Date: Fri, 15 Nov 2002 05:59:46 +0000 (GMT)
From: =?iso-8859-1?q?Scott=20Hamilton?= <s_h_hamilton-AT-yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: AUT: The Economist: Under Workers' Control - Argentina



Yes as John says I think the factory occupations need
to be related to unions - the National Assemblies of
Workers etc - and to the Neighbourhood Assemblies. 
A good source of information seems to be the Argentina
Solidarity list (public) archives at yahoogroups,
though I have heard complaints of censorship by
dissident list members. John writes that 

The struggle, then, is not to win the
> elections, but to
> strengthen and develop all the autonomous struggles
> that are taking place.

But it seems to me there are a couple of problems with
ths view. In the first place, many of the struggles
are not 'autonomous', in the sense that a lot of
autonomist Marxists and anarchists use the word. That
is, they are not being waged by 'pure' organisations
outside the old loop of reformist politics and
economistic organised labour. Left Peronism, for
instance, retains an influence in many of the trade
unions. Even those trade unions which have taken a
revolutionary position have done so only after
struggles between advocates of such a programme and
reformists. 

Although the Neighbourhood Assemblies would seem
closer to 'autonomous' organisations, they seem from
what I have read to be filled with the same
contradictions between reformist and revolutionary
politics. From what I can tell, Argentina is a very
'traditional' pre-revolutionary situation, with the
working class moving left through reformism to
revolutionary politics. And revolutionary parties have
certainly played a role in this, though they seem (not
unnaturally) to be in a state of turmoil.

I also think that John's talk of 'strengthening the
autonomous struggles' misses the point of the critique
of the election being made by nearly all the far left.
The far left seems to be counterposing *revolution* to
the elections. The argument is that time is short,
that Duhalde is trying to organise a crackdown, that
the army may be primed to intervene, and that the
situation of dual power needs to be ended in favour of
workers' power. Even the last National Assembly of
Workers stated that workers needed to 'take power' in
Argentina, and laid out a virtual transitional
programme aimed towards that end. 

Some far left organisations are calling for an 'active
boycott' of the elections involving the convening of a
super-assembly of National Assemblies of employed and
unemployed workers,  a national assembly of
Neighbourhood Assemblies, and a national assembly of
representatives of the occupied factories in central
Buenos Aires. This Soviet of Soviets would be
supported by an indefintite general strike defended by
workers' militia, and would be intended to displace
the Duhalde regime from power. 

A comrade of ours is visiting Argentina in a few days,
at the invitation of an Argentinian group, so I will
pass on any interesting reports he send home.

Cheers
Scott


 

===="Revolution is not like cricket, not even one day cricket"

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