>A few days ago Doug mentioned that Tahir is an
>autonomist Marxist. What are some distinguishing
>characteristics of this autonomist Marxism?
Sometimes people are prickly about these attributions. If so, Tahir, sorry. Just evoking a tendency - antistatist, antihierarchical, antiparty, pro the self-organizing activity of the working class.
Here's a bit from Harry Cleaver's intro to his AM archive: <http://www.eco.utexas.edu/faculty/Cleaver/txarchintro.html>.
>These archives contain a wide variety of material related to those
>threads of the Marxist tradition which have emphasized the
>self-activity of the working class. "Autonomist "is used here in
>several senses: 1. the autonomy of the working class vis a vis
>capital, 2. the autonomy of workers vis a vis their official
>organizations, e.g., trade unions or parties, 3. the autonomy of
>various sectors of the class from each other, e.g., that of blacks
>from whites, women from men, etc.
>
>I use the term "threads" because it is only fairly recently that
>elements of this tradition have emphasized the concept of workers
>autonomy. Previously an understanding and appreciation of autonomy
>could often be found only within some parts of various Marxist
>movements. For example, the Council Communists emphasized the
>autonomy of the working class vis a vis capital and the party in
>their political writings but often forgot about the idea when they
>turned to the theory of capitalist crisis. Similarly, there have
>been Marxists who have very much understood the ability of the
>working class to initiative struggle against capital (taking the
>offensive rather than being purely reactive) but have had no
>sympathy for the notion of the autonomy of struggles within the
>class.
>
>Much of the material included in this archive has been written as
>contributions to the elaboration of Marxist theory and pratice.
>Other materials touch on issues of working class autonomy but are
>not written by Marxists, e.g., there are commentaries on various
>political movements, writings of anarchists who would not call
>themselves Marxist (though they might well accept the label
>autonomist), campesinista writings which emphasize the autonomy of
>peasant struggles, and so on. As a byproduct of a long term research
>project, these archives include whatever materials I have found to
>be of interest in exploring both the history of thinking about
>workers autonomy and possible ways of elaborating such theory and
>pratice.
>
>These archives are being made available to the movement to acclerate
>the circulation of struggle, both from place to place and through
>time. As many contemporary Marxist historians have discovered the
>reconstruction of bottom up history, of our history, of the history
>of our struggles and of our thinking about our struggles, is
>generally very difficult. Materials pass from view and are
>forgotten, or they are lost or destroyed, and so on. What histories
>do exist are often written by outsiders with no direct experience or
>sympathy for the movements described. The various elements of the
>Marxist tradition that I am calling "autonomist" have been largely
>outside the mainstreams of Marxism, alien and critical of both
>orthodox Marxism (Leninist, Trotskyist, Maoist) and Critical theory
>(Frankfurt School, etc) for neglecting the self-activity of workers
>in favor of the study of capitalist power.