In Defense of Marxism, 24 novembre 2009 :

Deux militants ouvriers ont été récemment arrêtés au Kurdistan pour le “crime” d’avoir défendu les droits des travailleurs, participé à des meetings d’ouvriers et de n’avoir pas capitulé devant les menaces du régime iranien. Pedram Nasrollahi et Farzad Ahmadi ont le soutien de plusieurs dizaines de travailleurs de Sanandaj et d’autres régions du Kurdistan iranien.

Le Réseau de Solidarité avec les Travailleurs d’Iran (Iranian Workers Solidarity Network) défend le droit de ces militants de mener la lutte pour les droits fondamentaux du monde du travail et appelle à leur libération immédiate et inconditionnelle.

Une attaque contre un est une attaque contre tous !

Liberté pour tous les prisonniers politiques en Iran !

IWSN, 23 novembre

Merci d’envoyer vos messages de soutien et de solidarité à  // <![CDATA[
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Pedram Nasrollahi à nouveau arrêté !

La déclaration suivante a été publiée par les militants d’Iranian Workers’ Solidarity Network à Sanandaj lors de l’arrestation récente de Pedram Nasrollahi, un militant ouvrier kurde. Pedram avait été libéré sous caution le 6 avril 2009 de la prison de Sanandaj, la capitale de la province iranienne du Kurdistan.

Camarades ouvriers,

Pedram Nasrollahia été transféré à la section de quarantaine de la prison centrale de Sanandaj et est détenu dans des conditions très dures. Il est nécessaire que tous les militants ouvriers agissent rapidement pour la libération inconditionnelle la plus rapide possible de ce militant ouvrier.

Il est clair que pour continuer à nous exploiter et à voler nos salaires à nous les travailleurs, le système capitaliste est prêt à tout. Seule notre unité dans cette lutte prolétarienne peut forcer à un recul de cette vague de répression et d’arrestations de militants.

Vive l’internationalisme prolétarien !

Iranian Workers’ Solidarity Network Activists - Sanandaj, 16 novembre 2009

Arrestation de Farzad Ahmadi : Un militant ouvrier arrêté.

Selon les dernières nouvelles reçues, le jeudi 19 novembre vers 17 heures, Farzad Ahmadi, un militant ouvrier et tailleur, a été agressé par les forces de sécurité près de la rue Ferdowsi à Sanandaj, et après avoir été sévèrement battu, a été arrêté.

Il faut noter que cela a eut lieu le même jour que celui où les organisations des droits humains ont publié des déclarations condamnant la peine de mort et que ce fut la raison de l’arrestation de plusieurs militants sociaux.

En plus de la condamnation de l’arrestation de Farzad Ahmadi, nous déclarons qu’il n’avait été présent à aucun meeting public ce jour-là. Il a été arrêté vers la rue Vakil, qui n’est pas loin du carrefour Namaki. Les agents du capital cherchaient des excuses imaginaires pour emprisonner des militants anti-capitalistes.

Iranian Workers’ Solidarity Network – Sanandaj, 23 novembre 2009

‘The working class cannot simply lay hold of the ready-made state machinery, and wield it for its own purposes’. The fundamental structure of the state machinery is arranged to perpetuate answering to authority.

Communism’s main argument is the following: that economic production and the structure of society of every historical epoch necessarily arising there from constitute the foundation for the political and intellectual history of that epoch. Since dissolution of communal land ownership, all history is the history of class struggle, between the exploited and the exploiters. Only a total emancipation of the whole of society from exploitation can work. The aim is to ‘proclaim the inevitable impending downfall of present day bourgeois property’. It is not socialism.

Socialism is a maintaining of capitalism with a friendly face by eliminating social abuses. Communism is a total reconstruction of society, not just political revolutions. In 1847, socialism was a middle class movement and communism a working class movement, as such, Marx warns ‘a spectre is haunting Europe – the spectre of communism’. In 1847, Marx’s epoch, he saw the bourgeoisie as having simplified class antagonisms: there is now only the proletariat and the bourgeoisie. The bourgeoisie has a hegemonic hold on values, and as Marx states, ‘the bourgeoisie has resolved personal worth into exchange value’, freedom now is equal to free trade. The bourgeoisie will revolutionize the instruments of production and therefore the relations of production and the whole relations of society. The aim, for the epoch of the bourgeoisie is the constant revolution in production methods, the uninterrupted disturbance of all social conditions, everlasting certainty and agitation. ‘All fixed, frozen relations, with their train of ancient and venerable prejudices and opinions are swept away, all new formed areas become antiquated before they can ossify… all that is solid melts into air… all that is holy is profane’. The market must nestle everywhere, establish connections everywhere’. Where all enter a domain of cosmopolitan consumption, the normalization of the use of capital and its paradigms of desire. The interdependence of nations perpetuates capital and the nation itself, where the ‘cheap prices of commodities are the heavy artillery’ which has now, at the end of history, smashed every last wall of resistance when and where ever it was seen. The bourgeoisie force the world to conform to its model and creates a world after its own image, as the world of the neoliberal springs from the Washington consensus, and engulfs mostly without resistance all that it touches. When there is a crisis of over-production, society falls apart, unless new markets are created and old markets are re-exploited.

The main aim of the bourgeoisie is to commodity the proletariat, to lose their charm and character, which are in tern redefined as expressible as commodities (what does this hat say about me? which colour ipod represents me the best?). The proletariat becomes an ‘appendage of the machine’, where labourers are arranged like soldiers, in rank, authority and worth. Differences in age and sex are neutralized by capitalism, all the instruments of labour of the consumer of commodities, more or less expensive to use according to their age and sex. Although child labour in developed society is behind us, child labour is still exploited by capitalists all over the world. Children in developed countries are accomplices to this as they are born as consumers and trained to consume wit the same hear no evil, speak now evil, see no evil attitude as the bourgeois society around them.

In bourgeois society the past dominates the present, in communist society, the present dominates the past. In bourgeois society, capital has freedom, people don’t. Communism is against freedom as promoted by the bourgeoisie, as individuality and free-trade. ‘Communism deprives no man of the power to appropriate the products of society; all that is done is to deprive him of the power to subjugate the labour of others as a means of such appropriation’, we should enjoy our arts and leisure only when it has been produced in conditions not equatable to exploitation, I,e, outside a system of wage labour and the squeezing of profit from it. The recent phenomenon of ‘fair-trade’ is not enough. Those that work, get as little as possible to perpetuate the necessity of their labour, those who acquire do not work.

