have been overthrown - this has
largely been the result of struggles by millions of workers, peasants and slaves
against oppression. Slave revolts are part
of the history of class struggle against
capitalism. Peasant and worker resistance to colonialism are equally so, although
it must be noted that most anti-colonial
struggles were prevented from reaching
their necessary conclusion- socialist revolution- by the determination of local elites

Praxedis Guerrero, a great Mexican anarchist, described the process as follows14:

Racial prejudice and nationality,
clearly managed by the capitalist and
tyrants, prevent peoples living side by
side in a fraternal manner...

If all the workers of the different ...

nations had direct participation in all
questions of social importance which
affect one or more proletarian groups
these questions would be happily and
promptly solved by the workers themselves.
It happens between majority populations
and super-exploited minorities, but also
between the working classes of different
countries. Workers are told to blame and
hate other workers- distinguished by culture, language, skin colour, or some other
arbitrary feature- for their misery. A classic example is the scape-goating of immigrants and refugees for taking away jobs
and housing.

Red & Black Revolution (13)

In this way, workers anger is deflected

onto other workers (with whom they have
almost everything in common) rather than
being directed against capitalists ( with
whom workers have nothing in common).
An appearance of common interest is created between workers and bosses of a given
race or nation.

Who benefits?
Racism does not benefit any workers. Even
workers who are not themselves directly
oppressed by racism lose out from racism
because it divides the working class. White
American workers, for example, in no way
benefit from the existence of an impoverished and oppressed minority of African
American workers who can be used to
undercut wages, and working and living
conditions.

In addition, racist attitudes make it very

difficult to unite workers against the capitalists to challenge the overall distribution
of wealth and power in society. Racism has
been used again and again to break workers struggles.
The more the working class is divided, the
worse its overall condition will be. This
point, which was repeatedly made by the
classical anarchist movement15, has been
confirmed in a study by an American sociologist who set out to test the proposition
that white workers gain from racism16.

Comparing the situation of White and Black

workers in all fifty US states, he found,
firstly, that the less wage discrimination
there was against Black workers, the better were the wages that White workers
received. Secondly, he found that the existence of a substantial nationally oppressed
group of poor workers reduced the wages
Pamphlets from the
of White workers (but did not affect the
Workers Solidarity Movement earnings of middle and upper-class Whites
very much). Finally, he found that the
Anarchism & Ireland
more intense racial discrimination was,
(3rd reprint)
the more poverty there was for lower class
Whites.

Ireland & British Imperialism

Such facts fly in the face of political strategies which claim that majority population workers receive material benefits from
racism. The logic of this argument is that
these privileges must be renounced before working class unity is possible. Such
an argument assumes that capitalists
would adopt a strategy that systematically benefits the majority of workers, a
most unlikely (and as we saw above, unsustainable) notion. In addition, this argument implies that the immediate
political task is a redistribution of wealth
among workers as opposed to a class struggle against capitalism. That is to say, it
calls on the majority of workers to fight on
principle for worse conditions.
Finally, this approach mixes up two very
different things: oppression and privilege.
While it is obviously true that some workers do not directly experience racial oppression, it does not follow that they benefit
from it. The two terms are distinct: while
it is oppressive to be subject to low wages,
it is not a privilege to have a living wage.

Why racist ideas are accepted

Also: Anarchism in Action:
The Spanish Civil War
2/$4* each including post and
packing, or all 3 for 5/$10*

Other pamphlets:
Parliament or Democracy
Stalin didn't fall from the Moon!
1/$2* each including post and packing.

from Workers Solidarity Bookservice, PO

Box 1528, Dublin 8, Ireland.
* rate from outside Europe

None of the arguments made so far in this

article deny the possibility that minorities
of the working class may receive temporary benefits from racial oppression in
specific circumstances. A case in point
would be the small white working class in
South Africa between the 1920s and the
1980s, which received real benefits from
apartheid. But, as a general rule, racial
oppression is fundamentally against the
interests of the majority of workers of all
colours.
To recognise the primary role of capitalist
ruling classes (aided by their states) in
promoting and benefiting from racial oppression is not to deny that many working
class people often support racism. Racism
is often very widespread. However, such

support for racism is an example of working class people acting against their own
interests, rather than evidence that workers benefit from racism.
However, if racism provides no benefits for
workers, how can we explain such support
for the essentially irrational ideas of racism?
The answer is that there are very real
material forces in capitalist society which
operate to foster support for these ideas.
The first factor is capitalist control over
ideas. Capitalists do not simply rule by
force, they also rule by promoting a capitalist world-view. Here we must consider, as
Praxedis argued above, how the dominating classes, the keepers of education and
the wealth of nations feed the proletariat with the belief of stupid superiority
and pride: the role of the schools, the
media, literature and so forth. The impact
of this propaganda cannot be underestimated.
The second factor is the material conditions of the working class itself. Under
capitalism, the working class suffers poverty, alienation and misery. In the same
way that workers may take solace from
religion, they may also seek the imaginary
compensation of supposed racial superiority, the belief of stupid superiority and
pride (in Praxedis words).
In addition, working class people are locked
in bitter competition for a limited amount
of jobs, housing and other resources. In
this situation, they may blame other groups
in the working class for their plight. Where
the other groups are culturally or physically distinct in appearance, this resentment and competition may be expressed in
racist terms. Hence the view, for example,

Red & Black Revolution (14)

that 'they' are 'taking our jobs'.

The Oppressed divided

From the above, it is clear that racism is a
product of capitalism, and fundamentally
against the interests of the working class
and peasantry.
Are capitalists from oppressed groups reliable allies in the struggle against racism?
The short answer is, no, they are not.
The effects of racism are fundamentally
mediated by class position. Taking the
case of the United States: although national averages of White and Black incomes show a vast gulf between the two,
when class is taken into account the material inequalities between White and Black
workers are shown to be quite limited;
taken from another angle, the gap between
the conditions of both sets of workers, on
one side, and those of the upper class, on
the other, are yawning17.
Michael Jackson may still face racism, but
his wealth and power as a capitalist shields
him from the worst effects of racism. Private schools, lawyers, high incomes - all
these factors cannot be ignored.
Perhaps more importantly, the class interests of such elites tie them into supporting
the capitalist system itself. Black police
chiefs, mayors, and army officers are as
much defenders of capitalism as their White
counterparts. Such strata will readily compromise with the powers-that-be if it will
give them a chance to be 'in the racket and
in the running'.

Fighting racism
It is capitalism that continually generates
the conditions for racist oppression and
ideology. It follows that the struggle against
racism can only be consistently carried out
by the working class and peasantry: the
only forces capable of overthrowing the
capitalist system. The overthrow of capitalism will in and of itself fundamentally
undermine the social sources of racism.
The overthrow of capitalism however, requires the unification of the working class
and peasantry internationally, across all
lines of colour and nationality.
In addition, the crushing of capitalism,
and the establishment of libertarian socialism will allow the vast resources currently chained to the
needs
of
profiteering by a

rich few to be placed under the control of

the working and poor people of the whole
globe. Under libertarian communism it
will be possible to use these resources to
create social and economic equality for all,
thus finally enabling the disfigurements of
racial oppression to be scoured from the
face of the earth.

At a general level, we can approach these

tasks by active work in anti-racist struggles and campaigns, including work alongside non-anarchist forces (without, of
course, surrendering our political independence), and by continual propaganda
against racism in our publications,
workplaces, unions and communities.

However, this article is in no way arguing

that the fight against racism must be deferred until after the revolution. Instead, it
is arguing that on the one hand, only a
united working class can defeat racism
and capitalism; on the other, a united working class can only be built on the basis of
opposing all forms of oppression and prejudice, thereby winning the support of all
sectors of the broad working class.

The workplace and the union are particularly important sites for activity: it is here
that capitalism creates the greatest pressure for workers unity across all barriers,
and it is here that the workers movement
stands or falls on the basis of its ability to
address the needs of its whole constituency.

Firstly, it is clear that racism can only be

fought on a class basis. It is in the interest
of all workers to support the struggle
against racism. Racism is a working class
issue because it affects the conditions of all
workers, because most people affected by
racism are working class, and because, as
indicated above, it is the working class
members of racially oppressed groups who
are the most severely affected by racism.
Working class unity is also in the interests
of racially oppressed segments of the working class, as alliances with the broader
working class not only strengthen their
own position, but also help lay the basis for
the assault on capitalism. Without denying in the least the heroism, and, in some
cases, radicalising role played by minority
movements, it is quite obvious that a minority of, say, 10 per cent of the population
lacks the ability to overthrow the existing
conditions on its own18. Such unity is particularly vital in the workplace, where it is
almost impossible for unions of minority
workers to function.
Secondly, working class unity can, however, clearly only be built on the basis of a
resolute opposition to all forms of racism. If
other sections of the working class do not
oppose racism, they create a situation in
which nationalists can tie racially oppressed segments to Black and other minority capitalists in the futile games of
'Buy Black' campaigns and voting blocs.
Class-based and anarchist alternatives
must present a viable alternative if they
are to win support.

Our tasks
Anti-racist work should occupy a high priority in the activities of all class struggle
anarchists. This is important not simply
because we always oppose all oppression, and because anarchists have
long been opponents of racism. It
is also because such work is an
essential to the vital task of
unifying and conscientising the
working class - a unity without
which neither racism nor capitalism can be consigned to the
history books.

We can approach these tasks by raising, on

the one hand, demands that apply equally
to all workers (better wages, full union
rights, opposition to social partnership etc.),
and by raising, on the other, demands
which specifically address the needs of
racially oppressed segments of the working class (equal schooling, equal housing,
no to colour bars in industry etc.). Thus, we
should fight for Better Housing for All! No
to Segregation!, to take one example. The
target of such demands would, of course,
be the bosses, although in no case whatsoever should the tiniest concession be made
to racial prejudices on the part of any
workers.
There is no contradiction between the class
struggle and the struggle against racism.
Neither can succeed without the other.
1 Eric Williams, 1944, Capitalism and Slavery. Andre
Deutsch. p. 17. See also Peter Fryer, 1988, Black
People in the British Empire. Pluto Press. chapter 11.
2 Williams does not take sufficient account of the
institution of life-long slavery among Whites.
3 Williams, p. 14.
4 Williams, p. 10.
5 Leo Huberman, 1947, We, the People: the drama of
America. Monthly Review Press. p. 161.
6 Williams, pp. 18-9, 23-29.
7 Bill Freund, 1984, The Making of Contemporary
Africa: the development of African society since
1800. Indiana University Press. p. 51.
8 Fryer, p. 64.
9 Williams, pp. 23-6; Huberman, p. 167-8.
10 Huberman, p. 167.
11 See Freund for a discussion of the African
experience.
12 Fryer, pp. 61-81; Freund.
13 And not to workers as Fryer claims, pp. 54-5.
These arguments are criticised in greater detail in the
WSF Position Paper on Anti- Imperialism, online at
http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/africa.html.
14 Programa de la Liga Pan-Americana del Trabajo
in Articulos de Combate, p. 124-5, cited in D. Poole,
The Anarchists and the Mexican Revolution, part 2:
Praxedis G. Geurrero 1882-1910, Anarchist Review.
No. 4. Cienfuegos Press.
15 For example, Ricardo Flores Magon and others,
To the Workers of the United States, November 1914,
reproduced as Appendix A, in Colin Maclachlan,
1991, Anarchism and the Mexican Revolution: the
political trials of Ricardo Flores Magon in the United
States. University of California Press. p. 123.
16 Al Szymanski, 1976, Racial Discrimination and
White Gain, in American Sociological Review, 41.
17 N. Chomsky, 1994, Keeping the Rabble in Line.
AK Press. pp. 105-6.
18 See on this point, Race, Class and Organisation:
the view from the Workers Solidarity Federation
(South Africa), 1997, Black Flag, no. 212. Online at
http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/africa/wsfother/bf_race_org.html

Red & Black Revolution (15)

The Bolsheviks' pet

anarchist
THE LIFE, TIMES &
CONFESSIONS OF VICTOR SERGE

Leninists are fond of quoting from the writing of Victor Serge, as a means
of getting a libertarian rubber stamp for the actions of the Bolsheviks
during the October revolution and the subsequent events. In his keynote
article "In defence of October"1 John Rees uses no less than 8 quotes from
Serges writings within the space of 70 pages. Poor old Lenin only managed
to clock up 4 original quotes, while Tony Cliffs dubious interpretation of all
these events manages to get more quotes in than one could possibly count.
To a certain extent, what the Leninists of today are trying to tell us is that
Serge was a practical man, and he knew that the only way for the revolution
to succeed was to row in behind the Bolsheviks. So, with this in mind, we
take a look at Serges autobiography Memoirs of a Revolutionary.
Serge was born in 1890 and rapidly beCertainly on several essential points they
came a self educator and socialist joining
were mistaken: in their intolerance, in their
the Jeuns-Grades - a Belgium federation of
faith in stratification, in their leaning toSocialist youth groups. Serge eventually
wards centralism and administrative techended up in Paris, which was the scene of
niques5. In spite of these reservations he
threw himself into working alongside the
a huge demonstration (over 500,000 peoBolsheviks. He was invited to be a
ple) when the working class learned of the
execution of Francisco Ferrer2. It was a
Petrograd representative at the founding
time of pot-bellied peace; the atmosphere
meeting of the Communist International
was strangely electric, the calm before the
(Third International) initiated by Lenin in
storm of 1914.3 Serge was at this time
Moscow.
involved in publishing a journal in Paris.
All this work for the Party brought with it
Subsequent to the riots at the time of the
special rations. Such was the wide sweepdemonstrations his house was raided, the
ing famine in Russia at the time that, even
police found weapons there, two of his
with these rations, Serge wrote I would
comrades were sentenced to death by the
have died of hunger without the sordid
guillotine, and he got 5 years in prison.
manipulations of the black market, where
Nasty times to be living in if the state
we traded the petty possessions we had
considered you to be a revolutionary. But
brought in from France.6 The Central
they were about to get worse. While in
Committee, however, suffered none of these
prison, the Great War broke out in all its
hardships. Living in the Hotel Astoria,
futility, all over Europe sending young
they dined on soup and delicious
men to their deaths. Most of the mainhorsemeat7 in comparative warmth, overstream left parties turned towards fratrilooking the dark public squares. Serge
cidal patriotism causing mass confusion in
even calls this place the hotel of the dictathe movement. The young imprisoned
Serge found the whole situation incomprehensible.

tors.8

The Winter of 1919 was a cold and bitter

one. Civil War raged, exiled Russian Aristocrats traded currency with the Tsar still
on it, while the Bolsheviks printed it like it
was going out of fashion and used it to
procure arms. Thats right, the Bolsheviks
printed money with the Tsars image on it.
As Serge says we used to print them for the
poor fools (Russian Exiles)9. The widespread cloak of hunger hung over the whole
country. In the midst of this mess, the
infamous Bolshevik secret police, the
Chekas carried out their dastardly work.
The telephone rapidly became an enemy of
any sympathetic official and Serge was no
exception. He writes At every hour it
brought me voices of panic-stricken women
who spoke of arrests, imminent executions,
and injustice, and begged me to intervene
at once, for the love of God!10. At this stage
the custom of arresting and executing hostages had become generalised and legal.11
The mere existence of a secret police is a
rapid insight into the nature of the Partys
politics at the time. From 1918 onwards
the leadership, from Lenin downwards,
had become increasingly more paranoid
and saw plots and treachery everywhere.
The Cheka were formed to counteract this
but as Serge writes he believed it was one
of the gravest and most impermissible errors that the Bolshevik leaders committed
in 1918.12 He claimed that revolutionary
tribunals, letting in defensive evidence and
functioning in the clear light of day rather

Dawn and Decline

Following his release, Serge ended up in
Petrograd at the start of 1919. He was not
the only young revolutionary to be drawn
to Mother Russia during her famous date
with destiny. One of the first people he met
while there was Maxim Gorky. Gorky,
apart from being famous both at home and
abroad as a major writer, was also a respected political figure in Russia. Hed
been a champion of change for a long time,
and his opinion was one that was respected
by many.
Gorky had witnessed the early days of the
revolution and reported that the Bolsheviks were drunk with authority4. But,
after a brief time, Serge made his own
mind up about the whole matter. I was
neither against the Bolsheviks nor neutral;
I was with them, albeit independently, without renouncing thought or critical sense.

