Posted by kasama on December 6, 2011
We have excerpted the following from a longer piece received by Kasama.“The inherited practice of communism can not adequately speak to the present moment. The strategies and organizational forms of the past need to be reassessed. In some ways, our work is still beginning. How can we contribute to building a movement that can speak to the hope of millions?”
Loyal Heirs and Audacious Visionaries
by Tobias Reed
Communists must be more than loyal heirs. We must be audacious visionaries.
We have inherited a frame of reference for understanding the development of class society and social relations of all kinds. This frame of reference naturally has been reassessed and expanded over the years by countless writers, both inside and out of the communist “canon”, and it requires further elaboration still.
On the basis of what we know, we reaffirm the communist hypothesis: the idea that all oppressive social relations can and must be uprooted and transformed. We declare fidelity to communist theory and to the project of global emancipation. But this loyalty is not enough.
The inherited practice of communism can not adequately speak to the present moment. The strategies and organizational forms of the past need to be reassessed. In some ways, our work is still beginning. How can we contribute to building a movement that can speak to the hope of millions?
What is the role of communist leadership in a political climate where masses of people express anti-capitalist tendencies, yet communism (as such) is reviled? What will be our legacy for the next generation of communist revolutionaries?
Communist theory is synthetic. It draws from the social and natural sciences in order to develop a holistic understanding of the world. This thing which we call communism is not the source of truth. Communists, at their best, unify that which is essentially true in the service of overthrowing and transforming all oppressive social relations and defending life on Earth. If we isolate ourselves from all theorists and political actors which do not label themselves communist, we lose sight not only of the inherently integral nature of a communist understanding, but of important possibilities for establishing strategic alliances.
I would also like to add that we must cultivate revolutionary patience.
Revolutionaries are not born; they come to an identification with the communist project through a complicated path of political development. Through ideological struggle and common practice, we may bring more minds, hearts, and hands to this necessary work. Organizational alliances may be drawn and redrawn as we see fit. There is a need for explicitly communist organizing and leadership, but it would be foolish to make a declared unity with communism the dividing line for all political organizing, at least in this moment. I think that the slogan “regroup as we reconceive” speaks well to this organizational strategy.
As capitalism has coerced nearly all countries to industrialize or to otherwise participate in the global market, crises of capitalism have become more frequent and their consequences more far reaching. Capitalism’s need to exploit resources at an ever-accelerating rate destroys ecosystems, disrupts environmental cycles, and stores pollutants inside the very cells of our bodies.
Researchers at Cornell University blame 40 percent of all human deaths on water, air, and soil pollution. Climate change is already
responsible for droughts, floods, and increased hurricane activity.
responsible for droughts, floods, and increased hurricane activity.
Energy industries are resorting to increasingly damaging practices in order to extract fossil fuels. Securing access to resources is one of the primary reasons for economic and military imperialism. The depletion of fossil fuels represents a crisis for capitalism and imperialism from which the global industrial economy may not be able to recover. The environmental crisis, combined with the development of the global financial crisis, points to the emergence of revolutionary situations.
Flames of discontent burn throughout the world
The revolution in South East Asia, the “Arab Spring” phenomenon, revolt in Greece, mass protests throughout China, and now the worldwide occupy movement. These and other currents, as well as new developments yet to come, may represent the emergence of a new stage of global class war.
Despite the ambitious nature of the work before us, we must be humble.
So far, Kasama has contributed to the work of theoretical reconception, reported on existing communist struggle, and united unaffliated and developing communists, as well as communists looking for a different kind of organization and a different kind of communist theory. Kasama’s involvement in the occupy movement offers a new opportunity for uniting with and shaping new resistance movements. Further stages of revolution will pose other tasks and may eventually require other organizations built on different points of unity than the organizational forms which characterize these stage of revolutionary development….
Any way in which I can better contribute to the organization and collectivity of Kasama, let me know.