Communism aims to abolish the family as we know it. The family of the bourgeoisie, the wife in an instrumental part of production (and adultery is the private prostitution within alienated bourgeois society). Communism aims to abolish all countries and nationalities, as Marx writes ‘working men have no country’. The abolition of property is not a communist aim: it is the abolition of private bourgeois property. ‘Abolition of private property’ is communism. This should happen when the proletariat is raised to the ruling class, to achieve what is known as the ‘dictatorship of the proletariat’, means to abolish private property, a progressive/banded income tax, to abolish inheritance, confiscation of property from rebels and emigrants, centralize credit by setting up a state banking monopoly, to centralize transport, communications and factories, to all have the equal obligation to work, to bring agriculture and manufacturing together by merging town and city via the equal distribution of the population, to have free education, to abolish child labour. In sum, ‘the free development of each is the condition for the free development of all’. It could be said, that people of no class have no reality and exits in the realm of philosophical phantasy. To think one can philosophize, as classless thing, is to flee from the relations of the world you are thrown, by inauthentically ignoring ones historicity: all history is the history of class struggle. ‘All history is nothing but the continuous transformation of human nature: philosophy can be replaced by economic-historical science of society’, and accordingly, Marx questions Hegel, as ‘it is not the consciousness of men that determined their being but on the contrary their social being that determines their consciousness’.

We are in the age of the petite-bourgeoisie, where unions have numbers but have proven time and again to be in the pockets of politicians. The unions are a reaction to the fluctuating wages of the workers. Fluctuating wages causes anxiety: alienation is the existential state of the poor: the proletariat. The proletariat, the dangerous class, the social scum, is waged labour, capital needs labour and the bourgeoisie need capital. Liberal tools such as the minimum wage set the standards for bare existence. To the petite-bourgeoisie, all should become bourgeoisie! To eradicate social inequalities and let everyone enjoy the luxuries and products of their labour. Even those of the minimum wage can get credit cards to buy now pay later for that Playstation 3, car or fashionable haircut. The petite-bourgeoisie acts for the protection of the working class with these tools: the police, prisons and free-trade. The police reinforce, protect and perpetuate the capitalist state machinery, demonize enemies through media discourses and use prisons as the quantitative pecuniary measure of punishment, the ‘horror’ of being forced out of free society. Free society, free trade, free to consume as much as you like, hang the costs, borrow, pay later, you’re free.

Just got word that the blog side of Proletariat is back on line after a brief hiatus. Check out That’s The Hookup for updates on street art, boston events, and random internet fun stuff. While you’re there visit the webstore and pick up one of the recent Repeat Press/Proletariat collab prints… less than 10 left!

În esenţă, naţionalismul nu se deosebeşte cu nimic de comunism. E aceeaşi dictatură a gloatei, care urăşte fanatic individul şi libertăţile sale. Un pupător de prosoape şi icoane nu e cu nimic mai bun decât un pupător de drapel roşu. Ambele sunt impregnate de spiritul dictaturii, al grotei, al turmei… Atât comuniştii, cât şi naţionaliştii sunt gata să taie şi să spânzure oameni concreţi, în carne şi oase în numele idealurilor lor abstracte. Oameni care nu se încadrează în doctrinele şi ideologiile lor, în idealurile lor în care nu este loc de libertate, democraţie, individ, totul fiind în subordinea Statului, Neamului, Tradiţiei, Religiei, Proletariatului…

Practic, toate conflictele sângeroase de la sfârşitul secolului trecut, când se părea că Europa, chiar şi cea estică, a evoluat, s-a civilizat şi nu mai poate tolera sacrificarea oamenilor doar în baza apartenenţei lor la o religie sau naţionalitate, au avut la bază idealuri nobile, de emancipare a unui popor cu preţul sacrificării altuia. Iar purificările etnice sunt emblema idealurilor care privilegiază strămoşi în iţari sau şalvari, icoane, indiferent cine le operează: comuniştii şi cazacii lor ori Antonescu, Garda de Fier sau Miloşevici.

Deci, nu-mi rămâne decât să concluzionez. Dacă locul comuniştilor este luat de naţionalişti, cu siguranţă într-o ţară sau alta nu se întronează democraţia. Mai degrabă, o dictatură este înlocuită cu alta…

Appel du Syndicat Libre des Ouvriers Iraniens à la solidarité avec les ouvriers emprisonnés d’Haft Tapeh, 14 novembre 2009 :

Honorables travailleurs et peuple d’Iran !

Quatre ouvriers de la compagnie de sucre de canne Haft Tapeh, Fereydoon Nikoofard, Jalil Ahmadi, Ghorban Alipoor et Mohammad Heydari ont été arrêtés et envoyés en prison, suite à la confirmation de leurs condamnations à des peines de six mois de détention par la cour d’appel. Un autre travailleur, Ali Nejati, est sur le point d’être arrêté (*).

Dans le même temps, Farzad Kamangar, Mansoor Ossalou et Ebrahim Madadi purgent toujours de longues peines de prison. Mehdi Farahi Shandiz est toujours emprisonné, sans avoir été accusé, six mois après avoir été arrêté lors du Premier Mai à Téhéran, tandis que d’autres personnes arrêtées le Premier Mai, après avoir passé deux mois en prison, sont également poursuivis.

Ces travailleurs n’ont commis aucun crime. Leur seul crime est d’avoir protesté contre l’injustice et les retards dans le paiement des salaires, d’avoir célébré la journée du Premier Mai et d’avoir construit des organisations pour défendre leurs droits humains les plus fondamentaux.

Les ouvriers emprisonnés de la canne à sucre sont de façon répétée descendus dans les rues aux premiers rangs de leurs collègues pour protester contre le non-paiement des salaires et la détresse que subissaient leurs familles. La réponse du système actuel aux revendications les plus basiques des travailleurs sont les matraques, le gaz lacrymogène et des procès fabriqués.

Après avoir travaillé des années dans les pires conditions pour la société Haft Tapeh et avoir créé pour des milliards de Tomans de richesses, ces ouvriers avaient toutes les raisons de descendre dans les rues pour protester contre les salaires impayés et les conditions de vie épouvantables que l’inhumain système capitaliste imposait à eux et à leurs familles. Ils avaient raison de construire leur organisation indépendante et d’unir leurs forces contre les abus sans fin de l’employeur.