One of nine Rolls Royce cars ordered for Lenin at the 1920 London Motor Show

Red & Black Revolution (16)

than the cloak of the night, would have

functioned efficiently with far less abuse
and depravity.13 When Serge brought up
Zinoviev (Lenins appointed President of
the Third International and member of the
Politbureau) around this time in a conversation with Gorky, Gorky shouted out
Dont talk to me of that beast ever again tell him that his torturers are a disgrace to
the human image.14
By early 1920, it appeared that the Civil
War was coming to an end, and the idea of
normality returning to Mother Russia was
gaining popularity. By January of 1920
Dzerzhinsky (Peoples Commissar for the
Interior), with the backing of Lenin and
Trotsky, recommended the abolition of the
death sentence - except in areas where
there were still military operations being
carried out. Hope sprang up immediately
amongst the thousands of suspects in the
crammed prisons as the decree was passed
by the Government and signed by Lenin.
But the executioners of the Cheka were
busy that night, as 200 people were driven
outside of Petrograd and shot. Over 300 in
Moscow. Relatives scraped at the mass
burial grounds looking for relics of their
dead loved ones. Serge actually met one of
the grim reapers who worked in the
Petrograd Cheka, who said of that time
We thought that if the Peoples Commissars were getting converted to Humanitarianism, that was their business. Our
business was to crush the counter-revolution for ever, and they could shoot us afterwards if they like!"15 The work of the
Cheka, although well recognised, was never
spoken of. No one was disciplined for this
slaughter, implying that their dirty work
met with the approval of the Bolsheviks.

The enemies within ?

By 1920 opinions were rampant and divided about the Soviets. The Mensheviks
were outright opponents, the Left SocialRevolutionaries first boycotted them and
then collaborated with them. The anarchists were divided into pro-soviet and
anti-soviet. Serge called all the people
outside the party view of the time dissidents of the revolution who were right on
many points.16 But the dissidents had a
fundamental point which had to be admitted, which was above all the right oft h e
people of Russia for freedom of expression and the restoration of liberty
in the soviets.17 The Soviets of 1917
had been the workers councils which
had been composed of the workers
and soldiers delegates who wished to
disband the bad old society and bring about
the dawn of a new age of freedom for
mankind. But with the suppression of all
opposition to the viewpoints of the Bolsheviks, Serge writes In practice they (the
soviets) represented nothing but the local
Party Committees.18 The Party at this
time had been practically invaded, according to Serge, by careerists, mercenary elements who came over in swarms to the side
with power. Bureaucratisation was rampant. It comes as no surprise that the

Party that would bring about the dictatorship of the proletariat was now full of little
dictators who possessed no initiative.19
After all, the nature of their politics was to
have a small number of people making
decisions for the majority.
The search for the enemies within was
growing, mainly driven from the top (secretaries) downwards through the Party
and exercised by the Cheka. Of the many
anarchists in prison at this time, Lenin
said they were not true anarchists nor
idealists - just bandits and anyway The
State is a machine for which we are answerable and we cannot allow its operation to be
frustrated.20 By this stage, the Bolsheviks
were determined that this revolution was
theirs alone and anyone who held an alternative opinion was labeled against the
party - and therefore against the revolution. Any opposition to the will of the party
was seen as a threat as the Bolsheviks
wrestled for a grip on the monopoly of
power. They were hanging onto it by their
fingertips and any threat was dealt with in
a severe manner. As one party member
wrote in an official trade union journal at
the time Professionalny Vestnik the destruction of newspapers, the annihilation
of freedom of agitation for the socialist and
democratic parties is inadmissable.
The.....violence against strikers, etc. irritated open wounds. There has been too
much of this type of memory of the Russian
toiling masses and this can lead to an
analogy deadly to the Soviet power.21 The
Bolsheviks were holding onto State power
irrespective of costs, ideals or lives.
Anarchists were arrested en mass by the
Cheka in November 1920, as they prepared for their congress. Serge speaks, at
this time, of being horrified at witnessing
the rigging of elections so that Lenins and
Zinovievs majority opinion would win.
Lenin said the trade unions should organise autonomously from the state (an improvement from Trotskys position which
said they should be merged) but they must
be subordinate to the Party. 'All power to
the Party' would have been a much more
accurate slogan at this time. Incidents

happened all the time in factories. The

Party was becoming less and less popular,
and strikes were on the increase. This was
in the November and December of 1920.
The atmosphere was building towards a
confrontation between the Party and those
who were pro-revolution, but not pro the
Bolshevik version they were being served.
That confrontation would burst into the
open at Kronstadt and Serge was one of the
witnesses.

Whose Revolution is this ?

Kropotkin, the best known anarchist in
Russia and worldwide at the time, died.
The anarchists, including a number who
were temporarily released from Bolshevik
jails in order to attend, turned his funeral
into a massive show of strength and a
"denunciation of all tyranny"22. Behind the
coffin marched thousands of mourners hand
in hand, carrying the black flags of anarchism. The Chekas presence at the funeral added to the atmosphere of tension.
Many anarchists were arrested straight
after the burial of the old man, only to
disappear to prisons from which they would
never re-emerge. Just as the old man lay
in the ground, many were to join him and
with them went the hopes for socialism
and freedom.
18 days later, Serge was awoken in the
Astoria Hotel with the news that Kronstadt
is in the hands of the Whites.23 Later on
the next day other comrades told him the
sailors have mutinied24 and that what
hed heard previously was nothing but an
atrocious lie. Serge writes We were paralysed by official falsehoods. It had never
happened before that our Party should lie
to us like this.25 It was in fact a naval
revolt, led by the local Soviet.
The battle lines were drawn, this was a
battle for power. Who was really in charge
of the Soviets, the people themselves or a
Party already rampant with bureaucrats
and careerists? Lenin had written in 1918
that The irrefutable experience of history
has shown that.....the dictatorship of individual persons was very often the vehicle,
the channel of the dictatorship of the revolutionary classes.26 What this meant
in reality was that the make-up of
the Soviets had to change and was
changed from the freely elected delegates to submissive party hacks who
rubber stamped the decisions made further up the hierarchy. The battle at
Kronstadt was fought to either bring the
revolution back towards the people or to
wave good-bye to it all.

The killing of hope in

Kronstadt
Serge wrote of the demands of the
Kronstadt rebels. Pamphlets distributed in the working class areas ...
It was a programme for the renewal
of the Revolution ... re-election of the
Soviets by secret ballot; freedom of
the spoken and printed word for all
revolutionary parties and groupings;

Red & Black Revolution (17)

socialism is merely state capitalist monopoly

which is made to serve the interests of the
whole people and has to that extent ceased
to be capitalist monopoly.32 At the same
congress, a party faction known as the
Workers Opposition was outlawed and
denounced as anarcho-syndicalist because they wished management of production to be handed over to the trade unions.
This history of events displays that the
Bolsheviks could not accept any threat to
their monoploy of power. The threat at
that time was on the cold winds of change
blowing from the port of Kronstadt.

Do not mourn - Organise !

freedom for the trade unions; the release of

revolutionary political prisoners; abolition
of official propaganda; an end to requisitioning in the countryside; freedom for the
artisan class; immediate suppression of the
barrier squads that were stopping the people from getting their food as they pleased.27
The crews of the First and Second Naval
Squadrons, along with the garrison and
the Soviet in Kronstadt, were fighting for
the triumph of the above demands.
A delegation from Kronstadt which was
dispatched to Petrograd to explain the
uprising ended up in the hands of the
Cheka. Most of those who mediated on the
sailors behalf ended up being arrested.
Serge justifies the whole incident and his
own siding with the Party in this way
Kronstadt had right on its side. Kronstadt
was the beginning of a fresh liberating
revolution for popular democracy ... However, the country was absolutely exhausted,
and production practically at a standstill;
there were no reserves of any kind, not even
reserves of stamina in the hearts of the
masses. ...Soviet democracy lacked leadership, institutions and inspiration; at its
back there were only masses of starving
and desperate men.28 That was his reason.
He saw no hope for the people to take the
de-railed revolution and put it back on
track. Serge puts it more bluntly in his
propaganda of the time when he wrote
Despite its mistakes and abuses the Bolshevik Party is at present the supremely
organised, intelligent and stable force which
deserves our confidence. The Revolution
has no other mainstay, and is no longer
capable of any thorough going regeneration.29 It was with these words that Serge
kissed the idea of freedom good-bye, and
held up his arms in a shrug which said
there was nothing better.
The anarchists and the Menshevik Social
Democrats were outlawed, along with anybody else who didnt give absolute loyalty
to Lenins dictatorship. Charged with all
sorts of odious terms30, Serge himself
writes The Cheka is mad!31 In Moscow at
the same time Lenin was proclaiming the
New Economic Policy. Lenin, in his own
written words, described this: Socialism
is merely the next step forward from State
capitalist monopoly. Or in other words,

Serge has been championed for a long time

by various Trotskyists and Leninists as
the former Libertarian who saw the Bolshevik example and followed it. He was a
practical man, theyll say, an example of an
anarchist who saw sense in that time of
revolt. Read his book and listen to his
story. He was a man who was courageous
and strong and fought for what he believed. But at one point a light was extinguished in him, and he just kept on pushing
for the programme being put forth by the
party. That light that went out was his
belief that you could win freedom, he
thought that what the working class had to
do was trust in and obey the 'revolutionary
party'. Unfortunately, when they did that
they were left in a position of hoping the
party would deliver that freedom. Too late
did they realise that the emancipation of
the working class is the job of the working
class itself, the party isnt going to deliver
it.
This battle was lost in Kronstadt, and
thats why anarchists throughout the world
celebrated when we saw those joyous faces
on the other side as the Berlin wall was
smacked over. Then the Party had won the
battle and formed in its wake a viciously
authoritarian state - where the will of the
people was crushed beneath the wheels of
interest of the Bolsheviks. So we did not
mourn the passing of the Bolshevik dictatorship, socialisms chance in Russia passed
when the blood of the sailors was spilled by
the Red Army on the ice of Kronstadt.
Serge wrote his Memoirs of a Revolutionary - and in it he displays how the means
determine the end. Leninists have failed
to make a revolution based on freedom and
equality because it cannot be built on suppression. Bakunin wrote with a clarity
that Serge only found out though experience Only the practice of social revolution,
great new historical experiences, the logic
of events can bring them around, sooner or
later, to a common solution: and strong in
our belief in the validity of our
principle......the workers...., not their leaders, will then end by joining with us to tear
down these prisons called States and to
condemn politics, which is in fact nothing
more than the art of dominating and fleecing the masses.33 Its imperative that a
social revolution is built on freedom, as
any anarchist will tell you. When it is, that
revolution will not fail, and that is a truth

that we are here to build for.

References
1

In International Socialism No. 52 a journal

published by the Socialist Workers Party in
Britain
2
Memoirs of a Revolutionary by Victor Serge
3
An anarcho-syndicalist and educational
reformer. In Barcelona he translated French
Syndicalist material and founded the journal
Solidaridad Obrera. He was vilified and hated by
the Catholic Church and the right because he
established libertarian schools for the education of
working class children. His respect within the
working class was such that his death in Spain
brought half a million people out to demonstrate
on the streets of Paris.
4
Memoirs of a Revolutionary, page 73, Quote
attributed to Maxim Gorky
5
ibid page 76
6
ibid page 79
7
ibid page 79
8
ibid page 79
9
ibid page 86
10
ibid page 80
11
ibid page 80
12
ibid page 80-81
13
ibid page 81
14
ibid page 82
15
ibid page 99, Quote attributed to a man called
Leonidov - his real name was never written by
Serge - a man who took part in the execution of
hundreds of people outside Petrograd.
16
ibid page 118
17
ibid page 119
18
ibid page 118
19
ibid page 118
20
Anarchists behind bars (Summer 1921) - Lenin
quoted when asked about imprisoned anarchists
like Voline
21
The Bolsheviks & Workers Control, page 28,
Quote from Party member Lovosky
22
Memoirs of a Revolutionary, ibid page 121
23
ibid page 124
24
ibid page 125
25
ibid page 125
26
Lenins article The immediate Tasks of the
Soviet Government published in Isvestiya
27
Memoirs of a Revolutionary, ibid page 126
28
ibid page 128
29
ibid page 129
30
ibid page 129
31
ibid page 129
32
Lenin, Collected Works, Vol 25, page 358
33
No Gods, No Masters: Vol. 2, ed Daniel Guerin,
page 161 - Bakunin letter to La Liberte Oct 5th
1872

98

Red & Black Revolution (18)

17

In 1798 Ireland was shook by a mass rebellion for democratic rights and
against British rule. 200 years later 1798 continues to loom over Irish
politics. The bi-centenary, co-inciding with the Peace process, has attracted considerable discussion, with the formation of local history groups,
the holding of conferences and a high level of interest in the TV documentaries and books published around the event.
It is rightly said that history is written by
the victors. The British and loyalist historians who wrote the initial histories of the
rising portrayed it as little more than the
actions of a sectarian mob intent on massacring all Protestants. Later reformers
sought to hide the program of 1798 to unite
Irishmen regardless of creed. After 1798
they turned to the confessional politics of
mobilising Catholics alone. Daniel
OConnell, the main architect of this policy,
went so far in 1841 as to denounce the
United Irishmen as ... wicked and
villianously designing wretches who fomented the rebellion.1
So the first response to the Loyalist history
in Ireland was an alternative but parallel
history produced to suit a Catholic nationalist agenda. Both of these agendas neatly
dovetailed in showing the rising as a fight
for faith and fatherland. This is illustrated by the treatment of two portraits of
prominent figures in the rebellion. Lord
Edward Fitzgerald had his red cravat2
painted out and replaced with a white one.
Father Murphy had his cravat painted out
and replaced with a priest's collar! Within
parts of republicanism and the left there
have been attempts to rescue this history,
starting with the memoirs of United Irishmen like Myles Byrne who chose exile over
compromise. But, all too often, this history
has been crushed beneath histories designed to fulfil the needs of the British and

Irish ruling class.

