A Positive Program

Carrol Cox cbcox at ilstu.edu
Sat Sep 22 20:07:40 PDT 2001


kelley wrote:
>
> why are the WTO protests and anarchist movement not cause for the same joy?
> you need to explain that one.

Nothing I read on the WTO protests gave me any feel whatsoever of what was going on in the communities that the protesters came from -- and without that feel I didn't really auite beieve in the big demonstrations. But it was already becoming clear by early this week that there was immense local activity going on.

And also I still don't know what the actual content of the "anarchist" element in the movement is. An anarchist can be that only because (s)he is just getting into politics and that's the easiest label available -- or they might be real followers or descendants of Proudhon, Bakunin, etc, and thus they represent a long-run threat to any mass movement. On the marxism list I provisionally defended the "anarchists" because I thought attacks on them were unprincipled because based on inadequate information about the make-up of the protests and of the alleged anarchists. But if they are more or less true successors to the Weathermen, they are a deadly threat to the unity and health of the movement.

Carrol


>
> At 12:03 AM 9/22/01 -0500, Carrol Cox wrote:
>
> >Carrol
> >P.S. 128 people met here tonight to form "Bloomington-Citizens for Peace
> >and Justice." They plunged into work with enthusiasm and bubbling with
> >ideas. It looks quite promising. A campus organization is also being
> >formed. I'll be able to check it out on Monday. I'm really amazed that
> >Doug had to ask why I was feeling optimistic for the first time in 30
> >years. The answer ought to be obvious just from the postings on lbo.



More information about the lbo-talk mailing list