On The Jacobin Show, Amber Frost offers a critique of some of the intellectual arguments for mutual aid, debunks the myth that the Black Panther Party's free...
It is a pretty traditional Marxist-Leninist interpretation of serving the people.
Direct services are an outreach tactic. They deepen the relationship between a specific community and a communist party. From that relationship, the communist party can identify sites of potential class struggle within the community.
However, there is nothing inherently revolutionary about providing direct services. If you are providing direct services without a strategy for seizing state power, then you are not much different than the Liberal NGOs and philanthropies which also provide direct services.
The Marxist-Leninist strategy for seizing state power is to build a revolutionary party, which can lead the working class through periods of intensified class struggle. Direct services are a tactic for building the party.
The Party for Socialism and Liberation has a great article on this topic. [1]
In addition, there is nothing inherently radicalizing about having one’s needs met. There is a huge complex of non-profit organizations funded by ruling class foundation money–many of which mask themselves with radical-sounding language–that have been established in recent decades that meet the needs of working people but in a political sense serve as a means to inhibit the development of revolutionary consciousness. Promoting direct service activities as a form of dual power undercuts the core of the revolutionary socialist program: to have a society where people’s needs are met we need to expropriate the capitalist class, smash their state, and establish a workers’ state in its place.
What I don't understand about that argument tho is that you can't put in the intellectual and physical work of organizing if your basic needs aren't being met. Most don't give fuckall about expropriating from the capitalist class if no water is coming out of the taps. To me the real distinction lies in pairing direct service provision with organizing and education. Local self-governance and community organizing can be (obv not always) radicalizing. Personally I don't see any contradiction between dual power and creating a large movement for smashing the state, if anything they're complementary.
To me the real distinction lies in pairing direct service provision with organizing and education.
You might like this part of the article:
Properly applied, “serve the people” programs are primarily an outreach tactic with the goal of identifying sites of potential class struggle, rather than a manifestation of dual power.
To consider some practical examples, the Philadelphia branch of the Party for Socialism and Liberation is involved in a number of base building activities that utilize direct service events along these lines. In May, we organized a block party through our Kensington-based community center called the Philadelphia Liberation Center. At the block party, we distributed bags of household essentials and childcare goods marked with our Party logo, and also organized music, childrens’ activities, and a cookout to give neighbors a chance to socialize. Events geared towards meeting residents’ cultural and recreational needs can be just as effective as those aimed at meeting material needs, and has the added benefit of attracting in greater numbers the layers of the neighborhood with a baseline level of stability conducive to future organizing efforts.
Kensington is being intensely targeted by the big banks and real estate firms for gentrification. We made the right to housing the political theme of the block party, produced a special pamphlet for it, and promoted the event with the framing “strong communities can resist gentrification.” In the course of our outreach for the block party, we met a long-time, well-respected resident of the neighborhood who was fighting the construction of a massive, luxury apartment complex on the small residential street where she lived. She invited us to attend an upcoming hearing on the construction, and from there to join the fight on an ongoing basis. The practical commitment to the well-being of people in the neighborhood demonstrated by the PSL’s cadre earned the trust of the people, who invited us to intervene in this local issue. From there, we were able to help launch the Norris Square Community Action Network, which carried out a well-attended picket of the construction site and is also moving forward with other projects in the neighborhood.
This is great. It seems to me this pretty much satisfies all arguments for/against in this thread. I think we're all for mutual aid as an outreach tactic, provided it is not JUST mutual aid.
As much as I like the video and appreciate its discussion, it feels like Amber straw-mans mutual aid projects as non-political and dismissing them as political tools, without deeply discussing their actual potential. They just kinda go "ah yeah, if you're doing BPP style mutual aid that's good but normally mutual aid is bad" which I do actually agree with, but it's too much time spent dunking on people and not enough time spent analyzing efforts, for example by PSL.