James Connolly neatly described the Irish
nationalist version of 1798 thus
The middle class patriotic historians,
orators, and journalists of Ireland have
ever vied with one another in enthusiastic descriptions of their military exploits
on land and sea, their hairbreadth escapes and heroic martyrdom, but have
resolutely suppressed or distorted their
writings, songs and manifestos.3
In short, although the name of the United
Irishmen was honoured, their democratic
ideas were buried even before the formation of the 26 county state.
In the 1840s Ireland once again fell under
the influence of a wave of international
radicalism. They sought to uncover the
real aims of the 1798 rebellion. The republican organisation of the 1840s, the Young
Irelanders celebrated the United Irishmen not as passive victims or reluctant
rebels, but as ideologically committed revolutionaries with a coherent political strategy.4 They placed a marker on the grave
of the key United Irishmen leader, Wolfe
Tone, at Bodenstown. Paying homage at
the grave is an essential annual rite for
any party wishing to claim the republican
legacy.
These different histories mean that even
within republicanism there was little agree-

ment about what the real legacy of 1798

was. In 1934 when Protestant members of
the Republican Congress arrived at
Bodenstown with a banner proclaiming
Break the connection with capitalism they
were physically assaulted and driven off
by IRA members.
Of particular note is the way the women of
1798 have either been written out of history altogether or exist only as the faithful
wives of the nationalist histories and the
blood crazed witches of the loyalist accounts. Like other republicans of that
period the United Irishmen - for the most
part - did not see a role for women, although one proposal was made that women
should have the vote as well5 . Nevertheless a number of women, including Mary
Ann McCracken, played an important role
from an early period in promoting the organisation, and a Society of United Irishwomen was established in 1796.6
In the run up to the rebellion, women were
particularly active in subverting the Militia. They would swear in soldiers and also
spread rumours that the troops were going
to be sent abroad. Women were active in
the rebellion, not just in traditional roles
of medical aid etc., but also in quite a
number of cases as combatants. However,
almost all of these roles seem to be ones
that individual women demanded and
fought for, there is little evidence of any
serious effort on the part of the United
Irishmen to mobilise women.

An overview of the Rebellion

In the Autumn of 1791, societies of United
Irishmen were formed in Belfast and Dublin. Initially the organisation limited itself
to calling for democratic reforms including
Catholic emancipation7 . In response to
popular pressure, the British government
- which effectively ruled Ireland - initially
granted some reforms. This period of reform ended in 1793, when war broke out
between revolutionary France and Britain.
In December of 1796 the United Irishmen
came the nearest they would to victory,
when 15,000 French troops arrived off
Bantry Bay. Bad weather prevented the
landing and saved Britain from defeat.
After Bantry Bay, Irish society was bitterly polarised as loyalists flocked to join
the British army and the United Irishmens numbers swelled massively.
By the Spring of 1798, a campaign of British terror was destroying the United Irishmen organisation and many of the leaders

Red & Black Revolution (19)

had been arrested. The remaining leaders

felt forced to call an immediate rising, even
though this would be before French aid
could arrive. The date was set for May
23rd. A number of factors undermined the
rising in Dublin. However major risings
occurred in Wexford in the south, and Antrim and Down in the north. Elsewhere
there were minor skirmishes. By the autumn - despite a small French landing - the
rebellion had been defeated, tens of thousands were dead and a reign of terror had
spread over the country.

Origins of the rising

The 1798 rising occurred at a unique moment in world politics, the point at which
parliamentary democracy (and capitalism)
was replacing absolute monarchy (and feudalism). The American Revolution of 177181 and the French Revolution of 1789 were
the key inspirations for those who were to
lead the rebellion in Ireland. Wolfe Tone
described how the French Revolution became the test of every mans political creed,
and the nation was fairly divided into two
great parties the aristocracy and democrats.8
To this was added the severe oppression
the majority of Irish people lived under.
The country was bitterly divided , two wars
had been fought in the previous century
with the combatants split along religious
lines. The native Catholic landowning
class had been forced either to surrender
their lands or to convert to the Anglican
religion. In parts of the country, in particular the North-East, even the ordinary
Catholic tenants had been forced off the
land, to be replaced with Presbyterian
planters brought over from Scotland. This
left a legacy of sectarian rivalry which
helped the British to divide and rule.
Although some reforms had been won, the
situation by the 1780s was that the country was ruled by Anglican landowners,
with Presbyterian landowners having only
limited political power, and Catholic landowners none. Beyond this, the mass of the
population, Catholic, Protestant (Anglican)
and Dissenter (Presbyterian) had virtually no rights at all. In 1831 there were
6,000 absentee landlords, who owned over
7,000,000 acres.
The complete subjection the peasantry were
subjected to is hinted by a traveller through
Ireland at the time who wrote
A landlord in Ireland can scarcely invent an order which a servant, labourer,
or cottier dares to refuse to execute. ... A
poor man would have his bones broken if
he offered to lift a hand in his own
defence . . . Landlords of consequence
have assured me that many of their
cottiers would think themselves honoured by having their wives and daughters sent for to the bed of their master."9
There were famines in 1740, 57, 65 and
70. The first of these alone killed 400,000.10
The arrival of capitalism had seen the
beginnings of a working class. There were

at least 27 labour disputes in Dublin from

1717 to 1800 and the formation of the early
trade unions had started11 . There were 50
combinations in 27 different trades in Dublin in the period 1772-95. There were at
least 30 food riots ... in the period 177294..12
This atmosphere of revolutionary ideas on
the one hand, and brutal oppression on the
other, was the climate in which the United
Irishmen were born in 1791. This initially
reformist organisation, at first composed
of the Protestant middle class was to choose
within a few years to take the path of
launching a democratic and anti-colonial
revolution.

Leadership Vs masses
According to the Report of the Secret Committee of the House of Lords - shortly before
the United Irishmen were founded - Tone,
Samuel Neilson and others in the north
circulated a Secret Manifesto to the Friends
of Freedom in Ireland. Towards the end
this contained a description of past movements that was to prove prophetic as a
description of events in 1798
When the aristocracy come forward, the
people fall backwards; when the people
come forward, the aristocracy, fearful of
being left behind, insinuate themselves
into our ranks and rise into timid leaders or treacherous auxiliaries.13
Once the United Irishmen had decided to
take the direction of rebellion, they had to
win the mass of the people actively to join
in such a rebellion. To do this they highlighted the economic advantages of reform.
Gaining the vote for rich Catholic landowners would mean little to those paying
rent for this land.
Dr Willam James MacNeven, under interrogation by the House of Lords in 1798,
when asked if Catholic emancipation or
parliamentary reform mobilised the lower
orders said I am sure they do not understand it. What they very well understand is
that it would be a very great advantage to
them to be relieved from the payments of
tithes and not to be fleeced by the landlords14 In 1794 they asked Who makes
them rich? The answer is obvious - it is the
industrious poor.
Historian Nancy Curtin points out that
Some united Irish recruiters ... suggested
that a major redistribution of land would
follow a successful revolution and that as
a result To a certain extent republicanism
became associated in the common mind
with low rents, the abolition of tithes and a
tax burden borne by the wealthy and idle
rather than by the poor and industrious15
The Union doctrine; or poor mans catechism, was published anonymously as
part of this effort and read in part
I believe in a revolution founded on the
rights of man, in the natural and
imprescriptable right of all citizens to
all the land ... As the land and its produce was intended for the use of man tis

unfair for fifty or a hundred men to

possess what is for the subsistence of
near five millions ...16
Before 1794 the role consigned by republican leaders to the masses was one of fairly
passive displays of support for change. For
example Illuminations (where people put
lights in their windows) were important to
show the level of public support.
Following the 1794 banning of the Dublin
United Irishmen the masses became more
actively involved. Riots were organised by
the United Irishmen, particularly around
the arrival of the new Viceroy, Camden, in
March 1795, when aristocrats were stoned
in the streets of Dublin.
As public demonstrations were banned,
various ruses were used to gather United
Irishmen together. Race meeting were
used as pretexts for mass assemblies. Mock
funerals with up to 2,000 mourners would
be held, sometimes the coffin would actually contain arms. In the countryside mass
potato diggings (often for imprisoned
United Irishmen) were organised and often conducted as military drills. These
were a way of seeing who would turn out
and how well they would follow orders.
This following of orders was central to the
preparation for rebellion, as the United
Irishmens leadership wanted to be able to
control and discipline the masses in the
event of a rising. This was also why a
French landing was central. The French
army would help not just to beat Britain,
but also to control the masses. The original
strategy for the rebellion was for only a few
thousand United Irishmen to join the army
of the French (and for these to be quickly
disciplined).
This is the context in which Tones Our
freedom must be had at all hazards. If the
men of property will not help us, they must
fall; we will free ourselves by the aid of that
large and respectable class of the community - the men of no property must be
taken. Yes, the United Irishmen had turned

Red & Black Revolution (20)

to the men of no property, but the leadership still intended to run the show, and
with French help hold back the masses if
necessary.
After 1794, with the turn towards revolutionary politics and the need to mobilise
the masses, the class basis of the United
Irishmen underwent a radical change.
Dublin membership of artisans, clerks and
labourers rose to nearly 50% of the total.17
Other popular political societies in Dublin
in the 1790s included the Strugglers. One
judge referred to the nest of clubs in the
city of Dublin. Their membership was
said to consist of The younger part of the
tradesmen, and in general all the apprentices. The informer Higgins described
these clubs as comprising King killers,
Paineites, democrats, levellers and United
Irishmen.18

The link with the Defenders

A central part of the strategy for mass
rebellion was to build links with the already established movements, and in particular the Defenders. The Defenders had
started as a local faction (gang) in Armagh and were initially non-sectarian,
their first Captain being Presbyterian.19 .
Armagh was the scene of intense political
agitation around the arming of Catholics,
with the Protestant Orange Order20 conducting armed attacks on Catholics. However the arming of the Catholics had the
full support of a radical section of Protestant political opinion 21 . These origins
are important, as later historians have
attempted to portray the Defenders as
purely a Catholic sectarian organisation, a
sort of mirror image of the Orange Order.
In 1795, up to 7,000 Catholics were driven
out of Armagh by Orange Order pogroms.
The United Irishmen provided lawyers to
prosecute on behalf of the victims of Or-

ange attacks. Special missions were dispatched there in 1792 and again in 1795
and senior figures like Neilson, Teeling,
McCracken, Quigley and Lowry worked the
area ceaselessly ... .22 Many expelled
Catholic families were sheltered by Presbyterian United Irishmen in Belfast, and
later, Antrim and Down. These expulsions
facilitated the spread of Defenderism and
fear of the Orange Order to other parts of
Ireland.
The Defenders were already politicised to
some extent by the hope of French intervention and their anti- tax and anti-tithe
propaganda. They proclaimed We have
lived long enough upon potatoes and salt; it
is our turn now to eat mutton and beef 23 .
Despite their rural origins the Defenders
were not a peasant movement but drawn
from among weavers, labourers and tenant
farmers ... and from the growing artisan
class of the towns. By 1795 there were
some 4000 Defenders in Dublin, closely
linked with many of the republican clubs
in the city. The complex nature of the
Defenders is illustrated as in Dublin there
were Protestant Defenders even though
revenge against Protestants was certainly
an important element in Defender thinking 24 .
The Orange Order attacks had inevitably
introduced sectarianism into the Defenders. But the United Irishmen saw this
sectarianism as being due to the influence
of priests, and directed only against Protestant landlords. This was to prove a
serious under estimation, particularly outside of the north.

The Rebellion
In December of 1796, a French Fleet appeared off the shores of Bantry Bay with
15,000 French soldiers and Wolfe Tone.
Rough seas and inexperienced sailors prevented a landing which would have liber-

Pitch capping, in which molten

pitch was set alight on the
victims head and the travelling
gallows used to half-hang
people. Tortures like these,
along with flogging were used
on thousands of people to try to
force them to reveal the names
of United Irishmen or the
location of arms in 1797 and
early 1798. Many died as a
result of them.
They were accompanied by a
general campaign of looting
and rape, along with transportation of suspects to the fleet.
This allowed the British forces
to seriously undermine United
Irishmen organisation and
forced the remaining leadership
to call a premature rising.

ated the country from British rule. The

British campaign of terror against the
United Irishmen which followed was seriously undermining the organisation by
1798. In the Spring of 1798, pressure was
mounting for a rising without the French,
and after the arrest of most of the Leinster
leadership a date for the rising was set by
those who escaped.
The key to the rising was to be Dublin. It
was intended to seize the city and trigger a
message to the rest of the country by stopping the mail coaches. However, although
thousands turned out for the rising in the
city, it ended up as a fiasco with almost no
fighting. The reasons why this happened
can be found in the class basis of the leadership of the United Irishmen.
Once it was clear that the rising was going
to happen without the French, it was also
clear that there was no mechanism to hold
back the workers and peasants from going
beyond the bourgeois democratic and separatist aims of the rising. The key informer
who betrayed the Dublin rising, Reynolds,
had turned because of fears of his ancestral
estates being confiscated.25
Edward Fitzgerald, Neilson and the others
who planned the May 21st rising in Dublin
were willing to risk this. But they were
arrested and removed from the scene by
May 19th. The British, on the information
of informers, had seized the gathering point
for the rising. In the confusion there was
little chance of the rank and file of the
United Irishmen gathering to create an
alternative plan. And the second rank of
leadership, which could have created an
alternative plan, failed to do so precisely
because it now feared the uncontrolled
mob.
Precisely as had been warned when the
people come forward, the aristocracy, fear-

Red & Black Revolution (21)

ful of being left behind, insinuate themselves into our ranks and rise into timid
leaders or treacherous auxiliaries.

The Wexford Republic

A limited rising occurred around Dublin
which was rapidly and brutally suppressed.
Loyalists and British forces unleashed further terror in the rest of the country. In
Wicklow and North Wexford this included
the execution of over 50 United Irish prisoners, the murder of civilians and the burning of homes.
There was United Irishmen organisation
in this area, Wexford town was considered
the preferred landing place for the French.
But the bulk of the 300 or so United Irishmen here do not appear to have been preparing for a rising. One historian of the
rebellion, Dickson, reckons that without a
French landing and without the compulsion applied by the magistrates and their
agents ... there would have been no Wexford
rising at all.26 and his account demonstrates that the early battles were spontaneous clashes. The all important initial
victory was at Oulard, where there was no
real rebel commander and some of the
United Irishmen were armed only with
stones.
The Oulard victory demonstrated that the
British army were not unbeatable. This,
and the increasing repression, saw hundreds and then thousands flock to join the
rebel hilltop encampments. However the
superior tactics, arms and training of the
British forces was to prove a match for the
rebels. On 4th and 5th June the rebellion
suffered its most decisive defeat at the
battle of New Ross, and on 9th the defeat at
the battle of Arklow was the last major
attempt to spread the rebellion to neighbouring counties.
Wexford town was however liberated for
three weeks. At the time it was thriving
and had a population of 10,000, many of
whom were Protestants. After liberation,
a seven man directory of the main United
Irishmen and a 500 strong senate took over
the running of the town. Both of these
included Catholic and Protestant members. In addition each area / district had its
own local committee, militia and elected
leader. The time before it was retaken was
not sufficient for much constructive activity beyond the printing of ration coupons.
However the limited reorganisation of local government that did occur, and its
success in maintaining order until just
before the town fell, demonstrates the often denied political side of the Wexford
rebellion.27
On 21st the final major battle of the Wexford republic was fought at Vinegar Hill.
It had taken some 20,000 British soldiers
three weeks to crush the 30,000 Wexford
rebels who were utterly untrained, practically leaderless and miserably armed.28

