by mitch - personal capacity Fri Aug 02, 2013 11:03

The origins of CSAC falls short. The concept actually originated with NY WSA, with very early support for the first conference and concept from NEFAC (CS), with May First (Michigan-Minnesota Group) in close order. Additional comments to follow.

by Xtn Sun Aug 04, 2013 01:37

It's good to see you all writing up a little something saying where you all are at and where you are wanting to go. I wish you all the best and look forward to future networking, discussions and collaboration.

I do think that the outline and presentation of the Class Struggle Anarchist initiative is skewed and simplified, however. I say this as someone who was involved in the first couple years of organizing the initial conferences and then what became part of the "Rapprochement".

At the beginning, the CSAC came from loose conversations on the old Friends of NEFAC list where it was determined that given a recent wave of workers struggles (auto, transit, aircraft mechanics) that it would be a good thing for us to come together, get reacquainted and educate ourselves on a number of our common histories and experiences, and from there maybe figure out some practical forms of working together inside these emerging and future struggles.

The Regroupment aspect was never the primary basis for networking. It was a small tendency that grew but was never agreed upon by all groups or individuals. I was and remained opposed to Regroupment although I and my comrades were open to arguments in its favor. But I felt that a satisfactory argument in favor of Regroupment was never offered.

The course that I was a part in advocating (as well as other members of the pre-First of May Anarchist Alliance affinity group, the Michigan-Minnesota Group) was that the existing class struggle and social revolutionary anarchist and anti-authoritarian formations should develop various ongoing networks around labor, social justice, housing, etc. Through a decentralized, heterogeneous network that nonetheless had programs, principles and collective strategies for intervention and action, we would be building a revolutionary and anarchist presence in the mass movements. We would also, through principled collective collaboration, be developing a sense of shared politics. We felt this was a better (and organic) way of constructing what might be a down-the-road "federation". But we had the long view rather than the immediate "let's get all the groups together now" approach of the regroupment tendency. In fact, this debate was had in the open plenary of the second Class Struggle Anarchist Conference that was held in Detroit 2009. We were part of a bloc that included Open City (NYC NEFAC), MAS, Solidarity and Defense, and some individual members of the WSA.

Later that year MAS issued the Rapprochement proposal, which while I was skeptical of, I and others participated. My primary feeling of the Rapprochement process was that it was too close to and would be a cover for a simple regroupment and the creation of a unitary organization in which important political and strategic differences would be minimized in favor of a drawing together of as many groups and individuals as was possible under the rubric of a Platformist influenced class struggle anarchism. In the course of the Rapprochement Process discussions I feel this is exactly what happened and questions of internationalism, self-determination of the oppressed and an anti-Empire politic were never agreed upon and in fact positions that were at diametric odds were purposefully minimized.

For the record, I am in favor of self-determination (even within nationalist struggles) and anarchist involvement in class fronts within these struggles. I consider this an important point rather than a blanket rejection of nationalism or a plague on both houses approach. Given the limits of international class struggle and social revolutionary anarchism, we have to develop practical relations with a number of movements who we may have political differences with. This is not an easy avenue but what is easy and if anarchism is to be a viable alternative in these struggles then we have to consider a different approach rather than abstentionism.

This all said, I think that you all continuing to discuss and organize together is positive and as I said, I look forward to future networking around struggles.

by mitch - personal capacity Tue Aug 06, 2013 08:13

I'd largely agree with these comments and observations:

"At the beginning, the CSAC came from loose conversations on the old Friends of NEFAC list where it was determined that given a recent wave of workers struggles (auto, transit, aircraft mechanics) that it would be a good thing for us to come together, get reacquainted and educate ourselves on a number of our common histories and experiences, and from there maybe figure out some practical forms of working together inside these emerging and future struggles.

The Regroupment aspect was never the primary basis for networking. It was a small tendency that grew but was never agreed upon by all groups or individuals. ..."

I would share these thoughts as well. But I would also say that the collective we never really got it together enough to make such happen. Even though a few of us tried:

"The course that I was a part in advocating (as well as other members of the pre-First of May Anarchist Alliance affinity group, the Michigan-Minnesota Group) was that the existing class struggle and social revolutionary anarchist and anti-authoritarian formations should develop various ongoing networks around labor, social justice, housing, etc. Through a decentralized, heterogeneous network that nonetheless had programs, principles and collective strategies for intervention and action, we would be building a revolutionary and anarchist presence in the mass movements. We would also, through principled collective collaboration, be developing a sense of shared politics. We felt this was a better (and organic) way of constructing what might be a down-the-road "federation"

That said, I think we share a minority point of this on this. The correct one ( -:) ), but a minority one.

by Wayne - personal opinion Tue Aug 13, 2013 11:58 drwdprice at aol dot com

The criticisms make some valid points: It is good to have unity in practice, in labor and other arenas, before merging. It would be good to have unity in theory and program. This is especially true of taking a clear stand in favor of self-determination for oppressed nations, races, and communities (considering that we are living in the major imperialist power on earth, rotten with racism!).