Ouvriers amoureux de la liberté d’Iran

Enchainés les ouvriers du sucre pour avoir constituer leur organisation et pour avoir protesté contre le non-paiement des salaires signifient faire taire le moindre cri pour la liberté des ouvriers du pays. Nous devons nous lever en rangs serrés et appeler à la libération immédiate et inconditionnelle de ces travailleurs.

Le Syndicat Libre des Ouvriers Iraniens condamne l’arrestation et la détention des ouvriers d’Haft Tapeh et la détention continue de Farzad Kamangar, brahim Madadi, Mansoor Ossalou et des autres personnes éprises de justice qui sont dans les prisons du pays. Nous appelons les travailleurs et tout le peuple d’Iran à soutenir la revendication de libération immédiate et inconditionnelle de ces prisonniers et d’apporter leur soutien à leurs familles.

Notre syndicat met de côté une somme mensuelle de 3 millions de rials (en plus des dons versés par nos membres et d’autres travailleurs) et appelle tous les travailleurs et le peuple d’Iran d’envoyer des dons pour les familles des ouvriers emprisonnés d’Haft Tapeh. Notre syndicat se tient fermement avec les travailleurs d’Haft Tapeh dans leur lutte pour leurs droits humains, et continuera de lutter pour leurs libérations, sans oublier de soutenir leurs familles.

L’organisation, la grève et les assemblées sont nos droits inaliénables !

Vivent les travailleurs d’Haft Tapeh !

Vive la solidarité ouvrière !

Syndicat Libre des Ouvriers d’Iran, 14 novembre 2009

www.ettehadeh.com

k.ekhraji@gmail.com

Fax: 02144514795

(*) Ali Nejati, le président du syndicat, a commencé à purger sa peine de six mois de prison le lundi 16 novembre (notre du traducteur).

Communiqué du Comité de Solidarité Ouvrière Internationale du Parti Communiste-Ouvrier d’Iran, 16 novembre 2009 :

Ali Nejati, président du syndicat des travailleurs du sucre d’Haft Tapeh, est maintenant le cinquième travailleur a commencé sa peine de six mois de détention à la prison de Dezful. Il rejoint ses collègues Fereydoon Nikoofard, Jalil Ahmadi, Ghorban Alipoor et Mohammad Heydari,qui ont été arrêtés et emprisonnés plus tôt dans le mois.

Les emprisonnements viennent après une longue et difficile lutte des travailleurs de la canne à sucre, qui a duré des mois, pour le versement des salaires impayés et le droit de constituer leur syndicat.

Dans les jours qui ont précédé son arrestation, Nejati a rédigé plusieurs courriers au nom des travailleurs de la canne à sucre et de ses collègues emprisonnés, appelant à la solidarité les travailleurs en Iran et à l’échelle internationale.

“Alors que les employeurs peuvent s’organiser librement, les ouvriers qui constituent leurs organisations indépendantes sont poursuivis et jetés en prison” écrit Nejati dans son courrier daté du 7 novembre. “Le jour est venu de soutenir les travailleurs qui se sont battus à Haft Tapeh pour les droits des ouvriers, et qui ont été élus par les travailleurs d’Haft Tapeh pour les représenter au sein d’une organisation indépendante. Demain et dans l’avenir, lorsque nous serons sortis de prison, il n’y a aucun doute que nous accomplirons la part de notre devoir pour les ouvriers”.

Dans un communiqué daté de samedi, le Syndicat Libre des Ouvriers Iraniens a rappelé l’appel d’Ali Nejati à soutenir les travailleurs de la canne à sucre emprisonnés et leurs familles.

Nous devons obtenir la libération de ces travailleurs ! Touché par des mois de protestations révolutionnaires du peuple, le régime en Iran est plus vulnérable que jamais. Il ne peut pas et ne doit pas être autorisé à continuer ses habituels actes de persécution des travailleurs qui doivent être refusés. Votre solidarité est plus nécessaire que jamais. Merci de publier les nouvelles de ces travailleurs emprisonnés et d’aider par tous les autres moyens à votre disposition pour obtenir la libération de ces travailleurs. Nous pouvons les libérer !

Comité de Solidarité Ouvrière Internationale du Parti Communiste-Ouvrier d’Iran, 16 novembre 2009

Pour tout contact : wpi.workers.iran@gmail.com

Pour participer à la campagne de solidarité avec les militants ouvriers d’Haft Tapeh, voir l‘appel de l’UITA et les messages de protestation envoyés par des syndicats français à l’ambassade d’Iran dont vous pouvez vous inspirer pour envoyer des courriers au nom de vos structures syndicales.

Militants des Droits Humains en Iran, 15 novembre 2009 :

Ali Nejati, dirigeant du syndicat des travailleurs d’Haft Tapeh, a été arrêté et emmené à la prison de Dezful (Khuzestan) après s’être rendu de lui même à l’unité d’application des peines du tribunal de Dezful.

L’unité des droits des prisonniers de Militants des Droits Humains en Iran rapporte qu’Ali Nejati a été arrêté et emmené à la prison de Dezful pour y purger sa peine de prison après qu’il se soit rendu de lui-même à l’unité d’application des peines du tribunal de Dezful. En octobre 2009, Nejati, qui est le dirigeant du syndicat des travailleurs d’Haft Tapeh, a été condamné à six mois de prison ferme et six mois de prison avec sursis.

En octobre 2009, la première branche du tribunal révolutionnaire de Dezful a condamné à la prison plusieurs militants sydicalistes. Ali Nejati, Feraydoon Nikoofar, Ghorban Alipoor et Jalil Ahmadiont chacun été condamnés à six mois de prison ferme et à six mois de prison avec sursis. Mohammad Haydaripoor, un cinquième militant du syndicat, a été condamné à quatre mois de prison ferme et huit mois de prison avec sursis.

Le 4 novembre, Nikoofar et Ahmadi avaient été arrêtés et emmenés à la prison de Dezful où ils sont actuellement en train de purger leurs peines.