Events in Antrim/Down
The North had also seen a savage campaign of British torture which had terri-

fied, disorganised and disarmed many of

the United Irishmen. General Knox had
told General Lake that his methods were
also intended to increase the animosity
between the Orangemen and the United
Irishmen. Robert Simms who was Adjacent-General of the United Irishmen in the
north simply refused to acknowledge that
the signal from Dublin indicated he should
rise. Instead, presumably in part for the
class interests already outlined, he preferred to wait for the French.
Nevertheless, the rank and file were determined there should be a rising and the
lower officers with Henry Joy McCracken
(who had just returned from jail in Dublin)
forced Simms to resign on June 1st and got
an order for a rising at a delegate meeting
on June 2nd. This delay meant it was not
till 5th that the rising started in Antrim,
and 7th in Down. In the course of this
delay, the northern rising was further
weakened. Three of the United Irishmen
colonels gave the plans to the British, taking away any element of surprise and allowing them to prepare for the rising.
More seriously, stories started reaching
the north from the Wexford rebellion with
the newspapers rivalling rumour in portraying in Wexford an image of Catholic
massacre and plunder equalled only by
legends .... Many of these stories were
false although some Protestant men had
been killed in Enniscorthy. The distorted
version that reached the north by 4 June
(before the rising) was that at Enniscorthy
in the county of Wexford every Protestant
man, woman and child, even infants,
have been murdered. Alongside
this were manufactured items
like a supposed Wexford Oath
I, A.B. do solemnly swear ...
that I will burn, destroy and murder all heretics up to my knees in
blood.
Later commentaries tried to deny
the scale of the Northern rising,
or have claimed that many Presbyterians failed to turn out. However, given all of the above, what is
truly remarkable is how little effect
all this had, in particular as by 5th
the Wexford rising had clearly failed
to spread. Of the 31,000 United
Irishmen in the area of the northern
rising, 22,000 actually took part in
the major battles (more turned out
but missed the major battles).29
Like the Wexford rising, the
Northern rebels succeeded in winning miHenry Joy
McCracken,
executed in
Belfast at the age
of 31.

nor skirmishes against the British but

were defeated in the major battles by the
experienced and better equipped. As in
Wexford, the British burned towns, villages and houses they considered sympathetic to the rebels and massacred both
prisoners and wounded during and after
the battles. After the battle of Antrim,
some were buried alive.30
The last major battle of the Northern rising was at Ballynahinch on 13th June. By
the time the French arrived in Killala in
August, it was too late, although their
initial success does suggest that either the
Wexford or Antrim rebels may have been
much more successful if they had the benefit of even the small number of experienced French troops and arms later landed
at Killala.
Some 32 United Irishmen leaders were
executed in the North after the rising,
including two Presbyterian ministers.
Henry Joy McCracken in hiding after the
rising, wrote a letter to his sister in which
he sums up the cause of the failure of the
rising as the rich always betray the poor.
He was captured and executed in Belfast
on July 16th.

Post rebellion republicans

After the rising it was in the interests of
those who had led it to minimise their
involvement by insisting they were ignorant dupes or forced by the mob to take

Red & Black Revolution (22)

part. A song asks Who fears to speak of

98?. People researching oral histories
have indicated that the answer was just
about everyone. Even the year of death on
the gravestones of those who died in the
rising was commonly falsified. The reason
was the British campaign of terror, which
carried on into the following century with
chapel burnings and deportations of cart
loads of suspects.
In Wexford, where the death penalty still
applied to anyone who had been a United
Irish officer, it was a common defence for
ex-leaders to claim they were forced into
their role by mobs of rebels. This explanation was handy for both the official and
Catholic nationalist versions of the history. It suggested that the Protestant
portion of the leadership was coincidental
in what was otherwise a confessional or
sectarian rising, depending on your point
of view. This deception was credible because the United Irishmen membership
lists for Wexford were never captured. This
allowed ex-rebel leaders like Edward Hay
to argue that there were fewer United
Irishmen in the county of Wexford then in
any other part of Ireland31 .

The Orange Order

On the loyalist side, the Orange Order
needed to minimise Presbyterian involvement in the rising and portray it as a
purely sectarian and Catholic affair. So
loyalist accounts have tended to focus on
the Wexford massacres, often making quite
false claims about their scale, who was
massacred and why they were massacred.
Musgraves (the main loyalist historian) in
his coverage of the rebellion gives only 2%
of his writing to the Antrim and Down
rebellion while 62% of his coverage concentrates on Wexford.32 The limited accounts
given of the Northern rising portray it as
idealistic Presbyterians being betrayed by
their Catholic neighbours and so learning
to become good loyal Orange men. The
scale of British and loyalist massacres of
these Presbyterians is seldom mentioned.

Earl Camden, the

British Viceroy at
the time of the
rebellion

The Centenary
More than anything else the Catholic nationalist history of the rising was determined by the needs of the Catholic church
when faced with the socialist influenced
Fenian movement one hundred years later.
Patrick Kavanaghs A Popular history of
the insurrection of 1798, published in 1870
was the major work from this perspective.
This history had several aims; to hide the
role of the church hierarchy in condemning
the rising (and instead claim that the
church led the rising); to blame the failure
of the rising on underground revolutionary
organisation (as an attack on the Fenians);
and to minimise the involvement of Northern Presbyterians and democratic ideals.
In so far as they are mentioned the view is
that it was the turbulent and disorderly
Presbyterians who seduced the law abiding
Catholics. 33
This history has therefore emphasised the
rebellion in Wexford and elevated the role
of the handful of priests who played an
active part. Father Murphy thus becomes
the leader of the rising. The fight was for
faith and fatherland, as a statue of a
Pikeman draped in rosary beads which
was erected in Enniscorthy on the hundredth anniversary of the rising proclaims.
Finally, the role of the United Irishmen is
minimised. The leadership role of United
Irishmen like Baganal Harvey, Matthew
Keogh and Edward Lough, who were Protestant, is glossed over. The failure of the
rebellion is explained by the inevitability
of revolutionary movements being betrayed
by informers. Patrick Kavanagh presents
Father Murphy as the sole heart of the
insurrection, and the United Irishmen as
riddled by spies, ruined by drink, with
self-important leaders ... . 34

Issues of 98
To a large extent, these histories shaped
the popular understanding of the rising.
In this limited space it is impossible to
address all the issues they raise. But there
is a need for current revolutionary organisations in Ireland to dispel the illusions
created of the past. This is particularly
true with regard to Protestant workers in
the north who are largely unaware that it
was their forefathers who invented Irish
republicanism, nor indeed that the first
Republican victim of a showtrial and execution was a Presbyterian from
Ballymena, Willam Orr.
The current debate on the release of political prisoners could be much informed if
Orrs pre-execution words were remembered If to have loved my country, to have
known its Wrongs, to have felt the Injuries
of the persecuted Catholics and to have
united with them and all other Religious
Persuasion in the most orderly and sanguinary means of procuring Redress - If these
be Felonies I am a Felon but not otherwise
...". 35

The role of the Catholic church

Although, by 1898, the Catholic church
would choose to pretend it had led the

Wexford rising, in 1798 nothing could be

further from the truth. Dr Troy, Archbishop of Dublin, said within days of the
rising (27 May 1798) that We bitterly
lament the fatal consequences of this antiChristian conspiracy.
In fact the Catholic hierarchy was opposed
to the radical ideas of the rebellion and,
especially since the opening of the Catholic
seminary at Maynooth, stood beside Britain and the Irish Protestant Ascendancy
class. Three days after the rebellion had
started, the following declaration came out
of Maynooth
We, the undersigned, his Majestys most
loyal subjects, the Roman Catholics of
Ireland, think it necessary at this moment publicly to declare our firm attachment to his Majestys royal person, and
to the constitution under which we have
the happiness to live ... We cannot avoid
expressing to Your Excellency our regret
at seeing, amid the general delusion,
many, particularly of the lower orders,
of our own religious persuasion engaged
in unlawful associations and practises
(30 May 1798)
This was signed by the President of the
Royal College of Maynooth and 2000 of the
Professors and students, 4 lords and 72
baronets.36 One of the Wexford rebels,
Myles Byrne, wrote afterwards that priests
saved the infamous English government in
Ireland from destruction.37
Individual Catholic priests like Father
Murphy played an important leadership
role in the rising, alongside the mostly
Protestant United Irishmen leaders. According to Dickson at least eleven Catholic
curates took an active part and of these
three were executed.38 But their own
Bishop described the rebel priests after the
rebellion as excommunicated priests,
drunken and profligate couple-beggars, the
very faeces of the Church. 39 . Their role in
the leadership of the rising was against the
wishes of the hierarchy and out of a motivation to protect their parishioners from
Loyalist atrocities.
Was the rebellion Protestant in the
north and Catholic in the south?

A more complex attempt to deny the legacy

of 1798 is to suggest that the northern and
southern risings were not really connected.
That the northern rising was Presbyterian
and democratic while the southern was
Catholic and sectarian.
Although the population (and thus the
rebels) in the north were mainly Presbyterian and those in the south mainly Catholic, both armies contained considerable
number of both religions. Ive already
mentioned some of the Protestant leaders
in the south. Indeed, if partly to head off
sectarian tension within the rebel army,
United Irishmen commander Roche issued
a proclamation on 7th June to my Protestant soldiers I feel much in dept for their
gallant behaviour in the field. For the
reasons discussed below, the Wexford ris-

Red & Black Revolution (23)

ing was seriously mired by sectarianism,

but right to the end there were Protestants
among the rebels. It is still remembered
around Carlow that after the battle Father
John Murphy was hidden by a Protestant
farmer, only to be betrayed by a Catholic
the next day.
It is true that in the north there were
sectarian tensions present, a Catholic
United Irish officer urged a column of Presbyterians to avenge the Battle of the
Boyne40 just before the battle of Antrim!
Also in the north, at Ballynahinch, the
Defenders (who would have been overwhelmingly Catholic) fought as a distinct
unit. However the figures show that thousands of Catholics and Protestants turned
out and fought side by side in a series of
battles, despite the obvious hopelessness
of the situation.

Protestants in Wicklow and

Wexford
There were stronger sectarian elements in
the Wexford rising. To understand where
these came from, we need to look at events
immediately before the rising. About 25%
of the population was Protestant, these
included a few recently arrived colonies
that must have displaced earlier Catholic
tenants and thus caused sectarian tensions.
The high percentage of Protestants in
Wexford also made it possible to construct
a Militia and later Yeomanry that was
extremely sectarian in composition, in the
words of Dickson in Wexford these Yeoman were almost entirely a Protestant
force.41 This Yeomanry was responsible
in part for the savage repression that preceded the rising and the initial house and
chapel burning during it. Col. Hugh Pearse
observed in Wexford at least, the misconduct of the Militia and Yeomanry ... was
largely to blame for the outbreak ... it can
only be said that cruelty and oppression
produced a yet more savage revenge.42
When faced with a Protestant Landlord
class mobilising a mainly Protestant local
army to torture them and burn their chapels, it is perhaps unsurprising that many
Catholics were inclined to identify Protestants as a whole as the problem. The
United Irishmen organisation in the area
before the rising was too small to make
much progress in overcoming this feeling,
and in fact one of their tactics added to the
sectarian tension. There were Orange
Lodges in Wexford and Wicklow. As elsewhere, there is evidence that the United
Irishmen deliberately spread rumours of
an Orange plot to massacre Catholics. The
intention was that the Catholics would
join the rebellion in greater numbers, but
such rumours inevitably heightened distrust of all Protestants.

The Wexford massacres

Throughout the Wexford rising, sectarian
tensions were never far from erupting.
This was expressed throughout the rising
as a pressure on Protestants to convert to

A loyalist cartoon of United Irishmen training

Catholicism, particularly in Wexford town
where Among the insurgent rank and file
... heresy hunting became widespread ...
Protestants found it prudent to attend mass
as the only means of saving their lives.43
When the rebels carried out massacres
they often had strong sectarian undertones. Loyalist historians and even
Pakenham, the most widely read historian
of the rising, are guilty of distorting the
nature of these massacres by claiming only
Protestants were executed.
The reality of the Wexford massacres was
that the victims tended to be landlords, or
the actual agents of British rule like magistrates and those related to them or in
service to them. Anyone suspected of being
an Orangeman was also liable to be executed. Massacres were also a feature of
the rebellion in the north, where no sectarian motive can so easily be attached. A
rebel unit near Saintfield (in the north),
led by James Breeze, attacked and set fire
to the home of Hugh McKee, a well known
loyalist and informer, burning him, his
wife, five sons, three daughters and housemaid to death.44
Loyalist historians are also guilty of ignoring or minimising the causes of most of the
massacres, the far larger massacres by
British army and loyalist forces of civilians, rebel prisoners and wounded. The
greatest of these was the massacres during
and after the battle of New Ross where
even the Loyalist historian Rev. James
Gordon admits I have reason to think more
men than fell in battle were slain in cold
blood45 . The scale of this massacre can
only be guessed at, but after the battle 3,
400 rebels were buried, 62 cart loads of
rebel bodies were thrown in the river and
many others (particularly wounded) were
burned in the houses of the town. According to many accounts the screams of
wounded rebels being deliberately burned
alive may have played a significant part in
the murder of 100 loyalist civilian prisoners at nearby Scullabogue on the morning
of the battle.

At Scullabogue around 100 were murdered,

74 were burned alive in a barn, (nine of
whom were women and 8 of whom were
Catholic) and 21 men were killed on the
front lawn. A survivor, Frizel stated that
the cause was the rumour that the military
were murdering prisoners at New Ross.46
At least three Protestants were amongst
the rebels who carried out these killings.
The presence of Protestants amongst the
murderers and Catholics among the victims gives the lie to the claim that this was
a simple sectarian massacre.
The leadership of the rebellion, both United
Irishmen and the Catholic priests, tried to
defuse the sectarian tension and prevent
massacres. On 7th June, Edward Lough,
commander of the Vinegar Hill camp, issued a proclamation this is not a war for
religion but for liberty.47 Vinegar Hill was
the site of many individual executions over
the 23 days the rebel camp existed there.
Between 300 and 400 were executed, most
were Protestant although Luke Byrne, one
of the organisers of the executions, is quoted
as saying If anyone can vouch for any of
the prisoners not being Orangemen, I have
no objection they should be discharged
and indeed all captured Quakers were
released.48 In general, throughout Wexford Quakers who were Protestant but not
associated with loyalism were well treated
by the rebels, but did suffer at the hands of
the loyalists.
A proclamation from Wexford on 9th June
called to protect the persons and properties of those of all religious persuasions who
have not oppressed us49 and on 14th June
the United Irishmen oath was introduced
to the Wexford army. None of this is to
deny that there were sectarian tensions
and indeed sectarian elements to the massacres, perhaps most openly after the rebel
army had abandoned Wexford. Thomas
Dixon and his wife then brought 70 men
into the town during the night from the
northern side of the Slaney and plied them
with whiskey. The following day a massacre started at 14:00 and lasted over five
hours. Up to 97 were murdered.

Red & Black Revolution (24)

However, even here, not all the 260 prisoners from whom those massacred were selected could be described as innocent
victims. One of those killed (Turner) was
seen burning cabins in Oulard shortly before the battle there.50 Another prisoner
who survived was Lord Kingsborough, commander of the hated North Cork Militia
and popularly regarded as having introduced the pitch cap torture, in which the
victims head was set on fire.51 Most significantly this massacre happened when
the rebel army had withdrawn from the
town and stopped when rebel forces returned.
It is an unfortunate feature of some republican and left histories of 1798 that the
sectarian nature of the Wexford massacres
is either avoided or minimised. To northern Protestant workers today this merely
appears to confirm an impression that this
is the secret agenda of the republican movement. The stories - both true and false - of
sectarian massacres in Wexford that were
circulated in the North before and during
the rising must have undermined the unity
of the United Irishmen. Although the
Wexford leadership did act to limit sectarianism, in hindsight it is obvious that the
United Irishmen were complacent about
sectarianism amongst the Defenders and
in Wexford more could and should have
been done. In particular the final and most
blatantly sectarian massacre, at Wexford
bridge, could probably have been avoided if
the Dixons, the couple at the centre of it,
had been silenced. They had spent the
period of the rebellion in Wexford trying to
whip up a pogrom.

