Everything about Anarcho-syndicalists totally explained
Anarcho-syndicalism is a branch of
anarchism which focuses on the
labour movement.
Syndicalisme is a French word meaning "
trade unionism" – hence, the "
syndicalism" qualification. Anarcho-syndicalists view labour unions as a potential force for revolutionary social change, replacing
capitalism and the
State with a new society democratically self-managed by workers. Anarcho-syndicalists seek to abolish the wage system, regarding it as "
wage slavery," and state or private ownership of the means of production, which they believe lead to class divisions. (Not all seek to abolish wages per se. Ralph Chaplin states that "the ultimate aim of the General Strike as regards wages is to give to each producer the full product of his labor. The demand for better wages becomes revolutionary only when it's coupled with the demand that the exploitation of labor must cease.") Anarcho-syndicalism remains a popular and active school of Anarchism today and has many supporters as well as many currently active organizations. Many contemporary anarchists argue that Anarcho-Syndicalism is more of an anarchist workplace organizational structure than an economic system in and of itself. Anarcho-syndicalist trade unionists differ on anarchist economic arrangements from a
Collectivist anarchism type economic system to an
Anarcho-Communism type economic system. Historically most anarcho-syndicalists were/are also anarcho-communists (such as
Lucy Parsons) or anarcho-collectivists (such as
Buenaventura Durruti) but there have been many anarcho-syndicalists who preferred mutualist-type economic arrangements such as
Joseph Labadie. Anarcho-Syndicalism made an appearance in Monty Python's movie:
Monty Python and The Holy Grail.
Features of anarcho-syndicalism
The basic principles of anarcho-syndicalism are:
Workers' solidarity
Workers’ solidarity means that anarcho-syndicalists believe all workers, no matter what their
gender or
ethnic group, are in a similar situation in regard to their bosses (
class consciousness). Furthermore, it means that, in a capitalist system, any gains or losses made by some workers from or to bosses will eventually affect all workers. Therefore, to liberate themselves, all workers must support one another in their
class conflict.
Anarcho-syndicalists believe that only direct action — that is, action concentrated on directly attaining a goal, as opposed to indirect action, such as electing a representative to a government position — will allow workers to liberate themselves.
Moreover, anarcho-syndicalists believe that workers’ organizations — the organizations that struggle against the wage system, and which, in anarcho-syndicalist theory, will eventually form the basis of a new society — should be self-managing. They shouldn't have bosses or "business agents"; rather, the workers should be able to make all the decisions that affect them themselves.
Rudolf Rocker was one of the most popular voices in the anarcho-syndicalist movement. He dedicated himself to the organisation of
Jewish immigrant workers in
London's East End and led the 1912 garment workers strike. He outlined a view of the origins of the movement, what it sought, and why it was important to the future of labour in his 1938 pamphlet
Anarcho-Syndicalism.
In his article
Anarchism and Anarcho-Syndicalism, Rocker points out that the anarcho-syndicalist union has a dual purpose, "1. To enforce the demands of the producers for the safeguarding and raising of their standard of living; 2. To acquaint the workers with the technical management of production and economic life in general and prepare them to take the socio-economic organism into their own hands and shape it according to socialist principles." In short, laying the foundations of the new society "within the shell of the old." Up to the First World War and the Bolshevik Revolution, anarcho-syndicalist unions and organizations were the dominant actors in the revolutionary left.
History
Hubert Lagardelle wrote that
Pierre-Joseph Proudhon laid out the fundamental theories of anarcho-syndicalism, through his repudiation of both capitalism and the state, his flouting of political government, his idea of free, autonomous economic groups, and his view of struggle, not pacifism, as the core of humanity.
