----- Forwarded Message ----- From: john hoyt <[email protected]> To: ballistanc <[email protected]> Cc: Sent: Friday, January 21, 2011 6:49 PM Subject: FW: More on Proletarian Wave in Nort Africa Hi Jack, please say hello to mr. langly, lounds, mr. tinder, and the rest of the old staff....please let me know about them... Just finish this text didn't have time to go over it .....make any correction.... More on Proletarian Wave in North Africa *** What are the general characteristics generating the violent upsurge of the proletariat in the Middle East and North Africa? When you take a close look at the situation on a world scale, you'll find out that we're facing a global increase in the worsening conditions of human life. In every country, rich or poor, we find a population increase therefore migration according to capital's needs, high unemployment and and jails full of "young criminals" and political repression. Take for example the United States where there are many proletarian behind bars and a great number because of political reasons, in fact there is a case of a journalist that cannot travel outside New york City, Clark Kissinger. The the question here is not the number of political prisoners but the number of people in jail worldwide. Even in "socialist" Cuba you find a huge amount of people behind bars under the worse conditions one can think of. Chile...and England some good examples of what is on the line for those who dream about a human community. Last week we waged an international campaign to let the world know about our brothers and sisters behind bars: we'll take you out!! So the original intention of this essay is to contribute to clarify the struggle going on in the Middle East and North Africa from a class perspective and point out the need to expand such a confrontation on a world scale while admitting the political weakness of the communist movement to answer the desperate calls of the proletariat from different parts of the planet Earth. Another thing I want to do is the clarify or correct the definitions advanced by bourgeois ideological agents in relation the the concepts of "third world countries", developing nations", "underdeveloped countries" because those definitions confuse the young generation about the class boundaries determined by the division of the world in social and antagonistic classes. When you assume those bourgeois concepts your practice lead you to form coalitions, fronts...with fractions of capital therefore loosing sight of capital's nature. In other words, Argentina has the same nature of the United States, England, Germany or any other Empire so when the "left" creates a regional bloc against "US Imperialism" is taking up a bourgeois political line where the proletariat does not exist as a revolutionary class. Just to give you a resent example of bourgeois politics under the mask of socialism: ALBA. From a communist perspective the proletariat most create its own structure to fight against capital on a world scale to impose the communist mode of production. So countries such as Haiti are nation with less degree or level of capital accumulation of surplus values with the same essence as Imperialist nations, States with lower rates of surplus value within the international division of labor of the capitalist mode of production. Taking that communist definition into consideration we most design a clean proletarian strategy starting from the fact that we're dominated by world capital and we need to unify the working class to struggle for their own emancipation. In relation to the Middle East and North Africa wave of proletarian actions, we want to remind that Egypt has "though economic conditions, official corruption and little opportunity for its citizens to express their dissatisfaction with the political system. President Hosni Mubarak, 82 has an almost complete monopoly on power, has been in office for three decades and is seeking re-election this autumn". (www.bbc.co.uk) So the economic and social conditions for a social revolution are given and their subjective element seems to be expressing itself openly as Jon Leyne in Cairo says: "Most Egyptians do not see any way that they can change their country or their lives through political action, be it voting, activism, or going out on the streets to demonstrate". The voting aspect of the subjective conditions is the winning card of the dominant class in case the revolutionary minorities, on the international level, decides and solve their divisions to push as one mighty force the proletarian section in Egypt to start playing its vanguard role, that is to lead the proletarian mass to direct actions to expand the wave started in Tunisia. In Algeria the same economic and social conditions took the Young proletarian mass to the streets, "the trigger appeared to be economic grievance in particular sharp increases in price of food". (Tunisia: Will there be a domino effect? 17 January 2011. www.bbc.co.uk) And continue saying that "a state of emergency has been in place since 1992, and public demonstration been banned. There are regular impromptu protests elsewhere in the country, but in recent weeks these broke out simultaneously across Algeria for the first time, including in the capital, Algiers. There have been reports of selfimmolations, too". Why haven't the protests scalated in the same way as in Tunisia? There are severl answers to this question. But most analysts "have attributed to the relatively restrained response of the security forces, as well as the gevernment'sintervension to limit price rises". But that's not the right answer! One could argue that the administration approach to deal with contradictions and antagonisms created by capital has played an important role in desactivating a nationwide explosion, but it isn't the dominant role of the lack of force requiere to expand the actions above and beyond the fronteirs. What plays the dominant role is the political weakness of the proletariat, given by its division, as an international class since it has been demostrated, during the Shoras' insurrection back in 1991, unable to respond effectively to the call made from Athens in 2008-2009, or the call made from Paris back in November 2005, just to mention a few asamples. This political weakness has been expressiong itself everytime the revolutionary proletariat takes to the streets to destroy what is destroying its existance: private property. Put in other terms, the manner in which the administration "is trying to tackle the economic and social complains, including anger over unemployment, corruption, bureacracy, and lack of political reforms", puting huge amount of money in its account public spending programme, lide Chavez in Venezuela, wil get matters worse in the long term. Experience of the eastern bloc countries and Cuba in Latin America show the consequences of such "revolutionary" policy. Let me put it this way, we're not confronting a local or regional economic and social problem but a world crisis between capitalism and the human needs facing contemporary society. Libya is a good example in the area to illustrate the bakruptcy of creating a huge "public sector" to deal and "solve" the contradictions and antigonisms created by the violent separation of the productive forces from their means of production. As today's proletarian wave moves forward along the region borders, Co Gadaffi starts reflecting "his own nervousness about the possible domino effect". According to him, "there is none better than Zine to govern Tunisia. Tunisia now lives in fears". The simultaneous actions actions across the region, even though in its embrio form, is the political aspect that that keeps the world ruling class nerveous, worrying about the most effective measure to cut the wave within the bounderies of one of those nation/state. In Jordan, "thousands staged protests across (the country) in a 'day fo rage' on Saturday against rising food prices and unemployment. Some demanded the resignation of Prince Minister SamicRifai". Evem though there are reports that some elements withing the U.S. faction of the world bourgeoisie had edited wikileaks cables (lahine.org), the dominat class has put strict restrictions on the publication of information relating to its "allies". A gradual and convinient approach had been imposed. In Morocco, for example, information "leaks" "revealed allegations of increased corruption, in particular the royal's family's business affairs and the 'appalling greed' of people close to king Mohammed VI". So the "leaks" fuel protests aginst the socio-economic conditions affecting the population. The ball is on the "marxists" coart! There is a long tradition of marx thoughts all the world over but today's proletarian wave in the Middle East and North Africa and other part of the hemisphere, and the answers given to them, is clearly telling me that I have to say with Karl Marx: "I only know I'm not a marxist"!! PS. Corinna, thanks for sending the document, I opened it and after finish a light reading I just started I'll let you know my position...Also, I'm working on a document for Silvia Pankhurst International Center....Thank for keeping fluid information...is just an step forward...I'm going to send the document to other groups in Santo Domingo....lets see what happends. Just finish this text, please make any corection, I'm really tired... _______________________________________________ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list [email protected] To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
