01.08.2001
After Genoa
Left must rethink
As a clearer picture of the events in Genoa have begun to emerge, the differences in the anti-capitalist movement have come into sharper focus. Genoa saw the mobilisation of some 250,000, overwhelmingly working class protestors. At the same time the black bloc anarchists and their leftist hangers-on indulged in gesture politics. Futile amateur-military attempts to breach the red zone and, failing that, running battles across the streets and squares of the city - in a word riots and one tragic death.
Following on from the widely publicised brutality meted out to activists in Genoa, a wave of protests against the police actions have swept not just Italy itself, but other countries too. The Italian government has been mired in recrimination. Even British ministers - those previously supportive of the carabinieri - have been forced into silence, in the case of Tony Blair, or to express muted criticism, in the case of Jack Straw.
It is against this backdrop that the debate about the way forward has been conducted so far. Up until this time the anti-capitalist movement has been ideologically incoherent, moving from summit to summit, making its presence felt in terms of numbers, but not by articulating any positive alternative politics as a commonality. Equally germane, anti-capitalist demonstrations are still used as an excuse by lumpen elements, toytown revolutionaries and fifth columnists to wreak havoc and strike up ultra-militant poses.
Last weekend?s meeting of the SA Liaison Committee adopted a sloppy resolution that now formally constitutes the majority position. The resolution, drafted by Workers Power, while routinely denouncing police violence also contains a crass formulation that tails anarchism - currently a dominant trait of its authors? politics. It states: ?We refuse to condemn the protestors in any way.? The Socialist Alliance is thus rendered an uncritical cheerleader for the irresponsible actions of the anarchists. This despite the fact that when leading Globalise Resistance activist Tom Behan criticised the anarchist black bloc and its methods in the pages of this paper, he more than likely reflected a significant section of opinion within the anti-capitalist movement (Weekly Worker July 26).
Disappointingly the demand for a workers? inquiry into the events was not included in the resolution?s list of concrete demands. Incidentally the Socialist Party has, to its credit, taken up the argument for an ?independent inquiry?.
And, of course, the Genoa Social Forum is collecting evidence of police brutality and terrorism, asking for eyewitness accounts from those who were in Genoa. The GSF was the democratically recognised organiser of the protests with the affiliation of over 800 groups. A key part of its inquiry will no doubt be an investigation into the activities and composition of the black bloc and its role in allowing infiltration of our protests by the state and fascists. Berlusconi?s weak government has, let us note, a ?strategy of tension? and thus the aim of ciminalising dissent.
Workers Power in its response to Genoa, while on the one hand refusing to ?condemn? the methods of the black bloc, is forced on the other to at least pay lip service to a critique. It acknowledges that, ?We must criticise the BB from whether they add or detract from an effective working class offensive? (Workers Power e-wire, July 27). Later on, in the same communiqu?, WP states tamely, ?We do not share the BB view that, ?What we do is our affair and what you do is up to you.? We don?t live in such an unconnected world. Everything is tied together and one action has a reaction.? And so WP acknowledges that it must at least give the impression of criticising the black bloc.
WP?s account of its stay in Genoa provides a perfect example of its political disorientation. It asks the rhetorical question, ?Should we go to Cobas [Italian syndicalist trade union centre] and try to bring anti-capitalism to the working class?? This option is rejected on the grounds that, ?They have in the main no intention of confronting the police and seeking to get to the red zone.? Quite right too. Winning the battle of ideas within our movement is key, yet WP gives up on the working class movement in favour of a vicarious head-on assault on the overwhelmingly superior forces of the state and/or futile ?revolutionary? posturing.
Amongst our SWP allies there has also been tailism combined with a critical attitude towards the black bloc. Perhaps also evidence of a factional fault line can be detected. Under national organiser Chris Bambery, the SWP aped the anarchists in Genoa. There was talk of storming the red zone and the comrades actually launched an ineffective attack on the outer fence before a police-supervised retreat. However, sitting in London, Chris Harman does not appear too happy. Describing ?Who?s who on the Italian left?, Socialist Worker loudly complains that: ?The black bloc?s methods and use of masks opens them up to police infiltration? (July28). It correctly points out: ?The black bloc is made up of a small, self-selected elite who act in a paramilitary manner. It keeps apart from the organising of mass demonstrations.? Comrade Harman?s Socialist Worker diplomatically glosses over the unsuccessful attempt by Globalise Resistance to enter the red zone and ?liberate Genoa?.
The Bambery-Callinicos wing has hit back. Their comrades were responsible for the uncritical Socialist Alliance resolution. Also there has been a colourful eyewitness report written by Elane Hefernan, an SWPer, which has circulated around local Socialist Alliances in London citing the reason for withdrawal: ?We saw that we could not push through the lines without serious risk of many major injuries.? The certainty of which was obvious in the first place, Chris Harman might say. He could add that setting goals that are clearly unrealisable is a sure way to demoralise activists. In future we need to set goals not guided by the desire to appear oh so revolutionary, but by the need to deepen the roots of our movement.
Several questions present themselves. One, as we have already seen, is the role that the Socialist Alliance has to play in shaping the anti-capitalist movement. Its development should not be regarded as a totally separate process. A new layer of activists is moving into politics through the anti-capitalist movement, just as another layer is moving out of the orbit of Labourite politics. The SA must orientate towards both and seek to be the answer for both.
This is something that the SWP recognises. In his polemic against its former US comrades of the International Socialist Organization - entitled ?The anti-capitalist movement and the revolutionary left? - Alex Callinicos admits that ?the Socialist Alliance and Globalise Resistance conferences have brought together two overlapping constituencies - those inspired by the anti-globalisation movement and Labour Party supporters disillusioned by the experience of the Blair government.?
Yet, however ?overlapping? these constituencies may be, the SWP addresses them separately. ?Fuck capitalism? is the refrain in Genoa; ?150-a-week pensions in Gerrards Cross. And, what is more, there is nothing linking the two demands. No minimum-maximum revolutionary programme. This approach of campaigning for minimalist reforms as the Socialist Alliance while posing as ultra-revolutionaries within the anti-capitalist movement underlines the programmatic incoherence of the SWP, as it shapes its demands in line with what it imagines are the perspectives of its target audience.
This division of labour is reflected organisationally. The SWP maintains two ?united fronts? - albeit of a ?special kind? in the case of the alliance - with the organisational link being of course the SWP itself. Both the Socialist Alliance and the anti-capitalist movement are viewed as conduits into ?the party? that already exists.
The Socialist Alliance has begun to tentatively establish itself as a credible force among a small but significant section of working class activists. Winning the best activists of the anti-capitalist movement to join the SA and play a part in deepening the unity of the left is equally vital. A party that is democratic and effective, unlike the existing, narrowly defined, ideological sects, will surely attract recruits from a movement which is crying out for a way of combining the local with the global.
Darrell Goodliffe