 Reply to errors and distortions in Phil Mitchinson's Marxism and direct action

   Phil Mitchinson essay [1]Marxism and direct action attempts to provide
   a "Marxist" (i.e. Leninist/Trotskyist) critique of the current "Direct
   Action" based groups which came to notice at various demonstrations
   across the world -- most famously in Seattle, November 1999. He,
   correctly, links these groups and currents with anarchism. However, his
   "critique" is nothing but a self-contradictory collection of false
   assertions, lies and nonsense, as we shall prove (indeed, his
   "critique" seems more the product of envy at anarchist influence in
   these movements than the product of scholarship or objectivity). That
   is why we have decided to reply to his article -- it gives us an ideal
   possibility to indicate the depths to which some Marxists will swoop to
   distort anarchist politics and movements.

1. How does Mitchinson impoverish the politics of the direct action groups?

   He begins by noting that the "recent anti-capitalist demonstrations
   have brought together many different groups protesting against the
   destruction of the environment, racism, the exploitation of the third
   world, and also many ordinary young people protesting at the state of
   things in general. They have certainly shattered the myth that everyone
   is happy and that the capitalist system is accepted as the only
   possible form of society." Of course, this is correct. What he fails to
   mention is that these demonstrations and groups managed to do this
   without the "guidance" of any Leninist party -- indeed, the vanguard
   parties are noticeable by their absence and their frantic efforts to
   catch up with these movements. This, of course, is not the first time
   this has happened. Looking at every revolution we discover the
   "revolutionary" parties either playing no role in their early stages or
   a distinctly counter-productive role.

   He states that "[a]ll around us we see the misery this system causes.
   Famine, war, unemployment, homelessness and despair, these are the
   violent acts that the system perpetrates against millions every day."
   However, as much as these aspects of capitalism are terrible, the
   anti-capitalist revolt expressed by many within the direct action
   groups is much wider than this (standard) leftist list. The movements,
   or at least parts of them, have a much more radical critique of the
   evils of capitalism -- one that bases it self on abolishing alienation,
   domination, wage slavery, oppression, exploitation, the spiritual as
   well as material poverty of everyday life, by means of self-management,
   autonomy, self-organisation and direct action. They raise the
   possibility of playful, meaningful, empowering and productive
   self-activity to replace "tedious, over-tiring jobs" as well as the
   vision of a libertarian communist (i.e. moneyless, stateless) society.
   Mitchinson's account of the movements he is trying to critique is as
   poverty stricken intellectually as the capitalist system these
   movements are challenging. Leninists like Mitchinson, instead of a
   swallowing a dose of humility and learning from the very different ways
   this new wave of protest is being framed, are trying to squeeze the
   protest into their own particular one-dimensional model of revolution.
   Being unable to understand the movements he is referring to, he pushes
   their vision into the narrow confines of his ideology and distorts it.

   He goes on to state that "[w]itnessing and experiencing this
   destruction and chaos, young people everywhere are driven to protest."
   Of course, anyone who is part of these movements will tell you that a
   wide cross-section of age groups are involved, not just "young people."
   However, Mitchinson's comments on age are not surprising -- ever since
   Lenin, Bolshevik inspired Marxists have attributed other, more radical,
   political theories, analyses and visions to the alleged youth of those
   who hold these opinions (in spite of the facts). In other words, these
   ideas, they claim, are the produce of immaturity, inexperience and
   youth and will, hopefully, be grown out of. Just as many parents mutter
   to themselves that their anarchist (or socialist, homosexual, whatever)
   children will "grow out of it", Lenin and his followers like Mitchinson
   consider themselves as the wiser, older relations (perhaps a friendly
   Uncle or a Big Brother?) of these "young" rebels and hope they will
   "grow out of" their infantile politics.

   The word patronising does not do Mitchinson justice!

2. Does anarchism "juxtapose" theory and action?

   Now Mitchinson launches into his first strawman of his essay. He
   asserts:

     "However, the idea of getting involved in a political organisation
     is a turn off for many, who understandably want to do something, and
     do something now. In reality, the attempt to juxtapose organisation,
     discussion, and debate with 'direct action' is pure sophistry."

   We are not aware of any anarchist or direct action group which does not
   discuss and debate their actions, the rationale of their actions and
   the aims of their actions. These demonstrations that "young people"
   apparently turn up at are, in fact, organised by groups who have
   meetings, discuss their ideas, their objectives, their politics, and so
   on. That much should be obvious. In reality, it is Mitchinson who
   expresses "pure sophistry," not the "many" who he claims act without
   thinking. And, of course, he fails to mention the two days of meetings,
   discussion and debate which took place the Saturday/Sunday before the
   May Day actions in London. To mention the May Day 2000 conference would
   confuse the reader with facts and so goes unmentioned.

   He then asserts that the "ideas of Marxism are not the subject of
   academic study, they are precisely a guide to action." Of course, we
   have to point out here that the Marxist Parties Mitchinson urges us to
   build did not take part in organising the actions he praises (a few
   members of these parties did come along, on some of them, to sell
   papers, of course, but this is hardly a "vanguard" role). In general,
   the vanguard parties were noticeable by their absence or, at best,
   their lack of numbers and involvement. If we judge people by what they
   do, rather than what they say (as Marx urged), then we must draw the
   conclusion that the Marxism of Mitchinson is a guide to inaction rather
   than action.

   Mitchinson continues by stating Marxists "are all in favour of action,
   but it must be clearly thought out, with definite aims and objectives
   if it is to succeed. Otherwise we end up with directionless action." It
   would be impolite to point out that no anarchist or member of a direct
   action organisation would disagree with this statement. Every
   anti-capitalist demonstration has had a definite aim and objective, was
   clearly thought out and organised. It did not "just happen." Mitchinson
   presents us with a strawman so fragile that even a breeze of reality
   would make it disintegrate.

   The question is, of course, what kind of organisation do we create, how
   do we determine our aims and objectives. That is the key question, one
   that Mitchinson hides behind the strawman of organisation versus
   non-organisation, planned action versus "directionless action." To
   state it bluntly, the question is actually one of do we organise in an
   authoritarian manner or a libertarian manner, not whether or not we
   organise. Mitchinson may not see the difference (in which case he
   thinks all organisation is "authoritarian") but for anarchists and
   members of direct action groups the difference is vital.

   He goes on to state:

     "Furthermore without political organisation who decides what action
     is to be taken, when and where? There can be no greater direct
     action than the seizing of control over our own lives by the vast
     majority of society. In that act lies the essence of revolution. Not
     just an aimless 'direct action' but mass, democratic and conscious
     action, the struggle not just against capitalism, but for a new form
     of society, socialism."

   Again Mitchinson presents us with the strawman of "conscious" action
   verses "aimless" action. As noted above, the anti-capitalist
   demonstrations were organised -- non-hierarchical groups decided
   collectively what action was to be organised, when and where. The real
   question is not organisation versus non-organisation but rather
   authoritarian versus libertarian organisation. Either decision making
   from the bottom up or decision making from the top-down. As for there
   bring "no greater direct action" than revolution, well, anarchists have
   been saying that for over one hundred years -- we don't need a Marxist
   to tell us our own ideas!

3. How does Mitchinson distort the London May Day demo?

   He then gets to the crux of the issue -- "So, what comes next?" He goes
   on to assert:

     "The organisers of the demo tell us this was not a protest in order
     to secure changes, reforms apparently are a waste of time. No,
     simply by participating in what they call the 'carnival' we become
     better people, and eventually more and more people will participate,
     until a critical mass is reached and we all ignore capitalism, don't
     pay our bills, until they go away. What an infantile flight of
     fancy!"

   Yes, indeed, what an infantile flight of fancy! However, the flight is
   purely Mitchinson's. No one in RTS (or any other anarchist) makes such
   a claim. Yes, RTS urged people to take part in a carnival -- as they
   argue, "[m]any of the great moments of revolutionary history were
   carnivalesque . . . But we are not waiting for these moments of
   carnivalesque revolution, we are trying to merge them into every moment
   of everyday life. We cannot live on one-off days, a letting of stream,
   safety values for society enabling life to return to normal the next
   day or for hierarchical domination to return, as did in so many
   historical revolutions. Revolution is not an act but a process and
   carnival can prepare us for this process." [Maybe, p. 9] Thus
   "carnival" is not seen as an end to itself (as Mitchinson asserts) but
   rather an aid to the creation of a revolutionary movement. Mitchinson
   confuses a celebration of May Day with an insurrection! In the words of
   Maybe:

     "And although Mayday is just one day, it seeks to incite continuous
     creativity and action towards a radical remaking of everyday life.
     Steeped in a history of daily struggle, of 'day in day out'
     organising for social change, but pulsating with the celebration of
     renewal and fresh hope that returns with the coming of summer.
     Mayday will always be a pivotal moment." [Maybe, p. 5]

   Maybe is clear -- we need to organise the daily struggle and enjoy
   ourselves while we are at it. Mitchinson' distortion of that message is
   pitiful.

4. Do anarchists really think "the bosses will do nothing to defend their
system"?

   He continues:

     "The genuine intentions of those protesting is not open to question.
     However, the way to hell is paved with many such good intentions.
     Are we really to believe that whilst we all 'place ourselves outside
     of capitalism', the bosses will do nothing to defend their system?
     This ostrich like tactic of burying our heads in the sand until they
     go away is not serious. Nor is it action. In reality, it is
     irresponsible, indirect inaction."

   The comment about "indirect inaction" is somewhat funny coming from a
   political tendency which did not produce a movement of the importance
   of Seattle 1999 and is now trying to recruit from it. But it would be
   interesting to discover in which anarchist work comes the notion that
   we do not think the bosses will not defend their system. Yes, Lenin did
   claim that anarchists would "lay down their arms" after a revolution,
   but as Murray Bookchin notes, anarchists are "not so naive as to
   believe anarchism could be established overnight. In imputing this
   notion to Bakunin, Marx and Engels wilfully distorted the Russian
   anarchist's views. Nor did the anarchists . . . believe that the
   abolition of the state involved 'laying down arms' immediately after
   the revolution. . ." [Post-Scarcity Anarchism, p. 213] Bakunin, for
   example, thought the "Commune would be organised by the standing
   federation of the Barricades" and that "the federation of insurgent
   associations, communes and provinces . . . [would] organise a
   revolutionary force capable of defeating reaction . . . it is the very
   fact of the expansion and organisation of the revolution for the
   purpose of self-defence among the insurgent areas that will bring about
   the triumph of the revolution." [Michael Bakunin: Selected Writings, p.
   170 and p. 171]

   Moreover, RTS actions have continually came into conflict with the
   state and its forces of defence. Mitchinson seems to think that the
   participants of RTS and its demonstrations are incapable of actually
   understanding and learning from their experiences -- they have seen and
   felt the capitalist system defending itself. Anyone on the J18, N30,
   A16 or M1 demos or just watching them on TV would have seen the
   capitalist system defending itself with vigour -- and the protestors
   fighting back. Rather than acknowledge the obvious, Mitchinson asserts
   nonsense. The only person burying their head in the sand is Mitchinson
   if he ignores the experiences of his own senses (and the basic
   principles of materialism) in favour of an ideological diatribe with no
   basis in reality.

   What is "irresponsible" is misrepresenting the viewpoints of your
   enemies and expecting them not to point our your errors.

5. How does Mitchinson misrepresent anarchist organisation?

   Mitchinson now moves onto the real enemy, anarchism. He asserts that:

     "Anarchist organisations have always hidden behind a facade of
     'self-organisation'. They claim to have no leaders, no policy etc.
     Yet who decides?"

   Yes, anarchist groups claim to have no leaders but they do not claim to
   be without policies. Anyone with any comprehension of anarchist theory
   and history would know this (just one example, Bakunin argued that we
   needed to establish "a genuine workers' program -- the policy of the
   International [Workers Association]" ["The Policy of the
   International", The Basic Bakunin, p. 100]).

   Mitchinson asks the question, if we do not have leaders, "who decides?"
   That in itself exposes the authoritarian nature of his politics and the
   Bolshevik style party. He obviously cannot comprehend that, without
   leaders deciding things for us, we manage our own affairs -- we decide
   the policy of our organisations collectively, by the direct democracy
   of the membership. Forgetting his early comment of that there is "no
   greater direct action than the seizing of control over our own lives by
   the vast majority of society," he now asks how the vast majority of
   society can seize control over our own lives without leaders to tell us
   what to do!

   Anarchists reject the idea of leaders -- instead we argue for the
   "leadership of ideas."
   As we discuss this concept in [2]section J.3.6 and so will not do so
   here. However, the key concept is that anarchists seek to spread their
   ideas by discussing their politics as equals in popular organisations
   and convincing the mass assemblies of these bodies by argument. Rather
   than using these bodies to be elected to positions of power (i.e.
   leadership as it is traditionally understood) anarchists consider it
   essential that power remains in the hands of the base of an
   organisation and argue that the policies of the organisation be decided
   by the member directly in assemblies and co-ordinated by conferences of
   mandated, recallable delegates (see [3]section A.2.9 for more
   discussion).

   This is to be expected, of course, as anarchists believe that a free
   society can only be created by organisations which reflect the
   principles of that society. Hence we see policies being made by those
   affected by them and oppose attempts to turn self-managed organisations
   into little more than vehicles to elect "leaders." A free society is a
   self-managed one and can only be created by self-management in the
   class struggle or revolutionary process. All that revolutionaries
   should do is try and influence the decisions these organisations make
   by discussing our ideas with their membership -- simply as any other
   member could in the mass assemblies the organisation is built upon. Any
   attempt by revolutionaries to seize power upon behalf of these
   organisations means destroying their revolutionary potential and the
   revolution itself by replacing the participation of all with the power
   of a few (the party).

   Thus anarchist theory and practice is very clear on the question "who
   decides" -- it is those who are affected by the question via group
   assemblies and conferences of mandated, recallable delegates. Rather
   than have "no policy," policy in an anarchist organisation is decided
   directly by the membership. Without "leaders" -- without power
   delegated into the hands of a few -- who else could make the decisions
   and policy? That Mitchinson cannot comprehend this implies that he
   cannot envision a society without a few telling the many what to do.

   He continues:

     "If there was no leadership and no policy then there could be no
     action of any kind. The recent demonstrations have been highly
     organised and co-ordinated on an international scale. Good, so it
     should be. However, without organisation and democracy no-one,
     except a clique at the top, has any say in why, where and when. Such
     a movement will never bring international capital trembling to its
     knees."

   Firstly, we must point out that these demonstrations which have spread
   like wild-fire across the world have, most definitely, made
   international capital nervous. Secondly, we must point out that no
   Leninist vanguards were involved in organising them (a few members
   turned up to sell papers later, once their significance had registered
   with the party leadership). Thirdly, we must point out that no Leninist
   vanguard has made "international capital" tremble in the knees for
   quite a few decades -- since 1917, only Stalinist vanguards have had
   any effect (and, of course, "international capital" soon realised they
   could work with the Bolsheviks and other "Communist" leaders as one
   ruling elite with another). It seems somewhat ironic that a Leninist,
   whose movement was noticeable in its absence, mocks the first movement
   to scare the ruling class for nearly 30 years.

   Secondly, we must note that the policy decided upon by the multitude of
   groups across the world was decided upon by the members of those
   groups. They practised organisation and direct democracy to make their
   policy decisions and implement them. Given that Mitchinson wonders how
   people can make decisions without leaders, his comments about rule by
   "a clique at the top" are somewhat ironic. As the history of the
   Russian Revolution indicates, a highly centralised state system (which
   mimics the highly centralised party) soon results in rule by the top
   party officials, not by the mass of people.

   Mitchinson again decides to flog his fallacy of organisation versus
   non-organisation:

     "One of the best known anarchist groups in Britain, Reclaim the
     Streets, save the game away in their spoof Mayday publication,
     'Maybe'. Incidentally, who wrote these articles, who decided what
     went in and what didn't, who edited it, where did the money come
     from? Our intention here is not to accuse them of dodgy financing -
     simply to point out that this 'no leaders' stuff is a self-organised
     myth."

   It states who put together MayDay on page 5 of the paper. It was "an
   organic group of 'guerrilla gardeners'" -- in other words, members of
   Reclaim the Streets who desired to produce the paper for that event.
   These people would have joined the group producing it via the weekly
   RTS open meetings and would have been held accountable to that same
   open meeting. No great mystery there -- if you have even the slightest
   vision of how a non-hierarchical organisation works. Rather than being
   a "myth", RTS shows that we do not need to follow leaders -- instead we
   can manage our own organisations directly and freely participate in
   projects organised via the main open meeting. Writing articles,
   editing, and so on are not the work of "leaders" -- rather they are
   simply tasks that need doing. They do not imply a leadership role -- if
   they did then every hack journalist is a "leader."