1798 and Irish nationalism

The debate around nation is in itself
something that divides the Irish left.
In particular after the partition of
Ireland in 1922, there has been a real
and somewhat successful effort to
divide people into two nations. One
consists of all the people in the south
along with northern Catholics. Catholicism is a central part of this
definition, with the Catholic Church
being given an informal veto for many
decades over state policy in the south. To
a large extent this definition is tacitly
accepted by many parts of the Republican
movement today. Francie Molloys 1996
election campaign posters - based on there
being 20,000 more nationalists (i.e. Catholics) than Protestants in Mid-Ulster - is a
case in point. This has led to a situation
where those responsible for sectarian murders of Protestants were not treated as
seriously by the republican movement as
informers or even those judged guilty of
anti-social crime.
However, the south has started to emerge
from under the long dark shadow of Catholic nationalism, in the urban centres at
least. De Valeras comely maids at the
Crossroads and the threat of the Bishops
crosier have faded into a distant and bizarre past.

However in the north, the ideology of a

Protestant state for a Protestant people is
still strong. Particularly in recent years,
this has seen the political decision of northern loyalists to start referring to themselves as British or Ulster-Scots. This is
a quite remarkable robbing of even the
history of loyalism, and would have been
an insult to even the Orangemen of 1798,
one of whom James Claudius Beresford
declared he was Proud of the name of an
Irishman, I hope never to exchange it for
that of a colonist.52
A couple of years after the rising, Britain
succeeded in forcing the Irish Parliament
to pass an Act of Union which effectively
dissolved that parliament and replaced it
with direct rule from Westminster. It is
ironic that 36 Orange Lodges in Co. Armagh and 13 in Co. Fermanagh declared
against this Act of Union. Lodge No. 500
declared it would support the independence of Ireland and the constitution of 1782
and declare as Orangemen, as Freeholders,
as Irishmen that we consider the extinction
of our separate legislature
as the extinction of the
Irish Nation.53

What was the

nation fought for
in 1798?
The rewriting of the history of 1798 by loyalists
and nationalists alike has
a common purpose, which
is to define being Irish
as containing a requirement to being a Catholic.
The greatest defeat of
1798 is the success of this
project, in particular after partition when the
southern and northern
states adopted opposed confessional definitions of
themselves. One legacy of
that failure is that in 1998
we not only live on a divided island but that the
vast majority of our hospitals and schools are either
Catholic
or
Protestant.
The United Irishmens
core project, to replace the
name of Irishman for the labels of Catholic,
Protestant and Dissenter was not an abstract nationalist one. It came from a
concrete analysis that unless this was done
then no progress could be made because a
people divided were easily ruled. Here lies
the greatest gulf with republicans today
who reverse this process and imagine that
such unity can only be the outcome rather
than the cause of progress.
The rebellion of the United Irishmen was
not a rebellion for four abstract green fields,
free of John Bull. It was inspired by the
new ideas of equality, fraternity and liberty coming out of the French revolution.

Separatism became a necessary step once

it was realised that fulfilling these ideas
required the ending of British rule. For
many it also represented a rebellion against
the ownership of land by a few, and for
some a move towards an equality of property.
Those leaders who planned the rising were
part of a revolutionary wave sweeping the
western world, they were internationalists and indeed an agreement for distinct
republics was drawn up with the United
Scotsmen and the United Englishmen.54
They corresponded with similar societies
in Paris and London. Some, like Thomas
Russell, were also active anti-slavery campaigners. As Connolly puts it these men
aimed at nothing less than a social and
political revolution such as had been accomplished in France, or even greater.55
None of this is to claim that socialism was
on the agenda in 1798. Common ownership
of the means of production would not become a logical solution for some years yet,
when large numbers of people started to
work in situations where they could not
simply divide up their workplace. But
there is no denying that radical ideas that
are well in advance of todays republicans
were on the agenda of many in 1798.
The central message of 1798 was not Irish
unity for its own sake, indeed the strongest
opponents of the British parliament had
been the Irish ascendancy, terrified that
direct rule might result in Catholic emancipation. Unity offered to remove the sectarian barriers that enabled a tiny
ascendancy class to rule over millions without granting even a thimble full of democratic rights. The struggle has progressed
since as many of these rights have been
won, but in terms of creating an anarchist
society the words of James Hope, the most
proletarian of the 1798 leaders still apply
Och, Paddies, my hearties, have done
wid your parties. Let men of all creeds
and profissions agree. If Orange and
Green min, no longer were seen, min.
Och, naboclis, how easy ould Ireland
wed free.

This article is based on a much longer

draft which includes discussion of the
radical politics of the period and the prerebellion organisation of the United Irishmen. This can be read on the internet at
http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/andrew/1798.html
or by sending 1 and a S.A.E. to WSM,
PO Box 1528, Dublin 8.
1

Freemans Journal, 22 May, 1841

Which represented not only a revolutionary badge but a

defence of the execution of the French king Louis.
3
Labour and Irish History, James Connolly, ChVII
4

The Tree of Liberty, Radicalism, Catholicism and

the Construction of Irish Identity 1760 - 1830,
Kevin Whelan, p167
5
A history of the Irish Working Class, Peter
Berresford Ellis, 1972, p71
6
The Women of 1798 : Representations and
realities by Dire Keogh in 1798 ; 200 years of

Red & Black Revolution (25)

22

resonance, Ed. Mary Cullen

7

Catholic emancipation was the demand for the removal

of laws that discriminated against Catholics
8

quoted in Labour and Irish History, ibid, Ch VII

Arthur Young, in his Tour of Ireland quoted in
Labour and Irish History, ibid, chap IV
10
A history of the Irish Working Class, ibid, p54
11
The United Irishmen, Nancy Curtin, 1994, p 147
12
The Tree of Liberty, ibid, p92
13
Quoted in Labour and Irish History, ibid, Chap
VII
14
The United Irishmen, ibid, p28
15
The United Irishmen, ibid, p. 119 - 120
16
quoted in 1798: the United Irishmen and the
early Trade Unions, Mary Muldowney in SIPTU
Fightback No 7
17
The United Irishmen, ibid, 1994
18
The Tree of Liberty, ibid, p77 - 79
19
The United Irishmen, ibid, p 149.
9

20
Then known as the Peep O Day boy after their
practise of carrying out dawn raids on Catholic homes

21
The Defenders, p18, Deirdre Lindsay, in 1798 ;
200 years of resonance, Ed. Mary Cullen

The Tree of Liberty, ibid, p128

The Defenders, p19, ibid
24
Ibid, p20-22
25
Citizen Lord : Lord Edward Fitzgerald, 1763 1798, Stella Tillyard, p246
26
The Wexford Rising in 1798, Charles Dickson,
1955, p36
27
The Wexford Republic of June 1798 : A story
hidden from history, Kevin Whelan in 1798 ; 200
years of resonance, Ed. Mary Cullen
28
The Wexford Rising in 1798, ibid, p41
29
The United Irishmen, ibid, p260 -267
30
Revolt in North, Charles Dickson, 1960, p135
31
History of the Insurrection in the county of
Wexford, 1798
32
The Tree of Liberty, ibid, p138
33
ibid, p150
34
ibid, p170
35
Willam Orr, pre-hanging declaration, 2.45pm,
14 October 1796
36
The Wexford Rising in 1798, ibid, p 16
37
Memoirs, Vol. 1, p39 (1906)
38
The Wexford Rising in 1798, ibid, p 17
23

39
A vindication of the Roman Catholic Clergy of
the town of Wexford during the late unhappy
rebellion, pub 1799
40
When Catholics and Protestants fought on
opposite side
41
The Wexford Rising in 1798, ibid, p13
42
Col. Hugh Pearse in Memoir of the life and
service of Viscount Lake (1744 - 1808) p95
quoted in The Wexford Rising in 1798, ibid, p12
43
The Wexford Rising in 1798, ibid, p 18
44
APRN, 11 May 1998
45
The Wexford Rising in 1798, ibid, p116
46
Ibid, p129
47
Ibid, p126
48
Ibid, p77
49
Ibid, 1955, p126
50
Ibid, 1955, p62
51
Ibid, 1955, p149
52
Revolt in North, ibid, p243
53
Ibid, p243
54
A history of the Irish Working Class, ibid, p72
55
Labour and Irish History, ibid, Chap VII

Letters

The last issue of Red & Black Revolution included an article written by
Donato Romito, a militant in the Italian FdCA for many years. One
paragraph of this has proved controversial and below we print a reply to
this paragraph and Donato's response to the points raised. The full article
is on the web at http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/rbr/rbr3_italy.html or if
you send us an SAE we'll send you a copy of it. The paragraph in question
is reproduced below

There are tens of non-federated groups and circles. ... Among these groups we have to
mention Cane Nero. Their positions are inspired by insurrectionalism (in the name of
anarchy). Their "military" actions are decided in secrecy and often provoke police
repression against all anarchists who more often than not know nothing about Cane Nero's
actions. These comrades are then asked by Cane Nero to support it. Yet when the dust
eventually settles, the name of anarchy has been ruined and around anarchism there is
only a desert!!
Dear Comrades,

more than welcome to participate.

I read the article about Italian anarchism

in your last issue and after showing it to
comrades involved in the Italian Solidarity Committee in Munich, Germany, have
been urged to write to you to comment on
a few points in this article.

Insurrectionalistic anarchists in Italy do

not form a sort of clandestine movement as
the article implies, instead this is exactly
what the Italian state and the police want
to make everybody believe, so they can get
on with their repression and their imprisonments.

Under the heading Non-Federated

Groups the author talks about a group
called Canenero. In reality no such group
exists, Canenero is a magazine that writes
about insurrectionalism and is not affiliated to any particular group.
The author afterwards accuses this nonexistent group of military actions which
are decided in secrecy. This is simply a
lie, the comrades in Italy do not distinguish between military and nonmilitary
actions, they see it as direct action which
can - of course - take different forms. As
there is no established organisation most
actions are decided more or less secretly,
i.e. in very small groups, but there exist
many
opportunities
where
insurrectionalistic anarchists meet (with
the full knowledge of other Italian anarchists) and your author would have been

The insurrectionalistic comrades in Italy

need our solidarity, because tomorrow it
could be others who are criminalised and
eventually it could be us.
More information about the recent repression against Italian anarchists can be obtained from the Italian Solidarity
Committee in Munich at the following
address:
Solikommittee Italien c/o Infoladen
Munchen
Breisachnerstr. 12
81667 Munchen Germany
All the best.
Martin Kubler (for the Italian Solidarity
Committee, Munich)
23rd October 1997

Reply of Donato Romito (FdCA)

Yes, whats very important is solidarity solidarity with comrades who are victims
of state repression. (See judge Marinis
stunt, one comrades suicide in prison and
another two in jail in Turin, one comrade in
Milan sentenced to 5 years and 270 millions of Italian liras on the base of a not
focusing video....) But solidarity does not
imply agreement or support for
insurrectionalistic positions.
Direct action is made by the organised
masses, and not by individuals considering themselves as anarchist vanguards
and splinters of the working-class at the
same time. Anarchism was born inside the
real movement of the masses and its revolutionary aims live inside the class-struggles and are not separate from them.
So it does not matter whether Canenero
is a magazine or a group, it does matter if
different forms of direct action are decided more or less secretly by very small
groups of insurrectionist anarchists. Our
view it that of Cafiero, who wrote in 1882
: ...its better one step with all comrades
along the real road of life, than to stay
alone walking hundreds of yards...in
abstract.
Libertarian Regards, Donato Romito
Federazione Dei Comunisti Anarchici
[email protected]
http://www.pandora.it/fdca

Red & Black Revolution (26)

Review

The Friends of Durruti

Group: 1937-1939
The Friends of Durruti appear in just about every book on the
Spanish Civil War, especially in relation to the 1937 May Days in
Barcelona. They get mentioned but we are told very little about
their politics or activities. Some organisations, like the Workers
Solidarity Movement, see their political stance as important to
the tradition of revolutionary anarchism. Other anarchists,
most notably sections of the syndicalist movement, condemn
them for flirting with Bolshevism/Leninism/Trotskyism or
for advocating an anarchist dictatorship. So who were
they, where did they come from, what did they say, and
what did they do?
This book is probably the most detailed
work about them in the English language.
Unfortunately, it takes as its starting point
that readers will be extremely knowledgeable about both anarchist ideas and the
role of the anarchist movement in Spain.
Without such knowledge the reader will
find it impossible to understand what the
author is writing about. Guillamns book
reads as if it is a specialised academic
paper, or a chapter which has been extracted from a much bigger work about
Spain.
To make matters worse, the author seems
unable - despite a familiarity with the
historical details - to understand the ideas
of anarchism. He criticises the Friends on
each occasion when they dont issue instructions or seize power. His own bias
is made clear when he proclaims anarchisms inadequacy as a revolutionary
theory of the proletariat (p.93).
His own views appear to be of the Marxist
council communism type which enjoyed a
brief popularity, particularly in Germany
and the Netherlands, in the 1920s. Like all
councilists Guillamon sees unions as capitalist State machinery (page 83). Because

of this he sees the

entry of CNT members into the government
as
inevitable. Therefore his biggest
criticism of the
Friends is that
they did not split
from the CNT, renounce anarchism
and transform
themselves into a
revolutionary party.
Spain in the 1930s had
the biggest anarchist
movement in Europe,
with almost two million people in its National Confederation of Workers (CNT), it
truly was a mass organisation with very
deep roots in the working class. The Communist Party, prior to 1936, was a small
outfit, the anti-Stalinist POUM probably
had no more than a few thousand members
and the Trotskyists could be counted on
the fingers of a couple of hands.
Because of this the syndicalist notion that
the political battle of ideas was not of the
utmost importance was widespread. While
there were activists and tendencies with
varying ideas and strategies within the
movement, there was no large and clearcut opposition when a section of the CNT
leadership proposed postponing the revolution and collaborating with the government to win the war against Franco. The
Friends of Durruti group had no existence
prior to the outbreak of the Civil War in
July 1936.
On July 19th 1936 workers across most of
Spain took to the streets when the military
rose up against the centre left Popular
Front government. Arms were seized and
the military rising defeated in over half of
the country. For many this was the chance
to get rid of the capitalist system.

by Agustin Guillamn
Translation by Paul Sharkey
7.95 (AK Press)
Workplaces were seized and put under the
control of their workers. In rural areas
tens of thousands of peasants collectivised
their land. Trade union militias were
formed to attack the military rebels. Power
was shifted from the government and the
rich to local delegate committees.
Although the government still existed it
had no real power. The military, economic
and political struggle was proceeding independently of the government, and, indeed,
in spite of it. The councils and collectives
which had emerged were the structures
upon which the revolution could have been
built and consolidated. They needed to be
brought together on a regional and national level so that the power of the workers and peasants could have swept the
government aside. This would have meant
refusing to share power with the remnants
of the ruling class, it would have been a big
step in making the social revolution complete.