IWSN (Iranian Workers Solidarity Network), 12 novembre 2009 :

Plus d’un millier de coupeurs de canne de la compagnie de cannes Haft Tapeh ont mis fin à leurs trois jours de grève après que la direction ait accepté les revendications des ouvriers.

Les coupeurs de canne se sont mis en grève le 9 novembre à 11 heures et ont continué leur grève avec des rassemblements au campement des coupeurs de canne de la compagnie. Les ouvriers demandaient le paiement immédiat de leur prime annuel de productivité. La plupart des coupeurs de canne sont des ouvriers saisonniers venant de la province voisine du Lorestan et qui travaillent pour la compagnie Haft Tapeh cinq à six mois par an.

La grève s’est terminée le 12 novembre une fois que la prime fut payée. Le succès de cette grève est d’autant plus remarquable que plusieurs dirigeants du syndicat des travailleurs d’Haft Tapeh sont actuellement en prison (*).

(*) Voir la campagne pour la libération des militants ouvriers et la liberté syndicale à Haft Tapeh

1.1.4 Marxist Sociology

Definition – Sociology is the study of the individuals, groups and institutions, and the relationships between them, which make up human society.

Auguste Compte (1798–1875), associated in his youth with the socialist utopian Saint-Simon, was the father of sociology. His seminal work was significantly entitled A System of Positive Politics or A Textbook of Sociology that Institutes the Religion of Humanity. He proposes a religion without God in which humanity takes the place of its Creator.

Marxism took over the project formulated by Compte and gave it a new impetus by making it an instrument of social engineering. This exercise in social transformation was based on the Myth of Reason (as was the philosophy of the Enlightenment), and also on the Myth of Science which became the new ‘religion’ of this social model. Consequently, Marxist sociology promotes the Myth of the Scientific Transformation of the World, which consists in organising society in a scientific manner, with the aim of building a better society.

The Myth of Progress and the Myth of (Darwinian) Evolution – according to both of which there is always an ascending trend in the history of the Universe – of life in general and of humanity in particular – are closely related to the previous set of myths.

The central concept of Marxist sociology is that of social classes. According to communist ideology, these are defined primarily in terms of their relationship to property. Thus some classes (the ‘exploiters’), control the means of production, while the other classes (the working class – the proletariat and the like) are deprived of them. This leads to the class struggle, through which the working class aims to gain control of the means of production.

By formulating this social model, Marxism aims to legitimate the use of any means, no matter how violent or deceitful, for the establishment of the so-called dictatorship of the proletariat. This is the main explanation for the millions and millions of victims of communism all over the world, with casualties in absolutely every country where it became established, without any exception.

Selon un communiqué du Parti Communiste-Ouvrier d’Iran, 300 ouvriers du bâtiment, chargés de la mise en place d’installations pour la raffinerie d’Abadan (ville du Khuzestan, située à l’extrême sud-ouest de l’Iran, à la frontière de l’Irak et sur les bords du Golfe Persique), se sont mis en grève le jeudi 12 novembre et se sont rassemblés pour exiger le paiement de leurs primes et salaires en retard. La direction est immédiatement intervenue et a promis que 20% du montant total des sommes dues serait versé dès que possible.

From the AKpress Blog:

I recently posted Research & Destroy’s Communiqué from an Absent Future on this blog. The manifesto, circulated during the recent University of California walkout, has been generating a lot of online discussion.

I thought it might be useful to try to continue that discussion in a more, uh, “organized” manner…one that would free it from the sort of tit-for-tat exchanges that happen in listserv debates and within the confines of blog/Facebook comment boxes (though, of course, I encourage comments to this post).

I talked to one of the Communiqué’s authors, and to Brian Holmes (who wrote, I thought, a very interesting response to the manifesto), and to folks involved with the New School occupation. Together, we came up with three questions, based on reservations about and critiques of the Communiqué we’d seen circulated online.

So, here’s how the discussion will happen:

Round One, below, will be three sets of responses to the questions we came up with: one a collective response from Research and Destroy, one a collective response from Dead Labor (the aforementioned New School occupiers), and an individual response from Brian Holmes (who is one of the organizers of the “Continental Drift Seminar”).

Round Two, which will be posted in a week or two, will be everyone’s responses to the first round of responses.

These are the three questions folks were asked to answer:

1) Whaddya mean the management class is being proletarianized!?! Isn’t this somehow an insult/misrecognition regarding the REAL proletariat?

2) Does addressing the university student as the potential revolutionary subject get us closer to revolution? How? How not?

3) What would a non-reformist goal for a university be, if one exists?

Let the games begin! [Oh, by the way, it's a long post. If you prefer a printable PDF, click here.]

—–

DEAD LABOR RESPONSE

1) Whaddya mean the management class is being proletarianized!?! Isn’t this somehow an insult/misrecognition regarding the REAL proletariat?”

To speak of a distinct class of managers, whose function may arguably be facilitating the integration of the proletariat in response to its periodic intensified contradictions, is to run the risk of reducing the dynamic processes of proletarianization and mediation into fixed, sociological categories. Undoubetdly, this obscures the historical development, qualitative diffusion and generalization of the compulsion to sell one’s labor power.

What cannot be ignored however is the fact that the great bureaucracies of the 20th century have had their final gasps of air, both with the lucidity of their illusions, as well as their prominence in neutralizing and circumscribing class struggle. Their only recourse has been to recede into an image of themselves for the vultures of empirical analysis.

Thus, what is lost in such a point of departure is the understanding that the process of proletarianization is precisely that of mediation; the mediation between subject and object, individual and social, thought and practice, all of which become mangled and reconfigured through the intermediate of capital.

The superior question would be to inquire into the methods by which the proletariat itself produces generalized self-management as the object of capital. It is here that the proletariat emerges strictly as a form, the drive to sell labor power, with varying content, to the ultimate evasion of the metaphysician. Immediately, the notion of a more authentic or “real” proletariat dissolves upon an abstract equalization in which its only “real” expression derives from the contradiction between self-valorizing value and labor power. Archaic questions and inquiries into the “real” proletariat only divert analysis of proletarianization into a petrified and glorified object, finding refuge in its preservation that aims for an emancipation without self-abolition, ultimately deepening class society.

