THE ORGANIZATION QUESTION
Models of Revolution in Advanced Industrial Society (11/7/1978)
Copyright © 1978 by Henry A. Flynt, Jr.
Part I
In Part II of this essay, we will give a sweeping interpretation of the history of revolution in the twentieth century. The main themes of this interpretation are as follows. The arena of successful Leftist revolutions in the twentieth century has been the colonial world what is now called the third world. Revolutions have succeeded in the third world in spite of all obstacles, including the obstructive involvement of the Soviet Union, and, later, of China. The West, meanwhile, has remained capitalist and continues to control the world economy. Thus, in spite of the use of Marxist phraseology, the ultimate goal of the third-world revolutions has become national modernization or catching up with the West. The social order established by the third-world revolutions may be called colonial nationalism, modernizing nationalism, or remedial capitalism.
In the West, when the irrationality of capitalism has surfaced in economic crises, the Left has consistently failed to gain mastery of the situation, and the outcome has been fascism and world war. Western civilization has proved to be systematically and chronically unable to move beyond a social order which was discredited in theory by the middle of the nineteenth century. What is more, despite the vaunted intellectual superiority of Western civilization, the revolutionary Left in the West has eagerly surrendered its independence to modernizing-socialist tendencies (Lenin, Stalin, Trotsky, Mao, Eurocommunism). Indeed, Russian obstruction, which failed to prevent the Chinese, Cuban, and Vietnamese revolutions, easily sabotaged a whole series of progressive insurgencies in the West.
The systematic and chronic revolutionary bankruptcy of the West raises the following questions. Why do the people find economic crises, trade wars, fascism, and world wars so acceptable? – why are they not disaffected? Alternatively, why does any disaffection which they feel not translate into effective action to change the system? Western civilization is certainly unstable and destructive: there is no question of its achieving a beneficent stability. And unlike ancient slavery or the Dark Ages, Western civilization has the technological dynamism to support a new social order. Yet the West has consistently neutralized or coopted all internal disaffection. As a number of thinkers have recognized, there is a problem of subjugation of consciousness in the West about which Marx has nothing to say. This psychological subjugation is an objective phenomenon which calls for an entire sociological theory to treat it. Herbert Marcuse should be given special credit for identifying the phenomenon, but his analysis of it falls far short of an adequate theory. Our own opinions on the subject will be given in Part II.
Aside from the problem of interpreting what is already happening, however, the viability, or longevity of the status quo in the West is still an unresolved question. As for myself, I cannot rule out the possibility that capitalism may not be permanent, and that it may be superseded in an authentic revolution. Thus, it is necessary to think through one's attitude
to this possibility. But we must be more precise about what sort of possibility is worth analyzing. An authentic revolution would be an emancipation of the majority which established an economic order based on social ownership and production for needs – and which was able to sustain and build upon the wealth of preceding generations. Of course other scenarios are possible: fascism, conquest by the Soviet Union, state capitalism, even the present combination of business as usual with the counter-revolution of diminished expectations. But these scenarios would just be further manifestations of the bankruptcy of civilization. They would be reasons to be against society, not for it.
What we will focus on here may be called the "ecology" of revolutionary organization. How do the aims and the programmatic perspective of majoritarian emancipation relate to the nature of revolutionary organization? More specifically, how do "citizens" or "members" interact in revolutionary organization? How does organization relate to the surrounding social environment? How do these features interact with the goals of organization and condition the type of society it is capable of realizing? (I speak of "organization", not of "the organization," because I am referring to structured social activity in general, and not necessarily to a formal membership group.)
We will address these questions by presenting a series of contrasting models of organization. There is one unresolved issue for the analysis which we should mention in advance. Must any given model be considered to be either permanently and exclusively applicable or permanently and exclusively inapplicable? Or can one model evolve into another in the course of a single historic movement? Basically, our analysis belongs to the tradition which holds that the crucial organizational model at the very beginning of a movement does dominate for the duration and does determine the type of society which the movement is capable of realizing. We subscribe to the tradition which attempts to discern the features of a post-revolutionary society in the very earliest stages of the organization which engendered it. On the other hand, we acknowledge that this approach is only a hypothesis. Whether a single movement can program its essential organizational nature to vary appropriately as conditions change remains to be seen.