   He continues to attack what he cannot understand:

     "On page 20 they announce 'Reclaim the streets is non-hierarchical,
     spontaneous and self-organised. We have no leaders, no committee, no
     board of directors, no spokes people. There is no centralised unit
     for decision making, strategic planning and production of ideology.
     There is no membership and no formalised commitment. There is no
     master plan and no pre-defined agenda.'

     "There are two problems here. Firstly who is 'we', who made the
     above statement, and who decided it. Secondly, if it were true, it
     would not be something of which to be proud. Whether you like it or
     not, there is no way the capitalist system will ever be overthrown
     by such a haphazard and slipshod method."

   Taking the first issue, "who is 'we,' who made the above statement, and
   who decided it." Why, it is the membership of RTS -- decided via their
   weekly open meeting (as mentioned on that page). That Mitchinson cannot
   comprehend this says a lot about his politics and vision. He cannot
   comprehend self-management, direct democracy. He seems not to be able
   to understand that groups can make decisions collectively, without
   having to elect leaders to make any decisions for them.

   Taking the second issue, it is clear that Mitchinson fails to
   understand the role of RTS (and other anarchist groups). Anarchists do
   not try to overthrow capitalism on behalf of others -- they urge them
   to overthrow it themselves, by their own direct action. The aim of
   groups like RTS is to encourage people to take direct action, to fight
   the powers that be and, in the process, create their own organs of
   self-management and resistance. Such a process of working class
   self-activity and self-organisation in struggle is the starting process
   of every revolution. People in struggle create their own organisations
   -- such as soviets (workers' councils), factory committees, community
   assemblies -- through which they start to manage their own affairs and,
   hopefully, overthrow the state and abolish capitalism. It is not the
   task of RTS to overthrow capitalism, it is the task of the whole
   population.

   Moreover, many anarchists do see the need for a specific anarchist
   organisation -- three national federations exist in the UK, for
   example. RTS does not need to organise in this fashion simply because
   such groups already exist. It is not its role -- its role is a means to
   encourage self-activity and direct action as well as raising
   libertarian ideas in a popular manner. For more "serious" political
   organisation, people can and do turn to other anarchist groups and
   federations.

   The street carnival principle of RTS is precisely the type of
   organising anarchists excel at -- namely fun organising that catches
   the fun and excitement of popular direct action and, most importantly,
   gets people out on the streets -- something Marxists have failed to do
   very well (if at all). It's a small step from organising a street
   carnival to further, "more serious" organising. Anarchist revolution is
   about bringing joy back into human lives, not endless (and often
   dishonest) polemics on the ideas of long dead philosophers. Rather, it
   is about creating a philosophy which, while inspired by past thinkers,
   is not subservient to them and aims to base itself on current struggles
   and needs rather than past ones. It is also about building a new
   political culture, one that is popular, active, street-based (versus
   ivory-tower elitist), and above all, fun. Only this way can we catch
   the imagination of everyday people and move them from resigned apathy
   to active resistance. The Marxists have tried their approach, and it
   has been a resounding failure -- everyday people consider Marxism at
   best irrelevant, and at worst, inhuman and lifeless. Fortunately,
   anarchists are not following the Marxist model of organising, having
   learned from history

   Thus Mitchinson fails to understand the role of RTS or its position in
   the UK anarchist movement.

   He then asserts:

     "There is no theory, no coherent analysis of society, no alternative
     programme. To brag of a lack of direction, a lack of purpose and a
     lack of coherence, in the face of such a highly organised and brutal
     enemy as international capital, is surely the height of
     irresponsibility."

   Firstly, anyone reading Maybe or other RTS publications will quickly
   see there is theory, coherent analysis and an alternative vision. As
   Mitchinson has obviously read Maybe we can only assume his claim is a
   conscious lie. Secondly, RTS in the quoted passage clearly do not "brag
   of a lack of direction, a lack of purpose and a lack of coherence."
   They do state there is no "centralised unit for decision-making" --
   which is true, they have a decentralised unit for decision-making
   (direct democracy in open meetings). There is "no master-plan," etc. as
   any plans are decided upon by these open meetings. There is no
   pre-defined agenda because, as a democratic organisation, it is up to
   the open meeting to define their own agenda.

   It is only Mitchinson's assumption that only centralised parties, with
   leaders making the decisions, can have "direction," "purpose" and
   "coherence." As can be seen by their actions that RTS does have
   direction, purpose and coherence. Needless to say, while other
   anarchists may be critical about RTS and its actions, we do not deny
   that it has been an effective organisation, involving a great many
   people in its actions who would probably not be involved in political
   activities. Rather than being "irresponsible," RTS shows the validity
   of libertarian organisation and its effectiveness. No Marxist Party has
   remotely approached RTS's successes in terms of involving people in
   political actions. This is hardly a surprise.

6. How does Mitchinson define anarchism wrongly?

   Mitchinson states:

     "In reality the leaders of these movements are not devoid of
     ideology, they are anarchists. Anarchism is not simply a term of
     abuse, it comes from the Greek word 'anarchos' meaning 'without
     government'. To anarchists the state - the institutions of
     government, the army, police, courts etc. - is the root cause of all
     that is wrong in the world. It must be destroyed and replaced not
     with any new form of government, but the immediate introduction of a
     stateless society."

   Firstly, "anarchos" actually means "without authority," or "contrary to
   authority" (as Kropotkin put it). It does not mean "without government"
   as such (although it commonly is used that way). This means that
   anarchism does not consider the state as "the root of all that is wrong
   with the world" -- we consider it, like capitalism (wage slavery),
   patriarchy, hierarchy in general, etc., as a symptom of a deeper
   problem, namely authority (or, more precisely, authoritarian social
   relations, hierarchical power -- of which class power is a subset).
   Therefore anarchist theory is concerned with more than just the state
   -- it is against capitalism just as much as it is against the state,
   for example.

   Thus, to state the obvious, as anyone familiar with anarchist theory
   could tell you, anarchists do not think that "the state" is the root of
   all that is wrong in the world. Marxists have asserted this for years
   -- unfortunately for them, repetition does not make something true!
   Rather, anarchists see the state as one of the causes of evil in the
   world and the main protector of all the rest. We also stress that in
   order to combat all the evils, we need to destroy the state so that we
   are in a position to abolish the other evils by being in control of our
   own lives. For example, in order to abolish capitalism -- i.e. for
   workers' to seize the means of life -- the state, which protects
   property rights, must be destroyed. Without doing so, the police and
   army will come and take back that which the workers' have taken.
   However, we do not claim that the state causes all of our problems --
   we do claim that getting rid of the state is an essential act, on which
   many others are dependent.

   As Brian Morris argues:

     "Another criticism of anarchism is that it has a narrow view of
     politics: that it sees the state as the fount of all evil, ignoring
     other aspects of social and economic life. This is a
     misrepresentation of anarchism. It partly derives from the way
     anarchism has been defined, and partly because Marxist historians
     have tried to exclude anarchism from the broader socialist movement.
     But when one examines the writings of classical anarchists. . . as
     well as the character of anarchist movements. . . it is clearly
     evident that it has never had this limited vision. It has always
     challenged all forms of authority and exploitation, and has been
     equally critical of capitalism and religion as it has been of the
     state." ["Anthropology and Anarchism," Anarchy: A Journal of Desire
     Armed, no. 45, p, p. 40]

   As can be seen, Mitchinson repeats into the usual Marxist straw man.

7. Does anarchism reject fighting for reforms?

   After asserting the usual Marxist falsehoods about anarchism, he moves
   on:

     "This opposition to the state and authority leads to a rejection of
     participation in any form of parliamentary activity, belonging to a
     political party or fighting for any reforms, that is political
     change through the state."

   Again Mitchinson smuggles in a falsehood into his "analysis."
   Anarchists do not reject "fighting for any reforms" -- far from it. We
   do reject parliamentary activity, that is true, but we think that
   reforms can and must be won. We see such reforms coming via the direct
   action of those who desire them -- for example, by workers striking for
   better working conditions, more wages and so. Anyone with even a
   passing awareness of anarchist thought would know this. Indeed, that is
   what direct action means -- it was coined by French
   anarcho-syndicalists to describe the struggle for reforms within
   capitalism!

   As for rejecting parliamentary activity, yes, anarchists do reject this
   form of "action." However, we do so for reasons Mitchinson fails to
   mention. [4]Section J.2 of the FAQ discusses the reasons why anarchists
   support direct action and oppose electioneering as a means of both
   reform and for revolution.

   Similarly, anarchists reject political parties but we do not reject
   political organisations -- i.e. specific anarchist groups. The
   difference is that political parties are generally organised in a
   hierarchical fashion and anarchist federations are not -- we try and
   create the new world when we organise rather than reproducing the
   traits of the current, bourgeois, one.

   Needless to say, Mitchinson seeks to recruit the people he is
   slandering and so holds out an olive-branch by stating that "[o]f
   course, Marxism is opposed to the brutal domination of the capitalist
   state too. Marx saw a future society without a state but instead 'an
   association in which the free development of each is the condition for
   the free development of all.' That is a self-governing people. The
   question however is how can this be achieved?"

   Yes, as Bakunin argued, Marxists do not reject our programme out of
   hand. They claim to also seek a free society and so Mitchinson is
   correct -- the question is how can this be achieved. Anarchists argue
   that a self-governing people can only be achieved by self-governing
   means -- "Bakunin . . . advocated socialist (i.e., libertarian) means
   in order to achieve a socialist (i.e., libertarian) society." [Arthur
   Lehning, "Introduction", Michael Bakunin: Selected Writings, p. 27]
   Thus means and ends must be consistent -- revolutionary movements must
   be organised in a way that reflects the society we want to create. Thus
   a self-governing society can only be created by self-governing
   organisations and a self-governing movement. If the revolutionary
   movement reflect bourgeois society -- for example, is hierarchical --
   then it cannot create a free society. That is the rationale for the way
   anarchist groups organise, including RTS. Marxists, as we will see,
   disagree and consider how a revolutionary movement organises itself as
   irrelevant.

   Also, we must note that earlier Mitchinson denied that a self-governing
   organisation could exist when he was discussing RTS. He asserted that
   "[i]f there was no leadership and no policy then there could be no
   action of any kind." Now he claims that it is possible, but only after
   the revolution. We will note the obvious contradiction -- how do people
   become capable of self-government post-revolution if they do not
   practice it pre-revolution and, obviously, during the revolution?

8. Does anarchism see the state as the root of all problems?

   Mitchinson moves on to assert that:

     "Since anarchism sees in the state the root of all problems, it
     therefore believes these problems will be resolved by the
     destruction of the state."

   As noted above, anarchists do not see in the state the root of all
   problems. We do urge the destruction of the state but that is because
   the state is the protector of existing society and in order to
   transform that society we need get rid of it. Kropotkin, for example,
   was well aware of "the evil done by Capitalism and the State that
   supports it." [Evolution and Environment, p. 83] Rather than seeing the
   State as the root of all evil, anarchists are well aware that evil is
   caused by many things -- particularly capitalism -- and that the state,
   as well as causing its own evils, supports and protects others. Thus
   anarchists are aware that the state is a tool for minority rule and
   only one source of evil.

   Mitchinson, after misrepresenting anarchist thought, states:

     "Marxism, meanwhile, sees the division of society into classes, a
     minority who own the means of producing wealth, and the majority of
     us whose labour is the source of that wealth, as the crux of the
     matter. It is this class division of society which gives rise to the
     state - because the minority need a special force to maintain their
     rule over the majority - which has evolved over thousands of years
     into the complicated structures we see today."

   Anarchists would agree, as far as this goes. Bakunin argued that the
   State "is authority, domination, and forced, organised by the
   property-owning and so-called enlightened classes against the masses."
   He saw the social revolution as destroying capitalism and the state at
   the same time, that is "to overturn the State's domination, and that of
   the privileged classes whom it solely represents." [The Basic Bakunin,
   p. 140] The idea that the state is a means to ensure class rule is one
   anarchists, as can be seen, would agree with.

   However, anarchists do not reduce their understanding of the state to
   this simplistic Marxist analysis. While being well aware that the state
   is the means of ensuring the domination of an economic elite,
   anarchists recognise that the state machine also has interests of its
   own. The state, for anarchists, is the delegation of power into the
   hands of a few. This creates, by its very nature, a privileged position
   for those at the top of the hierarchy:

     "A government, that is a group of people entrusted with making the
     laws and empowered to use the collective force to oblige each
     individual to obey them, is already a privileged class and cut off
     from the people. As any constituted body would do, it will
     instinctively seek to extend its powers, to be beyond public
     control, to impose its own policies and to give priority to its
     special interests. Having been put in a privileged position, the
     government is already at odds with the people whose strength it
     disposes of." [Malatesta, Anarchy, p. 34]

   Thus, while it is true that the state (particularly under capitalism)
   acts as the agent of the capitalist class, it does not mean that it
   does not have interests of its own. The State has developed as a means
   of imposing minority rule -- that much anarchists and Marxists can
   agree upon. To do so it has developed certain features, notably
   delegation of power into the hands of a few. This feature of the state
   is a product of its function. However, function and feature are
   inseparable -- retain the feature and the function will be
   re-established. In other words, maintain the state and minority rule
   will be re-established.

   The simplistic class analysis of the state has always caused Marxists
   problems, particularly Trotskyists who used it to deny the obvious
   class nature of Stalinist Russia. Rather than see the USSR as a class
   society in which the State bureaucracy exploited and oppressed the
   working class for its own benefits, Trotskyists argued it was an
   autocratic, privileged bureaucracy in a classless society. As anarchist
   Camillo Berneri argued:

     "In history there is no absurdity. An autocratic bureaucracy is a
     class, therefore it is not absurd that it should exist in a society
     where classes remain -- the bureaucratic class and the proletarian
     class. If the USSR was a 'classless' society, it would also be a
     society without a bureaucratic autocracy, which is the natural fruit
     of the permanent existence of the State." ["The State and Classes",
     Cienfuegos Press Anarchist Review, no, 4, p. 49]

   The weakness (or incompleteness) of the Marxist understanding of the
   state can best be seen by Trotsky's and his followers lack of
   understanding of Stalinism. As the state owned all the land and means
   of production, there could be no classes and so the Soviet Union must
   be a classless society. However, the obvious privileges of the
   bureaucracy could not be denied (as Trotsky was once a leading
   bureaucrat, he saw and experienced them at first hand). But as the
   state bureaucracy could not be a class and have class interests (by
   definition), Trotsky could not see the wood for the trees. The actual
   practice of Leninism in power is enough to expose its own theoretical
   weaknesses.

9. Why is Mitchinson wrong about the "Abolishion [i.e. Abolition] of the state"?

   Mitchinson moves on to argue that the "modern capitalist state can wear
   many guises, monarchy, republic, dictatorship, but in the end its
   purpose remains the same, to maintain the minority rule of the
   capitalist class. Marxism's goal therefore is not simply to abolish the
   state, but to put an end to class society." Needless to say, that is
   also anarchism's goal. As Bakunin argued, "political transformation . .
   . [and] economic transformation . . . must be accomplished together and
   simultaneously." [The Basic Bakunin, p. 106] So, as can be seen,
   anarchism's goal is not simply abolishing the state, but to put an end
   to class society. That anarchists have always argued the state and
   capitalism must be destroyed at the same time is easily discovered from
   reading their works.

   Continuing this theme he argues that the state "was born with the split
   of society into classes to defend private property. So long as there
   are classes there will be a state. So, how can class society be ended?
   Not by its denial, but only by the victory of one of the contending
   classes. Triumph for capitalism spells ruin for millions."

   Of course, we could point out here that many anthropologists disagree
   with the claim that the state is a product of class society. As Michael
   Taylor summarises, the "evidence does not give this proposition a great
   deal of support. Much of the evidence which has been offered in support
   of it shows only that the primary states, not long after their
   emergence, were economically stratified. But this is of course
   consistent also with the simultaneous rise . . . of political and
   economic stratification, or with the prior development of the state --
   i.e. of political stratification -- and the creation of economic
   stratification by the ruling class." [Community, Anarchy and Liberty,
   p. 132]

   Also, of course, as should be obvious from what we have said
   previously, anarchists do not think class society can be ended by
   "denial." As is clear from even a quick reading of any anarchist
   thinker, anarchists seek to end class society as well as the state.
   However, we reject as simplistic the Marxist notion that the state
   exists purely to defend classes. The state has certain properties
   because it is a state and one of these is that it creates a
   bureaucratic class around it due to its centralised, hierarchical
   nature. Within capitalism, the state bureaucracy is part of the ruling
   class and (generally) under the control of the capitalist class.
   However, to generalise from this specific case is wrong as the state
   bureaucracy is a class in itself -- and so trying to abolish classes
   without abolishing the state is doomed to failure.