But it would be a mistake to let these weaknesses hold up genuine movement toward merger, to creating a national federation of revolutionary, class-struggle, anarchists. These are anarchists who (whether influenced by the historical Draft Platform or not) believe in dual-organizationalism (specific revolutionary-anarchist organization and general labor and community organizations). While building it and organizing it, we would be working on our unity in action and program. These are not either /or tasks.

by mitch - personal only Tue Aug 13, 2013 13:36

"This is especially true of taking a clear stand in favor of self-determination for oppressed nations, ...."

There will never be a unified point of view on this. I mean, after 20 plus years of the same discussions, you would think that closer view points would have developed, wouldn't ya? At best, all we prolly can do is comradely agree to disagree on this point.

by anarcho-communist Tue Aug 13, 2013 22:56

Mitch, Wayne says "it would be good", not we "have to". I think he agrees to disagree on this point.

by Xtn Wed Aug 14, 2013 07:45

To me the actual issue here is that it was difficult for the various groups to come to common consensus of what work to collaborate on. Part of this was that joint work between the groups was, for some, never a priority, or at best joint work would follow once political agreement was made.There should have been, and remains, an importance to determine how various campaigns intersect, match, parallel and diverge. Coordinating our forces would have and could still lay the foundation for a real regroupment. Despite saying " These are not either /or tasks" Wayne seems to be stressing that ideological coherence rather than practical action deserves more attention towards "genuine movement toward merger, to creating a national federation of revolutionary, class-struggle, anarchists". What does genuine mean? Without practical work, which should necessitate us all to examine in a critical manner, ourselves and the other parties were working with, then how do you arrive at "genuine" agreement and possible unity? Any overemphasis on ideological concerns disconnected from organizing is abstract at best.

I dont want to make light the difficulty at developing joint work, its easier said then done. But in its absence its easy for us to move on and sometimes it's what is necessary.

I in no way speak for M1, and this has to be seen as my personal position, but I felt that the Regroupment/Rapprochement initiative had no clear direction forward, definitely not with on-the-ground work, and thus the main task became drafting and debate over a series of documents. I feel that M1 as a (very)small group had to decide what time and energies we could contribute and how it fit into an approach of both identifying and aiding in the development of social struggles as well as our own organizational development. Housing, labor, anti-racist, Occupy (when it initially emerged), etc,. These were areas we were or became more heavily involved in and for good or bad, they trumped what appeared to be a stagnant Regroupment/Rapprochement process.

At the particular time (2011- 2012) I'm not sure we were in a position to formulate or argue for a renewal of the Regroupment/Rapprochement process and so we eventually resigned, wishing all well.

I think it would a mistake to think that a position on anti-imperialism/self-determination is the core issue for M1. It isn't, although it is an important one. However, it became at a certain point the most acute issue and encapsulated the bigger differences in political orientation and strategies. Possibly even greater an issue, could have been on questions of how social revolutionary anarchists interact with NGO's, non-profits, the union bureaucracies, and voting. These issue themselves never came up in a serious way and and I think many would be surprised to see the variance of positions within the anarchist movement(s). Rather than me cite my groups position I would direct interested people to read, Our Anarchism: http://m1aa.org/?page_id=57 which gives a brief and cursory view of my position as articulated by the organization I am a part of and which I agree with.

Anyway, on the issue of self-determination, if there was a flattening of those differences within the Regroupment/Rapprochement process what else would be minimized in the sake of organizational "unity"?

by mitch - strictly personal Wed Aug 14, 2013 13:11

I would agree with Xtn in this respect. Common work is key to forward motion. Very little of this has taken place. And where it has, it has been uneven at best. Organization building has to be organic on a number of levels. Ideological and interaction between comrades. Sometimes ideological difference get worked out as folks work together, sometimes not.

But I suspect, there are some with already exisiting politics which are close enough where there's a bunch of movement to regroup. My own read is that numbers of folks feel isolated and that some form of national would break that down. Personally, I'm much for hesitant and reserved. Some of this just goes back to my own ideological orientation, other, the fact that there's been no real close cooperation and working projects.