The organization question has been much discussed in the West, but only in ways which are shallow and self-serving. The contributions by Western thinkers on the organization question are absurdly inadequate to the pretensions of the West to be an advanced technological and economic civilization. So far as I know, this is the first radical analysis of the organization question which is meant to be impartial. I am writing neither to praise, nor to condemn, nor to predict the future. I only establish standards by which alternatives can be classified and their consequences can be evaluated. When I define an organizational model, the definition is not meant to be a proof that the model will be actualized. Rather, the definition has two uses. It enables the model to be recognized if it does appear. And the definition can be used to argue that the model can not be actualized, if the conditions which are required for it are not met.
I cannot emphasize too strongly that the norms of organization I am discussing pertain to the project of majoritarian emancipation. If one believes that it is the fate of human kind for the majority always to be deluded slaves, then the norms of organization which we will invoke are not even worth discussing. If one believes that the only rational purpose of organization is to protect humankind's few treasures from the stupidity and savagery of the majority, then norms of organization are required which are entirely different from the majoritarian ones. Let us follow this thought through a little further. Suppose that the goal of organization is not the emancipation of the majority, but, for example, the preservation of Greek mathematical knowledge during the Dark Ages. More generally, we may consider the following state of affairs. It is possible for a social order to be chronically unstable and destructive, without any possibility of the instability being resolved. In consequence, the very trends which encourage the majority to conform and to acquiesce may also alienate a minority, driving that minority to band together in deviance or dissidence. In this case, the minority organization is not necessarily weakened because it is out of step with fashion, or because prevailing trends increasingly wall it off from the majority, or because its members lose social contact with the majority. If the prevailing trends are destructive, and if the organization possesses something of value, then the organization will not be drained by the effort required to keep it separate from the majority: the objective antagonisms in the society will keep it separate automatically.
We assume here that it is possible for an outlook to arise which is both dissident and superior. If the purpose of the minority is to preserve an outlook which is both valuable and unpopular, then it may be desirable for the organization to be systematically "anti-spontaneous". The persecuted outlook is valuable precisely because it is not average–because it is not common coin. Thus, indiscriminate liberalism and permissiveness toward the organization's boundary and toward the organization's activities would liquidate the very distinctiveness which makes the dissident outlook valuable. In these circumstances, democracy in the organization might justifiably be limited to those who had both endorsed the aims of the organization and been molded in its outlook. It might be justifiable for the organization to have a self-appointed or inherited leadership which placed new members solely by appointment from the top down. To let anybody waltz in and do any damn thing he pleased would negate the very distinctiveness which makes the outlook valuable. What is more, asking recruits to suspend their own whims in order to learn the dissident outlook would not amount to asking them to forego responsibility. To be subject to an externally supplied discipline is not necessarily incompatible with learning to exercise responsibility.
What is overwhelmingly important, however, is that it would be impossible for such an organization to be a means of emancipation of the majority. The organization would have renounced at the outset any claim to represent the interests of the majority or to prefigure the future of the majority. The whole intent of the organization would be to protect its outlook from the majority. (We may also add that such an organization would tend to be dogmatic and inflexible and to become encrusted with inessentials. However, these defects might be unavoidable under the circumstances we have postulated.)
There is one concept which I use repeatedly in my analysis, and which has provoked so much criticism that I will define it separately. I refer to the concept of trends which are uncontrollable by individuals or by the voluntarism of insurgents. Insurgents have to function in a context of broad trends which they cannot program. There are some trends that no amount of rhetoric or willfulness can reverse. If the dogma of the insurgents denies these trends, then the trends will automatically work against the insurgents. An insurgency can be viable only if the insurgents can find a way to make the uncontrollable trends work for them.
Thus, in what follows I will frequently speak of uncontrollable trends. These trends include trends which nobody controls or even predicts: the hippie movement, women's liberation, and gay liberation are examples. But to insurgents, the uncontrolled trends must also include the successful manipulation of society by the ruling institutions. It is axiomatic that the ruling class will rule that is, that it will exercise power. For insurgents to expect that supplication will convince it not to exercise power is childish. (As an example, the racism of white workers has been a constant feature of American society literally since the New York Draft Riots during the Civil War. The point is that racism will not be conjured away by the Left's adopting a doctrine which blames it on the deception of the workers by the plutocrats. If the plutocrats can maintain racial divisions for one hundred years merely by dispensing a few lies, then they are far more powerful than the Left has ever conceded explicitly-and in any case, to foster racial divisions is a maneuver which the ruling class is obliged to make. It is childish for the Left to hope to conjure this reality away by mere rhetorical flourishes or supplications.)*
A. Mass Action Models
Model 1: Mass Action by "Citizens" or "Peers." Here we consider mass action by equals, that is, by "citoyens" in the French terminology or "peers" in the English terminology. The following are prerequisites for effective mass action by equals.