However, in order for the proletariat to combat its own existence as a class, and thus dissolve existing conditions in general, its only recourse is to proceed from its particular relation to both the productive and reproductive processes, and from the social categories to which these processes provide expression. This entails calling into question all fractions of proletarian existence, from the circuits of both the production and reproduction of capital. The latter, defined with a particular relation to the production process whereby capital is not necessarily generated, but rather provided social lubrication and logical adherence for global production processes, still demonstrates the qualities of the productive proletariat merely in the exchange of their labor power with a capital engaged in the sphere of production. Thus, the notion of the proletariat is not limited to those who toil strictly within the productive process or exist as a uniform assemblage without its own specified mediums, features, or echelons. Instead, the proletariat resides precisely in the contradictions of productive labor that structure society as a whole.

This perspective further renders the proletariat as an a priori socioeconomic category stale and useful only to the extent that its specified categorical forms are utilized for its further integration with capital. If one were to pay recognition to the proletarianization of what may vulgarly be identified as a “management class,” it is only in the hope of elucidating the contradictions between labor and capital as diffuse and without regard to traditional class narratives, instead constituting various modes and dynamics of exploitation both within the productive and reproductive spheres. Anything less perpetuates the notion of class as an exterior constraint to the proletariat’s self-abolition.

2) Does addressing the university student as the potential revolutionary subject get us closer to revolution? How? How not?

No. The only revolutionary subject we acknowledge in the present is capital. Capital constantly revolutionizes our activities, our wants, our needs. The revolution within and against the revolution of capital will be done by its objects. The name given to that particular object of capital which produces value through its living labor has historically been called the proletariat. This object, because its activity is the most direct expression of capital, has the potential to negate it. Why? Because the proletariat is a function of capital, and hence, in interrupting itself, it interrupts the function of capital as well. This does not produce revolution or communism, only insurrection, the gap in which the possibility of nonalienated life can be asked meaningfully, truthfully. Insurrection, the horizon and limit of our potential antagonistic activity today, poses the material possibilities in which communism can be achieved. But from insurrection to communism, there is no common term. We do not impose our view of how that rupture between the two will take place, we can only narrate the history of its attempted failures.

In the present moment, the question of the proletariat wanders aimlessly amongst the population. Neither here nor there, its nominal absence reveals its material omnipresence. Only that which can no longer be identified has been fully diffused. The great potential to valorize all activities is the common project of humanity today; it is our collective identity, our global home. From the standpoint of capital, there is no longer any difference between making a television show and watching a television show. They are both congealed modes of dead labor which offer up statistics to be interpreted for the further intensification of capital into life. In other words, objective proletarian functions have been extended to the population at large, and along with it, subjective proletarian conditions attach themselves. The former case means we are always working, and the latter means we are always alienated. From the proletariat to proletarianized life, this is the history of our present.

Granted such a situation, the university student is in no way outside the circuits of exploitation and alienation. But neither is the video artist, the drug dealer, the internet addict, the zine maker, the dumpster diver, the guerrilla gardener, the social critic, the radical publisher, the anti-capitalist organizer, the train hopper, the bank robber, the co-op manager. All these jobs of modern life are exactly that, jobs. A job is no longer what is done in return for a wage, it is rather what is done to acquire the means of existence, and this is exactly what capital seeks to incorporate into its accounting books.

The need of a constantly emerging revolutionary subject for its theories chases the Marxist ideologue over the entire surface of the globe: the French communards, the German industrial working class, the Russian soviets, the white American machinist, the black American urbanite, the nationalist revolutionary in the third world, the postcolonial subaltern, the unwaged female, ad infinitum.

Never has addressing any of these as the potential revolutionary subject gotten us any closer to revolution. In fact, by ignoring the totalizing nature of capitalism as a social system, attempts to concentrate on particular social actors have served only to fracture the coherency of revolutionary critique and impede its negative function.

The university student does not exist in isolation. What is higher education if not training for a life of wage labor? Gone are the days when attendance at university was an ascetic phase for the sons of the ruling class, an initiation into the upper echelons of capitalist society. Nowadays, students often work before and during their college years. After school they will be ejected into the “free market” for labor power to toil their lives away, gifted with a hefty debt burden. Even the process of learning, such as it exists today, is steeped in neoliberal ideology and geared towards fostering docility and compliance.

To separate the university student from the worker is to separate the what-is-becoming from the what-will-be. This wholly ignores the ways in which capitalist social relations are reproduced. In this era, our enemy has subsumed the greater parts of our lives. The prevailing mode of production requires a social factory where all sectors of society are enlisted (often unpaid) in reproducing capitalist social relations. The university student is no exception.

When workers withdraw their labor, when students block their universities, when the unemployed loot their stores, when the youth burn their neighborhoods—and when this is done all in relation to each other—we call them the the proletariat. Nothing unites them but a collective disgust with their lives under capital, a disgust expressed not in political terms, but in practical refusal. The proletariat is the anti-political subject that knows itself by destroying itself. Destroying itself, it clears away all the shit of a society built on its labor and consumption.

This name, proletariat, must be divorced from its usual, narrow definition. How can we talk seriously of revolutionary potential without including unions of the unemployed in revolutionary Spain, militant communist women’s groups during Italy’s Hot Autumn, or the revolutionary students of May 1968? It is not up to us to address them. It is the entirety of the expropriated, inside and outside the workplace, that must address itself.

The university student is not the potential revolutionary subject. It is but a reflection of its own future and, like the whole of the proletariat, it is a subject that can only reach its potential through self-abolition. This is our goal, this is our struggle.

#3: What is a non-reformist goal for a University?

There is no non-reformist goal for a university. Until capital ends, all our goals become means of furthering its value. This does not, however, make the process of achieving them less worthwhile.

An alternative to having reformist or non-reformist goals is to have revolution. But if 1) revolution is understood as a violent resolution of the historic contradictions in a given society, 2) the revolution of the global proletariat entails the final struggle of humans against themselves as alienated beings, then a struggle which aims at overcoming reformism must seek to reveal the conditions in which the contradictions of history culminate such that any further goal is impossible outside of ending alienated life in its totality. In this explosive situation any reformist goal of détente is impossible. This situation sets up the ultimate “goal”, though we have surely been forced down this path more so than we would like to admit.

