The Crisis of Everything Everywhere — Day 4
Comments Off on The Crisis of Everything Everywhere — Day 4THE CRISIS OF EVERYTHING EVERYWHERE
or WELCOME TO THE NEW PARADIGM
A midwinter retreat, a modular molecular seminar with Everyone
Day 4
Egypt and Greece (in focus) & the Strike
The fourth day will resume our inquiry into the global context of this struggle. It is our belief that any actions taking place within the US can only resonate further and add to the struggle for global solidarity and social justice through an awareness of developments elsewhere. For this reason, we will organize a series of Skype interviews with comrades in Egypt and in Greece. These conversations will be followed by a discussion around the possibilities for different forms of strike or refusal to pay movements, including calls for a General Strike.
4-5:30PM
Jacquie Soohen (www.bignoisefilms.com) and Lobna Darwish (www.mosireen.org) will be joining us in person and online, respectively, for an update on the Egyptian context. And a discussion about potential ways of building up existing solidarity.
6-7:30PM
This session will include an interview with Dimitris Dalakoglou, co-editor of Revolt and Crisis in Greece, is one of the guests confirmed to speak about the current situation in Athens. We will be also inviting friends in the city who can add to this discussion.
8PM
On The General Strike
A discussion and open work space for a General Strike, and how it could be deployed – what are our historical and political conceptions of the strike, how do they relate to our present contexts, and what forms of communication and solidarity are necessary to see the strike we want to see.
Some questions:
— Who calls for the strike, who strikes, what do we do during the strike, and is there an AFTER the strike?
— What activities do we expect to precede this call, and what do we expect to follow?
During the Wisconsin protests in the Spring of 2011 the threat of the General Strike re-entered popular consciousness, but it existed, as in George Sorel’s work, only as myth, the spectre of a proletariat unrealized. Following the occupation of Zuccotti Park on September 17th, which was for many the beginning of the Occupy Wall Street movement, murmurs of this myth began to rise again.
On October 8th Nikolas Kozloff wrote an opinion piece for Al Jazeera English, “What chance a general strike in Manhattan?” Thus far, the answer has been none.
But we saw Occupy Oakland call for a General Strike for November 2nd, followed by Occupy Dallas’ call for November 30th. We have recently seen many calling for May 1st, 2012 Mayday, to be America’s first national General Strike. Rosa Luxemburg distinguished between the demonstrative and fighting general strike. W.E.B. Du Bois suggested America’s first general strike was carried out by former slaves who refused to continue working on plantations, leading to civil war. Can we have a general strike which is not instrumentalized, but is a political act, a step towards definitive refusal or revolt? We would like to not just create a space for general open discussion, but also a space to work together toward existing plans to carry out or experiment with strikes.
SUGGESTED READINGS: —
Rosa Luxemburg, 1906
The Mass Strike, the Political Party and the Trade Unions
Nikolas Kozloff, 2011
What Chance a General Strike in Manhattan?
Society of Enemies, 2011
A Message to the Partisans, in Advance of the General Strike
Society of Enemies, 2011
Blockading the Port is Only the First of Many Last Resorts
BIBLIOGRAPHY:
Reflections on Violence – George Sorel, 1908
The General Strike – Bill Haywood, 1911
Critique of Violence – Walter Benjamin, 1921
The General Strike – Ralph Chaplin, 1933
The General Strike – W.E.B. Du Bois, 1935
Endnote:
The so-called sympathetic Seattle strike was an attempted revolution. … True, there were no flashing guns, no bombs, no killings. Revolution, one should repeat, doesn’t need ‘violence’. The general strike, as practiced in Seattle, is in and of itself the weapon of revolution, all the more dangerous because quiet. To succeed, it must suspend everything; stop the entire life stream of a community… That is to say, it puts the government out of operation. And that is all there is to revolt – no matter how achieved.
Seattle General Strike