Red & Black Revolution (27)

The CNTs leading committees refused to

do this. After July 19th Prime Minister
Companys of Catalonia called them to his
office and told them that the CNT had the
mass support, they controlled the region,
and he would be their faithful servant if
they took over. They refused. Instead the
CNT joined the Catalan government, and
later the national government in Madrid.
This collaboration was in direct opposition
to all anarchism holds dear about ending
the division of people into rulers and ruled.
Their reasoning was that the Western democracies would not supply arms to beat
Francos rebels if there was a social revolution. (No arms ever came anyway!). They
had decided that winning the war and
making the revolution were two different
things, and that winning the war came
first. This meant collaborating with all the
anti-Franco forces.
Over the next year the capitalist state,
aided by Stalins loyal servants in the Communist Party, set about rebuilding itself.
All states demand a monopoly of armed
force and October 10th 1936 saw a
militarisation decree making provision
for putting the workers militias under
government control.
Five days later Jaime Balius wrote in
Solidaridad Obrera, a CNT daily paper,
that the working class should push on and
he warned against applying a brake to the
revolution. He was a journalist with a
record as a hard-line anarchist, which
earned him several spells of imprisonment
by the Popular Front governments during
the 1936-38 period. Balius was later to
become secretary of the Friends.
In November, the legendary anarchist militant Buenaventura Durruti told the magazine Anti-Fascist Spain,
This decision by the government has
had a deplorable effect. It is absolutely
devoid of any sense of reality. There is
an irreconcilable contrast between that
mentality and that of the militias. We
know that one of these attitudes has to
vanish in the face of the other one.
On November 20th Durruti was killed on
the Madrid front. Over 500,000 attended
his funeral in Barcelona. In December the
German volunteers in the Durruti Columns International Group expressed their
opposition to militarisation and listed a
number of items they wanted incorporated
in any new military code: they wanted the
delegate system retained along with egalitarian features; they wanted soldiers councils to represent the army as a whole.
The beginning of 1937 saw the government
issue an order that no pay and no equipment would be issued to non-militarised
combat units. The anarchists and other
revolutionaries were viewed by the government as a bigger threat than Francos
military rebels. The state authorities were
even prepared to weaken the front if that
was the cost of preserving capitalism.

March 5th, Solidaridad Obrera announced the formation of a new grouping: The Friends of Durruti is not
just another club. We aim to see the
Spanish Revolution pervaded by the
revolutionary acumen of our Durruti.
The FoD remain faithful to the last
words uttered by our comrade in the
heart of Barcelona in denunciation of
the work of the counter revolution. To
enrol in our association it is vital that
one belong to the CNT and show evidence of a record of struggle, a love of
ideas and the revolution. Applications for membership could be made at the
office of the CNT journalists union.
April 1st saw, Ruta, the paper of the Libertarian Youth in Catalonia, print an article
by the Friends which says
We point the finger at no one. We feel a
burning love for our precepts and our
organisations. But as militants of them,
we have an indisputable right to speak
out. There is still time for us to rescue the
revolution and revitalise our precepts
but we must press on with the revolution.

On May 2nd the Friends held a public

meeting in the Goya Theatre in Barcelona
at which they warned that an attack upon
the workers was imminent. The following
day the Stalinists seized the Telephone
Exchange. This signalled the start of the
May Events which saw the CNT, Iberian
Anarchist Federation (FAI), Iberian Libertarian Youth Federation (FIJL) and the
POUM fighting against the Stalinists, republicans and Catalan nationalists, and
the official security forces.
The revolutionary forces soon controlled
most of the city. The next day, just as the
CNT-FAI Defence Committee had resolved

Want to find out more?

The Spanish Civil War: Anarchism in Action by Eddie Conlon. Why the war
started, the workers response, was a revolution possible, the anarchist contribution
in industry and on the land, their role in organising the anti-fascist militias, the
Stalinist sabotage of the revolution, why Franco won. 1.50
Lessons of the Spanish Revolution by Vernon Richards. Investigates the defeat
of the Spanish Revolution and looks critically at the CNT leadership. 5.00
Anarchists in the Spanish Revolution by Jose Peirats. The first 100 pages are
a brief survey of the working class movement from the founding of the Spanish
section of the first International in 1969, and the struggles that were a prelude to the
events of 1936-39. The rest of the book is taken up with a comprehensive, critical
history of the Spanish Civil War and the role played by the anarchists. 6.00
Durruti: The People Armed by Abel Paz. Biography of the legendary Buenaventura
Durruti. A rich and passionate documentary of a man and his time. 8.95
Spain: Revolution and Counter-Revolution Reprints of articles from the
British paper Spain and the World which appeared from 1936 - 1939. First hand
accounts of the constructive aspects of the revolution: the collectives in industry,
agriculture and public services; reports from the front. 5.00
The Maydays in Barcelona 1937 by Emma Goldman, Jose Peirats, Burnett
Bolloten and Agustin Souchy. Barcelona members of the CNT and Marxists of the
POUM party responded to provocations of the state police - backed by Catalan
republicans and the Communist Party - by seizing control of the city. 2.50
Towards A Fresh Revolution by the Friends of Durruti. Why workers power and
liberty were not won in Spain in 1936/37. This was written by a group of anarchist
militants after the May Days of 1937, an excellent assessment of the mistakes that
should not be made again. 0.80
A Chronology of the Friends of Durruti by Paul Sharkey. A short history of the
Friends, goes well with the above pamphlet. 0.50
Please add about 20% to cover postage & packing, and send your order to WSM
Books, P.O. Box 1528, Dublin 8.

Red & Black Revolution (28)

It sounds disturbing to hear anarchists

talking about the need for a junta. To
most of us in the English speaking world it
conjures up an image of Generals in dark
glasses running a dictatorship. However,
in Spanish, it means no more than a committee or council. CNT unions each had a
junta, as did the Mexican Liberal Party (an
anarchist organisation - which shows that
labels can be deceptive!).
In their pamphlet Towards A Fresh Revolution the Friends spelled out what they
meant

to make a final assault on the government

building, the police HQ and the Hotel Colon, there came the radio appeals by CNT
leaders Garcia Oliver and Marano Vazquez
for a ceasefire. The state forces availed of
this chance to renew their attacks. The
conflict ignited again.
The FoD proclaimed
"we anarchists have arrived at the limit
of our concessions... not another step
backwards. It is the hour of action. Save
the revolution. If we continue to give up
our position there is no doubt that in a
short time we shall be overwhelmed. It
is for this fundamental reason that it is
necessary to develop a new orientation
for our movement.
To beat Franco we need to crush the
bourgeoisie and its Stalinist and Socialist allies. The capitalist state must be
destroyed totally and there must be installed workers power depending on
rank & file committees. A-political anarchism has failed.
They called for the formation of a revolutionary Junta, the disarming of the police,
socialisation of the economy, and the dissolution of parties which had turned against
the working class. In effect they called for
working class power.
The confusion caused by CNT ministers
appealing for the barricades to be taken
down demoralised the fighters. CNT and
POUM militia columns preparing to march
on Barcelona were turned back after pleas
from their leaders, but thousands of progovernment troops did arrive. The workers were defeated and the repression that
followed was severe.
The regional committee of the CNT issued
a statement denouncing the Friends as
agents provocateurs and saying they were
expelled from the CNT. The Friends replied that only the local unions had that
power, and, interestingly, not a single CNT
union was prepared to expel a single member for being in the FoD. But the struggle
had been lost, their offices were taken over
by the police. The revolution was finished
and it was only a matter of time before
Francos forces won the war.

The body will be organised as follows:

members of the revolutionary Junta will
be elected by democratic vote in the union organisations. Account is to be taken
of the number of comrades away at the
front. These comrades must have a right
to representation. Posts are to come up
regularly for re-election so as to prevent
anyone growing attached to them. And
the trade union assembles will exercise
control over the juntas activities.
The task of this junta was to be that of a
National Defence Council: to oversee the
war, control public order, and deal with
international relations. Alongside it the
unions were to take control of the economy
and the free locality was to be the basic
decision-making level of territorial organisation.

Spanish Revolution on the Web

http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/spaindx.html
Includes new translations into English
from the Friends of Durruti paper El
Amigo del Pueblo

Also over 100 other

documents and
photographs

The Friends - despite the claims of their

detractors - represented no break with
anarchism. Their break was with the traditional a-politicism of the CNT. They
knew that state power would not disappear just because that was the wish of the
majority; it would have to be smashed and
replaced with the power of workers, peasants and soldiers councils.
They saw the defects of syndicalism. Nothing and nobody can take away from the
militancy of the CNT. As
Eddie Conlon remarked in
Anarchism in Action:
The rank and file literally
tore down capitalism and
put workers and peasants
collectives in its place. They
fought heroically in the militias and the members of
the CNT surpassed all others with their bravery.
The problem for the CNT was
that after the workplaces and

lands had been seized the state should

have died. It didnt. The CNT had great
ideas about what the anarchist future
would look like, it knew that the working
class wold have to make a revolution, but it
could not make a connection between the
existing revolutionary situation and the
anarchist objective. The majority ended
up behaving like a minority.
The Friends put it this way:
We (CNT) did not have a concrete programme. We had no idea where we were
going. We had lyricism aplenty but
when all is said and done we did not
know what to do with our masses of
workers or how to give effect to the popular effusion. The anarchists should
have leapt into the drivers seat in the
country, delivering a severe coup de grace
to all that is outmoded and archaic.
The CNT did not see things this way.
Garcia Oliver, one of the CNT representatives in the government, said The CNT
and FAI decided on collaboration and democracy, renouncing revolutionary totalitarianism which would lead to the
strangulation of the revolution by the anarchist ...dictatorship. But nobody was suggesting an anarchist dictatorship or the
CNT becoming a new government.
The question was whether or not new bodies would be created and co-ordinated
through which the working class could
assert their power. Syndicalism did not
see this, because it holds that the unions
are structures upon which the new society
is to be built.
When the state did not simply pack its bags
and vanish, they felt they had to participate in order to have some control. The
Friends were an expression of opposition
to this thinking. In their paper, the Friend
of the People, and in numerous local publications of the CNT, the Libertarian Youth
- and, indeed, the UGT and POUM you
found the same sentiments.
However this was only given a clear expression when it was too late. The Friends
did not have enough time to win over the
majority to their position. What they have
left in their wake are the lessons they had
drawn from their experiences in a living
revolution. By understanding what went
wrong in the past we can
prepare ourselves for the
future. The lessons they
left us were a re-affirmation of the need for political
anarchism,
for
anarchist political organisations which can become
a leadership of ideas (and
certainly not a leadership
of personalities or wouldbe-dictators like the Russian Bolsheviks). The
state and political power
does not die or wither
away; it has to be
smashed.

Red & Black Revolution (29)

The Platform
Anarchists are constantly thinking about how society is and how it could
be. We strive towards the ideal of a free and democratic society. We know
that, in order to get there, it will be necessary to tear down the present
authoritarian system of government. Our struggle for freedom throws up
many areas of controversy and debate. One of these has always been, and
always will be, how do we get to a revolution? How do we organise for
change? An important contribution to this debate was the Organisational
Platform of the Libertarian Communists, a document which was written in
1926 by a group of exiled Russian and Ukrainian anarchists, and which still
has much to offer to todays debates around the question of organisation.
The authors had participated in the Russian revolution and saw all their work,
their hopes and dreams fail as an authoritarian Bolshevik state triumphed and destroyed real workers power. They wrote
the pamphlet in order to examine why the
anarchist movement had failed to build on
the success of the factory committees, where
workers organising in their own workforces
began to build a society based on both
freedom and equality. In the first paragraph they state
"It is very significant that, in spite of the
strength and incontestably positive character of libertarian ideas, and in spite of
the facing up to the social revolution,
and finally the heroism and innumerable sacrifices borne by the anarchists in
the struggle for anarchist communism,
the anarchist movement remains weak
despite everything, and has appeared,
very often, in the history of working class
struggles as a small event, an episode,
and not an important factor."
This is strong stuff, a wake up call for the
anarchist movement. It is a call that we
still need to hear. Despite the virtual
collapse of almost all other left wing tendencies, anarchism is still not in a position

strength and rightness of our ideas will

shine through and win the day. The world
we live in is the product of struggles between competing ideas of how society should
be organized. If the anarchist voice is weak
and quiet, it wont be heard, and other
arguments, other perspectives will win the
day.

The introduction is brief, it describes the

poor state of the anarchist movement and
explains why they felt it necessary to formulate a new approach to organisation.
The authors then describe the following
two sections as the "minimum to which it is
necessary and urgent to rally all the militants of the anarchist movement". These
are the basic issues on which they believe
it is important to have agreement, in order
to have an organisation which can co-operate and work together in practice.

General Section

It is not my intention to go through The

Platform with a fine-tooth comb. It was
never intended to provide all the answers,
in the introduction they make this clear

This section outlines what they saw as the

basic anarchist beliefs. They look at what
is meant by class struggle, what is meant
by anarchism and libertarian communism.
They explain why they oppose the state
and centralised authority. The role of the
masses and of anarchists in the social struggle and social revolution is also explained.
They criticise the Bolshevik strategy of
obtaining control of the state. Finally they
look at the relationship between anarchism
and the trade unions.

We have no doubts that there are gaps in

the present platform. It has gaps, as do all
new, practical steps of any importance. It
is possible that certain important positions have been missed, or that others are
inadequately treated, or that still others
are too detailed or repetitive.

This outlines how a future anarchist society would be organised, they look at how
the factories would operate and how food
would be produced. They warn that the
revolution will have to be defended, and
talk a little about how this might be done.

It was hoped, however, that it would form

the beginning of a debate about how anarchists could escape from the doldrums they
were in.
Instead I will look at some of the documents underlying principles, in particular
the problems which they identify in anarchist organisations, which they describe as
follows.
In all countries, the anarchist movement is advocated by several local organisations advocating contradictory
theories and practices, leaving no
perspectives for the future, nor of a
continuity in militant work, and
habitually disappearing hardly leaving the slightest trace behind them. (my
emphasis).

of strength. Even though the Trotskyist

organisations have either evaporated into
thin air, shrunk drastically in size or moved
to social democracy, it is a sad fact, that
were there a revolution tomorrow, they
still would be in a better position to have
their arguments heard and listened to than
we would. This fact alone should give us
pause for thought. We cannot be complacent, and rely on the hope that the obvious

The Platform: Whats in it?

Their solution is the creation of certain

type of anarchist organisation. Firstly the
members of these organisations are in theoretical agreement with each other. Secondly they agree that if a certain type of
work is prioritised, all should take part.
Even today within the anarchist movement these are contentious ideas so it is
worth exploring them in a little more detail.
The Platforms basic assumption is that
there is a link between coherency and efficiency. Those who oppose the Platform
argue that this link does not exist. To them
efficiency has nothing to do with how coherent an organisation is, rather it is a
function of size. This position argues that

The Constructive Section

The Organisational Section

This is the shortest and most contentious
section of The Platform. Here the authors
sketch their idea of how an anarchist organisation should be structured. They call
this the General Union of Anarchists.
By this they seem to mean one umbrella
organistion, which is made up of different
groups and individuals. Here we would
disagree with them. We dont believe there
will ever be one organisation which encompasses everything, neither do we see it as
necessary. Instead we envisage the existence of a number of organisations, each
internally unified, each co-operating with
each other where possible. This is what we
call the Anarchist movement, it is a much
more amorphous and fluid entity than a
General Union of Anarchists.
However, what we do agree on are the
fundamental principles by which any anarchist organisation should operate.