Furthermore, universities are not revolutionary subjects. Universities are ancient hierarchical institutions which are symptomatic of class society and have preserved themselves with great success for centuries. The university is so entrenched in the past and separated from the outside world that it is only in the past 60 years or so that it has taken on the aspects of a bourgeois revolution. Only recently have universities, at least in the most advanced sectors of capitalist society, been open to workers; the privatization process is a part of this revolution, the turn towards training and craft and the proletarianization of professors and students alike are mature products of this historic change. Any revolutionary path at this stage must lead outside of the university.

As we mentioned in our response to question #2, only the totality of the proletariat, the vast majority of humanity, has revolutionary potential, certainly not an alienated institution like a university. University students however can initiate the expansion of struggle and help proliferate the revolutionary condition.

The ultimate “goal,” if we must assume a normative stance, or better, the result which can lead from this particular decadent historical situation of the proletariat’s university students is best characterized as the will of living labor to abolish itself in the struggle for a liberated social totality.

Talk of reformist and non-reformist goals are uninteresting and blind to the fluidity of resistance. The question is not of this binary, but of the tactical and strategic moves which may bring us closer to the abolition of the university, the destruction of that which divides us, and the integration of all that remains.

Given our “goal,” it is simple to presume that the authorities, ipso facto, have zero legitimacy. What will be won in the final analysis must be taken. Taken with a combination of force and cunning.

Yes, our ultimate “goal” is presupposed in this conversation. For reasons of tactics and strategy, what may crudely be termed as reformist positions may be taken up—indeed, even with great enthusiasm—for reasons of delay and relationship-building. But instead of the old Leftist strategy of winning reforms so as to strengthen ourselves, we know that the most advanced struggles today are those in which we win without winning anything commensurable within the system; we win but realize there really are no victors in this game. So long as the final “aim” is neither cast aside nor given secondary status, this method is acceptable.

What is interesting is how this can be done. A singularity of unflinching force is beyond our present means and conditions, so standing toe-to-toe with those against whom we are positioned is not the immediate solution. While passion and honesty would have us occupy everything right now without a single demand to authorities, the generalized situation of immanent crisis is not as urgent among all our fellow proletarians, so this cannot be our only move.

Delay: in both New School occupations, negotiations, issue-driven banners and liberalisms were embraced in order to feign cooperation and moderation while more endgoal-appropriate methods were explored. This delay led to the realization of the situation as unsustainable without the expansion of our occupation or the intensification of social conflict.

Coordination: resistance is nothing if not fluid. Those who begin the fight as liberals today may become, through struggle, comrades against the commodity tomorrow. There is no classroom like the field of social antagonism. Indeed, many at The New School were radicalized by the first occupation—the limitless possibilities breaching what was previously off-limits to the individual’s purview. Understanding the capacity for change within an individual in the context of an antagonistic moment, it may be wise to stand by the hoisting of the reformist banner in order to grow with potential comrades.

There will be no rest until the social sleep is broken. How we wake is the only relevant interrogation.

RESEARCH & DESTROY RESPONSE

1) Whaddya mean the management class is being proletarianized!?! Isn’t this somehow an insult/misrecognition regarding the REAL proletariat?

The R&D communiqué seems to have provoked skepticism with the brief passage, “The crisis of the university today is the crisis of the reproduction of the working class, the crisis of a period in which capital no longer needs us as workers.” Against misreading, perhaps we should say that the crisis of the university is the crisis of the reproduction of the capital-labor relationship. Classes are a relation; when we talk about capital and labor we mean the poles of this relation in motion, not a series of rigid sociological categories with, say, the right amount or right kind of immiseration. The current crisis of profitability, for example, is not just a crisis of and for capitalists; it goes to every point in the social grid.

Whether or not one thinks of the places traditionally reserved for university graduates—the professional, the technician, the manager—as middle-class or some privileged fraction of the working-class, the university has no existence save by relationship to work and future work prospects. Even if one thinks narrowly of the true proletariat as unskilled manual laborers, such a group still remains the other of the university: the truth of class society from which university entrants seek immunity or escape. By serving as a real or imagined sorting system, the university (and like organs of class reproduction) assists in the perpetuation not only of the working-class but all classes.

This is precisely what has begun to decompose. Close to half of university graduates work in unskilled and service-sector occupations for which their degrees are entirely unnecessary. Those who do find employment in the technical, professional, and managerial occupation discover that decades of routinization and labor-market oversupply have nullified the advantage of these positions. Computer programming becomes data-entry, so-called “middle”-management positions nothing more than routinized clerical work. As manufacturing jobs departed with the high industrial era, it was precisely these other positions to which capital shifted its attention, attempting, rather desperately, to save on labor costs in a local-global competition—managing the managers so that they, in turn, might hector and superexploit the inferiors they were made to fear becoming. No doubt the university continues to reproduce a (shrinking) class of elites. The broad lines, however, are clear: a university degree is now as mythical a form of security as the value of a home in 2006. This myth forms, in part, the object of our researches, of our destructions.

There’s no need to overread “capital no longer needs us as workers.” We understand that there is no capital without the extraction of surplus-value from workers: capitalism is nothing but this extraction in motion. But capital now casts about wildly in its attempts to find new pools of accumulation: it cannot valorize itself to the degree it would like, and many workers find themselves without the dubious but nonetheless necessary benefits of such exploitation. The annihilation visited on the manufacturing sectors has leapt to the fields of work that can’t be compressed through labor-saving mechanization. There is nowhere for capital to turn but to the intensification of labor, the harrying of workers, managerial mechanics.  Yes, capital will find use for some of us; many will find little or no employment. This is not to say that the college graduates inhabit the same place in the structure as the most immiserated workers—in both objective and subjective terms the composition of the working-class exhibits great variety. Solidarity means recognizing these differences in relation; it means a revolutionary program with the will to destroy them. . .

2) Does addressing the university student as the potential revolutionary subject get us closer to revolution? How? How not?

It remains opaque to us why one would not address the student as a potential revolutionary subject. The exploitation on which the current relations of production depend is immanent: it passes through walls and hours. If there is some idea, within or without the porous borders of the university, that life there is in some way exempt from the logic of capital, that the university is not indeed a forcing house for that logic, well, this is an illusion that should be directly confronted. That’s likely the best reason to address the university student—as recognition of capital’s true success in the recent epoch, which is to have successfully insinuated itself into every minute, every conversation and every dream.