Yeah I fully agree with you? I don't think I said anything else. This "podcast" is just a discussion with some propaganda sprinkled in. I don't think Bhaskar has ever claimed to do anything like a "coherent political project" with Jacobin, it's just leftist press.
To me the real distinction lies in pairing direct service provision with organizing and education.
The PSL article discusses this. We provide direct services to the people. These services are an outreach tactic to build relationships with the working and oppressed classes in our communities.
Personally I don’t see any contradiction between dual power and creating a large movement for smashing the state
The contradiction comes from the definition of "dual power." We consider "dual power" to be a historical phenomenon in which multiple organs capable of wielding state power exist concurrently.
The most famous example of this is the period between the February and November revolutions in Russia. Both the Provisional Government and the Soviets were capable of wielding state power, and each struggled for supremacy over the other.
We don't consider direct services to be dual power. Also, we don't prioritize the construction of dual power. Our objective is to construct a revolutionary party capable of leading the working class.
Thanks for that clarification. I think the historical example you cited is a really important one that should certainly be learned from. I guess my construction of what dual power could be differs a bit from how it's defined elsewhere. I think having self-governing units within cities and communities (united under a party or organization) could constitute a kind of dual power whereby alternatives to capitalism and the capitalist state are being actively created under the banner of one organ of power. I lean more towards the social ecologist/Bookchin side of things, but I've never seen a good reason for why a concept like libertarian municipalism couldn't exist under the auspices of a larger apparatus. Does the PSL have any literature on synthesizing direct democracy/local self-governance and democratic centralism?
Does the PSL have any literature on synthesizing direct democracy/local self-governance and democratic centralism?
There's a good translation of a Raul Castro speech on this topic I'd recommend. [1]
In a workers state, democratic centralism only happens within the party itself. The party is not a state organ. It is a vanguard party which provides direction to the state organs. But the state organs can reject this direction if the people disagree with the party.
In Cuba, which is the example PSL studies the most, organs of state power are democratic.
There are Municipal Assemblies, which are local governments elected by direct democracy.
There is also a National Assembly, which is the national government. Half the representatives are elected by Municipal Assemblies & half are elected by trade unions, student organizations, and other progressive advocacy groups.
The National Assembly elects the president, vice president, and their supreme court members. It also votes on the major policy positions of the Cuban government.
At the last National Assembly, 2/3rds of the representatives were members of the Cuban Communist Party. They are most represented because their Party is incredibly popular, but the people are free to elect other representatives.
I think there's a lot of room for Anarchists to feel represented in a workers state, despite their (justified) distrust of states. They are democratic in a way that is difficult for people living in a bourgeois state to understand.
Yep, her criticisms were fine, but her prescriptions were a bit weak. Whether proletarian organizing ala orthodox Marxism, or Marxist Leninist approaches, organizing is incredibly vita and should not be limited to trade union organizing, which Amber mostly focuses on ("we don't need to go 'imagine', just do what worked before! (except it didn't work because they got AFL-CIO'd and taft hartley'd and then wiped out)
It is a pretty traditional Marxist-Leninist interpretation of serving the people.
Direct services are an outreach tactic. They deepen the relationship between a specific community and a communist party. From that relationship, the communist party can identify sites of potential class struggle within the community.
However, there is nothing inherently revolutionary about providing direct services. If you are providing direct services without a strategy for seizing state power, then you are not much different than the Liberal NGOs and philanthropies which also provide direct services.
The Marxist-Leninist strategy for seizing state power is to build a revolutionary party, which can lead the working class through periods of intensified class struggle. Direct services are a tactic for building the party.
The Party for Socialism and Liberation has a great article on this topic. [1]
Yeah, this is a key part of the discussion.
In my opinion, this is exactly why mass line strategy should be used with mutual aid efforts.
What I don't understand about that argument tho is that you can't put in the intellectual and physical work of organizing if your basic needs aren't being met. Most don't give fuckall about expropriating from the capitalist class if no water is coming out of the taps. To me the real distinction lies in pairing direct service provision with organizing and education. Local self-governance and community organizing can be (obv not always) radicalizing. Personally I don't see any contradiction between dual power and creating a large movement for smashing the state, if anything they're complementary.