10. Why is Mitchinson's comment that we face either "socialism or barbarism"
actually undermine his case?

   Mitchinson continues:

     "As Marx once explained the choice before us is not socialism or the
     status quo, but socialism or barbarism."

   We should point out that it Rosa Luxemburg who is usually associated
   with this quote. She made her famous comment during the First World
   War. The start of this war saw the Marxist German Social Democratic
   Party (and a host of others) vote for war credits in Parliament. This
   party was a mass workers' party which aimed to used every means,
   including elections, to gain reforms for the working class. The net end
   result of this strategy was the voting for war credits and the support
   of their state and ruling class in the war -- that is, the betrayal of
   the fundamental principles of socialism.

   This event did not happen out of the blue. It was the end result of
   years of working within the bourgeois political system, of using
   elections ("political activity") as a means of struggle. The Social
   Democratic Parties had already been plagued with reformist elements for
   years. These elements, again, did not come from nowhere but were rather
   the response to what the party was actually doing. They desired to
   reform the party to bring its rhetoric in-line with its practice. As
   one of the most distinguished historians of this period put it, the
   "distinction between the contenders remained largely a subjective one,
   a difference of ideas in the evaluation of reality rather than a
   difference in the realm of action." [C. Schorske, German Social
   Democracy, p. 38] The debacle of 1914 was a logical result of the means
   chosen, the evidence was already there for all to see (except,
   apparently, Lenin who praised the "fundamentals of parliamentary
   tactics" of the German and International Social Democracy and how they
   were "at the same time implacable on questions of principle and always
   directed to the accomplishment of the final aim" in his obituary of
   August Bebel in 1913! [Marx, Engels and Lenin, Anarchism and
   Anarcho-Syndicalism, p. 248])

   Needless to say, this result had been predicted by Bakunin over 40
   years previously. And Mitchinson wants us to repeat this strategy? As
   Marx said, history repeats itself -- first it is tragedy, second time
   it is farce.

11. Why is Mitchinson wrong to assert anarchists do not believe in defending a
revolution?

   Mitchinson argues that the "victory of the working class can only mean
   the destruction of the capitalist state. Will the capitalists take
   defeat like sporting ladies and gentlemen, retiring quietly to the
   pavilion? No, all history suggests that they would not. The workers
   would need to create a new state, for the first time to defend the rule
   of the majority over the minority."

   Yes, indeed, all history does show that a ruling class will not retire
   quietly and a revolution will need to defend itself. If anarchists did
   believe that they would retire peacefully then Marxists would be
   correct to attack us. However, Marxist assertions are false. Indeed,
   they must think anarchists are morons if they genuinely do think we do
   not believe in defending a revolution. A few quotes should suffice to
   expose these Marxist claims as lies:

     "Commune will be organised by the standing federation of the
     Barricades. . . [T]he federation of insurgent associations, communes
     and provinces . . . [would] organise a revolutionary force capable
     of defeating reaction . . . it is the very fact of the expansion and
     organisation of the revolution for the purpose of self-defence among
     the insurgent areas that will bring about the triumph of the
     revolution." [Michael Bakunin: Selected Writings, pp. 170-1]

     "[L]et us suppose . . . it is Paris that starts [the revolution] . .
     . Paris will naturally make haste to organise itself as best it can,
     in revolutionary style, after the workers have joined into
     associations and made a clean sweep of all the instruments of
     labour, every kind of capital and building; armed and organised by
     streets and quartiers, they will form the revolutionary federation
     of all the quartiers, the federative commune. . . All the French and
     foreign revolutionary communes will then send representatives to
     organise the necessary common services . . . and to organise common
     defence against the enemies of the Revolution." [Op. Cit., p. 178-9]

   Bakunin was well aware that revolution implied "civil war" -- i.e.
   attempts by the ruling class to maintain its power (see, for example,
   his "Letters to a Frenchman" in Bakunin on Anarchism). As can be seen,
   Bakunin was well aware of the needs to defend a revolution after
   destroying the state and abolishing capitalism. Similarly we discover
   Malatesta arguing that we should "[a]rm all the population," and the
   "creation of a voluntary militia, without powers to interfere as
   militia in the life of the community, but only to deal with any armed
   attacks by the forces of reaction to re-establish themselves, or to
   resist outside intervention by countries as yet not in a state of
   revolution." [Life and Ideas, p. 170 and p. 166] In Malatesta's words:

     "But, by all means, let us admit that the governments of the still
     unemancipated countries were to want to, and could, attempt to
     reduce free people to a state of slavery once again. Would this
     people require a government to defend itself? To wage war men are
     needed who have all the necessary geographical and mechanical
     knowledge, and above all large masses of the population willing to
     go and fight. A government can neither increase the abilities of the
     former nor the will and courage of the latter. And the experience of
     history teaches us that a people who really want to defend their own
     country are invincible: and in Italy everyone knows that before the
     corps of volunteers (anarchist formations) thrones topple, and
     regular armies composed of conscripts or mercenaries disappear. . .
     [Some people] seem almost to believe that after having brought down
     government and private property we would allow both to be quietly
     built up again, because of a respect for the freedom of those who
     might feel the need to be rulers and property owners. A truly
     curious way of interpreting our ideas!" [Anarchy, pp. 40-1]

   Not only do we have this theoretical position, we can also point to
   concrete historical examples -- the Makhnovist movement in the Russian
   Revolution and the CNT militias during the Spanish Revolution, among
   others -- that prove that anarchists do recognise the need and
   importance of defending a successful revolution.

   Therefore, statements asserting that anarchists are against defending a
   revolution are either spreading a conscious lie or a product of deep
   ignorance.

   Thus the question is not one of defending or not defending a
   revolution. The question is how do we defend it (and, another key
   question, what kind of revolution do we aim for). Marxists urge us to
   "create a new state, for the first time to defend the rule of the
   majority over the minority." Anarchists reply that every state is based
   on the delegation of power into the hands of a minority and so cannot
   be used to defend the rule of the majority over the minority. Rather,
   it would be the rule of those who claim to represent the majority. The
   confusion between people power and party power is at the root of why
   Leninism is not revolutionary.

   Mitchinson then quotes Lenin and Trotsky to defend his assertion:

     "The proletariat needs the state only temporarily. We do not at all
     disagree with the anarchists on the question of the abolition of the
     state as the aim. We maintain that, to achieve this aim, we must
     temporarily make use of the instruments resources and methods of
     state power against the exploiters." [Lenin]

     "Marxists are wholly in agreement with the anarchists in regard to
     the final goal: the liquidation of the state. Marxists are statist
     only to the extent that one cannot achieve the liquidation of the
     state simply by ignoring it." [Trotsky]

   Of course, quoting Lenin or Trotsky when they make a false assertion
   does not turn lies into truth. As proven above, anarchists are well
   aware of the necessity of overthrowing the state by revolution and
   defending that revolution against attempts to defeat it. To state
   otherwise is to misrepresent anarchist theory on this subject.
   Moreover, despite Trotsky's claims, anarchists are aware that you do
   not destroy something by ignoring it. The real question is thus not
   whether to defend a revolution or whether to shatter the state machine.
   The questions are, how do you shatter the state, what do you replace
   existing society with and how do you defend a revolution. To state
   otherwise is to build a strawman -- unfortunately much of Lenin's
   "masterpiece" The State and Revolution is based on destroying this
   self-created strawman.

12. Would the "workers' state" really be different, as Mitchinson claims?

   Mitchinson argues that from "the very beginning this would be like no
   previous state machine. From day one it would be in effect a
   semi-state." The question is, for anarchists, whether this "semi-state"
   is marked by the delegation of power into the hands of a government. If
   so, then the "semi-state" is no such thing -- it is a state like any
   other and so an instrument of minority rule. Yes, this minority may
   state it represents the majority but in practice it can only represent
   itself and claim that is what the majority desires.

   Hence, for anarchists, "the essence of the state . . . [is] centralised
   power or to put it another way the coercive authority of which the
   state enjoys the monopoly, in that organisation of violence know as
   'government'; in the hierarchical despotism, juridical, police and
   military despotism that imposes laws on everyone." [Luigi Fabbri, Op.
   Cit., pp. 24-5] The so-called "semi-state" is nothing of the kind -- it
   is a centralised power in which a few govern the many. Therefore, the
   "workers' state" would be "workers" in name only.

   Mitchinson continues:

     "The task of all previous revolutions was to seize state power. From
     the experience of the Paris Commune of 1871 Marx and Engels
     concluded that it would not be possible for the workers to simply
     use the old state apparatus, they would instead have to replace it
     with an entirely new one, to serve the interests of the majority and
     lay the basis for a socialist society."

   Needless to say, he forgets the key question -- who is to seize power.
   Is it the majority, directly, or a minority (the leaders of a party)
   who claim to represent the majority. Leninists are clear, it is to be
   the party, not the working class as a whole. They confuse party power
   with class power. In the words of Lenin:

     "The very presentation of the question -- 'dictatorship of the Party
     or dictatorship of the class, dictatorship (Party) of the leaders or
     dictatorship (Party) of the masses?' -- is evidence of the most
     incredible and hopeless confusion of mind . . . [because] classes
     are usually . . . led by political parties. . . "

   And:

     "To go so far in this matter as to draw a contrast in general
     between the dictatorship of the masses and the dictatorship of the
     leaders, is ridiculously absurd and stupid." [Left-wing Communism:
     An Infantile Disorder, pp. 25-6 and p. 27]

   However, what is truly stupid is confusing the rule by a minority with
   that of the majority managing their own affairs. The two things are
   different, they generate different social relationships and to confuse
   the two is to lay the ground work for the rule by a bureaucratic elite,
   a dictatorship of state officials over the working class.

   Now we come to the usual Leninist claims about Bolshevik theory:

     "To ensure that the workers maintain control over this state, Lenin
     argued for the election of all officials who should be held
     accountable and subject to recall, and paid no more than the wage of
     a skilled worker. All bureaucratic tasks should be rotated. There
     should be no special armed force standing apart from the people, and
     we would add, all political parties except fascists should be
     allowed to organise."

   This is what Lenin, essentially, said he desired in The State and
   Revolution (Mitchinson misses out one key aspect, to which we will
   return later). Anarchists reply in three ways.

   Firstly, we note that "much that passes for 'Marxism' in State and
   Revolution is pure anarchism -- for example, the substitution of
   revolutionary militias for professional armed bodies and the
   substitution of organs of self-management for parliamentary bodies.
   What is authentically Marxist in Lenin's pamphlet is the demand for
   'strict centralism,' the acceptance of a 'new' bureaucracy, and the
   identification of soviets with a state." [Murray Bookchin,
   Post-Scarcity Anarchism, p. 213] As an example, let us look at the
   recall of "officials" (inspired by the Paris Commune). We find this in
   Bakunin's and Proudhon's work before it was applied by the Communards
   and praised by Marx. Bakunin in 1868 argued for a "Revolutionary
   Communal Council" composed of "delegates . . . vested with plenary but
   accountable and removable mandates." [Michael Bakunin: Selected
   Writings, pp. 170-1] Proudhon's election manifesto of 1848 argued for
   "universal suffrage and as a consequence of universal suffrage, we want
   implementation of the binding mandate. Politicians balk at it! Which
   means that in their eyes, the people, in electing representatives, do
   not appoint mandatories but rather abjure their sovereignty! That is
   assuredly not socialism: it is not even democracy." [No Gods, No
   Masters, vol. 1, p. 63] As can be seen, Lenin's recommendations were
   first proposed by anarchists.

   Thus the positive aspects of Lenin's work are libertarian in nature,
   not Marxist as such. Indeed given how much time is spent on the Paris
   Commune (an essentially libertarian revolt obviously inspired by
   Proudhon's ideas) his work is more libertarian than Marxist, as
   Bookchin makes clear. It is the non-libertarian aspects which helped to
   undermine the anarchist elements of the work.

   Secondly, Lenin does not mention, never mind discuss, the role of the
   Bolshevik Party would have in the new "semi-state." Indeed, the party
   is mentioned only in passing. That in itself indicates the weakness of
   using The State and Revolution as a guide book to Leninist theory or
   practice. Given the importance of the role of the party in Lenin's
   previous and latter works, it suggests that to quote The State and
   Revolution as proof of Leninism's democratic heart leaves much to be
   desired. And even The State and Revolution, in its one serious
   reference to the Party, is ambiguous in the extreme:

     "By educating the workers' party, Marxism educates the vanguard of
     the proletariat which is capable of assuming power and of leading
     the whole people to Socialism, of directing and organising the new
     order, of being the teacher, the guide, the leader of all the
     toiling and exploited in the task of building up their social life
     without the bourgeoisie and against the bourgeoisie." [The Essential
     Lenin, p. 288]

   Is it the vanguard or the proletariat which is "capable of assuming
   power"? The answer is important as a social revolution requires the
   fullest participation of the formerly oppressed masses in the
   management of their own affairs. In the context of the rest of The
   State and Revolution it could be argued it is the proletariat. However,
   this cannot be squared with Lenin's (or Trotsky's) post-October
   arguments and practices or the resolution of the Second World Congress
   of the Communist International which stated that "[e]very class
   struggle is a political struggle. The goal of this struggle . . . is
   the conquest of political power. Political power cannot be seized,
   organised and operated except through a political party." [cited by
   Duncan Hallas, The Comintern, p. 35] It is obvious that if the party
   rules, the working class does not. A socialist society cannot be built
   without the participation, self-activity and self-management of the
   working class. Thus the question of who makes decisions and how they do
   so is essential -- if it is not the masses then the slide into
   bureaucracy is inevitable.

   Thus to quote The State and Revolution proves nothing for anarchists --
   it does not discuss the key question of the party and so fails to
   present a clear picture of Leninist politics and their immediate aims.
   As soon becomes clear if you look at Leninism in power -- i.e. what it
   actually did when it had the chance, to which we now turn.

   Thirdly, we point to what he actually did in power. In this we follow
   Marx, who argued that we should judge people by what they do rather
   than what they say. We will concentrate on the pre-Civil War (October
   1917 to May 1918) period to indicate that this breaking of promises
   started before the horrors of Civil War can be claimed to have forced
   these decisions onto the Bolsheviks.

   Before the out-break of Civil War, the Bolsheviks had replaced election
   of "all officials" by appointment from above in many areas of life --
   for example, they abolished the election of officers in the Red Army
   and replaced workers' self-management in production with one-man
   management, both forms of democracy being substituted by appointed from
   above. In addition, by the end of April, 1918, Lenin himself was
   arguing "[o]bedience, and unquestioning obedience at that, during work
   to the one-man decisions of Soviet directors, of the dictators elected
   or appointed by Soviet institutions, vested with dictatorial powers."
   [Six Theses on the Immediate Tasks of the Soviet Government, p. 44 --
   our emphasis] Moreover, the Soviet Constitution stated that "[e]very
   commissar [of the Council of People's Commissars -- i.e. the Soviet
   government] has a collegium (committee) of which he is the president,
   and the members of which are appointed by the Council of People's
   Commissars." Appointment was the rule at the very heights of the state.
   The "election of all officers" ("without exception" [Lenin, The State
   and Revolution, p. 302]) had ended by month six of the revolution even
   in Lenin's own writings -- and before the start of the Civil War.

   Lenin also argued in mid-April 1918 that the "socialist character of
   Soviet, i.e. proletarian, democracy" lies, in part, in "the people
   themselves determin[ing] the order and time of elections." [The
   Immediate Tasks of the Soviet Government, pp. 36-7] Given that "the
   government [had] continually postponed the new general elections to the
   Petrograd Soviet, the term of which had ended in March 1918" because it
   "feared that the opposition parties would show gains" Lenin's comments
   seem hypocritical in the extreme. [Samuel Farber, Before Stalinism, p.
   22]

   Moreover, the Bolsheviks did not stay true to Lenin's claim in The
   State and Revolution that "since the majority of the people itself
   suppresses its oppressors, a 'special force' is no longer necessary" as
   so "in place of a special repressive force, the whole population itself
   came on the scene." In this way the "state machine" would be "the armed
   masses of workers who become transformed into a universal people's
   militia." [Op. Cit., p. 301, p. 320 and p. 347] Instead they created a
   political police force (the Cheka) and a standing army (in which
   elections were a set aside by decree). These were special,
   professional, armed forces standing apart from the people and
   unaccountable to them. Indeed, they were used to repress strikes and
   working class unrest. So much for Mitchinson's claim that "there should
   be no special armed force standing apart from the people" -- it did not
   last three months (the Cheka was founded two months into the
   revolution, the Red Army was created in early 1918 and elections set
   aside by March of that year).