The earliest expressions of anarcho-syndicalist structure and methods were formulated in the
International Workingmen's Association or First International, particularly in the
Jura federation. The First International, however, split between two main tendencies within the organization over the question of political, parliamentary action; the libertarian wing represented by
Mikhail Bakunin and the statist wing represented by
Karl Marx. Adherents of the former would go on to influence the development of the labour movement in Spain, France, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Latin America (see
anarchism in Brazil and
anarchism in Mexico), while orthodox Marxists would form mass-based labour and social democratic parties throughout Europe (initially grouped around the
Second International), with major strongholds in Germany and England. Some Marxists, notably
Anton Pannekoek, would formulate positions remarkably close to anarcho-syndicalism through
council communism. (See main article
Anarchism and Marxism.)
In 1895, the
Confédération Générale du Travail (CGT) in
France expressed fully the organizational structure and methods of revolutionary syndicalism influencing labour movements the world over. The CGT was modelled on the development of the
Bourse de Travail (labour exchange), a workers' central organization which would encourage self-education and
mutual aid, and facilitate communication with local workers' syndicates. Through a
general strike, workers would take control of industry and services and self-manage society and facilitate production and consumption through the labour exchanges. The
Charter of Amiens, adopted by the CGT in 1906, represents a key text in the development of revolutionary syndicalism rejecting parliamentarianism and political action in favour of revolutionary
class struggle. The
Central Organisation of the Workers of Sweden (SAC) (in Swedish the Sveriges Arbetares Centralorganisation), formed in 1910, are a notable example of an anarcho-syndicalist union influenced by the CGT. Today, the SAC is one the largest anarcho-syndicalist unions in the world in proportion to the population, with some strongholds in the public sector.
The
International Workers Association, formed in 1922, is an international anarcho-syndicalist federation of various labour unions from different countries. At its peak, the International Workers Association represented millions of workers and competed directly for the hearts and minds of the working class with social democratic unions and parties. The
Spanish Confederación Nacional del Trabajo played and still plays a major role in the Spanish labour movement. It was also an important force in the
Spanish Civil War, organizing worker militias and facilitating the collectivization of vast sections of the industrial, logistical, and communications infrastructure, principally in
Catalonia. Another Spanish anarcho-syndicalist union, the
Confederacion General del Trabajo de España, is now the third largest union in Spain and the largest anarchist union with tens of thousands of members.
The
Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), although not explicitly anarcho-syndicalist, were informed by developments in the broader revolutionary syndicalist milieu at the turn of the twentieth-century. At its founding congress in 1905, influential members with strong anarchist or anarcho-syndicalist sympathies like
Thomas J. Haggerty,
William Trautmann, and
Lucy Parsons contributed to the union's overall revolutionary syndicalist orientation. Lucy Parsons, in particular, was a veteran anarchist union organizer in Chicago from a previous generation, having participated in the struggle for the 8-hour day in Chicago and subsequent series of events which came to be known as the
Haymarket Affair in 1886.
Anarcho-syndicalism and revolutionary syndicalism
Although the terms anarcho-syndicalism and revolutionary syndicalism are often used interchangeably, the anarcho-syndicalist label wasn't widely used until the early 1920s (some credit
Sam Mainwaring with coining the term). “The term ‘anarcho-syndicalist’ only came into wide use in 1921-1922 when it was applied polemically as a pejorative term by communists to any syndicalists…who opposed increased control of syndicalism by the communist parties.” In fact, the original statement of aims and principles of the International Workers Association (drafted in 1922) refers not to anarcho-syndicalism, but to revolutionary unionism or revolutionary syndicalism, depending on the translation. The use of the term "anarcho-syndicalist" signifies the increasing gap between proponents of orthodox, political Marxism and unionists who advocated complete independence from political parties following the
Russian Revolution, and the shift to a more politically doctrinaire version of syndicalism. As a broad ideological heading, prior to the First World War and the Bolshevik seizure of state power in Russia, revolutionary syndicalism grouped numerous left-wing tendencies together united on a class basis with no official party affiliation, as outlined in the Charter of Amiens.