1. The uncontrollable trends must impel the oppressed to arrive at
a common understanding of their collective interests and needs and of the objective social situation. This understanding must be realistic and not illusory. In this case, the uncontrollable trends are hostile to the interests of the ruling class and tend to discredit that class. One says that the objective antagonisms in the social order are coming to the surface.
2. The uncontrollable trends must drive large numbers of people into the movement or organization, while at the same time keeping the boundaries between the inside and outside of the movement permeable. The uncontrollable trends energize the organization externally (and are again hostile to the interests of the ruling class).
3. The citizens or members must be willing to assume responsibility for their own actions without at the same time asking other members to surrender responsibility. Delegated authority must be conferred by election, not by appointment. The general membership must retain control of individuals with delegated authority.
4. The organization must derive its cohesion from the consent of citizens or peers. The hostility of the members is directed outward from the organization to the class enemy and its repressive apparatus. Members provide each other with emotional support. Evaluation by one's peers inside the organization does not become hierarchically enforced moral intimidation. Thus, the organization energizes itself internally.
5. Talent is utilized through a process of being recognized by the general membership. There is no apparatus of authority roles enforced by police methods. This condition makes the heroic assumption that the peer group will acknowledge talent and can evaluate talent. To acknowledge talent in a peer is a matter of acknowledging talent which is not certified and supported by institutional authority. Among peers, even if one person has proven talent, another person will not necessarily acknowledge it unless he needs the first person's services so desperately that he can overcome any petty, personal resentment of the first person. Then, there is a second problem in finding talent which exists in all situations. Often talent cannot prove itself without the opportunity for prolonged utilization through which the individual can build confidence. The question is whether peer groups have any special capacity to deal with these problems, or indeed whether they are less adequate to deal with these problems than other forms of organization.
(Digression on the theory of talent. Prevailing social doctrine as to what constitutes talent is profoundly ideological, and is manipulated by the ruling class. Thus we have the outrageous devaluation of language involved in identifying the words "intelligence" and "genius" with IQ test scores. The point is that the type of talent which is needed in a period of social liberation is actively repressed by the apparatus of enculturation prevailing in conservative eras. As children mature and adjust to society during conservative eras, they conform by repressing subversive or liberating abilities, in order to give scope to conventional abilities. What is more, they internalize the prevailing doctrine as to which abilities are desirable. Thus, they vehemently defend themselves against a wider understanding of their own abilities. It is axiomatic that anyone who has talent will use it in a conventional way to obtain conventional rewards. In such circumstances, an individual typically can discover his liberating talents only as a result of taking the Establishment's virtuous aspirations literally, trying to realize them, and being resented and rejected as a result; or more generally, as a result of a series of misadventures in which he discovere that his virtues make him a misfit.)
(I wish to propose that the community of insurgents should go beyond a fatalistic attitude towards talent. Techniques should be developed for getting through the defenses which prevent the individual from acknowledging his own subversive abilities. I must end this digression, however, with a comment to discourage naively optimistic expectations. To get full value from a subversive talent evidently requires far more work than to get full value from a conventional talent. This may be an additional reason why so many people find it easier to believe that they do not have any subversive talents.)
We now return to the prerequisites for peer-group action.
6. One of the decisive questions for any revolution is how the repressive apparatus by which the ruling class maintains itself in power is to be dismantled and dispersed. The viability of peer-group action requires that this result be achievable through peer-group action. This condition is facilitated if the oppressive regime is decadent and anachronistic, if it has lost its moral authority and administrative efficacy and is beginning to disintegrate through defections. The condition is also facilitated if the conscript soldiers of the regime fraternize with the oppressed, and desert to the revolution. The extent to which peer organization can effectively resist a vigorous and well-organized repression has never been decided. The Makhno campaign and the anarchist campaign in the Spanish Civil War must be re-evaluated. The extent to which the French Resistance can be regarded as peer-group action, even though it was led by the Stalinist party, needs to be evaluated. The fact remains, however, that none of these campaigns achieved a revolution, Meanwhile, the problems of organizing in the Tsarist police state were among the main justifications of the Leninist party. The example of South Africa shows that this is not a closed question today.