The university with its ceremonial robes still holds on to something of the medieval—a distant whiff of the guild, with its masters, apprentices, stock boys. It is no doubt a challenge to persuade professors, graduate and undergraduate students to identify themselves as part of a larger class of labor. No doubt this is in part because each occupies a visibly different place in the matrix of the exploited, and some are more rewarded than others for their participation. This failure of class consciousness, this blindness to base material conditions, is a description of the problem that exists at all strata—not a reason to look elsewhere for problems.

Do students have a peculiar or novel position in this problem of consciousness, of self-identification within the matrix of capital and its possible overcoming? Yes and no—an answer that goes for almost every group among the exploited. Let us imagine the student who indeed goes four years entirely free from wage labor: that nearly extinct case, the pure student, who exists largely in the idealizations of the idiot bourgeois, and in the resentment of some few representatives of the immiserated industrial proletariat of North America whom, having failed to realize themselves as a revolutionary class, now would bar the doors of their historic defeat.

The novel role of these “pure students” (as representatives of the problem at hand) is not that they are free from wage exploitation for four idyllic years. It is that they are the subject of an epochal historical bargain. No mass of surplus value will be extracted for these four years—on promise that the training received therein will allow correspondingly greater value extraction over the following fifty. They are, in short, a personification (complete with skateboard and laptop) of capital’s widespread wager on relative as against absolute surplus value. Allowing greater historical specificity, they are the burgeoning subclass conjured by late capital’s increasing dependence on technologies of management—including managerial bodies—to defer its own crisis.

So what is not novel, not peculiar? That, en route to refusal and insurrection, students are easily bought off. Less easily than unions, in some formal sense of negotiation (if there is one lesson to learn from 1968, it is this); more easily, in that it is easier to purchase a student with an abstraction like democracy or peace. Everyone has their price. Correspondingly, everyone is a potential subject of the logic of price, and of its undoing —

3) What would a non-reformist goal for a university be, if one exists?

This question is hard to answer, because we can’t extract universities from the world around them. We can’t take individual universities and re-make them along communist lines, as though they could function as oases in the desert. This is a bit like trying to “free” workers by re-making individual workplaces into workers’ cooperatives. While businesses that are co-managed on a democratic basis by workers, who also divide the profits, may have certain advantages for those who work there, they are in no meaningful way moving beyond capitalism—they must make a profit in order to survive, they must pay for rent and equipment, and all the workers must make a wage that allows them to pay for all of the costs of survival.  In a society in which the vast majority of people must spend most of their lives selling their labor for a wage, educational institutions will necessarily be places of social reproduction, places that train people to work. None of the possibilities for transforming the university within capitalism are able to overcome this problem.

The most commonly heard goal on the left for the university is the goal of accessibility—that is, making higher education free and available to all people. While we certainly agree that this kind of transformation would allow people from poor or disadvantaged backgrounds to compete more easily against wealthier people in the job market, it does not change the basic fact that people would still be forced to compete for the ability to work. In fact as more people get bachelors’ degrees, what we find is not a decrease in wealth inequality but a decrease in the worth of the degree, to the point where now to compete for many jobs degree holders must go back to school for more training.

The other goal for the university sometimes discussed in radical circles is the goal of a space where “real” learning can take place, in a mode that is either explicitly radical or at least in opposition to the values of a society based on wage labor. Those who take this position usually cite the importance of the Arts and Humanities as disciplines that play a central role in fostering human creativity, teaching critical thinking, and transmitting knowledge about the world. They point out that these disciplines are under attack and sometimes call for the creation of an autonomous “people’s” university operated by teachers and students, where learning will trump profit as a guiding principle. Of course we agree about the value of creativity and critical thought. However, any university that operated along these lines would quickly become irrelevant to the vast majority of people who need an education that provides them with a better chance of finding work. It would be useful only to those who aim to translate the cultural capital acquired through training in the Arts and Humanities into jobs in the culture industry or to those who are independently wealthy.

The honest answer to the question about a non-reformist goal for a university is that our world is structured in such a way as to make radical change within one sphere impossible. Only by dismantling the whole can we hope to produce institutions that actually provide for people’s needs in a meaningful way. In other words, focusing on the university as a site of radical transformation is a mistake. The real value of university struggles is not their ability to transform the university, but their potential to draw attention to the interrelations between the reproductive and productive spheres. As students begin to articulate themselves as workers and future workers, the mythology around the university starts to dissipate and the separation between students and workers begins to disappear.

A non-reformist approach to the university must expose what universities really are: institutions that reproduce the workforce, that is, that train and educate people to become workers, depending upon the particular needs of the economy at any given moment; and workplaces in their own right, employing teachers, staff, and service workers. We must also demonstrate that movements for university reform take the wrong position at a critical historical moment, a moment of capitalist crisis. Hearkening back to a time of generous government spending on public needs is the wrong strategy when the public purse is shrinking rapidly. Instead of trying desperately to show how the government can meet our needs, we should use the opportunity to show how it can’t meet our needs—to demonstrate capitalism’s inherent instability and its inability to provide for people. The system is faltering, and instead of trying to get it working smoothly again we need to aid its demise.

Instead of thinking of the university as our goal, we should see it as the means to an end: a useful place that can help us in our struggle against capitalism by exposing many of the contradictions inherent in the system as a whole. The university is simply one of many sites where these contradictions become concentrated—like workplaces, schools, prisons, and neighborhoods. We analyze a part to shed light on the whole. The most important thing is to demonstrate the university’s relationship to all of these other sites. Once these connections are made then university struggles blend more easily into other struggles in workplaces and communities. Strikes and expropriations (such as occupations) can be ways of demonstrating these connections. Taking over a university is really just taking over private property and collectivizing it—just like any property anywhere else in society. The point is to show that the university doesn’t belong just to the students who attend classes there or the individual workers who are employed there, but to all of the working class.

As for the role of universities in a free society, I think most of us at R&D agree that they will not exist. Learning and teaching will take place in very different modes, based on people’s varied needs and desires.  But we think these modes will emerge through the process of communisation, as people begin to experiment with new social forms, and can’t be prescribed now.

BRIAN HOLMES RESPONSE

I want to take these questions in a different order, or all at once. To address students as revolutionaries is to address them as equals, right now not later. It’s the best way of recognizing the long implosion of middle-class status that the financial crisis has suddenly thrust in our faces: “We are all going bankrupt,” says the communiqué from the second Santa Cruz occupation. Addressing students as revolutionaries asks the question, it possible to depose the people who run things this way?