   Lastly, the Bolsheviks banned newspapers from the start -- including
   other socialist papers. In addition, they did not allow other political
   tendencies to organise freely. The repression started before the Civil
   War with the attack, by the Cheka, in April 1918 on the anarchist
   movements in Petrograd and Moscow. While repression obviously existed
   during the Civil War, it is significant that it, in fact, started
   before it began. During the Civil War, the Bolsheviks repressed all
   political parties, including the Mensheviks even though they
   "consistently pursued a policy of peaceable opposition to the Bolshevik
   regime, a policy conducted by strictly legitimate means" and
   "[i]ndividual Mensheviks who joined organisations aiming at the
   overthrow of the Soviet Government were expelled from the Menshevik
   Party." [George Leggett, The Cheka: Lenin's Political Police, pp. 318-9
   and p. 332] In fact, repression increased after the end of the Civil
   War -- a strange fact if it was that war which necessitated repression
   in the first place.

   Moreover, Mitchinson fails to mention Lenin's argument that, like the
   Paris Commune, the workers' state would be based on a fusion of
   executive and administrative functions in the hands of the workers'
   delegates. This is hardly surprising, as Lenin created an executive
   body (the Council of People's Commissars) immediately after the October
   Revolution. This division of executive and administrative powers was
   written into the Soviet Constitution. So much for The State and
   Revolution -- its promises did not last a night.

   Thus, his claims that the "semi-state" would not be like any other
   state are contradicted by the actual experience of Bolshevism in power.
   For anarchists, this comes as no surprise as they are well aware that
   the state machine does not (indeed, cannot) represent the interests of
   the working classes due to its centralised, hierarchical and elitist
   nature -- all it can do is represent the interests of the party in
   power, its own bureaucratic needs and privileges and slowly, but
   surely, remove itself from popular control. Hence the movement away
   from popular control -- it is the nature of centralised power to remove
   itself from control from below, control by the masses, particularly
   when all other focal points of working class self-management have been
   abolished as being no longer required as we have a "semi-state."

   Mitchinson seems to want us to look purely at Bolshevik theory and not
   its practice. It is exactly what supporters of capitalism desire us to
   do -- in theory, capitalism is based on free agreement and free
   exchange between autonomous individuals but in practice it is a system
   of inequality which violates the autonomy of individuals and makes a
   mockery of free agreement.

   In a way, The State and Revolution laid out the foundations and
   sketched out the essential features of an alternative to Bolshevik
   power -- as noted, that system would be essentially libertarian. Only
   the pro-Leninist tradition has used Lenin's work, almost to quiet their
   conscience, because Lenin, once in power, ignored it totally. Such is
   the nature of the state -- as Kropotkin and all other anarchists have
   argued, there can be no such thing as a "revolutionary government."
   Conflict will inevitably arise between the party which aims to control
   the revolution and the actions of the masses themselves. To resolve the
   conflict the state must eliminate the organs of workers self-activity
   which the revolution creates otherwise the party cannot impose its
   decisions -- and this is what the Bolshevik state did, aided of course
   by the horrors of the civil war.

   To state the obvious, to quote theory and not relate it to the practice
   of those who claim to follow that theory is a joke. It is little more
   than sophistry. If you look at the actions of the Bolsheviks before and
   after the Russian Revolution you cannot help draw the conclusion that
   Lenin's State and Revolution has nothing to do with Bolshevik policy
   and presents a false image of what Trotskyists desire.

13. Is the Marxist "worker's state" really the rule of one class over another?

   Mitchinson argues that the "task of this state would be to develop the
   economy to eradicate want. Less need, means less need to govern
   society, less need for a state. Class society and the state will begin
   to wither away as the government of people, the rule of one class over
   another, is replaced by the administration of things, the planned use
   of resources to meet society's needs."

   As Malatesta makes clear, this is pure sophistry:

     "Whoever has power over things has power over men; whoever governs
     production also governs the producers; who determines consumption is
     master over the consumer.

     "This is the question; either things are administered on the basis
     of free agreement of the interested parties, and this is anarchy; or
     they are administered according to laws made by administrators and
     this is government, it is the State, and inevitably it turns out to
     be tyrannical.

     "It is not a question of the good intentions or the good will of
     this or that man, but of the inevitability of the situation, and of
     the tendencies which man generally develops in given circumstances."
     [Life and Ideas, p. 145]

   Moreover, it is debatable whether Trotskyists really desire the rule of
   one class over another in the sense of working class over capitalist
   class. To quote Trotsky:

     "the proletariat can take power only through its vanguard. In itself
     the necessity for state power arises from an insufficient cultural
     level of the masses and their heterogeneity. In the revolutionary
     vanguard, organised in a party, is crystallised the aspirations of
     the masses to obtain their freedom. Without the confidence of the
     class in the vanguard, without support of the vanguard by the class,
     there can be no talk of the conquest of power.

     "In this sense the proletarian revolution and dictatorship are the
     work of the whole class, but only under the leadership of the
     vanguard."
     [Stalinism and Bolshevism]

   Thus, rather than the working class as a whole seizing power, it is the
   "vanguard" which takes power -- "a revolutionary party, even after
   seizing power . . . is still by no means the sovereign ruler of
   society." [Ibid.] That is, of course, true -- they are still organs of
   working class self-management (such as factory committees, workers
   councils, trade unions, soldier committees) through which working
   people can still exercise their sovereignty. Little wonder Trotsky
   abolished independent unions, decreed the end of soldier committees and
   urged one-man management and the militarisation of labour when in
   power. Such working class organs do conflict with the sovereign rule of
   the party and so have to be abolished.

   After being in power four years, Trotsky was arguing that the "Party is
   obliged to maintain its dictatorship . . . regardless of temporary
   vacillations even in the working class . . . The dictatorship does not
   base itself at every moment on the formal principle of a workers'
   democracy." [quoted by Brinton, The Bolsheviks and Workers' Control, p.
   78]

   This position follows naturally from Trotsky's comments that the party
   "crystallises" the "aspirations" of the masses. If the masses reject
   the party then, obviously, their "cultural level" has fallen and so the
   party has the right, nay the duty, to impose its dictatorship over
   them. Similarly, the destruction of organs of working class
   self-management can be justified because the vanguard has taken power
   -- which is exactly what Trotsky argued.

   With regards to the Red Army and its elected officers, he stated in
   March 1918 that "the principle of election is politically purposeless
   and technically inexpedient, and it has been, in practice, abolished by
   decree" because the Bolshevik Party held power or, as he put it,
   "political power is in the hands of the same working class from whose
   ranks the Army is recruited." Of course, power was actually held by the
   Bolshevik party, not the working class, but never fear:

     "Once we have established the Soviet regime, that is a system under
     which the government is headed by persons who have been directly
     elected by the Soviets of Workers', Peasants' and Soldiers'
     Deputies, there can be no antagonism between the government and the
     mass of the workers, just as there is no antagonism between the
     administration of the union and the general assembly of its members,
     and, therefore, there cannot be any grounds for fearing the
     appointment of members of the commanding staff by the organs of the
     Soviet Power." [Work, Discipline, Order]

   He made the same comments with regard the factory committees:

     "It would be a most crying error to confuse the question as to the
     supremacy of the proletariat with the question of boards of workers
     at the head of factories. The dictatorship of the proletariat is
     expressed in the abolition of private property in the means of
     production, in the supremacy of the collective will of the workers
     [a euphemism for the Party -- M.B.] and not at all in the form in
     which individual economic organisations are administered." [quoted
     by Maurice Brinton, Op. Cit., p. 66]

   This point is reiterated in his essay, "Bolshevism and Stalinism"
   (written in 1937) when he argued that:

     "Those who propose the abstraction of Soviets to the party
     dictatorship should understand that only thanks to the party
     dictatorship were the Soviets able to lift themselves out of the mud
     of reformism and attain the state form of the proletariat."
     [Trotsky, Op. Cit., p. 18]

   And, obviously, without party dictatorship the soviets would return to
   the "mud." In other words, the soviets are only important to attain
   party rule and if the two come into conflict then Trotskyism provides
   the rule of the party with an ideological justification to eliminate
   soviet democracy. Lenin's and Trotsky's politics allowed them to argue
   that if you let the proletariat have a say then the dictatorship of the
   proletariat could be in danger.

   Thus, for Trotsky, the "dictatorship of the proletariat" is independent
   of allowing the proletariat to manage their own affairs directly.
   However, without the means of manage their own affairs directly,
   control their own lives, the proletariat are placed into the position
   of passive electors, who vote for parties who rule for and over them,
   in their own name. Moreover, they face the constant danger of the
   "vanguard" nullifying even these decisions as "temporary vacillations."
   A fine liberation indeed.

   Also, as libertarian socialist Maurice Brinton argues, none of the
   Bolshevik leaders "saw the proletarian nature of the Russian regime as
   primarily and crucially dependent on the exercise of workers' power at
   the point of production (i.e. workers' management of production). It
   should have been obvious to them as Marxists that if the working class
   did not hold economic power, its 'political' power would at best be
   insecure and would in fact degenerate." [Op. Cit., p. 42]

   With direct working class sovereignty eroded by the Bolsheviks in the
   name of indirect, i.e. party, sovereignty it is hardly surprising that
   the dictatorship of the proletariat becomes the dictatorship over the
   proletariat as Bakunin predicted. With the elimination of functional
   democracy and self-management, indirect democracy would not be able to
   survive for long in the face of centralised, top-down decision making
   by the ruling party.

   So hopeless was Trotsky's understanding of socialism and the nature of
   a working class social revolution that he even considered the Stalinist
   dictatorship to be an expression of the "dictatorship of the
   proletariat." He argued that the "bureaucracy has expropriated the
   proletariat politically in order to guard its social conquests with its
   own methods. The anatomy of society is determined by its economic
   relations. So long as the forms of property that have been created by
   the October Revolution are not overthrown, the proletariat remains the
   ruling class." [The Class Nature of the Soviet State]

   Just to stress the point, according to Trotsky, under Stalinism the
   proletariat was the ruling class and that Stalin's dictatorship
   eliminated what remained (and it was not much) of working class
   political influence in order "to guard its social conquests"! What
   social conquests could remain if the proletariat was under the heel of
   a totalitarian dictatorship? Just one, state ownership of property --
   precisely the means by which the (state) bureaucracy enforced its
   control over production and so the source of its economic power (and
   privileges). To state the obvious, if the working class does not
   control the property it is claimed to own then someone else does. The
   economic relationship thus generated is a hierarchical one, in which
   the working class is an oppressed class. Thus Trotsky identified the
   source of the bureaucracy's economic power with "socialism" -- no
   wonder his analysis of Stalinism (and vision of socialism) proved so
   disastrous.

   Trotsky argues that the "liberal-anarchist thought closes its eyes to
   the fact that the Bolshevik revolution, with all its repressions, meant
   an upheaval of social relations in the interests of the masses, whereas
   Stalin's Thermidorian upheaval accompanies the reconstruction of Soviet
   society in the interest of a privileged minority." [Stalinism and
   Bolshevism] However, social relations are just that, social and so
   between individuals and classes -- ownership of property cannot tell
   the whole story. What social relations did Bolshevism bring about?

   As far as the wage labour social relationship goes (and do not forget
   that is the defining feature of capitalism), the Bolsheviks opposed
   workers' self-management in favour of, first, "control" over the
   capitalists and then one-man management. No change in social
   relationships there. Property relations did change in the sense that
   the state became the owner of capital rather than individual
   capitalists, but the social relationship workers experienced during the
   working day and within society was identical. The state bureaucrat
   replaced the capitalist.

   As for politics, the Bolshevik revolution replaced government with
   government. Initially, it was an elected government and so it had the
   typical social relationships of representative government. Later, it
   became a one party dictatorship -- a situation that did not change
   under Stalin. Thus the social relationships there, again, did not
   change. The Bolshevik Party became the head of the government. That is
   all. This event also saw the reconstruction of Soviet Society in the
   interest of a privileged minority -- it is well known that the
   Communists gave themselves the best rations, best premises and so on.

   Thus the Bolshevik revolution did not change the social relations
   people faced and so Trotsky's comments are wishful thinking. The
   "interests of the masses" could not, and were not, defended by the
   Bolshevik revolution as it did not change the relations of authority in
   a society -- the social relationships people experienced remain
   unchanged. Perhaps that is why Lenin argued that the proletarian nature
   of the Russian regime was ensured by the nature of the ruling party?
   There could be no other basis for saying the Bolshevik state was a
   workers' state. After all, nationalised property without workers'
   self-management does not change social relationships it just changes
   who is telling the workers what to do.

   The important point to note is that Trotsky argued that the proletariat
   could be a ruling class when it had no political influence, never mind
   democracy, when subject to a one-party state and bureaucratic
   dictatorship and when the social relations of the society were
   obviously capitalistic. No wonder he found it impossible to recognise
   that dictatorship by the party did not equal dictatorship by the
   proletariat.

   Therefore, the claim that Trotskyists see the "dictatorship of the
   proletariat" as "the rule of one class over another" is, as can be
   seen, a joke. Rather they see it as the rule of the party over the rest
   of society, including the working class. Even when that party had
   become a bureaucratic nightmare, murdering millions and sending
   hundreds of thousands to forced labour camps, Trotsky still argued that
   the "working class" was still the "ruling class." Not only that, his
   political perspective allowed him to justify the suppression of
   workers' democracy in the name of the "rule" of the workers. For this
   reason, anarchists feel that the real utopians are the Leninists who
   believe that party rule equals class rule and that centralised,
   hierarchical power in the hands of the few will not become a new form
   of class rule. History, we think, supports our politics on this issue
   (as in so many others).

   Mitchinson argues that "Anarchism's utopian calls to abolish the state
   overnight demonstrates neither the understanding of what the state is,
   nor the programme of action necessary to achieve the goal it sets
   itself." However, as made clear, it is Marxism which is utopian,
   believing that rule by a party equals rule by a class and that a state
   machine can be utilised by the majority of the population. As Kropotkin
   argued, Anarchists "maintain that the State organisation, having been
   the force to which minorities resorted for establishing and organising
   their power over the masses, cannot be the force which will serve to
   destroy these privileges." [Kropotkin's Revolutionary Pamphlets, p.
   170]

   Luigi Fabbri sums up the difference well:

     "The mistake of authoritarian communists in this connection is the
     belief that fighting and organising are impossible without
     submission to a government; and thus they regard anarchists . . . as
     the foes of all organisation and all co-ordinated struggle. We, on
     the other hand, maintain that not only are revolutionary struggle
     and revolutionary organisation possible outside and in spite of
     government interference but that, indeed, that is the only effective
     way to struggle and organise, for it has the active participation of
     all members of the collective unit, instead of their passively
     entrusting themselves to the authority of the supreme leaders."
     ["Anarchy and 'Scientific' Communism", in The Poverty of Statism,
     pp. 13-49, Albert Meltzer (ed.), p. 27]

   Mitchinson moves on to the usual Marxist slander that as "a modern
   philosophy anarchism developed in the 19th century alongside the
   explosive growth of capitalism and its state machine. It represented a
   rebellion by a section of the petty bourgeoisie at the loss of their
   position in society, driven to the wall by the growth of monopoly." We
   have refuted this assertion in another appendix ([5]Reply to errors and
   distortions in David McNally's pamphlet "Socialism from Below") and so
   will not do so here.

14. Why do anarchists reject the Marxist notion of "conquest of power"?

   Mitchinson now decides to quote some anarchists to back up his spurious
   argument:

     "Their case was argued by Mikhail Bakunin and his supporters in the
     First International. At an anarchist conference in 1872 they argued
     'The aspirations of the proletariat can have no other aim than the
     creation of an absolutely free economic organisation and federation
     based on work and equality and wholly independent of any political
     government, and such an organisation can only come into being
     through the spontaneous action of the proletariat itself...no
     political organisation can be anything but the organisation of rule
     in the interests of a class and to the detriment of the masses...the
     proletariat, should it seize power, would become a ruling, and
     exploiting, class...'"