Red & Black Revolution (30)

the Platform, in its search for theoretical

agreement, excludes those not in absolute
agreement, and thus will always be smaller
than a looser organisation. As size is of
more importance than theory, practically
these organisations will not be as effective.
This debate takes us to the centre of one of
the most important debates within anarchism. How does a revolutionary change of
society occur? What can anarchists do to
assist in the process of bringing such change
about?
Capitalism is an organized economic system. Its authority is promoted by many
voices, including the parliamentary political parties, the media and education system (to name but a few). A successful
revolution depends on the rejection of those
voices by the majority of people in society.
Not only do we have to reject capitalism,
but we also need to have a vision of an
alternative society. What is needed is an
understanding both that capitalism should
be defeated and that it can be replaced. For
an anarchist revolution there has to be the
recognition that we alone have the power
and the ability to create that new world.
The role of an anarchist organisation is to
spread these ideas. Not only do we need to
highlight the negative and injurious aspects of capitalism (which is obvious to
many anyway), we also need to develop
explanations of how the system operates.
This is what is meant by theory, simply it
is the answer to the question why are
things as they are?. And we need to do one
more thing, we need to be able to put our
theory into practice, our understanding of
how things work will inform how we struggle.
Returning to the Platform, the key problem with anarchist organisations as they
existed is that they were not only incapable
of developing such an approach, but didnt
even see it as necessary. Because there
was no agreement on theoretical issues,
they could not provide answers to the working class. They could agree that womens
oppression was wrong, but not explain why
women were oppressed. They could agree
that World War One was going to lead to
death and destruction, but not why it had
occurred. Such agreement is important
because without it cooperation on activity,
agreement on what to do, is unlikely. This
is how the Platforms authors described
such an organisation
"Such an organisation having incorporated heterogeneous
theoretical and practical elements, would only
be a mechanical assembly of individuals
each having a different
conception of all the
questions of the anarchist movement, an assembly which would
inevitably disintegrate
on encountering reality"
(my emphasis).

By a mechanical assembly of individuals

they mean a group of individuals meeting
together, yet not united in mind or in
action. This undermines the entire meaning of organisation, which is to maximise
the strength of the individuals through cooperation with others. Where there is no
agreement, there can be little co-operation. This absence of co-operation only
becomes obvious when the group is forced
to take a position on a particular issue, a
particular event in the wider world.
At this point, two things happen. Either,
the individuals within the group act on
their own particular interpretation of
events in isolation, which raises the question, what is the point of being in such an
organisation? Alternatively the group can
decide to ignore the event, thus preventing
disagreement.
This has a number of unfortunate side
effects for anarchist politics. Most seriously, it means that the anarchist interpretation of events still will not be heard.
For no matter how large the organisation,
if all within it are speaking with different
voices, the resulting confusion will result
an unclear and weak anarchist message.
Such an organisation can produce a weekly
paper, but each issue will argue a different
point of view, as the authors producing it
change. Our ideas will not be convincing,
because we ourselves are not convinced by
them. The second side effect is that our
ideas will not develop and grow in depth
and complexity because they will never be
challenged by those within our own organisation. It is only by attempting to reach
agreement, by exchanging competing conceptions of society, that we will be forced to
consider all alternatives. Unchallenged
our ideas will stagnate.
Without agreement on what should be done,
the anarchist organisation remains no more

Theoretical Unity, that there is a commitment to come to agreement on theory.

By theory they dont mean abstract musings
on the meaning of life. By theory they
mean the knowledge we have about how
the world operates. Theory answers the
question why?, for example why is there
poverty? why havent Labour Parties provided a fairer society? and so on and so on.
By theoretical unity they mean that members of the organisation must agree on a
certain number of basics. There isnt much
an organisation can do if half their members believe in class struggle and the other
half in making polite appeals to politicians, or one in which some people believe
union struggles are important and others
think they are a waste of time. Of course,
not everybody is going to agree with everybody else on every single point. If there was
total agreement there would be no debate,
and our politics would grow stale and sterile. Accepting this however, there is a common recognition that it is important to
reach as much agreement as possible, and
to translate this agreement into action, to
work together, which brings us to ...
Tactical Unity, that the members of the
organisation agree to struggle together as
an organisation, rather than struggle as
individuals in opposition to each other. So
for example in Ireland, the WSM identified
the anti-water charges campaign (see R&
BR 3 for more details) as an issue of great
importance. Once it was prioritised, all of
our members committed themselves to
work for the campaign, where possible.
The tactics and potential of the campaign
were discussed at length at our meetings.
It became the major focus of our activity.
Collective Responsibility, by this they
mean that each member will support the
decisions made by the collective, and each
member will be part of the collective decision making process. Without this, any
decisions made will be paper decisions
only. Through this the strength of all the
individuals that make up the group is
magnified and collectively applied. The
Platform doesnt go into detail about how
collective responsibility works in practice.
There are issues it leaves untouched such
as the question of people who oppose the
majority view. We would argue that obviously people who oppose the view of the
majority have a right to express their own
views, however in doing so they must
make clear that they dont represent the
view of the organisation. If a group of
people within the organisation oppose the
majority decision they have the right to
organise and distribute information so
that their arguments can be heard within
the organisation as a whole. Part of our
anarchism is the belief that debate and
disagreement, freedom and openness
strengthens both the individual and the
group to which she or he belongs.
Federalism, which they define as "the
free agreement of individuals and organisations to work collectively towards common objectives".

Red & Black Revolution (31)

than a collection of individuals. The members of that organisation dont see themselves as having any collective identity.
Too often the lifetimes of such groups are
the lifetimes of those most active individuals. There is no sense of building a body of
work that will stretch into the future.
Considering that in these times the revolution is a long term prospect, such short
term planning is a tragic waste of energy
and effort.
Often the experience of anarchists is that
they are energetic and committed activists, but fail to publicize the link between
the work they do and the ideas they believe
in. One example of this is the successful
anti-Poll Tax Campaign in England, Scotland and Wales. Although many anarchists were extremely involved in the
struggle against this unjust tax, when victory finally came, anarchists didnt come
out of it, as might be expected, in a strength-

ened position. We need to ask ourselves

why this is so.
It would seem to be because anarchists
concentrated their efforts making arguments against the tax, and sidelined arguments in favour of anarchism.
Furthermore, though many worked as individuals they couldnt give any sense that
they were part of any bigger movement.
They were seen as good heads, and that
was all. In contrast, despite the WSMs
extremely small size when a similar campaign - the Anti-Water Charges Campaign
- ended, we had heightened the profile of
anarchism in Ireland. We emphasised
that our opposition to an unjust tax was
linked to our opposition to an unjust society and our belief that a better society is
possible.
Returning to the question of efficiency and
size, organisations in the Platform tradi-

Platformist
groups today
Anarchist organisations that have been influenced by the Platform are
well aware that it is no Bible full of absolute truths. There is no grouping
anywhere that would be so stupid to treat it as one. Anarchists have no
need of such things. It is just one of the signposts pointing us in what we
believe is the direction of making anarchism the most realistic and desirable alternative to both the present set-up and the authoritarian alternatives served up by most of the left.
Its ideas have been developed and modified in the light of experience over the
years. Two other relatively well known
documents are Towards A Fresh Revolution by the Friends of Durruti (which arose
from the experience of the Spanish revolution) and the Manifesto of Libertarian Communism by Georges Fontenis (which arose
from French experiences in the post-World
War II years). The WSM stands in this
tradition because it is the best one we have
found, but it is a continually developing,
modifying and growing one. We have no
tablets carved in stone, and we dont want
or need any.
Organisations which are influenced, to
varying degrees, by this tradition can be

found in countries where anarchism has

sunk deep roots, like France (Libertarian
Alternative), Switzerland (Libertarian
Socialist Organisation) and Italy (Federation of Anarchist Communists); and also in
countries where anarchism is a fairly new
force, like the Lebanon (Al Badil al
Taharouri) and South Africa (Workers Solidarity Federation). In the last year new
translations of the Platform have appeared
in Polish and Turkish.
In the English speaking world, however,
many anarchists are either unaware of
what is in the Platform, or are hostile to it.
Why? The authors drew a distinction between real federalism, the free agreement
to work together in a spirit of free debate

tion agree that size is important and they

all seek to grow so that they are in a
position of importance in society. However, they emphasise that all the positive
attributes of belonging to a larger organisation, the increased work that can be
undertaken, the increased human potential that can be drawn on, are undermined
if such an organisation is directionless.
The key point is that it is not a case of
choosing between size or coherency, rather
we should aim for both.
The importance of the Platform is that it
clearly highlights the serious problems
caused by the disorganised nature of loosely
based anarchist organisations. It exposes
a problem, it highlights how fatal this flaw
in anarchism can be, it emphasises the
urgency with which we must deal with it
and compels us to come up with some
answers.

for agreed goals; and what they describe as

the right, above all, to manifest ones ego,
without obligation to account for duties as
regards the organisation. As they point
out, there is no point making decisions if
members will not carry them out.
However, when they went on to talk about
a General Union of Anarchists they found
themselves under attack from prominent
anarchists such as Voline, Fabbri,
Malatesta and Camilo Berneri who accused them of trying to Bolshevise anarchism. I believe that this criticism was
wrong. On one hand Voline and his fellow
thinkers were opposed because they saw
no problem with organisations which were
a pick n mix of anarcho-syndicalism, anarchist-communism and individualism
with all the incoherence and ineffectiveness that implies. On the other hand many
anarchists saw the proposed General Union of Anarchists as some sort of monopoly

Red & Black Revolution (32)

tably lead to an abandonment of anarchism.

Of course, even the briefest look at the
movement beyond the shores of Britain
shows that this is clearly not the case at all.
But what did go wrong with both the AWA
and the AWG? After all, mistakes that are
not understood can easily be repeated.
One factor shared by both organisations
was that they were formed by people who
were already anarchists and who saw the
need for an alternative to the loose organisation and lack of theoretical clarity so
prevalent in British anarchism. Or to put
it simply: they saw a movement with great
ideas but a very poor ability to promote
them. They started off by concentrating
too much on what was wrong with the
movement; they lost sight of all that is
sensible and inspiring, and increasingly
only saw the problems.

organisation that would incorporate all

anarchists. It is a fault of the authors that
they did not say explicitly that the General
Union would, as all anarchists should, work
with others when it is in the interests of the
class struggle.
Neither did they spell out that all the
decisions, the policies and the direction of
the organisation would be taken by the
members after full and free debate. It
should not have had to be spelled out when
addressing other anarchists but seemingly
it did, and the Platform was misunderstood by many as a result of this omission.
Further signs of authoritarianism were
seen in the proposal for an executive committee. Maybe if they had called it a
working collective or something similar
the same threat would not have been seen.
The tasks of this executive committee were
listed as
the execution of decisions taken by the
Union with which it is entrusted, the
theoretical and organisational orientation of isolated organisations consistent
with the theoretical positions and general tactical line of the Union, the monitoring of the general state of the
movement, the maintenance of working
and organisational links between all the
organisations in the union, and with
other organisations. The rights, responsibilities and practical tasks of the executive committee are fixed by the
congress of the Union.
The last sentence of the document talks
about the aim of the Union to become the

organised vanguard of the emancipating

process. It appears that what is being
talked about is winning the best militants,
the most class conscious and revolutionary
workers to the Union. But it is not clearly
spelled out. A doubt could exist. Did they
mean a more Leninist type of vanguard?
When read as part of the entire pamphlet
I dont think so, but even if this is not the
case it still does not invalidate the rest of
the work. It would be very stupid to throw
away the whole document because of one
less than clear sentence.
Two arguments get used again and again
against the Platform. Firstly we are told
that it is Arshinovs Platform as if the
other four authors were just dupes, but
then it would be far less credible to throw
the same accusation at Nestor Makhno. It
is done because in 1934 Arshinov returned
to Russia, where three years later he was
murdered in Stalins purges. What
Arshinov did eight years after helping to
write the Platform surely does no more to
invalidate what was written in 1926 any
more than Kropotkins support for Allied
imperialism in the First World War invalidated all his previous anarchist writings.
The other reason is the experience in Britain where the Anarchist Workers Association in the 1970s and the Anarchist Workers
Group of the early 1990s both claimed the
Platform as an inspiration. Both groups after very promising starts - declined, degenerated, died and then saw their remnants disappear into the Leninist milieu.
This has been held up as some sort of proof
that the basic ideas of the Platform inevi-

In so far as there was regular internal

education and discussion it tended to be
about strategies and tactics. New members were recruited on the basis of activity
in strikes and campaigns, and often had
little understanding of basic anarchist
ideas. These people had, however, come
from a background where anarchists were
presented as a group of clowns without two
ideas to rub together or as dropouts, incapable of dealing with modern society and
wishing for a return to living on the land.
There were no formal educationals on the
anarchist tradition but a fair few slagging
off other anarchists.
At the last conference of the AWG one
observer was shocked to discover that someone who had been in that organisation for
over a year knew, by his own admission,
virtually nothing about the biggest ever
practical anarchist experiment - the Spanish revolution. Not surprisingly many of
these new members came to believe that
the AWG must be a radical departure from
anarchism for it seemed radically different
from what they had been told anarchism
was. This, in turn, strengthened a feeling
that there was little to learn from the
anarchist tradition.
The result of this was that, as the anarchists got demoralised and drifted away,
the remaining members felt they had to
move beyond anarchism. In both cases
the surviving rumps ended up moving into
authoritarian politics. We cannot be surprised when organisations where the majority of members have little understanding
of anarchist ideas cease to be anarchist
organisations. To expect anything else
would be crazy.
The ideas of the Platform can aid anarchists to organise more effectively, but this
is meaningless if we have not first ensured
that those in the anarchist organisations
have a good grasp of anarchist ideas, are
confident enough to disagree and debate,
and are united by the common cause of
making anarchism a reality.

Red & Black Revolution (33)

Hobson's choice...
The 'Good Friday Agreement' & the Left
Until the Real IRA blasted the heart out of Omagh and its people, the
Northern peace process appeared to be close to achieving the impossible.
Loyalists and Republicans alike signing up to the Good Friday Agreement, its acceptance by large majorities on both sides of the border, Gerry
Adams and Ian Paisley sitting down in the same room as part of the new
Assembly - it seemed as if what had appeared for decades to be impossible
had been overtaken by the realpolitik of the pragmatic. All sides in the
conflict - we were led to believe - were looking to a new beginning.
Countless column inches in the popular press had been written eulogising
the statesmanship of David Trimble and Seamus Mallon, the peacemaking skills of Tony Blair and Bertie Ahern and the pragmatism of Gerry
Adams and David Ervine.
At the time of writing it remains to be seen
what the ramifications of the massive carnage wreaked on the people of Omagh by
the Real IRA will be. What is already clear,
however, is that the working-class people
of the 6-Counties are once again the people
who suffer. Following on from the sectarian murders of the 3 Quinn brothers in
Ballymoney during the Drumcree standoff, another working class community was
on the morning of August 16th counting
their dead and injured. Jumping on the
bandwagon of populism, right wing politicians and commentators such as Shane
Ross (Senator and Sunday Independent
columnist) and Michael McDowell (former
Progressive Democrats TD) were screaming for the introduction of internment and
even hinting that the extra-judicial murder of those associated with the Real IRA
and the 32-County Sovereignty Committee should be considered.
While the reactions of the mainstream
media commentators and political parties
North and South and on both sides of the
Irish Sea and in the United States to the
Good Friday Agreement have been well
commented on, this article is a look at the
reactions to this deal from left wing parties
and organisations in Ireland.