Anarcho-syndicalism and party politics
The anarcho-syndicalist orientation of many early American labour unions arguably played an important role in the formation of the American political spectrum, most significantly of the Industrial Workers of the World. The United States is the only industrialized ("first world") country that doesn't have a major labour-based political party. This hasn't always been the case. In 1912, for example,
Eugene Debs (a founding member of the
IWW) polled 6% of the popular vote as the Socialist Party presidential candidate - a significant portion of the popular vote considering that this was 8 years before the adoption of
universal suffrage in the U.S. Some
political scientists would, in part, attribute the lack of an American labour party to the
single member plurality electoral system, which tends to favour a two-party system. This phenomenon is sometimes referred to as
Duverger's law.
Controversially, the
Confederación Nacional del Trabajo participated in the Spanish Republican
Popular Front government in the
Spanish Civil War. In November 1936, four anarchist ministers—
Garcia Oliver,
Frederica Montseny,
Joan Peiró, and
Juan López—accepted positions in the government. This move was criticized by rank-and-file groups like the
Friends of Durruti.
Quotations
Rudolf Rocker wrote in
Anarcho-Syndicalism:
Political rights don't originate in parliaments, they are, rather, forced upon them from without. And even their enactment into law has for a long time been no guarantee of their security. Just as the employers try to nullify every concession they'd made to labour as soon as opportunity offered, as soon as any signs of weakness were observable in the workers' organizations, so governments are always inclined to restrict or to abbrogate completely rights and freedoms that have been achieved if they imagine that the people will put up no resistance. . . . Political rights don't exist because they've been legally set down on a piece of paper, but only when they've become the ingrown habit of a people, and when any attempt to impair them will meet with the violent resistance of the populace.
Revolutionary Syndicalism basing itself on the class-war, aims at the union of all manual and intellectual workers in economic fighting organisations struggling for their emancipation from the yoke of wage slavery and from the oppression of the State. Its goal consists in the re-organisation of social life on the basis of free Communism, by means of the revolutionary action of the working-class itself. It considers that the economic organisations of the proletariat are alone capable of realising this aim, and, in consequence, its appeal is addressed to workers in their capacity as producers and creators of social riches, in opposition to the modern political labour parties which can never be considered at all from the points of view of economic re-organisation.
Criticisms and responses
Anarcho-syndicalism is viewed as an
anachronism by many contemporary anarchists. Anarcho-syndicalism is criticized by other anarchists as an "anachronism" because anarcho-syndicalists often deny the importance of anarchist groups and federations, arguing that revolutionary industrial and community unions are enough in themselves. Many anarchists see anarcho-syndicalism as "self-managed capitalism", or as John Zerzan describes it, the "self-management of alienation."
Syndicalists think that the anarchist and union movements can be fused into one while most other anarchists would disagree. Anarcho-syndicalist Eugene Varlin defended anarcho-syndicalism arguing
"the enormous advantage of making people accustomed to group life and thus preparing them for a more extended social organisation. They accustom people not only to get along with one another and to understand one another, but also to organise themselves, to discuss, and to reason from a collective perspective." and that unions
"form the natural elements of the social edifice of the future; it's they who can be easily transformed into producers associations; it's they who can make the social ingredients and the organisation of production work."
Few anarcho-syndicalists deny the need for political organization and many today believe that union activity would lead to federation activity amongst free workers,
Direct action, being one of the main staples of anarcho-syndicalism, would extend into the political sphere according to its supporters. Famous examples being the French
French Confederation Generale du Travail (
General Confederation of Labour) and the Spanish CNT/FAI (Confederation Nacional de Trabajo/Federacion Anarquista Iberica, the Popular Front Libertarian movements in Spain which included the Mujeres Libres). To them, the labour council is the federation of all workplace branches of all industries in a geographical area "territorial basis of organisation linkage brought all the workers from one area together and fomented working-class solidarity over and before corporate solidarity." Rudolf Rocker argues,
Thus, anarcho-syndicalism isn't apolitical but instead sees political and economic activity as being one in the same. And, unlike some critics propose, anarcho-syndicalism is different from reformist union activity in that it aims to completely obliterate capitalism
"(Anarcho-syndicalism) has a double aim: with tireless persistence, it must pursue betterment of the working class's current conditions. But, without letting themselves become obsessed with this passing concern, the workers should take care to make possible and imminent the essential act of comprehensive emancipation: the expropriation of capital."