   To understand this passage it is necessary to place it in historical
   context. In 1872, the proletariat was a minority class within all
   nations bar the UK. In almost all nations, the majority of the working
   class were either artisans or peasants (hence the reference to "the
   masses"). To urge that the proletariat seize power meant to advocate
   the class rule of a minority of the working masses. Minority rule could
   be nothing else but the dictatorship of a minority over the majority (a
   dictatorship in the usual sense of the word), and dictatorships always
   become exploitative of the general population.

   Thus Mitchinson's "analysis" is ahistoric and, fundamentally,
   unscientific and a mockery of materialism.

   Moreover, anarchists like Bakunin also made clear that the Marxist
   notion of "proletarian dictatorship" did not even mean that the
   proletariat as a whole would exercise power. In his words:

     "What does it mean, 'the proletariat raised to a governing class?'
     Will the entire proletariat head the government? The Germans number
     about 40 million. Will all 40 million be members of the government?
     The entire nation will rule, but no one would be ruled. Then there
     will be no government, there will be no state; but if there is a
     state, there will also be those who are ruled, there will be slaves.

     "In the Marxists' theory this dilemma is resolved in a simple
     fashion. By popular government they mean government of the people by
     a small number of representatives elected by the people. So-called
     popular representatives and rulers of the state elected by the
     entire nation on the basis of universal suffrage -- the last word of
     the Marxists, as well as the democratic school -- is a lie behind
     which the despotism of a ruling minority is concealed, a lie all the
     more dangerous in that it represents itself as the expression of a
     sham popular will.

     "So . . . it always comes down to the same dismal result: government
     of the vast majority of the people by a privileged minority. But
     this minority, the Marxists say, will consist of workers. Yes,
     perhaps, of former workers, who, as soon as they become rulers or
     representatives of the people will cease to be workers and will
     begin to look upon the whole workers' world from the heights of the
     state. They will no longer represent the people but themselves and
     their own pretensions to govern the people."
     [Statism and Anarchy, p. 178]

   Thus anarchists reject the notion of the dictatorship of the
   proletariat for two reasons. Firstly, because it excluded the bulk of
   the working masses when it was first used by Marx and Engels. Secondly,
   because in practice it would mean the dictatorship of the party over
   the proletariat. Needless to say, Mitchinson does not mention these
   points.

   Mitchinson argues that "[a]lthough this sounds radical enough it
   nonetheless amounts to a recipe for inaction and disaster." And quotes
   Trotsky to explain why:

     "To renounce the conquest of power is voluntarily to leave the power
     with those who wield it, the exploiters. The essence of every
     revolution consisted and consists in putting a new class in power,
     thus enabling it to realise its own programme in life. It is
     impossible to wage war and to reject victory. It is impossible to
     lead the masses towards insurrection without preparing for the
     conquest of power."

   For anarchists the question immediately is, "power to who"? As is clear
   from the writings of Lenin and Trotsky they see the "conquest of power"
   not in terms of "putting a new class in power" but, in fact, the
   representatives of that class, the vanguard party, into power.
   Anarchists, in contrast, argue that organs of working class
   self-management are the means of creating and defending a social
   revolution as it is the only means that the mass of people can actually
   run their own lives and any power over and above these organs means
   dictatorship over the working class, a new form of state and class
   power.

   As Rudolf Rocker argues:

     "Let no one object that the 'dictatorship of the proletariat' cannot
     be compared to run of the mill dictatorship because it is the
     dictatorship of a class. Dictatorship of a class cannot exist as
     such, for it ends up, in the last analysis, as being the
     dictatorship of a given party which arrogates to itself the right to
     speak for that class. Thus, the liberal bourgeoisie, in their fight
     against despotism, used to speak in the name of the 'people'. . .

     "We already know that a revolution cannot be made with rosewater.
     And we know, too, that the owning classes will never yield up their
     privileges spontaneously. On the day of victorious revolution the
     workers will have to impose their will on the present owners of the
     soil, of the subsoil and of the means of production, which cannot be
     done -- let us be clear on this -- without the workers taking the
     capital of society into their own hands, and, above all, without
     their having demolished the authoritarian structure which is, and
     will continue to be, the fortress keeping the masses of the people
     under dominion. Such an action is, without doubt, an act of
     liberation; a proclamation of social justice; the very essence of
     social revolution, which has nothing in common with the utterly
     bourgeois principle of dictatorship.

     "The fact that a large number of socialist parties have rallied to
     the idea of councils, which is the proper mark of libertarian
     socialist and revolutionary syndicalists, is a confession,
     recognition that the tack they have taken up until now has been the
     product of a falsification, a distortion, and that with the councils
     the labour movement must create for itself a single organ capable of
     carrying into effect the unmitigated socialism that the conscious
     proletariat longs for. On the other hand, it ought not to be
     forgotten that this abrupt conversion runs the risk of introducing
     many alien features into the councils concept, features, that is,
     with no relation to the original tasks of socialism, and which have
     to be eliminated because they pose a threat to the further
     development of the councils. These alien elements are able only to
     conceive things from the dictatorial viewpoint. It must be our task
     to face up to this risk and warn our class comrades against
     experiments which cannot bring the dawn of social emancipation any
     nearer -- which indeed, to the contrary, positively postpone it.

     "Consequently, our advice is as follows: Everything for the councils
     or soviets! No power above them! A slogan which at the same time
     will be that of the social revolutionary."
     [Anarchism and Sovietism]

   Or, as the Bakunin influenced Jura Federation of the First
   International put it in 1874, "the dictatorship that we want is one
   which the insurgent masses exercise directly, without intermediary of
   any committee or government." [quoted by Peter Marshall, Demanding the
   Impossible, p. 631] In other words, a situation in which the working
   masses defend their freedom, their control over their own lives, from
   those who seek to replace it with minority rule.

15. What caused the degeneration of the Russian Revolution?

   Mitchinson argues that:

     "Anarchists see in the degeneration of the Soviet Union into a
     totalitarian dictatorship proof that Bakunin was right. In reality,
     only Leon Trotsky and Marxism have been able to explain the causes
     of that degeneration, finding its roots not in men's heads or
     personalities, but in the real life conditions of civil war, armies
     of foreign intervention, and the defeat of revolution in Europe."

   Needless to say, anarchism explains the causes of the degeneration in a
   far more rich way than Mitchinson claims. The underlying assumption of
   his "critique" of anarchism is that the politics of the Bolsheviks had
   no influence on the outcome of the revolution -- it was a product
   purely of objective forces. He also subscribes to the contradictory
   idea that Bolshevik politics were essential for the success of that
   revolution. The facts of the matter is that people are faced with
   choices, choices that arise from the objective conditions that they
   face. What decisions they make will be influenced by the ideas they
   hold -- they will not occur automatically, as if people were on
   auto-pilot -- and their ideas are shaped by the social relationships
   they experience. Thus, someone placed into a position of power over
   others will act in certain ways, have a certain world view, which would
   be alien to someone subject to egalitarian social relations.

   So, obviously the "ideas in people's heads" matter, particularly during
   a revolution. Someone in favour of centralisation, centralised power
   and who equates party rule with class rule (like Lenin and Trotsky),
   will act in ways (and create structures) totally different from someone
   who believes in decentralisation and federalism. In other words,
   political ideas do matter in society. Nor do anarchists leave our
   analysis at this obvious fact -- as noted, we also argue that the types
   of organisation people create and work in shapes the way they think and
   act. This is because specific kinds of organisation have specific
   authority relations and so generate specific social relationships.
   These obviously affect those subject to them -- a centralised,
   hierarchical system will create authoritarian social relationships
   which shape those within it in totally different ways than a
   decentralised, egalitarian system. That Mitchinson denies this obvious
   fact suggests he knows nothing of materialist philosophy.

   Moreover, anarchists are aware of the problems facing the revolution.
   After all, anarchists were involved in that revolution and wrote some
   of the best works on that revolution (for example, Voline's The Unknown
   Revolution, Arshinov's The History of the Makhnovist Movement and
   Maximov's The Guillotine at Work). However, they point to the obvious
   fact that the politics of the Bolsheviks played a key role in how the
   revolution developed. While the terrible objective conditions may have
   shaped certain aspects of the actions of the Bolsheviks it cannot be
   denied that the impulse for them were rooted in Bolshevik theory. After
   all, anarchist theory could not justify the suppression of the
   functional democracy associated with the factory committees or the
   soldiers election of officers in the Red Army. Bolshevik theory could,
   and did.

   Indeed, Trotsky was still claiming in 1937 that the "Bolshevik party
   achieved in the civil war the correct combination of military art and
   Marxist politics." [Stalinism and Bolshevism] In other words, the
   Bolshevik policies implemented during the Civil War were the correct,
   Marxist, ones. Also, although Lenin described the NEP (New Economic
   Policy) of 1921 as a 'defeat', at no stage did he describe the
   suppression of soviet democracy and workers' control in such language.
   In other words, Bolshevik politics did play a role, a key role, in the
   degeneration of the Russian Revolution and to deny it is to deny
   reality. In the words of Maurice Brinton:

     "[I]n relation to industrial policy there is a clear-cut and
     incontrovertible link between what happened under Lenin and Trotsky
     and the later practice of Stalinism. We know that many on the
     revolutionary left will find this statement hard to swallow. We are
     convinced however that any honest reading of the facts cannot but
     lead to this conclusion. The more one unearths about this period
     [1917-21], the more difficult it becomes to define -- or even see --
     the 'gulf' allegedly separating what happened in Lenin's time from
     what happened later. Real knowledge of the facts also makes it
     impossible to accept . . . that the whole course of events was
     'historically inevitable' and 'objectively determined.' Bolshevik
     ideology and practice were themselves important and sometimes
     decisive factors in the equation, at every critical stage of this
     critical period." [Op. Cit., p. 84]

   We should also point out that far from "Leon Trotsky and Marxism"
   explaining the degeneration of the Russian revolution, Trotsky could
   not understand that a "totalitarian dictatorship" could be an
   expression of a new minority class and presented a decidedly false
   analysis of the Soviet Union as a "degenerated workers' state." That
   analysis led numerous Trotskyists to support these dictatorships and
   oppose workers' revolts against them. In addition, Trotsky's own
   reservations were only really voiced after he had lost power. Moreover,
   he never acknowledged how his own policies (such as the elimination of
   soldiers democracy, the militarisation of labour, etc.) played a key
   role in the rise of the bureaucracy and Stalin.

   Ultimately, every explanation of the degeneration of the Russian
   revolution by Trotskyists ends up as an appeal to "exception
   circumstances" -- they blame the rise of Stalinism on the Civil War, to
   the "exceptional circumstances" created by that war. This can be
   faulted for two reasons.

   Firstly, as Trotsky himself argued (with respect to the Spanish
   Anarchists) "did not the leaders of German social democracy invoke, in
   their time, the same excuse? Naturally, civil war is not a peaceful and
   ordinary but an 'exceptional circumstance.' . . . we do severely blame
   the anarchist theory, which seemed wholly suitable for times of peace,
   but had to be dropped rapidly as soon as the 'exceptional circumstance'
   of the . . . revolution had begun." [Stalinism and Bolshevism] Needless
   to say, he did not apply his critique to his own politics, which were
   also a form of the "exceptional circumstances" excuse. Given how
   quickly Bolshevik "principles" (as expressed in The State and
   Revolution) were dropped, we can only assume that Bolshevik ideas are
   also suitable purely for "times of peace" as well.

   Secondly, this "explanation" basically argues that, if the bourgeois
   did not defend their power in 1917, then Leninism would have worked out
   fine. As Mitchinson himself noted above, belief that the bourgeois will
   just go away without a fight is "an infantile flight of fancy." As
   Lenin argued, "revolution . . ., in its development, would give rise to
   exceptionally complicated circumstances" and "[r]evolution is the
   sharpest, most furious, desperate class war and civil war. Not a single
   great revolution in history has escaped civil war. No one who does not
   live in a shell could imagine that civil war is conceivable without
   exceptionally complicated circumstances." [Will the Bolsheviks Maintain
   Power?, p. 80 and p. 81]

   If the Civil War did solely produce the degeneration of the Russian
   Revolution then all we can hope for is that in the next social
   revolution, the civil war Lenin argued was inevitable is not as
   destructive as the Russian one. Hope is not much of a basis to build a
   "scientific" socialism -- but then again, neither is "fate" much of a
   basis to explain the degeneration of the Russian Revolution but that is
   what Trotskyists do argue.

   We discuss the Russian Revolution in more detail in the appendix on
   [6]" What happened during the Russian Revolution?" of the FAQ and will
   not do so here. However, we can point out the experience of the
   anarchist Makhnovist movement in the Ukraine during the Russian
   Revolution. Facing exactly the same objective conditions they
   encouraged soviet democracy, held regular congresses of workers and
   peasants (the Bolsheviks tried to ban two of them), defended freedom of
   the press and of association and so on. If objective conditions
   determined Bolshevik policies, why did they not also determine the
   policies of the Makhnovists? This practical example indicates that the
   usual Trotskyist explanation of the degeneration of the Revolution is
   false.

   Perhaps it is because of this, that it showed an alternative to
   Bolshevik politics existed and worked, that Trotskyists slander it?
   Trotsky himself asserted that the Makhnovists were simply "kulaks" on
   horseback and that Makhno's "followers . . . [expressed] a militant
   anti-Semitism." [Lenin and Trotsky, Kronstadt, p. 80] We discuss the
   Makhnovist movement in the appendix on [7]"Why does the Makhnovist
   movement show there is an alternative to Bolshevism?" of the FAQ and
   there we refute claims that the Makhnovist movement was a kulak (rich
   peasant) one. However, the charge of "militant anti-Semitism" is a
   serious one and so we will expose its falsehood here and well as in
   [8]section 9 of the specified appendix.

   The best source to refute claims of anti-Semitism is to quote the work
   of the Jewish anarchist Voline. He summarises the extensive evidence
   against such claims:

     "We could cover dozens of pages with extensive and irrefutable
     proofs of the falseness of these assertions. We could mention
     articles and proclamations by Makhno and the Council of
     Revolutionary Insurgents denouncing anti-Semitism. We could tell of
     spontaneous acts by Makhno himself and other insurgents against the
     slightest manifestation of the anti-Semitic spirit on the part of a
     few isolated and misguided unfortunates in the army and the
     population. . . One of the reasons for the execution of Grigoriev by
     the Makhnovists was his anti-Semitism and the immense pogrom he
     organised at Elizabethgrad. . . We could cite a whole series of
     similar facts, but we do not find it necessary . . . and will
     content ourselves with mentioning briefly the following essential
     facts:

     "1. A fairly important part in the Makhnovist movement was played by
     revolutionists of Jewish origin.

     "2. Several members of the Education and Propaganda Commission were
     Jewish.

     "3. Besides many Jewish combatants in various units of the army,
     there was a battery composed entirely of Jewish artillery men and a
     Jewish infantry unit.

     "4. Jewish colonies in the Ukraine furnished many volunteers to the
     Insurrectionary Army.

     "5. In general the Jewish population . . . took an active part in
     all the activities of the movement. The Jewish agricultural colonies
     . . . participated in the regional assemblies of workers, peasants
     and partisans; they sent their delegates to the regional
     Revolutionary Military Council. . ."
     [The Unknown Revolution, pp. 967-8]

   Voline also quotes the eminent Jewish writer and historian M.
   Tcherikover about the question of the Makhnovists and anti-Semitism.
   The Jewish historian states "with certainty that, on the whole, the
   behaviour of Makhno's army cannot be compared with that of the other
   armies which were operating in Russian during the events 1917-21 . . .
   It is undeniable that, of all these armies, including the Red Army, the
   Makhnovists behaved best with regard the civil population in general
   and the Jewish population in particular . . . The proportion of
   justified complaints against the Makhnovist army, in comparison with
   the others, is negligible. . . Do not speak of pogroms alleged to have
   been organised by Makhno himself. That is a slander or an error.
   Nothing of the sort occurred. As for the Makhnovist Army . . . [n]ot
   once have I been able to prove the existence of a Makhnovist unit at
   the place a pogrom against the Jews took place. Consequently, the
   pogroms in question could not have been the work of the Makhnovists."
   [quoted by Voline, Op. Cit., p. 699]

   Given that the Red Army agreed to two pacts with the Makhnovists, we
   can only surmise, if Trotsky thought he was telling the truth, that
   Trotsky was a hypocrite. However, Trotsky was either consciously lying
   or in error -- unfortunately the Trotskyist publishers of his words did
   not bother to note that his assertion was false. We are sorry for this
   slight digression, but many Trotskyists take Trotsky's words at face
   value and repeat his slander -- unless we indicate their false nature
   they may not take our argument seriously.