7. Administration of the new society which is to be achieved can be carried out without the need for a caste of administrators and experts (line and staff personnel).
So concludes our list of conditions for peer-group action. There is one positive consequence of peer-group action which should be given special mention. The wars between so-called Communist oountries compel us to recognize that the spread of revolution across national boundaries is obstructed by so-called Communist organization. Communist organization incorporates the workers in a hierarchy which is essentially nationalistic and nationally self-seeking. By contrast, peer-group action would presumably be much more able to spread a revolution across national boundaries. More generally, peer-group organization has an adhesive or attractive effect on the generic interest group which it is supposed to represent. It is not a private olub camouflaged by hypocritical invocations of a general interest.*
Before we continue with more organizational models, we must recognize that revolution today faces two qualitatively new possibilities of violent repression which revolutionaries of earlier eras did not have to contend with. The question arises as to which of the organizational models can best cope with these possibilities; and we do not have an answer.
The first possibility has to do with the technological innovations in warfare and the organization of repression. Nuclear weapons, in particular, give immense destructive power to a small and secret elite. There has never been a serious revolutionary threat inside a nation with nuclear weapons. The Vietnam war was not a test of this possibility because the issue there was whether the U.S. would use nuclear weapons against an insurgency in Asia supported by the Soviet Union and China. The issue here is how the threat to use the technology of destruction against a domestic insurgency can be neutralized. All of our organizational models should be evaluated with respect to this question. (The first test in regard to this question may come in South Africa.)
The second possibility has to do with the reaction of the Soviet regime, which is after all one of the two superpowers, to an insurgency in the West which is independent and majoritarian. The Soviet regime has a long record of not wanting any revolution to succeed which could lessen its authority on the Left, not even a revolution led by a foreign Stalinist party. What is more, the Soviet government has floated trial balloons among West European diplomats about the possibility of a "nuclear castration" of China. Thus, the question arises as to how any hostile Soviet response to insurgency in the West can be neutralized. Again, all of our organizational models should be evaluated with respect to this question.*
Model 2: A Mass Electoral Party With a Radical Program. What we refer to here is a legal, electoral organization which is modelled on a bourgeois political party in every respect except one: it has a program of economic and other reforms which are unacceptable to the ruling class. The Allende episode in Chile was one instance; the Puerto Rican Socialist Party may be another. Aside from the party's program, such a party differs from a bourgeois party in one other respect, which is crucial. No political party in a democracy has state power in the sense of having its own army. However, the overtly bourgeois parties are political agencies of the same ruling class which controls the nation's army through direct relations of patronage to the officer corps. The radical electoral party, on the other hand, has no social connection to the officer corps. Nevertheless, it advocates loyalty to the existing state (the army, and opposes giving citizens the right to bear arms, The irony is that the nation's army and police officers typically consider the radical party to be a nest of traitors. Yet the radical party proposes to rely on these very officers – on the legal army of the bourgeois state – to maintain "order" if it wins an electoral victory. Ultimately, the innocent supporters of the radical party are led up the primrose path to fascist counter-revolution. The total inability of the legal party to relate its program of radical reforms to the realities of state power discredits it as a model. (Note: We must distinguish between the legal radical party, and an organization such as the Bolshevik party which engaged in electoral politics as a tactic but whose controlling body was extra-legal.)
Model 3: Mass Action by a Hierarchical Organization Capable of Confronting State Power. In this section, we discuss the reasonable arguments that a "vanguard" or "general staff" or hierarchical leadership is necessary. Although Lenin wrote the first and most notorious pamphlet on this question, our analysis must not be equated with Lenin's. It is clear now that Lenin sought to become an autocrat from the beginning; his bias was toward autocracy for its own sake. Still less is our analysis a justification for the so-called Communist parties today. In the U.S., the so-called Communist parties are mere cults and fossils. In Southern Europe, they are doing incalculable damage to the progressive cause. Then, my analysis does not even assume a specifically Marxist or proletarianist analysis of society as a background. What I am analyzing is the case for "leaderism" in the most general model of revolutionary mass action.
The arguments for the necessity of leaderism are as follows.