While collectivist and communist anarchists criticize syndicalism of having the potential to exclude the voices of citizens and consumers outside of the union, anarcho-syndicalists argue that labor councils will work outside of the workplace and within the community to encourage community and consumer participation in economic and political activity (even workers and consumers outside of the union or nation) and will work to form and maintain the institutions necessary in any society such as schools, libraries, homes, etc. Murray Bookchin argues
"[a]t the same time that syndicalism exerts this unrelenting pressure on capitalism, it tries to build the new social order within the old. The unions and the 'labour councils' are not merely means of struggle and instruments of social revolution; they're also the very structure around which to build a free society. The workers are to be educated [bytheir own activity within the union] in the job of destroying the old propertied order and in the task of reconstructing a stateless, libertarian society. The two go together."
Individualist anarchists in the labor movement
In terms of its alignment/deviation with
anarchism - even though the organized labor movement has historically been most closely aligned with
social anarchists, it has also historically garnered much support from
individualist and
mutualist anarchists. Individualist anarchist Benjamin Tucker believed that strikes should be composed by free workers rather than by bureaucratic union officials and organizations. He argued,
"strikes, whenever and wherever inaugurated, deserve encouragement from all the friends of labor. . . They show that people are beginning to know their rights, and knowing, dare to maintain them." and furthermore,
"as an awakening agent, as an agitating force, the beneficent influence of a strike is immeasurable. . . with our present economic system almost every strike is just. For what is justice in production and distribution? That labor, which creates all, shall have all." Tucker envisioned an individualist anarchist society as
"each man reaping the fruits of his labor and no man able to live in idleness on an income from capital....become[ing] a great hive of Anarchistic workers, prosperous and free individuals [combining] to carry on their production and distribution on the cost principle." rather than a bureaucratic organization of workers organized into rank and file unions. However, he did hold a genuine appreciation for labor unions (which he called
"trades-union socialism") and saw it as
"an intelligent and self-governing socialism" saying,
"[they] promise the coming substitution of industrial socialism for usurping legislative mobism." Mutualist anarchist Pierre-Joseph Proudhon believed that
worker-owned cooperatives would replace capitalist workplace and mutual banks replacing capitalist institutions and gave fierce support to labor union movements, arguing
"every worker employed in the association [musthave] an undivided share in the property of the company" . Mutualist William Kline believed that labor union movements and cooperative movements would form federations to allow social groups to interconnect with one another for decision-making for the common good
"industries are sisters; they're parts of the same body; one can't suffer without the others sharing in its suffering. They should therefore federate, not to be absorbed and confused together, but in order to guarantee mutually the conditions of common prosperity . . . Making such an agreement won't detract from their liberty; it'll simply give their liberty more security and force." Some of the most prominent figures in the late 19th century and early 20th century labor movement, such as
Dyer Lum and
Joseph Labadie were individualist anarchists.
Organizations
Books
Rocker, Rudolf, Anarchism and Anarcho-Syndicalism
Rocker, Rudolf, Anarcho-Syndicalism
Lenny Flank (ed), IWW: A Documentary History, Red and Black Publishers, St Petersburg, Florida, 2007. ISBN 978-0-9791813-5-1
Film
"Vivir la utopia. El anaarquismo en espana - Living Utopia", Film by Juan Gamero, 1997. Here via en.anarchopedia a short description of the film and direct link to the film via Youtube, Spanish with English subtitlesFurther Information
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