   Mitchinson continues by stating:

     "The position of anarchism only serves to endorse the bourgeois
     slander that Stalinism was inherent in Bolshevism."

   This appeal against slander is ironic from someone who writes an
   article full of it. But, of course, it is bourgeois slander that he
   objects too -- Trotskyist slander (and falsification) is fine.

   The question of whether it is a "bourgeois slander" to argue (with
   supporting evidence) that "Stalinism was inherent in Bolshevism" is an
   important one. Trotskyists often point out that anarchist and
   libertarian Marxist critiques of Bolshevism sound similar to bourgeois
   ones and that anarchist accounts of Bolshevik crimes against the
   revolution and working class give ammunition to the defenders of the
   status quo. However, this seems more like an attempt to stop critical
   analysis of the Russian Revolution than a serious political position.
   Yes, the bourgeois do argue that Stalinism was inherent in Bolshevism
   -- however they do so to discredit all forms of socialism and radical
   social change. Anarchists, on the other hand, analyse the revolution,
   see how the Bolsheviks acted and draw conclusions from the facts in
   order to push forward revolutionary thought, tactics and ideas. Just
   because the conclusions are similar does not mean that they are invalid
   -- to label criticism of Bolshevism as "bourgeois slander" is nothing
   less than attempt to put people off investigating the Russian
   Revolution.

   There is are course essential differences between the "bourgeois
   slanders" against the Bolsheviks and the anarchist critique. The
   bourgeois slander is based on an opposition to the revolution as such
   while the anarchist critique affirms it. The bourgeois slanders are not
   the result of the experiences of the working masses and revolutionaries
   subject to the Bolshevik regime as the anarchist is. Similarly, the
   bourgeois slanders ignore the nature of capitalist society while the
   anarchist critique points out that the degeneration of the Bolshevik
   state and party were a result of it not breaking with bourgeois ideas
   and organisational structures. Ultimately, it is not a case of
   "bourgeois slanders" but rather an honest evaluation of the events of
   the Russian Revolution from a working class perspective.

   To use an analogy, it is common place for the bourgeois press and
   ideologists to attack trade unions as being bureaucratic and
   unresponsive to the needs of their members. It is also common place for
   members of those same trade unions to think exactly the same. Indeed,
   it is a common refrain of Trotskyists that the trade unions are
   bureaucratic and need to be reformed in a more democratic fashion
   (indeed, Mitchinson calls for the unions to be "transformed" in his
   essay). Needless to say, the bourgeois comments are "correct" in the
   sense that the trade unions do have a bureaucracy -- their reasons for
   stating that truth serve their interests and their solutions aid those
   interests and not those of the members of the unions. Could a
   Trotskyist say that it was a "bourgeois slander" if the capitalist
   press point to the bureaucratic nature of the unions when their own
   papers do the same?

   While it may be in the interests of the ruling elite and its apologists
   to scream about "bourgeois slanders", it hinders the process of working
   class self-emancipation to do so. As intended, in all likelihood.

16. Did anarchists reject "the need for organisation in the shape of trade
unions"?

   Mitchinson now decides to "expose" anarchism:

     "In its early days, this modern anarchism found a certain support
     amongst the workers. However, through the course of struggle workers
     learned the need for organisation in the shape of the trade unions,
     and also for political organisation which led to the building of the
     mass workers parties."

   To see the total nonsense of this claim we need only to turn to Marx.
   In his words, Bakunin thought that the "working class . . . must only
   organise themselves by trades-unions." [Marx, Engels and Lenin,
   Anarchism and Anarcho-Syndicalism, p. 48] Bakunin himself argued "the
   natural organisation of the masses . . . is organisation based on the
   various ways that their various types of work define their day-to-day
   life; it is organisation by trade association." [The Basic Bakunin, p.
   139] Kropotkin argued that the "union [syndicat] is absolutely
   necessary. It is the only form of workers' grouping which permits the
   direct struggle to be maintained against capital without falling into
   parliamentarism." [quoted by Caroline Cahm, Kropotkin and the Rise of
   Revolutionary Anarchism, p. 269]

   So much for anarchism being against trade unions (as Mitchinson
   implies). As for mass workers parties, well, history proved Bakunin
   right -- such parties became corrupted, bureaucratic and reformist. For
   Mitchinson the last 130 years have not existed.

   He goes on to argue that "Bakunin and co. denounced participation in
   parliament, or the fight for reforms as a betrayal of the revolution,
   they 'rejected all political action not having as its immediate and
   direct objective the triumph of the workers over capitalism, and as a
   consequence, the abolition of the state.'"

   We must first note that the Bakunin quote presented does not support
   Mitchinson's assertions -- unless you think that reforms can only be
   won via participation in parliament (something anarchists reject). The
   reason why Bakunin rejected "all political action" (i.e. bourgeois
   politics -- electioneering in other words) is not explained. We will
   now do so.

   Bakunin did denounce participation in parliament. History proved him
   right. Participation in parliament ensured the corruption of the Social
   Democratic Parties, the Greens and a host of other radical and
   socialist organisations. Mitchinson seems to have forgotten the fights
   against reformism that continually occurred in the Social Democratic
   Parties at end of the nineteenth and start of the twentieth centuries,
   a fight which ended with the defeat of the revolutionary wing and the
   decision to support the nation state in the first world war. The actual
   experience of using parliament confirmed Bakunin's prediction that when
   "the workers . . . send common workers . . . to Legislative Assemblies
   . . . The worker-deputies, transplanted into a bourgeois environment,
   into an atmosphere of purely bourgeois ideas, will in fact cease to be
   workers and, becoming Statesmen, they will become bourgeois . . . For
   men do not make their situations; on the contrary, men are made by
   them." [The Basic Bakunin, p. 108]

   What is not true, however, is that claim that Bakunin thought that "the
   fight for reforms [w]as a betrayal of the revolution." Bakunin was a
   firm believer in the importance of struggles for reforms, but struggles
   of a specific kind -- namely struggles to win reforms which are based
   on the direct action by workers themselves:

     "What policy should the International [Workers' Association] follow
     during th[e] somewhat extended time period that separates us from
     this terrible social revolution . . . the International will give
     labour unrest in all countries an essentially economic character,
     with the aim of reducing working hours and increasing salary, by
     means of the association of the working masses . . . It will [also]
     propagandise its principles . . . [Op. Cit., p. 109]

     "And indeed, as soon as a worker believes that the economic state of
     affairs can be radically transformed in the near future, he begins
     to fight, in association with his comrades, for the reduction of his
     working hours and for an increase in his salary. . . through
     practice and action . . . the progressive expansion and development
     of the economic struggle will bring him more and more to recognise
     his true enemies: the privileged classes, including the clergy, the
     bourgeois, and the nobility; and the State, which exists only to
     safeguard all the privileges of those classes."
     [Op. Cit., p. 103]

   This argument for reforms by direct action and workers' associations
   was a basic point of agreement in those sections of the First
   International which supported Bakunin's ideas. In the words of an
   anarchist member of the Jura Federation writing in 1875:

     "Instead of begging the State for a law compelling employers to make
     them work only so many hours, the trade associations directly impose
     this reform on the employers; in this way, instead of a legal text
     which remains a dead letter, a real economic change is effected by
     the direct initiative of the workers . . . if the workers devoted
     all their activity and energy to the organisation of their trades
     into societies of resistance, trade federations, local and regional,
     if, by meetings, lectures, study circles, papers and pamphlets, they
     kept up a permanent socialist and revolutionary agitation; if by
     linking practice to theory, they realised directly, without any
     bourgeois and governmental intervention, all immediately possible
     reforms, reforms advantageous not to a few workers but to the
     labouring mass -- certainly then the cause of labour would be better
     served than . . . legal agitation." [quoted by Caroline Cahm,
     Kropotkin and the Rise of Revolutionary Anarchism, p. 226]

   So much for Bakunin or the libertarian wing of the First International
   being against reforms or the struggle for reforms. Anarchists have not
   changed their minds on this issue.

17. Why do anarchists reject political activity?

   After spreading falsehoods against Bakunin, Mitchinson states that:

     "Marxism fights for the conquest of political power by the working
     class and the building of a socialist society, under which the state
     will wither away.

     "Until then should workers refrain from political activity? Should
     they reject all reforms that might improve their existence? Nothing
     would please Blair or the bosses more."

   It is ironic that Mitchinson mentions Blair. He is, after all, the
   leader of the Labour Party -- as mass workers party formed from the
   trade unions to use political action to gain reforms within capitalism.
   The current state of Labour indicates well the comment that "in
   proportion as the socialists become a power in the present bourgeois
   society and State, their socialism must die out." [Kropotkin,
   Kropotkin's Revolutionary Pamphlets, p. 189] It is as if the history of
   Social Democracy (or even the German Greens) does not exist for
   Mitchinson -- he points to Blair to refute anarchist analysis that
   Parliamentary politics corrupts the parties that use it! How strange,
   to ignore the results of socialists actually using "political activity"
   (and we must stress that anarchists traditionally use the term
   "political action" to refer to electioneering, i.e. bourgeois politics,
   only). Obviously reality is something which can be ignored when
   creating a political theory.

   Needless to say, as noted above, anarchists do not "reject all
   reforms." We have quoted Bakunin, now we quote Kropotkin -- "the
   Anarchists have always advised taking an active part in those workers'
   organisations which carry on the direct struggle of Labour against
   Capital and its protector, the State." He continued by arguing that
   such struggle, "better than any other indirect means, permits the
   worker to obtain some temporary improvements in the present conditions
   of work, while it opens his eyes to the evil done by Capitalism and the
   State that supports it, and wakes up his thoughts concerning the
   possibility of organising consumption, production, and exchange without
   the intervention of the capitalist and the State." [Evolution and
   Environment, pp. 82-3]

   Thus we do not think that political action (electioneering) equates to
   reforms nor even is the best means of winning reforms in the first
   place. Anarchists argue that by direct action we can win reforms.

   Mitchinson continues his diatribe:

     "Of course not, we must advocate the struggle for every gain no
     matter how minor, and use any and every field open to us. Only the
     dilettante can reject better wages or a health care system.
     Precisely through these struggles, and the struggles to transform
     the workers organisations the unions and the parties, we learn and
     become more powerful and bring closer the day when it will be
     possible to transform society for good."

   As noted, anarchists do not reject reforms. Only a dilettante
   misrepresents the position of his enemies. And, as can be seen from the
   above quotes by Bakunin and Kropotkin, anarchists agree with
   Mitchinson's comments. Anarchists agree on the need to win reforms by
   direct action, which necessitates the creation of new forms of working
   class organisation based on firm libertarian principles and tactics --
   organisations like workers' councils, factory committees, community
   assemblies and so on.

   However, when looking at the fields of struggle open to us, we evaluate
   them based on a materialist basis -- looking at the implications of the
   tactics in theory and how they actually worked out in practice.
   Mitchinson obviously refuses to do this. Anarchists, on the other hand,
   base their politics on such an evaluation. For example, Bakunin would
   have been aware of Proudhon's experiences in the French National
   Assembly during the 1848 revolution:

     "As soon as I set foot in the parliamentary Sinai, I ceased to be in
     touch with the masses; because I was absorbed by my legislative
     work, I entirely lost sight of current events . . . One must have
     lived in that isolator which is called the National Assembly to
     realise how the men who are most completely ignorant of the state of
     the country are almost always those who represent it . . . fear of
     the people is the sickness of all those who belong to authority; the
     people, for those in power, are the enemy." [Proudhon, quoted by
     Peter Marshall, Demanding the Impossible, p. 244]

   Similarly, the practical experiences of a socialist elected into
   Parliament would be easy to predict -- they would be swamped by
   bourgeois politics, issues and activities. Anarchism gained such
   socialists elected to parliament as Johann Most and Ferdinand
   Nieuwenhuis who soon released the correctness of the anarchist
   analysis. Thus actual experience confirmed the soundness of anarchist
   politics. Mitchinson, on the other hand, has to deny history -- indeed,
   he fails to mention the history of Social Democracy at all in his
   article.

   Thus the claim that we should use "every field open to us" is
   idealistic nonsense, at total odds with any claim to use scientific
   techniques of analysis (i.e. to being a scientific socialist) or a
   supporter of materialist philosophy. It means the rejection of
   historical analysis and the embrace of ahistoric wishful thinking.

   Moreover, why do the workers need to "transform" their own
   organisations in the first place? Perhaps because they are bureaucratic
   organisations in which power is centralised at the top, in a few hands?
   Why did this happen, if fighting for reforms by any suitable means
   (including electioneering) was their rationale? Perhaps because the
   wrong people are in positions of power? But why are they the wrong
   people? Because they are right-wing, have reformist ideas, etc. Why do
   they have reformist ideas? Here Mitchinson must fall silent, because
   obviously they have reformist ideas because the organisations and
   activities they are part of are reformist through and through. The
   tactics (using elections) and organisational structure (centralisation
   of power) bred such ideas -- as Bakunin and other anarchists predicted.
   Mitchinson's politics cannot explain why this occurs, which explains
   why Lenin was so surprised when German Social Democracy supported its
   ruling class during the First World War.

18. How do anarchists struggle for reforms under capitalism?

   Mitchinson continues his distortion of anarchism by arguing:

     "Marxists fight for every reform, whilst at the same time explaining
     that while capitalism continues none of these advances are safe.
     Only socialism can really solve the problems of society."

   As noted above, anarchists also fight for every reform possible -- but
   by direct action, by the strength of working people in their "natural
   organisations" and "social power" (to use Bakunin's words). We also
   argue that reforms are always in danger -- that is why we need to have
   strong, direct action based organisations and self-reliance. If we
   leave it to leaders to protect (never mind win reforms) we would not
   have them for long. Given that Labour governments have whittled
   previous reforms just as much as Conservative ones, anarchists feel our
   strategy is the relevant one.

   Mitchinson continues:

     "Our modern day anarchists, Reclaim the Streets and others, have no
     support in Britain amongst the organised workers."

   Which is not true, as RTS and other anarchists do seek influence with
   the organised workers (and the unorganised ones, and the unemployed,
   etc.). They have invited rank-and-file trade union activists to their
   demonstrations to speak, trade unionists are members of anarchist
   organisations, etc. Anarchists are at the forefront of supporting
   strikers, particularly when their union betrays their struggle and does
   not support them. For example, during the Liverpool dockers strike RTS
   and the dockers formed a common front, organised common demonstrations
   and so on. The trade unions did nothing to support the dockers, RTS and
   other anarchist groups did. That in itself indicates the weakness of
   Mitchinson's claims. It would also be useful to point out that
   Trotskyists have little support amongst organised workers as well.

   Moreover, anarchists do not seek to become part of the trade union
   bureaucracy and so their influence cannot be easily gauged.

   After asserting these dubious "facts" about anarchist influence, he
   continues:

     "Some radicalised youth however are attracted to their 'direct
     action' stance. There is a vacuum left by the absence of a mass
     Labour youth organisation which, fighting for a socialist programme,
     could attract these young workers and students. With no lead being
     given by the tops of the unions, and Labour in government attacking
     young people, that vacuum can be temporarily and partly filled by
     groups like Reclaim the Streets."

   Needless to say, Mitchinson does not pose the question why the Labour
   government is attacking "young people" (and numerous other sections of
   the working class). Why has the Labour Party, a mass workers party
   which uses elections to gain reforms, been attacking (as it has always
   done, we must note) its support? If its because the leaders are
   "right-wing" then why have the membership supported them? Why have the
   "right-wing" gained such influence? Also, why is there no "mass Labour
   youth organisation"? And why should "young people" join an organisation
   which is part of the party which is attacking them? And why are the
   "tops of the unions" not giving a "lead"? Perhaps because its not in
   their interests to do so? Because they hate direct action and radical
   workers as much as the bosses?

   Mitchinson's "analysis" is question begging in the extreme.

   He continues:

     "What action do they propose though? In their press statement
     (2/5/00) they explain, 'We were not protesting. Under the shadow of
     an irrelevant parliament we were planting the seeds of a society
     where ordinary people are in control of their land, their resources,
     their food and their decision making. The garden symbolised an urge
     to be self-reliant rather than dependent on capitalism.'"