1. The objective conditions and uncontrollable trends mystify the social order, leading ordinary people to misunderstand their own interests and to misunderstand the objective possibilities of their situation. Even the most skillful advocate of anarchism, Voline, acknowledges that the Russian masses were profoundly ignorant in consequence of objective causes–prior to 1917. (Of course, beginning with 1917, Voline places the blame for everything that happens in Russia on the malice of Lenin. Miraculous year, 1917: suddenly history stopped being purely objective and became instead purely subjective:)
Two cases in particular deserve mention. First, the culture of religion and racism, combined with the culture of greed, has long impelled oppressed groups to seek to advance their interests by fighting each other. The conflicts of interest between oppressed groups may be real. Nevertheless, none of the groups can eliminate the common system of oppression (e.g. capitalism) by defeating another oppressed group or by mere separatism.
The second case has to do specifically with economics. The oppressed may be taught by the conditions of their lives to think of improvement in their economic situation in terms of gaining larger incomes, or even in terms of overstaffing the workplace, etc. Yet a genuine solution of the capitalist crisis may require a total reorganization of economic institutions and purposes. The vision which encompasses this perspective cannot arise from myopic personal struggles for more money. A collectivist economy is not a generalization of higher wages or overstaffing or unemployment benefits. In fact, fully developed socialism would differ from all previous formations as the sky differs from the earth.
Thus, a doctrinal leadership is necessary, and this leadership must be autonomous or authoritative in the sense that the truth or falsity of the analysis cannot be decided by majority rule – by fashion. There must be a doctrinal vanguard capable of safeguarding its analysis in the face of majority opinion. It must be emphasized that this argument assumes that the vanguard's analysis is in fact realistic. In the case of the so-called Communist parties, what we have, of course, is the use of police methods to enforce an analysis which is objectively false. The party leaders lie to themselves about the trends and moving forces on which they propose to base their political strategy. This situation can only end in farce or tragedy.
2. As a corollary of the previous argument, a doctrinal leadership is necessary to take a wide-angle view of society. Such leadership is needed to mediate among diverse groups which cannot eliminate the common system of oppression without cooperating with each other; yet which cannot cooperate spontaneously because of real differences in past histories and real conflicts of interest.
3. As we have said repeatedly, one must expect the ruling class to exercise power. The ruling class will carry out systematic repression, sabotage, and disorientation of any progressive movement. As we mentioned, such repression could even involve use of the new technologically centralized means of repression. Again, the question is how the repressive apparatus by which the ruling class maintains itself is to be dismantled and dispersed. A plausible argument can certainly be made that to combat vigorous, well-organized repression, a whole array of authoritative or leaderist measures are necessary. These include secrecy; screening for infiltrators; a military headquarters; and a military chain of command. The case of South Africa today shows that this is by no means an academic question. The extent to which a military hierarchy and a revolutionary political police are necessary is still an open question for me, but the question cannot be dismissed as an idle one.
4. If the capitalist crisis can only be resolved decisively by total reorganization of the economy, then a new economic-administrative framework will be necessary. Without being dogmatic on this question, the case can be made that the revolution needs a vanguard as a nucleus for a future economic-administrative structure. (Incidentally, Voline places an enormous emphasis on whether the administrative personnel installed by the revolution are intellectuals or "real" workers. I think this distinction is largely meaningless. Once one accepts the legitimacy of administrative roles, all persons filling those roles belong to the same "caste," whatever their class origin is.) This is as good a place as any to make an observation about the extent to which workers can be masters of the system in the post-revolutionary society. If the existing organization of work is accepted and perpetuated, then many people will spend forty hours or so a week doing mindless or myopic tasks. How can these workers act as masters of the system in any but a nominal sense?
What we must now recognize is that even though the above arguments are based on real conditions, they have highly problematic implications relative to the project of majoritarian emancipation. We next enumerate these implications.
1. If the masses cannot identify their own interests and make cogent judgments themselves, how will they ever become masters of society, the masters of the system? If they are dependent on the commands of a beneficent leader to lead them to freedom, why won't it be possible for the commands of a malevolent leader to lead them right back to slavery? If the masses are slaves of fashion and of strongmen or the star system, then what guarantee is there that they will even attach themselves to the best leader in the first place? It seems to me that the emancipation of the majority requires more than that the masses follow a great leader. It requires that at some point they stop acting as followers and start acting as peers and masters. There may, unfortunately, be millions of people who want to escape responsibility, and who will flock to an organization which assures them that they have escaped it. But how can such escape realize the goal of impelling people to take responsibility?
