[p2p-research] left thinking

[Michel Bauwens]

Serious Times: Getting
Organized<http://www.solidarityeconomy.net/2009/06/01/serious-questions-for-serious-times-getting-organized/>

Posted: 01 Jun 2009 10:53 AM PDT
 Insurrections or Revolutions?
The Role of the Political Instrument [Editor's Note: If you find some
agreement with this, check out our 'Where To Begin' document. Click in the
upper left corner.]


*By Marta Harnecker*

*Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal*

*[First in a Series]*

1. The recent popular uprisings at the turn of the 21st century that have
rocked numerous countries such as Argentina and Bolivia -- and, more
generally, the history of the multiple social explosions that have occurred
in Latin America and the rest of the world -- have undoubtedly demonstrated
that the initiative of the masses, in and of itself, is not enough to defeat
ruling regimes.

2. Impoverished urban and country masses, lacking a well-defined plan, have
risen up, seized highways, towns and neighbourhoods, ransacked stores and
stormed parliaments, but despite achieving the mobilisation of hundreds of
thousands of people, neither the size nor their combativeness have been
enough to develop from popular insurrection into revolution. They have
overthrown presidents, but they haven’t been able to conquer power and
initiate a process of deep social transformations.

3. On the other hand, the history of triumphant revolutions clearly
demonstrates what can be achieved when there is a political instrument
capable of raising an alternative national program that unifies the
struggles of diverse social actors behind a common goal; that helps to
cohere them and elaborate a path forward for these actors based on an
analysis of the existent balance of forces. Only in this manner can actions
be carried out at the right place and right time, always seeking out the
weakest link in the enemy’s chain.

4. This political instrument is like a piston that compresses steam at the
decisive moment and -- without wasting any energy -- converts it into a
powerful force.

5. In order for political action to be effective, so that protests,
resistance and struggles are really able to change things, to convert
insurrections into revolutions, a political instrument capable of overcoming
the dispersion and fragmentation of the exploited and the oppressed is
required, one that can create spaces to bring together those who, in spite
of their differences, have a common enemy; that is able to strengthen
existing struggles and promote others by orientating their actions according
to a thorough analysis of the political situation; that can act as an
instrument for cohering the many expressions of resistance and struggle.

6. We are aware that there are a number of apprehensions towards such ideas.
There are many who are not even willing to discuss them. Such positions are
adopted because they associate this idea with the anti-democratic,
authoritarian, bureaucratic and manipulating political practices that have
characterised many left parties.

7. I believe it is fundamental that we overcome this subjective barrier and
understand that when we refer to a political instrument, we are not thinking
of just any political instrument, we are dealing with political instrument
adjusted to the new times, an instrument that we must built together.

8. However, in order to create or remodel this new political instrument, the
left has to change its political culture and its vision of politics. This
cannot be reduced to institutional political disputes for control over
parliament or local governments; to approving laws or winning elections. In
this conception of politics, the popular sectors and their struggles are
completely ignored. Neither can politics be limited to the art of what is
possible.

9. For the left, politics must be the art of making possible the impossible.
And we are not talking about a voluntarist declaration. We are talking about
understanding politics as the art of constructing a social and political
force capable of changing the balance of force in favour of the popular
movement, so as to make possible in the future that which today appears
impossible.

10. We have to think of politics as the art of constructing forces. We have
to overcome the old and deeply-rooted mistake of trying to build a political
force without building a social force.

11. Unfortunately, there is still a lot of revolutionary phase-mongering
among our militants; too much radicalism in their statements. I am convinced
that the only way to radicalise a given situation is through the
construction of forces. Those whose words are filled with demands for
radicalisation must answer the following question: What are you doing to
construct the political and social force necessary to push the process
forward?

12. But this construction of forces cannot occur spontaneously, only popular
uprisings happen spontaneously. It needs a protagonist.

13. And I envisage this political instrument as an organisation capable of
raising a national project that can unify and act as a compass for all those
sectors that oppose neoliberalism. As a space that directs itself towards
the rest of society, that respects the autonomy of the social
movementsinstead of manipulating them, and whose militants and leaders
are true
popular pedagogues, capable of stimulating the knowledge that exists within
the people -- derived from their cultural traditions, as well as acquired in
their daily struggles for survival -- through the fusion of this knowledge
with the most all-encompassing knowledge that the political organisation can
offer. An orientating and cohering instrument at the service of the social
movements.

Posted May 21, 2009.

Marta Harnecker’s bibliography

?La izquierda después de Seattle, Siglo XXI España, 2002.

La izquierda en el umbral del Siglo XXI. Haciendo posible lo imposible,
Publicado en: México, Siglo XXI Editores, 1999; España,    Siglo XXI
Editores, 1ª ed., 1999, 2ª ed., 2000 y 3ª ed., 2000; Cuba, Editorial
de Ciencias
Sociales, 2000; Portugal, Campo das Letras Editores, 2000; Brasil, Paz e
Terra, 2000; Italia, Sperling and Küpfer Editori, 2001; Canadá (francés),
Lantôt Éditeur, 2001; El Salvador, Instituto de Ciencias Políticas y
Administrativas Farabundo Martí, 2001.

Hacia el Siglo XXI, La izquierda se renueva, Quito, Ecuador, CEESAL, 1991

Vanguardia y crisis actual o Izquierda y crisis actual, Siglo XXI España,
1990. Publicado en: Argentina, Ediciones de Gente Sur, 1990; Uruguay, TAE
Editorial, 1990; Chile, Brecha, 1990; Nicaragua, Barricada, 1990. Con el
título Izquierda y crisis actual: México, Siglo XXI Editores, 1990; Perú,
Ediciones Amauta, 1990; Venezuela, Abre Brecha, 1990; Dinamarca,
Solidaritet, 1992.

[Marta Harnecker is originally from Chile where she participated in the
revolutionary process of 1970-1973. She has written extensively on the Cuba
Revolution, and on the nature of socialist democracy. She now lives in
Caracas and is a participant in the Venezuelan revolution.]


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