   Firstly, we should point out that having access to land is a key way
   for workers to be independent of capitalism. Perhaps Mitchinson forgets
   Marx's discussion of the colonies in chapter 33 of Capital? In it Marx
   discusses how access to land allowed immigrants to America and
   Australia to reject wage labour (i.e. capitalism) by providing them
   with the means to survive without selling themselves on the labour
   market to survive. The state had to be used to enforce the laws of
   supply and demand by restricting access to the land. Or, perhaps, he
   had forgotten Marx's discussion in chapter 27 of Capital of the role of
   enclosures in creating a dispossessed mass of people who were forced,
   by necessity, to become the first generation of wage slaves? Either
   way, access to the land was (and still is, in many countries) a means
   of being independent of capitalism -- and one which the state acts to
   destroy.

   Secondly, the garden was a symbol of a communist society, not an
   expression of the type of society RTS and other anarchists desire. So,
   as a symbol of a anti-capitalist vision, the garden is a good one given
   the history of state violence used to separate working people from the
   land and propel them into the labour market. However, it is only a
   symbol and not, obviously, to be taken as an example of the future
   society RTS or other anarchists desire. Only someone lacking in
   imagination could confuse a symbol with a vision -- as the press
   release states it "celebrated the possibility of a world that
   encourages co-operation and sharing rather than one which rewards
   greed, individualism and competition."

   Thirdly, as their press release states, "Guerrilla Gardening is not a
   protest; by its very nature it is a creative peaceful celebration of
   the growing global anticapitalist movement." Mitchinson attacks the
   action for being something it was never intended to be.

   He "analyses" the RTS press release:

     "The fact that parliament appears powerless to prevent job losses or
     the destruction of the environment, only demonstrates that it serves
     the interests of capitalism."

   Very true, as Kropotkin argued the "State is there to protect
   exploitation, speculation and private property; it is itself the
   by-product of the rapine of the people. The proletariat must rely on
   his own hands; he can expect nothing of the State. It is nothing more
   than an organisation devised to hinder emancipation at all costs."
   [Words of a Rebel, p. 27] He argues elsewhere that "small groups of men
   [and women] were imbued with the . . . spirit of revolt. They also
   rebelled -- sometimes with the hope of partial success; for example
   winning a strike and of obtaining bread for their children . . .
   Without the menace contained in such revolts, no serious concession has
   ever been wrung by the people from governing classes." [Evolution and
   Environment, p. 103]

   Mitchinson seems to agree:

     "However, under pressure from below it is possible to introduce
     reforms through parliament that are in the interests of ordinary
     people."

   Thus reforms are possible, but only if we rely on ourselves, organise
   pressure from below and use direct action to force parliament to act
   (if that is required). Which is what anarchists have always argued.
   Without anti-parliamentary action, parliament will ignore the
   population. That is what anarchists have always argued -- we have to
   reply on our own organisations, solidarity and direct action to change
   things for the better. Faced with such a movement, parliament would
   introduce reforms regardless of who was a member of it. Without such a
   movement, you end up with Tony Blair. Thus Mitchinson is confused -- by
   his own logic, the anarchists are correct, we have to work outside
   parliament and electioneering in order to be effective.

   He continues:

     "It is no use declaring parliament to be irrelevant, and turning
     your back on it when the majority do not agree, and still look to
     government to make their lives better. This is the mirror image of
     the sects attitude to the Labour Party. Any and every avenue which
     can be used to improve our lives must be used."

   How do you change the opinion of the majority? By changing your
   position to match theirs? Of course not. You change their position by
   argument and proving that direct action is more effective in making
   their lives better than looking to government. Mitchinson would have a
   fit if someone argued "it is no use declaring capitalism to be wrong
   and fighting against it when the majority do not agree and still look
   to it to make their lives better." If the majority do not agree with
   you, then you try and change their opinion -- you do not accept that
   opinion and hope it goes away by itself!

   Mitchinson seems to be following Lenin when he argued "[y]ou must not
   sink to the level of the masses . . . You must tell them the bitter
   truth. You are duty bound to call their bourgeois-democratic and
   parliamentary prejudices what they are -- prejudices. But at the same
   time you must soberly follow the actual state of the
   class-consciousness . . . of all the toiling masses." [Left-wing
   Communism: An Infantile Disorder, p. 41] Obviously, you cannot tell
   workers the bitter truth and at the same time follow their prejudices.
   In practice, if you follow their prejudices you cannot help but
   encourage faith in parliament, social democratic parties, leaders and
   so on. Progress is achieved by discussing issues with people, not
   ducking the question of political issues in favour of saying what the
   majority want to hear (which is what the capitalist media and education
   system encourage them to believe in the first place). As a means of
   encouraging revolutionary thought it is doomed to failure.

   Also, just to stress the point, any and every avenue which can be used
   to improve our lives must be used but only if it actually is
   revolutionary and does not place obstacles in the process of social
   change. Parliamentary action has been proven time and time again to be
   a false way for radical change -- it only ends up turning radicals into
   supporters of the status quo. It makes as much sense as arguing that
   any and every avenue must be used to cure a disease, including those
   which give you a new disease in its place.

19. How does Mitchinson distorts the use of the term "Self-reliance"?

   Mitchinson argues that:

     "In any case this 'self-reliance' is no alternative. Self-reliance
     won't get electricity into your house, educate your children or
     treat you when you are ill."

   No anarchist and no one in RTS ever claimed it would. We use the term
   "self-reliance" in a totally different way -- as anyone familiar with
   anarchist or RTS theory would know. We use it to describe individuals
   who think for themselves, question authority, act for themselves and do
   not follow leaders. No anarchist uses the term to describe some sort of
   peasant life-style. But then why let facts get in the way of a nice
   diatribe?

   He continues:

     "We have the resources to cater for all of society's needs, the only
     problem is that we do not own them."

   Actually, the real problem is that we do not control them. The examples
   of Nationalised industries and the Soviet Union should make this clear.
   In theory, they were both owned by their populations but, in practice,
   they were effectively owned by those who managed them -- state
   bureaucrats and managers. They were not used to cater for our needs,
   but rather the needs of those who controlled them. For this reason
   anarchists argue that common ownership without workers' self-management
   in the workplace and community would be little more than state
   capitalism (wage labour would still exist, but the state would replace
   the boss).

   He continues with his distortion of the concept of "self-reliance":

     "Individualism (self-reliance) cannot be an alternative to
     socialism, where all the resources of society are at all of our
     disposal, and equally we all contribute what we can to society."

   Firstly, anarchists are socialists and mostly seek a (libertarian)
   communist society where the resources of the world are at our disposal.

   Secondly, self-reliance has little to do with "individualism" -- it has
   a lot to do with individuality, however. The difference is important.

   Thirdly, in a part of the press release strangely unquoted by
   Mitchinson, RTS argue that their action "celebrated the possibility of
   a world that encourages co-operation and sharing rather than one which
   rewards greed, individualism and competition." RTS are well aware that
   self-reliance does not equal individualism and they are very clear that
   oppose individualism and desire co-operation. Given that Mitchinson
   quotes from their press release, he must know this and yet he asserts
   the opposite.

   Mitchinson seems to equate self-reliance with "individualism" and so,
   presumably, capitalism. However, capitalists do not want self-reliant
   workers, they want order takers, people who will not question their
   authority. As David Noble points out, after an experiment in workers'
   control General Electric replaces it with a the regime that was
   "designed to 'break' the pilots of their new found 'habits' of
   self-reliance, self-discipline, and self-respect." [Forces of
   Production, p. 307]

   Capitalists know the danger of self-reliant people. Self-reliant people
   question authority, think for themselves, do not follow leaders and
   bring these abilities into any groups they join. Thus self-reliance is
   not purely an individual thing, it also refers to groups and classes.
   Anarchists desire to see a self-reliant working class -- a class which
   makes its own decisions and does not follow leaders. Thus, for
   anarchists, self-reliance refers to both individuals and groups (just
   as self-management and self-liberation does). Needless to say, for
   those in authority or those seeking authority self-reliance is an evil
   thing which must be combated. Hence Mitchinson's diatribe -- it is the
   cry of the would-be leader who is afraid his followers will not respect
   his authority.

20. Is anarchism an example of "Philosophical idealism"?

   He turns to the May Day demonstration:

     "Guerrilla gardening and its related varieties that have sprung up
     in various places, is nothing more than an offshoot of the old
     utopian idea of changing society by example."

   Actually, it was a specific demonstration to encourage people to get
   involved in collective action, to have a good time and challenge
   authority and the status quo. It was an attempt to change society by
   example only in the sense that it would encourage others to act, to
   challenge the status quo and get involved in collective action. If
   Mitchinson was consistent he would have to oppose every demonstration
   that occurred before the final insurrection that created the "workers'
   state" -- a demonstration is, by its very nature, an example to others
   of what is possible, an example of our collective strength and our
   desire for change. You may be critical of the nature of the guerrilla
   gardening action (and many anarchists are), but you cannot misrepresent
   its nature as Mitchinson does and be expected to be taken seriously.

   He continues:

     "The roots of this scheme lie in idealist philosophy. Philosophical
     idealism refers to the notion that people's actions are a
     consequence of their thoughts, that ideas and not our conditions of
     life determine our outlook. When, through a long process of
     accumulation, we change people's minds, then they will live
     differently, capitalism will simply be redundant. The capitalist
     class themselves will presumably sit idly by and watch their system
     fall apart."

   Given that the "anti-capitalist" demonstrations have meet extensive
   state violence, it is clear that those involved are well aware that
   capitalist class will not just watch its power disappear.

   Also, calling RTS's action "idealist philosophy" is quite ironic for
   someone who seems intent in ignoring the history of Social Democracy
   and dismisses attempts to analyse the Bolsheviks in power as "bourgeois
   slanders." However, Mitchinson in his diatribe forgets one of the basic
   arguments of materialism -- namely that ideas themselves are part of
   the material world and so influence society and how it develops. He
   rejects the notion that peoples thoughts and ideas determine their
   actions. He obviously thinks that people operate on auto-pilot, not
   thinking about their actions. However, in reality, what people do is
   dependent on their thoughts -- they think about their actions and what
   motivates them influences their activity. If thoughts did not determine
   people's actions then Mitchinson would not have spent so much time
   writing this article!

   Thus Mitchinson is well aware of the importance of ideas in social
   change, at least implicitly. Indeed, he argues for the need for a "mass
   Labour youth organisation which, fighting for a socialist programme,
   could attract these young workers and students." To state the obvious,
   a socialist programme is a means to "change people's minds" and present
   the possibility of creating a new society. Does he seriously think a
   socialist revolution is possible without changing people's minds,
   getting them to desire a socialist society?

   Moreover, if he had read Bakunin he would be aware that anarchists
   consider the class struggle as the way to change people's ideas. As
   Bakunin argued:

     "the germs of [socialist thought] . . . [are to] be found in the
     instinct of every earnest worker. The goal . . . is to make the
     worker fully aware of what he wants, to unjam within him a stream of
     thought corresponding to his instinct . . . What impedes the swifter
     development of this salutary though among the working masses? Their
     ignorance to be sure, that is, for the most part the political and
     religious prejudices with which self-interested classes still try to
     obscure their conscious and their natural instinct. How can we
     dispel this ignorance and destroy these harmful prejudices? By
     education and propaganda? . . . they are insufficient . . . [and]
     who will conduct this propaganda? . . . [The] workers' world . . .
     is left with but a single path, that of emancipation through
     practical action . . . It means workers' solidarity in their
     struggle against the bosses. It means trade-unions, organisation . .
     . To deliver [the worker] from that ignorance [of reactionary
     ideas], the International relies on collective experience he gains
     in its bosom, especially on the progress of the collective struggle
     of the workers against the bosses . . . As soon as he begins to take
     an active part in this wholly material struggle, . . . Socialism
     replaces religion in his mind. . . through practice and collective
     experience . . . the progressive and development of the economic
     struggle will bring him more and more to recognise his true enemies
     . . . The workers thus enlisted in the struggle will necessarily . .
     . recognise himself to be a revolutionary socialist, and he will act
     as one." [The Basic Bakunin, pp. 102-3]

   Thus anarchists are aware that experience determines thought but we are
   also aware that thought is essential for action. We recognise the
   importance of ideas in the class struggle but we also realise that the
   ideas people have change as a result of that struggle. To state
   otherwise is to misrepresent anarchist thought.

21. How is Mitchinson's critique self-contradictory?

   He continues his distortion:

     "Whilst believing in a revolutionary struggle to overthrow
     capitalism, anarchists argue that it must be replaced by...nothing."

   This is ironic for quite a few reasons. Firstly, above Mitchinson
   claimed that anarchists did not aim to overthrow capitalism, just the
   state. Now he is claiming we do believe in overthrowing capitalism.
   Secondly, he quoted Trotsky saying that anarchists just ignore the
   state. Now Mitchinson states we aim to overthrow the capitalism via
   revolutionary struggle. How do you overthrow something via
   revolutionary struggle by ignoring it? His critique is not even
   internally consistent.

   Moreover, he is well aware what anarchists want to replace capitalism
   with, after all he quotes an anarchist conference which stated that
   they aimed for "the creation of an absolutely free economic
   organisation and federation based on work and equality"! Bakunin was
   always arguing that the International Workers Association should become
   "an earnest organisation of workers associations from all countries,
   capable of replacing this departing world of States and bourgeoisie."
   [The Basic Bakunin, p. 110] In other words, the "future social
   organisation must be made solely from the bottom upwards, by the free
   association of workers, first in their unions, then in the communes,
   regions, nations and finally in a great federation, international and
   universal." [Michael Bakunin: Selected Writings, p. 206] Even Engels
   acknowledged that the anarchists aimed to "dispose all the authorities,
   abolish the state and replace it with the organisation of the
   International." [Marx, Engels and Lenin, Op. Cit., p. 72] Anyone with
   even a basic knowledge of anarchist theory would know this. And given
   that Mitchinson stated that "Marx saw a future society without a state"
   as well and that he quotes Trotsky as arguing "Marxists are wholly in
   agreement with the anarchists in regard to the final goal: the
   liquidation of the state" we can only assume that Marxists also aim at
   replacing it, eventually, when the state "withers away," with
   "nothing."

   This sentence, more than any other, shows the level which some Marxists
   will sink to when discussing anarchism. It shows that the standard
   Marxist critique of anarchism is little more than an inconsistent
   collection of lies, distortion and misrepresentation. Mitchinson not
   only contradicts his ideological gurus, he even contradicts himself!
   That is truly impressive.

22. How did Trotsky make the trains run on time?

   Mitchinson asks:

     "Yet with no central apparatus, no organisation, how would the
     trains run on time, how could organ transplants be organised, how
     could the world's resources be channelled into permanently
     overcoming famine."

   Firstly, we must note the usual fallacy -- being opposed to a "central
   apparatus" does not imply "no organisation." Instead of centralised
   organisation, anarchists propose federal organisations in which
   co-ordination is achieved by collective decision making from the bottom
   up. In other words, rather than delegate power into the hands of
   "leaders", an anarchist organisation leaves power at the bottom and
   co-ordination results from collective agreements that reflect the needs
   of those directly affected by them. Thus a federal organisation
   co-ordinates activities but in a bottom-up fashion rather than
   top-down, as in a centralised body.

   Secondly, needless to say, anarchists are quite clear on who would make
   the trains run on time -- the railway workers. Anarchists are firm
   supporters of workers' self-management. Anyone with even a basic
   understanding of anarchist theory would know that. Moreover, the
   experience of workers' self-management of the railways by the anarchist
   union the CNT during the Spanish Revolution indicates that such
   anarchism can, and does, ensure that the trains run on time In
   contrast, the experience of Russia -- when the Bolsheviks did create a
   "central apparatus" -- proved a total failure. It is quite appropriate
   that Mitchinson uses the "trains running on time" example, after all it
   is what apologists for Italian fascism praised Mussolini for! This is
   because Trotsky (when he ran the railways) did so in a way that
   Mussolini would have been proud of -- he subjected the railway workers
   to military discipline:

     "Due to the Civil War -- and to other factors less often mentioned,
     such as the attitude of the railway workers to the 'new' regime --
     the Russian railways had virtually ceased to function. Trotsky,
     Commissar for Transport, was granted wide emergency powers [in
     August 1920] to try out his theories of 'militarisation of labour.'
     He started out placing the railwaymen and the personnel of the
     repair workshops under martial law. When the railwaymen's trade
     union objected, he summarily ousted its leaders and, with the full
     support and endorsement of the Party leadership, 'appointed others
     willing to do his bidding. He repeated the procedure in other unions
     of transport workers.'" [Maurice Brinton, The Bolsheviks and
     Workers' Control, p. 67]

   He ruled the "central apparatus" he created, called the Tsektran,
   "along strict military and bureaucratic lines." [Ibid.] The trains did
   start moving again, of course. The question is -- do workers manage
   their own activity or does some other group. Trotsky and Lenin in power
   decided for the latter -- and built the "centralised apparatus"
   required to ensure that result. Needless to say, Trotsky did not
   justify his militarisation of work in terms of necessary evils
   resulting from appalling objective conditions. Rather he saw it as a
   matter of "principle":

     "The working class cannot be left wandering all over Russia. They
     must be thrown here and there, appointed, commanded, just like
     soldiers."