2. Given that the uncontrollable trends of the society and of mass opinion discourage a realistic analysis and encourage illusions, the vanguard organization exists on the defensive. It is on the defensive against the group it purports to represent – the oppressed majority – and is on the defensive against the future of that majority. Relative to the organization's intended purpose, the external trends drain its energy. The organization must expend energy to repel the majority which it purports to represent. Spontaneity and an open future have to be considered threatening. How can the majority be emancipated and become the masters of the system under these conditions?
3. The organization is based on leaders whose job is to give orders, and followers whose job is to execute orders without understanding them. It becomes necessary to encourage the habit of following orders among followers. Duty and sacrifice must be extolled as the motives for participation in the movement. In these respects, the organization does not energize itself internally.
4. The authority of the leaders is legitimated and an apparatus is developed to enforce that authority. The organization has a legitimate interest in screening for infiltrators. But because the organization is on the defensive against external uncontrollable trends, the matter of unconscious infiltration also arises; and the organization's reaction is to use its apparatus of authority to repel this threat. Members suspect each other of being agents of the external enemy. A portion of the members' hostility is directed toward each other. The result is a climate of hierarchically enforced moral intimidation. Again, the motives for participation become sacrifice and fear. The organization does not energize itself internally.
5. Once the organization's authority is established, the extension of that authority becomes a natural goal. We have already seen that the organization is on the defensive against the inclinations of the generic interest group which it purports to represent, and that it inculcates loyalty to its hierarchy based on moral. intimidation and fear. Thus, the organization is not adhesive toward the generic interest group which it is supposed to represent. It extends its authority by subjugating outsiders. The organization has superseded any generic oppressed group as the object of loyalty. Thus, the way is prepared for war between Leftist parties and for war between Leftist governments.
Before I end the discussion of this topic, let me emphasize that all of these criticisms are directed towards leaderist models which are adopted for plausible and understandable reasons. Not only does the experience of the twentieth century indicate that leaderist organizations can be viable; so far they have been the only viable revolutionary organizations. I do not wish to overstate my critique; and certainly do not intend to morally castigate leaderism. Indeed, the above critique has nothing to do with my critique of the so-called Communist parties. The bankruptcy of the Communist parties goes far beyond the problems of a viable leaderism.
As a final observation on this topic, we may mention that in Lenin's attack on evolutionary socialism and bourgeois statism in State and Revolution, he gave three principles which are construed by his supporters as a guarantee that an organization of workers' representatives will not usurp power over the class. The principles are:
a. Representatives must be elected by universal sufferage.
b. Representatives must be subject to recall by the electorate. c. Representatives must not be paid more than workers.
The amazing thing about State and Revolution is that Lenin' supporters and detractors alike assume that what Lenin said there oorresponded to what he did as an organizational leader. But nothing could be further from the truth. State and Revolution is rather near to Voline's anarchism, even in its naive assumption that the post-revolutionary economic-administrative task is trivial and can be carried out on the basis of the common sense of the capitalist economy. When Lenin speaks of the dictatorship of the proletariat, he does so in Marx's sense of an armed working class which staffs administrative positions itself. But the point is that in his political practice, Lenin never sponsored anything of this nature. Indeed, as soon as Lenin went into action in 1917, he ignored the virtuous pronouncements of State and Revolution and openly devoted his efforts to making the Bolshevik Politbureau as autonomous and unaccountable as possible, and to making his role in the Politbureau as autonomous and unaccountable as possible. Lenin was explicit about his reasons for taking this course: see, for example, his approving marginal notes on Bukharin's The Economics of the Transformation Period. Our conclusion is that the circumstance that a politician writes a book like State and Revolution does not prove that he represents the principles which he proclaims. The three principles above are part of the definition of the control of society by worker-citizens; but merely to proclaim these principles means little.*
The last remarks lead to a more general observation about organizations. What we have called the "ecological" features of an organization will not necessarily be visible in the literature it publishes, or in the slogans or specific issues which it raises. In the Sixties, almost all of the so-called Communist parties in the U.S. opposed the Vietnam war as a matter of course. Such nominal and unexceptionable positions say nothing about the "ecology" of an organization. (This is not even to mention that organizations are perfectly free to lie about their size, their sources of financing, etc.) Further, the members of an organization may be the least equipped to recognize the crucial features of the organization's "ecology."