You might like this part of the article:
This is great. It seems to me this pretty much satisfies all arguments for/against in this thread. I think we're all for mutual aid as an outreach tactic, provided it is not JUST mutual aid.
As much as I like the video and appreciate its discussion, it feels like Amber straw-mans mutual aid projects as non-political and dismissing them as political tools, without deeply discussing their actual potential. They just kinda go "ah yeah, if you're doing BPP style mutual aid that's good but normally mutual aid is bad" which I do actually agree with, but it's too much time spent dunking on people and not enough time spent analyzing efforts, for example by PSL.
Amber.
Social media & podcasts are not a substitute for a coherent political project.
This video makes good points, but it was intentionally made controversial because that increases engagement on social media.
Yeah I fully agree with you? I don't think I said anything else. This "podcast" is just a discussion with some propaganda sprinkled in. I don't think Bhaskar has ever claimed to do anything like a "coherent political project" with Jacobin, it's just leftist press.
Yeah, I wasn't disagreeing with you.
Oh word lol
The PSL article discusses this. We provide direct services to the people. These services are an outreach tactic to build relationships with the working and oppressed classes in our communities.
The contradiction comes from the definition of "dual power." We consider "dual power" to be a historical phenomenon in which multiple organs capable of wielding state power exist concurrently.
The most famous example of this is the period between the February and November revolutions in Russia. Both the Provisional Government and the Soviets were capable of wielding state power, and each struggled for supremacy over the other.
We don't consider direct services to be dual power. Also, we don't prioritize the construction of dual power. Our objective is to construct a revolutionary party capable of leading the working class.
Thanks for that clarification. I think the historical example you cited is a really important one that should certainly be learned from. I guess my construction of what dual power could be differs a bit from how it's defined elsewhere. I think having self-governing units within cities and communities (united under a party or organization) could constitute a kind of dual power whereby alternatives to capitalism and the capitalist state are being actively created under the banner of one organ of power. I lean more towards the social ecologist/Bookchin side of things, but I've never seen a good reason for why a concept like libertarian municipalism couldn't exist under the auspices of a larger apparatus. Does the PSL have any literature on synthesizing direct democracy/local self-governance and democratic centralism?
There's a good translation of a Raul Castro speech on this topic I'd recommend. [1]
In a workers state, democratic centralism only happens within the party itself. The party is not a state organ. It is a vanguard party which provides direction to the state organs. But the state organs can reject this direction if the people disagree with the party.
In Cuba, which is the example PSL studies the most, organs of state power are democratic.
There are Municipal Assemblies, which are local governments elected by direct democracy.
There is also a National Assembly, which is the national government. Half the representatives are elected by Municipal Assemblies & half are elected by trade unions, student organizations, and other progressive advocacy groups.
The National Assembly elects the president, vice president, and their supreme court members. It also votes on the major policy positions of the Cuban government.
At the last National Assembly, 2/3rds of the representatives were members of the Cuban Communist Party. They are most represented because their Party is incredibly popular, but the people are free to elect other representatives.
I think there's a lot of room for Anarchists to feel represented in a workers state, despite their (justified) distrust of states. They are democratic in a way that is difficult for people living in a bourgeois state to understand.
Other references: [2] [3]
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Her criticisms were in line with an ML interpretation. I didn't get to the point where she talked about her solutions.
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Yep, her criticisms were fine, but her prescriptions were a bit weak. Whether proletarian organizing ala orthodox Marxism, or Marxist Leninist approaches, organizing is incredibly vita and should not be limited to trade union organizing, which Amber mostly focuses on ("we don't need to go 'imagine', just do what worked before! (except it didn't work because they got AFL-CIO'd and taft hartley'd and then wiped out)
Amber.