     "The very principle of compulsory labour is for the Communist quite
     unquestionable . . . the only solution to economic difficulties from
     the point of view of both principle and of practice is to treat the
     population of the whole country as the reservoir of the necessary
     labour power . . . and to introduce strict order into the work of
     its registration, mobilisation and utilisation."

     "The introduction of compulsory labour service is unthinkable
     without the application . . . of the methods of militarisation of
     labour."
     [quoted by M. Brinton, Op. Cit., p. 61 and p. 66]

   Why "principle"? Perhaps because Marx and Engels had stated in The
   Communist Manifesto that one of the measures required during the
   revolution was the "[e]stablishment of industrial armies"? [Selected
   Writings, p. 53]

   Moreover, the experience of "central apparatus" in Bolshevik Russia
   helped create famine -- the vast bureaucracy spawned by the "workers'
   state" could not handle the information a centralised distribution
   system required. Food rotted in trains waiting for bureaucrats to
   "channel" resources (and, needless to say, the bureaucrats never went
   hungry).

23. Can centralised planning meet the needs of the whole of society?

   Our Marxist friend then quotes Maybe:

     "The radical social movements that are increasingly coming together
     don't want to seize power but to dissolve it. They are dreaming up
     many autonomous alternative forms of social organisation, forms that
     are directly linked to the specific needs of locality. What might be
     an alternative to capitalism for people living currently in a
     housing estate in Croydon is completely different to what might be
     suitable for the inhabitants of the slums of Delhi."

   He comments on these very sensible words:

     "It cannot be of no concern to us what form a new society will take
     in different countries or even different regions. The economic power
     we have created over centuries can and must be used in a planned,
     rational way to eradicate hunger, disease and illiteracy. It must be
     used in the interests of the whole of society."

   Obviously, the needs of actual people, what sort of society they want,
   is irrelevant to Marxism. Also ignored is the fact that different
   cultures will have different visions of what a free society will be
   like. Thus, for Mitchinson, everyone, everywhere, will be subject to
   the same form of society -- "in the interests of society." However, as
   Bakunin argued, the state "is an arbitrary creature in whose breast all
   the positive, living, individual or local interests of the people
   clash, destroy and absorb each other into the abstraction known as the
   common interest, the public good or the public welfare, and where all
   real wills are dissolved into the other abstraction that bears the name
   of the will of the people. It follows that this alleged will of the
   people is never anything but the sacrifice and dissolution of all the
   real wants of the population, just as this so-called public good is
   nothing but the sacrifice of their interests." [Michael Bakunin:
   Selected Writings, pp. 265-6]

   The different needs of different areas and regions must be the starting
   point of any social reconstruction, the basis on which we create
   specific programmes to improve our societies, eco-systems and world. If
   we do not recognise the diversity inherent in a world of billions of
   people, millions of eco-systems, thousands of cultures, hundreds of
   regions then we cannot use the resources of society to improve our
   lives. Instead we would have uniform plan imposed on everything which,
   by its very nature, cannot take into accounts the real needs of those
   who make up "the whole of society." In other words, the resources of
   the world must not be used by an abstraction claiming to act "in the
   interests of society" but rather by the people who actually make up
   society themselves -- if we do that we ensure that their interests are
   meet directly as they manage their own affairs and that their use
   reflects the specific requirements of specific people and eco-systems
   and not some abstraction called "the interests of society" which, by
   its centralised nature, would sacrifice those interests.

   Of course, it seems somewhat strange that Mitchinson thinks that people
   in, say, New Delhi or Croyden, will not seek to eradicate hunger,
   disease and illiteracy as they see fit, co-operating with others as and
   when they need to and creating the federative organisations required to
   do so. The need to share experiences and resources does not conflict
   with the different areas experimenting in different ways, expressing
   themselves in ways which suit their particular needs and difficulties.
   As any ecologist could tell you, different eco-systems need different
   forms of care. The same with communities -- Mitchinson would drown
   local needs in the name of an artificial construct.

   He continues:

     "That can only be achieved by the democratic planning of society
     where the power at our fingertips could be used with due respect for
     the future of the planet, the conservation of it's resources, our
     own working conditions, and living standards. Whether we like it or
     not, growing a few carrots on empty plots of land will not eradicate
     hunger and famine."

   How can "democratic planning" of the whole "of society" take into
   account the needs of specific localities, eco-systems, communities? It
   cannot. Respect for the future of our planet means respecting the
   fundamental law of nature -- namely that conformity is death. Diversity
   is the law of life -- which means that a future socialist society must
   be libertarian, organised from the bottom up, based on local
   self-management and a respect for diversity. Such a federal structures
   does not preclude co-ordinated activity (or the creation of democratic
   plans) -- the reverse in fact, as federalism exists to allow
   co-ordination -- but instead of being imposed by a few "leaders" as in
   a centralised system, it is the product of local needs and so
   reflective of the needs of real people and eco-systems.

   As for his comment about "due respect of the future of the planet" is
   obviously inspired by "the youth" being concerned about ecological
   issues. However, Leninism's desire for centralised states and planning
   excludes an ecological perspective by definition. As Bakunin argued:

     "What man, what group of individuals, no matter how great their
     genius, would dare to think themselves able to embrace and
     understand the plethora of interests, attitudes and activities so
     various in every country, every province, locality and profession."
     [Op. Cit., p. 240]

   Diversity is the basis of any eco-system. Centralism cannot, as Bakunin
   makes clear, embrace it.

   Needless to say, Mitchinson's comments about carrots is pure stupidity
   and an insult to the intelligence of his audience.

24. Is technology neutral?

   Mitchinson goes on:

     "We have the power to do just that, but only if we combine new
     technology, industry and the talents and active participation of
     millions."

   Needless to say, he fails to indicate how the millions can participate
   in a "centralised apparatus" beyond electing their "leaders." Which
   indicates the fallacy of Marxism -- it claims to desire a society based
   on the participation of everyone yet favours a form of organisation --
   centralisation -- that precludes that participation.

   In addition, he fails to note that technology and industry have been
   developed by capitalists to enhance their own power. As we argued in
   [9]section D.10, technology cannot be viewed in isolation from the
   class struggle. This means that industry and technology was not
   developed to allow the active participation of millions. The first act
   of any revolution will be seizing of the means of life -- including
   industry and technology -- by those who use it and, from that moment
   on, their radical transformation into appropriate technology and
   industry, based on the needs of the workers, the community and the
   planet. Mitchinson obvious shares the common Marxist failing of
   believing technology and industry is neutral. In this he follows Lenin.
   As S.A. Smith correctly summarises:

     "Lenin believed that socialism could be built only on the basis of
     large-scale industry as developed by capitalism, with its specific
     types of productivity and social organisation of labour. Thus for
     him, capitalist methods of labour-discipline or one-man management
     were not necessarily incompatible with socialism. Indeed, he went so
     far as to consider them to be inherently progressive, failing to
     recognise that such methods undermined workers' initiative at the
     point of production. This was because Lenin believed that the
     transition to socialism was guaranteed, ultimately, not by the
     self-activity of workers, but by the 'proletarian' character of
     state power. . . There is no doubt that Lenin did conceive
     proletarian power in terms of the central state and lacked a
     conception of localising such power at the point of production."
     [Red Petrograd, pp. 261-2]

   The Russian workers, unsurprisingly, had a different perspective:

     "Implicit in the movement for workers' control was a belief that
     capitalist methods cannot be used for socialist ends. In their
     battle to democratise the factory, in their emphasis on the
     importance of collective initiatives by the direct producers in
     transforming the work situation, the factory committees had become
     aware -- in a partial and groping way, to be sure -- that factories
     are not merely sites of production, but also of reproduction -- the
     reproduction of a certain structure of social relations based on the
     division between those who give orders and those who take them,
     between those who direct and those who execute . . . inscribed
     within their practice was a distinctive vision of socialism, central
     to which was workplace democracy." [Op. Cit., p. 261]

   The movement for workers' control was undermined and finally replaced
   by one-man management by the kind of "central apparatus" Mitchinson
   urges us to build (see M. Brinton's classic work The Bolsheviks and
   Workers' Control for more details). Those who do not study history are
   doomed to repeat it.

   He goes on:

     "The economic power we have created can be compared to the
     destructive force of lightning, untamed and anarchic under the
     market, yet organised into cables and wires electricity transforms
     our lives. Industry is not the enemy, nor are machines. The state
     is, but it is a symptom not the disease. It is capitalism and its
     ownership of the economy, its stewardship of society that we have to
     replace."

   However, unlike electricity, "economic power" requires people to
   operate it. The question is not whether "machines" are the enemy (often
   they are, as machines are used by capitalists to weaken the power of
   workers and control them). The question is whether the future society
   we aim at is one based on workers' and community self-management or
   whether it is based on an authoritarian system of delegated power. It
   is clear that Marxists like Mitchinson desire the latter -- indeed, as
   is clear from his diatribe, he cannot comprehend an alternative to
   hierarchical organisation.

   Given that one of the things capitalism and the state have in common is
   a hierarchical, top-down structure, it is clear that any revolutionary
   movement must fight both -- at the same time.

25. Do anarchists ignore the "strength of the working class"?

   Mitchinson argues that:

     "The task of our time is to combine the strength and experience of
     the working class and its mighty organisations with the power and
     energy of the youth internationally, on the basis of a clear
     understanding of what capitalism is, what the state is, and a
     programme for changing society. That requires a combination of
     theory and action. In that combination lies the strength of
     Marxism."

   The first question is surely what "mighty organisations" of the working
   class is he talking about. Is it the Labour Party? Or is it the trade
   unions? Probably the latter -- if so, the question is how effective
   have these "mighty organisations" been recently? The answer must,
   surely, be "not very." Why is that? In union there is strength, as
   anarchists have long been aware. Why has this strength been so lacking?
   Simply because the unions are centralised, bureaucratic and run from
   the top down. They have placed numerous barriers in front of their
   members when they have taken militant action. That is why anarchists
   urge workers to form rank-and-file controlled organisations to manage
   their own struggles and take back the power they have delegated to
   their so-called leaders. Only in this way, by building truly
   revolutionary organisations like workers' councils (soviets), factory
   committees, community assemblies and so on can they really create a
   "mighty" force. In other words, anarchists are well aware of the
   strength of working class people and their power to change society --
   indeed, as proven above, anarchism is based on that awareness and
   organise appropriately!

   The second question is surely to ask whether Mitchinson is aware that
   Reclaim the Streets have been building links with rank and file trade
   union militants for years -- long before Mitchinson decided to
   enlighten them with "the strength of Marxism." In other words, "the
   strength of Marxism" seems to rest in telling radical working class
   people to do what they have already doing! Such strength is truly
   amazing and must explain the prominent role Leninists have had in the
   numerous anti-capitalist demonstrations and organisations recently.

   Needless to say, anarchism provides "a clear understanding of what
   capitalism is, what the state is, and a programme for changing society.
   That requires a combination of theory and action." This has been proven
   above when we corrected Mitchinson's numerous errors regarding
   anarchist theory. Moreover, as far as combining theory and action goes,
   it is clear that anarchism has been doing that of late, not Marxism.
   While anarchists have been at the forefront of the anti-capitalist
   demonstrations, working with others as equals, Marxists have been
   noticeable by their absence. Combining theory and practice,
   non-hierarchically organised direct action closed down the WTO and
   presented a clear message to the oppressed around the world --
   resistance is fertile. What have Marxists achieved? Apparently
   producing articles such as these, distorting the politics and
   activities of those who actually are changing the world rather than
   just interpreting it. That they cannot produce an honest critique of
   anarchism indicates the uselessness of their politics.

26. What does Mitchinson's article tell about the nature of Trotskyism?

   He finishes his diatribe as follows:

     "If you want to fight against capitalism, do so fully armed with a
     socialist programme and perspective. Join with us in the struggle
     for the socialist transformation of the planet."

   It is clear that to be "fully armed with a socialist programme" means
   to critique that which you know nothing about, spread slanders and lie
   about what your opponents actually think. There is much to be critical
   of in the recent anti-capitalist demonstrations and the various groups
   that have helped organise and take part in them. Anarchists have been
   the first to point these out. However, we have a lot to learn from them
   as well -- they are struggling against capitalism and, as Kropotkin
   argues, "Anarchism . . . originated in everyday struggles" and "the
   Anarchist movement was renewed each time it received an impression from
   some great practical lesson: it derived its origin from the teachings
   of life itself." [Evolution and Environment, p. 58 and p. 57]

   Thus we must critique these movements honestly and as equals --
   Mitchinson, as can be seen, does neither. He slanders those involved
   and dismisses out of hand their experiences and the reasons that have
   brought them to struggle in a specific way against the dominant
   society. In this he follows Lenin, who argued in Left-Wing Communism:
   An Infantile Disorder that western revolutionaries ignore their own
   experiences in their own -- and similar -- countries and instead follow
   the "lessons" of experiences gained in a near pre-capitalist,
   absolutist state. The stupidity of such an approach is clear.

   Mitchinson presents those in struggle with the ultimatum "subscribe to
   our platform or be denounced." Little wonder that Leninists are
   non-existent in the groups that have taken part and organised the
   anti-capitalist demonstrations -- not willing to learn from those
   involved in the class struggle, all they can do is act as petty
   sectarians. Sectarians expect working class people to relate to their
   predetermined political positions, whereas revolutionaries apply our
   politics to the conditions we face as members of the working class. For
   Leninists revolutionary consciousness is not generated by working class
   self-activity, but is embodied in the party. The important issues
   facing the working class -- and how to fight -- are to be determined
   not by the workers ourselves, but by the leadership of the party, who
   are the "vanguard of the working class". Hence Mitchinson's dismissal
   (in a particularly dishonest manner, we must stress) of those involved
   in struggle and their experiences. True "revolution" obviously lies in
   the unchanging ideas generated at the start of the twentieth century in
   a monarchy developing towards capitalism, not in the experiences and
   desires of living people fighting for freedom in the here and now. Yes,
   these ideas and movements can be confused and unclear -- but they are
   living and subject to change by the influence of revolutionaries who
   act in a libertarian manner (i.e. as equals, willing to learn as well
   as teach).

   The Italian Marxist Antonio Gramsci once wrote that "to tell the truth
   is a communist and revolutionary act." However, even he did not apply
   this when discussing anarchism and the activities of anarchists (see
   Gwyn Williams' Proletarian Order, pp. 193-4). Be that as it may,
   Gramsci's point is correct. Telling the truth is a revolutionary act.
   If we judge Mitchinson's article by this standard then we can only
   conclude that neither he nor the politics he defends are revolutionary
   or communist.

   Thus we find his ending comment truly a "flight of fancy" -- after
   reading our comments above, we hope you agree with us. If you seek a
   true socialist transformation of this planet rather than its
   degeneration into centralised state capitalism, discover more about
   anarchism.

References

   1. http://www.marxist.com/Theory/direct_action.html
   2. file://localhost/home/mauro/baku/debianize/maint/anarchy/secJ3.html#secj36
   3. file://localhost/home/mauro/baku/debianize/maint/anarchy/secA2.html#seca29
   4. file://localhost/home/mauro/baku/debianize/maint/anarchy/secJ2.html
   5. file://localhost/home/mauro/baku/debianize/maint/anarchy/append3.html#app31
   6. file://localhost/home/mauro/baku/debianize/maint/anarchy/append41.html
   7. file://localhost/home/mauro/baku/debianize/maint/anarchy/append46.html
   8. file://localhost/home/mauro/baku/debianize/maint/anarchy/append46.html#app9
   9. file://localhost/home/mauro/baku/debianize/maint/anarchy/secD10.html