*
B. Minority Action Models Which Envision the Transformation of the Whole Society in the Long Run
Model 4. Terrorism. Here we consider attempts. to achieve conventional Leftist goals on the part of isolated terrorists. In Tsarist Russia, terrorism was the consequence of naivete about the nature of ruling class power. It was believed that elimination of a single regime official could change the social system – a belief which was quite unrealistic. Today, terrorism in the West has a different origin. If the terrorists are not outright provocateurs, or agents of the foreign policy of one or another third-world government, then they are children of the ruling class who have been overwhelmed by the protracted subjugation of mass consciousness in the West to which we have already referred. They assume that under the conditions of the subjugation of mass consciousness, social revolution is still an appropriate goal, but that it can be adequately simulated by sabotage and commando operations. Now sabotage and commando operations have a legitimate role when a country is already at war and ordinary people are forced to become politically conscious and to take a stand by the very fact of being at war. Sabotage is used to damage the enemy behind the lines when the enemy regime has the approval of the masses and there is no question of appealing to the masses' good intentions. Today, the veterans of the SOE and OSS campaigns in Nazi-occupied Europe are acclaimed as heroes. The point is, however, that there is no illusion that these commandos were social revolutionaries. (Indeed, they were agents of British and American imperial interests, and were the nucleus of the future British and American foreign secret police.) Sabotage and commando operations can also play a legitimate supporting role within a revolution, as they did in the war in South Vietnam.
However, the conception that isolated terrorist acts are an adequate substitute for revolution – that they can simulate or replace revolution – is madness. This conception disregards the two most important aspects of revolutions mass radicalization, and the explicit program of social construction. Terrorism is an attempt to make a revolution without the people or a revolution against the people. It elevates mad-dog killers to the status of revolutionaries. It convinces the masses that Leftists are mad dogs, and generates outpourings of sympathy for the aristocratic victims of the terrorists. Its objective effect, as we are seeing in West Germany as of 1977-78, is to recruit the working class for fascism.Model 5. Communes. Here we speak of voluntary organizations which propose to develop into secessionist economies. (Cf. Alten.) There are two problems with this perspective. One is that the communes espouse a subversive ideology, and thus cannot expect the friendly treatment accorded by police and government to the conservative ideologically motivated non-profit economic subcultures (the Billy Graham organisation, etc.).
The other problem area concerns the economic difficulties involved in trying to drop out of an oligopolistic, mass production, mass distribution economy. Given the vertical integration of the oligopolies, one has to buy supplies from one's own competitors and to rely on one's competitors for distribution (if the operation is to achieve a significant market share). Then, there is greater personal freedom in having an anonymous, alienated straight job than in depending economically on a cooperative. (As for Alten's proposal that communes should produce mass entertainment, there are two difficulties. Entertainment addressed to minority audiences has ceased to be economical. And one is at the mercy of mass tastes. How does one sell Beethoven when the obligatory entertainment music is punk rock?)* C. Trans-Political Subversion
Model 6. A purely cognitive revolution such as the seventeenth-century scientific revolution. Not possible today because there is no principled disaffection with the intellectual status quo. Whether or not Western civilization is politically stable, its dominant mythology is the most viable of all time. The attitude toward the intellectual status quo is one of total complacency and acquiescence.
Model 7. A community of sublime gratification. A minority adopts a new intellectual modality and life-style – not to carry out economic production, but to achieve a more noble gratification now, without waiting for an imaginary future. Again, fails because there is no principled disaffection with the intellectual status quo and stereotypical life-styles.
Model 8. Clandestine sabotage and subversion for some original purpose outside the scope of conventional politics. Discover technological knowledge based on principles that are outside the boundaries of science as those boundaries are currently drawn. Infiltrate the most centralized institutions of the regime. That is, infiltrate any secret government research project in which there is inherently the chance that the project may turn against the interests of its sponsors and usurp their hegemony. Two such projects would be attempts by government astronomers to contact extra-terrestrial intelligence, and attempts by government neurocyberneticians to build artificial super-human beings. (The reverse of the attitude of John Lilly, who quit when he realized that his research was wanted for military reasons.)
***
(Ed. note: Model 9. The Gen. 3.1-24 based St.rike moves through the Revolution of Catast.rophe towards the Inevitable Universal Allocation of Minimum Subsist.ence Salvation. To be continued.)