Desire for peace

In the May 22nd referendum on the deal the
Workers Solidarity Movement called for an
abstention, stating that Neither a yes
vote nor a no vote will advance the cause of
workers unity and socialism. We noted in
a statement issued before the referendum
that the great desire for peace was being
.used to pressurise us into choosing
between two completely flawed alternatives. The agreement, which was drawn
up in secret by our so-called representatives, does not challenge the sectarian
divisions which have bedevilled this
country.
Indeed our statement went on to note that
the structures proposed in the agreement
actually institutionalise sectarian divisions. Politicians elected to the proposed
Assembly must declare themselves either

unionist or nationalist.
Those who refuse, we noted, will not
have their votes counted in measuring
the cross community support necessary
for passing legislation..As the agreement was drawn up in the interests of
the ruling class, the concept of working
class
interests
is
not
even
considered..The division between rulers and ruled, between bosses and workers, between rich and poor remains. The
biggest change will be a few nationalist
faces sitting down with bigots like
Trimble and Taylor, to make laws which
preserve the dominance of the rich over
the poor.
In relation to the aspect of the referendum
which proposed changes to Articles 2 and 3
of the Southern Constitution, the statement pointed out that these amendments
mean nothing to us..Articles 2 & 3
have never made one whit of difference
to the real lives of anyone on this island.
While rejecting the agreement as having
nothing to offer the working class North or
South, we went on, however, to point out
that

Those urging rejection of the agreement have no alternative to offer, just

more of the same conflict that has ruined
tens of thousands of working class lives.
The republican forces of the 32 County
Sovereignty Committee, RSF [Republican Sinn Fein] and IRSP [Irish Republican Socialist Party - the political wing
of the Irish National Liberation Army]
have nothing but increased communalism and sectarian tension to offer. The
loyalist opponents - whose rallies are
attended by vocal supporters of the Loyalist Volunteer Force death squads want a return to a time when Catholics
lived on their knees and in fear.
The WSM statement further criticised the
undemocratic nature of the referendum
itself. The manner in which the deal was
put to the people was such that it was not
possible to support or oppose the many
individual components of the agreement,
allowing only one vote for or against the
entire complex package.

Failed armed struggle

Having called for an abstention in the vote
on the deal, our statement went on to urge
the continuation of the IRA and loyalist
ceasefires, stating that there must be no
going back to the failed armed struggle
which gave us nothing except repression,
suffering and increased sectarian hatred.
We then outlined the task facing anarchists, socialists and trade unionists in the
coming period:When working class people begin to ask
what kind of country they want to live in,
and what kind of country they want
their children to grow up in, the politics
of anti-imperialism will start making

Red & Black Revolution (34)

haps this is the best we can

hope for from this agreement.
This was an assessment shared
in large part by Sol. Fed.s sister
organisation in Ireland Organise!-IWA. In an interview with
a spokesperson for Organise! in
the same edition of Direct Action, it was stated that some
members of the organisation had
supported the WSM position of
abstention on the referendum.
Other members of Organise!.
it was stated, like many working class people, voted yes to the
Agreement, not because they in
any way support sectarianism,
or want anything to do with
choosing the form of government
which oppresses us, but because
of a simple desire to see the guns
removed from the sectarian politics in the north.

sense to people who up to now have been

trapped in green and orange communalism.
Our struggle is for liberty, we are for the
removal of the British troops from Ireland - and the destruction of the sectarian Orange state in the North and the
Green conservative state in the South.
We remain committed to a united Irish
Workers Republic, run by working class
people in their own interests, and democratically controlled through a federated system of workers and community
councils. Nobody has the right to wage
war on our behalf, working people themselves must discuss the future they want
and fight together for that future. Our
struggle is for liberty, and no minority
can impose liberty on the majority. The
emancipation of the working class is the
task of the working class itself.

Nothing to offer
Our analysis that the agreement had nothing to offer working class people was shared
by the majority of socialists and anarchists
in both Ireland and Britain - although all
other organisations ended up by coming
down on either the yes or no sides. Perhaps one of the most realistic assessments
of the realities of the deal was offered by
the British-based Solidarity Federation in
the Summer 1998 edition of Direct Action when they stated
Just maybe the peace agreement will
take the gun out of Northern Irish politics, or at least limit its impact. A
sectarian political scene without guns
will be preferable to one with guns. Per-

Sectarian politicians agreeing

a format in which to argue is
better than the prospect of continued or worsening sectarian
violence being counted in the
lives, maiming and imprisonment of working class people Social issues, the
position of workers and the
unemployed at the bottom of society etc.,
will not and cannot be tackled through
this agreement - but surely at least a vast
reduction in sectarian violence must be
welcomed. Beyond this, we may also see
the development of an atmosphere in
which anti-sectarian working class politics may be given room to develop.

'Normalisation'
It was this hope that the agreement might
lead to some normalisation of the political
scene which also appeared to be the primary factor behind the Socialist Partys
call for a yes vote in the referendum. In an
article in the May 1998 edition of the SPs
newspaper Voice, Joe Higgins the partys
TD (Teachta Dala - member of the Irish
Parliament) wrote
Tragically, but inevitably, the terms
drawn up are a reflection of the stunted
politics that have dominated Northern
Ireland for generations, the work of politicians and political parties, most of
which are hopelessly sectarian-based or
right wing or both.....It appears inconceivable to those who have framed
this agreement, that the ordinary people
of Northern Ireland might want to elect
individuals or parties which are not
sectarian based but which represent
working class people equally from Protestant and Catholic backgrounds, and
who would have a vision utterly different to the narrow sectarian politics that
have dominated Northern Ireland for
decades with disastrous consequences.
According to Higgins article, the choice
was a stark one. Rejection of the deal
would be seen as a victory by the most

reactionary elements Bitter sectarian polarisation in the communities would be the background to
paramilitary outrages and open warfare on issues such as parades. If the
deal was accepted This may at least see
the main political parties carry on their
strategies within the framework agreed
even though they will stumble from one
political crisis to the next. It would
allow the continuation of the peace process and could provide a space for working class politics to emerge which could
challenge the grip of the sectarian based
parties.
In the same edition of Voice, Peter
Hadden, Secretary of the SP in the North
wrote
A yes vote is likely in the referendum,
more because of the lack of an alternative rather than any conviction that the
Agreement will work.
On offer, he wrote, is a choice of two
roads towards sectarian conflict. The
immediate and direct route is via the No
camp. A Yes victory would mean a
slightly longer road. There might be a
limited breathing space which would
give more time to the working class to
challenge the sectarians. We believe the
best option is to vote Yes, not in support
of the Agreement, but for a continuation
of the peace process and to allow more
time for class politics to develop.

Challenge
Hadden went on to offer what he saw as the
challenge for socialists in the post-referendum scenario:The real issue is not just to vote in the
referendum but to use this time to build
a socialist alternative and campaign for
a socialist solutionOne advantage
of the Assembly would be that the anti
working class policies of the major parties on issues such as Health, Education
and Economic development would be
exposed to view - but this will only happen if a socialist opposition is built. This
is now the key task.
This was a theme to which the SP returned
in an editorial in the June 1998 issue of
Voice:If the situation holds together over the
summer, they wrote, then there is a
possibility that the agreement can hold,
at least for a period. This can open up a
space for working class and socialist
politics.
Local politicians will lose the luxury of
blaming London and the Northern Ireland Office for cuts in services, hospital
closures and other unpopular decisions.
Their real nature will be exposed as they
take the decisions in these areas in the
Assembly. The Assembly would provide
a focal point in the North for workers
struggles and community campaigns.

Red & Black Revolution (35)

Window of oppertunity

Hopes & realities

The Socialist Party decided to contest the

elections to the Assembly on the basis that

The Socialist Workers Party, on the other

hand, called for a no vote on May 22nd. The
May 1st - 14th 1998 edition of their paper
Socialist Worker stated that many hoped
that the deal brings peace to the working class areas that have suffered most
during the conflict. Pointing out however
that the Agreement does nothing to dismantle the sectarian structures of the
North..institutionalises sectarian
division.doesnt even begin to tackle the
poverty that affects both Catholic and Protestant workers and that Having Gerry
Adams in a cabinet with David Trimble
will only mean that both preside over student fees, cutbacks and poverty the SWP
called for a No vote in the referendum.

It is likely that small parties will make

a breakthrough by winning seats in the
Assembly. All of this can open up an
opportunity for building a socialist alternative to the sectarian based
partiesIf a window of opportunity
opens up for class based politics, we are
determined to go through it.
In a lengthy article entitled Will the Agreement bring peace? in the May 1998 issue
of Socialism 2000, the political journal of
the Socialist Party, Peter Hadden expanded
on how this window of opportunity might
be represented:There is only one way out for the working class. It is not to imitate the leaders
of the trade unions and sit back and
applaud the Agreement and the politicians who produced it. Rather it is to
begin to build an alternative to sectarian politics, to unite working people,
Catholic and Protestant, around common class interests and in opposition to
all who attempt to maintain sectarian
division From a working class point
of view the best scenario is that the
Agreement would hold, that a new local
administration would form and that as
many as possible of the existing parties
accept the ministerial reins they are offered. On the one hand this would allow
the working class movement the precious ingredient of time to begin to put
an alternative to these parties in place.
On the other hand the fact of these parties holding responsibility for local services and for the low pay, contracting out
and privatisation which goes with them,
would be a positive assistance to the
development of a class opposition .
United class movements directed against
local politicians would open the way for
political conclusions to be drawn, for
socialist ideas to begin to take on flesh
. Forces and obstacles which today
appear unshakeable, the various sectarian forces included, can be melted down
in the furnace of struggle. The building
of a socialist organisation which can
influence and effect events can be a crucial factor in determining whether the
coming political and social upheaval
leads towards a carnival of reaction or
towards united class action to bring
about socialist change.
The way to solve the national question,
according to Haddens analysis, is to
build unity between the working class in
common struggle against the present
rotten system and for a socialist society We stand for the unity of the
working class to achieve a socialist Ireland as part of a democratic and voluntary socialist federation of England,
Scotland, Wales and Ireland.

The alternative, the SWP stated, is

not civil war or armed conflict..The
pressure for a settlement came from both
the elite at the top and workers at the
bottom of society. Tens of thousands of
workers turned up to peace rallies to
demand an end to the armed campaign.
In the unlikely event of the settlement
being rejected that same pressure for
peace would continue and socialists
would give it every support. The real
solution to sectarianism lies in common
class struggleIt is time to break from
all the sectarian agendas and put class
politics to the fore. Voting No to this deal
will mark a start.

What's the alternative?

All in all then it can safely be said that the
Good Friday Agreement excited little positive support on the left. It must be stated
however that those who adopted a position
which might best be described as critical
support were much more honest than those
who opposed the deal without actually
putting forward any credible alternative.
The SWP view that a No vote would have
resulted in the coming to the fore of class
politics ignores completely the fact that
the deals rejection would have been hailed

by the most reactionary elements on both

sides of the sectarian divide - from Paisley
and the LVF through to the 32 County
Sovereignty Committee and RSF - as their
victory. A more likely scenario than the
coming to the fore of working class politics
would have been a demoralisation of such
tiny progressive forces as currently exist
and the filling of the subsequent political
vacuum by the forces of sectarian hatred.
We would quite possibly have been facing
into a Lebanon/Balkan type situation with
each community retreating into its own
area and the possibilities of cross class
unity would at the very least have been
dealt a severe blow.
As Andrew Flood wrote in Workers Solidarity 54(Summer 1998) For anarchists
looking at the future the old saying if I was
going there I wouldnt start from here rings
particularly true. The challenge facing all
of us is to attempt to break down the
sectarian barriers and to build unity between Catholic and Protestant workers.
The question is not whether this is desirable - All sections of the left are agreed that
it is. How to do it is however the problem
that remains. What is achievable in the
short to medium term? And - provided that
the guns remain silent - does the new
situation make this task any easier?
The WSM has always drawn a distinction
between the ceasefires and the peace process. In a statement issued on September
7th 1994, following the first IRA ceasefire
we welcomed the decision to end the armed
struggle but pointed out that
The peace process as it is called, will
not deliver a united socialist Ireland, or
significant improvements apart from
those associated with demilitarisation.
In addition it represents a hardening of
traditional nationalism, and the goal of
getting an alliance of all the nationalists, Fianna Fail, SDLP, Sinn Fein and
the Catholic Church.
Its appeal to Protestant workers is no

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Red & Black Revolution (36)

Red & Black

Revolution

The 'Good Friday

agreement' & the Irish Left
greater than the military campaign (i.e.
none) and to date republican statements
have focused on the need for a De Klerk
type figure to lead the Protestants to
compromise This approach should
come as no surprise to us, it is the underlying bedrock of nationalism. It is the
reason we are anti-imperialists rather
than socialist republicans..The ending of the armed struggle cannot simply
become part of history. The issue of
partition cannot be quietly dropped in
the interests of winning over Protestant
workers. In the short term it would be
possible to build workers unity on day to
day economic issues without mentioning partition but it would be building on
sand. In the past we have seen how
instances, some involving very large
numbers, of working class unity have
been swept away on a tide of bigotry.
What is needed is a revolutionary movement, with consistent anti-imperialist
policies that is composed from both Protestant and Catholic backgrounds.

Commemoration 1934, Shankill Road Belfast Branch. Break The Connection With
Capitalism and James Connolly Club,
Belfast. United Irishmen of 1934. Unfortunately the Belfast comrades found themselves confronted by, and ultimately
attacked by, a body of IRA men with orders
to prevent them marching unless they
agreed to take down their banners. The
strategy of breaking the connection with
capitalism was one step too far for the

Republican leadership whose political

project looked no further than the extension of the Southern clerical state north of
the border. Making the links with Protestant workers would have involved breaking the links with the Catholic Church and
with the southern ruling class. The Republican leadership then were unwilling to do
so and, following in their footsteps - despite
the occasional left-wing rhetoric - the republican leadership of today see their allies in the likes of Bertie Ahern, Bill Clinton
and John Hume.
Republicanism will be forced to drop completely the remaining elements of its socialist rhetoric in the coming years.
Certainly an opportunity has opened up
for the development of class politics but
this will not be built successfully by ignoring partition. The challenge is to build a
movement of working class people involving people from all religious backgrounds a movement which will be anti-capitalist
and anti-imperialist. Northern workers
have united across the sectarian divide in
the past to fight on economic issues, this
will happen again in the future. We must
build an anarchist movement on this island which will be big enough to be in a
position to turn future battles into the
fight for an anarchist Ireland.

Although 4 years have passed since the

issuing of this statement, these sentiments
still stand as an accurate assessment of the
challenge facing revolutionaries today. The
Good Friday Agreement is a consequence
of the failure of republicanism and the left
to win over any section of northern Protestant workers to an anti-partitionist, antiimperialist stance. Right now, this failure
is complete and it may even seem utopian
to put forward such a project as the principal challenge facing us. But historically,
most notably at the time of the Republican
Congress of 1934, sections of the Protestant working class have proved open to
such a strategy and the idea of uniting
Protestant, Catholic and Dissenter became more than a catchphrase.

A step too far

At the Bodenstown Wolfe Tone commemoration of 1934, some 500 Belfast Protestant workers marched to Tones graveside
behind banners proclaiming Wolfe Tone

Inside: 1798, Victor Serge, Racism & more