Bankruptcy is a powerful word. It drains the belief from an institution the way news of an accident drains the blood from your face. At last, some disbelief. With tuition practically doubling, job markets plunging, health care non-existent for huge amounts of people, and flexible contracts getting more coercive by the day, it’s right to say that proletarianization is haunting the student population, and that’s what comes off clearest in the Communiqué from an Absent Future. I especially like the cynical realism: it hits people where they are, it’s perfect. But words like “proletarian” or “working class” will never catch the aspirations of people going to school, they have a lot more to lose than their chains. What they have to lose are the potentials, the life chances, offered by the social state. Face it, people want something from the state! The budget cuts break the promise, that’s what hurts, that’s what makes people angry. “Occupy everything” is a great response, not because it’s the total appropriation of everyday life here and now—that’s overblown and it’s an illusion—but because occupation is a political “No!” that draws a line and proves that a fight is essential. What’s needed is to stop the neoliberal machine from privatizing everything, which can only be done by a break, a frontal opposition that wrenches everyone out of their ruts and opens up new chances, puts the whole social deal back on the table. The bankruptcy of the system reveals its potential value, and at the same time, its actual ruin by the elites who are creating a society that no one else wants to live in.

The question is, how to make the break? The radical point of the Communiqué is to avoid useless negotiation that only delays the inevitable. And it’s effective. But you better also avoid empty radicalism that only touches a small and easily neutralizable group. Here’s the paradox: passion is essential, the rhetoric of insurrection is good for sparking it, the experience of revolt is fundamental and it changes your life—but the riot never lasts for more than a few days. And the problems are immensely bigger than the rhetoric can encompass. No one should forget that the management plans that are being imposed, and the financial engineering behind them, are typical products of the university itself, which is the laboratory of neoliberalism and one of its most powerful institutions, it’s hardly slated to disappear in some catastrophic collapse. To oppose those techniques and to depose the people behind them is going to require, not the abandonment of the institution, but its complete refashioning, which would have to be done by strong currents of internal and external subversion. The aim is rational and affective reshaping, changing the feel and the very logic of the place. It’s not about reform, it’s about transforming the institution that fabricates social beings, with their subjectivity and their knowledge and their technical skills. If we don’t transform it, the current brand of dominant subjectivity is gonna stay in power and set up lots more police. But the question is how to get people to make the change, when in fact, so many interest groups are profiting from the situation as it is, while others are trying to hang on to their status quo, and still others are too scared or just too dazed to mobilize. Invocations of early twentieth-century struggles are not going to do the trick. Marx did not live through the 1930s and there is no analysis in Capital of the class structure produced by the social state, let alone the perverse twists that neoliberalism has given it. ‘68 already failed on outdated schemas and slogans. With the same starting points, this time will be no different. You have to begin with all the complexity of real life, and get the people living it to push it much further.

The specter of bankruptcy has shocked the ones who thought they could hang on to their current positions, the professors I mean. What they need to do—and to be forced to do—is publicly recognize that that they are losing their old liberal dream of the university, even while the students are slipping massively towards a precarious existence that has nothing to do with the subjects they came to study. I would say, the revolutionary strategy is getting a fraction of the profs to radicalize. That will send a lot more students over the line, don’t you think? It will take a three-sector alliance—the precarious students and contract faculty, the service workers of the university, and the full professors threatened in both their pocketbook and their sense of mission—to stand up to all the other interest groups who, so far, have been the winners. The Communiqué pushes mainly towards the affects of fear and refusal of exclusion, it doesn’t show how knowledge and cooperation become a weapon. I’d say, go for critique in action, occupy everything you can, but start opening up perspectives for a more complex resistance.

After the RNC protests in St Paul in ‘08 and similar paramilitary abuses at the recent G20 meeting in Pittsburgh, what’s missing are ideas about how to develop a radical struggle in a country that’s set up such an extreme repressive apparatus. We need non-violent techniques for direct action, fresh arguments for the right to dissent by professors and political figures, a mobilization of legal support, and, at the same time as all that, a refusal of the procedural limits that make the repressive system into its own tautology, allowing only the kinds of debates that insure its own reproduction. Movements are strong when they have lots of openings. In France these days, small coteries of people whisper about what’s happening in the countryside, in Tarnac, the coming insurrection. But the huge social movements of which those people form one interesting part require cooperation among many different levels of society. They are based in a continuous analysis of legislative, legal, and economic changes, along with a cultural production of counter-values and ways of reimagining the common, the public sphere, solidarity and social rights. In America we lack outbursts of revolt and sustained movements in order to overcome the enforced paralysis that has kept such ideas from getting anywhere near the mainstream over the last thirty years. For that we have to radicalize the universities, which is why I think this movement is so important.

Nothing is gonna happen in a day, or in one single social situation either. The rot in the system is deep and the neoliberal rationality is still convincing for large numbers of people. If we are lucky and some initial battles are won at UC, still there is going to be a need for longer-term strategies that can give intellectuals—read: revolutionaries—a role in society again. That also requires forming serious groups off campus, and outside the career fixation that sucks away most of the time and energy of people getting their degrees, publishing their papers, and looking at their navels in the complicated and submissive ways that people are trained for in the universities, and particularly in the humanities. It’s amazing how effective that training is, to the point where nobody seems to have any materialist curiosity anymore. Few intellectuals today have much of a grasp of how society functions in its deadly complexity. Neither outdated Marxist categories nor even brilliant riffs on Situationist insurrectionalism are gonna give anyone that understanding, the knowledge of how to subvert the system. How does a revolutionary go about changing the wills of engineers, scientists, accountants, doctors, entertainers, politicians—or at least, of young people who aspire to become those things, but also see the dead-ends of society as it is?

Some answers to that question were already learned in the counter-globalization movements, and the existence of free-software networks is proof of the possibility to transform the technical basis of life in the overdeveloped societies. Now the reality of climate change is making larger numbers of people aspire to that kind of transformation. By studying how things work, by going out to other groups in society and getting their perspectives, by finding out their economic and technical problems as well as their cultural and affective ones, we could build a capacity to bring new agendas into the university system and also out into the population at large. This process points a way out of the bubble, a way to live outside the incredible complacency that has been the inflexible rule in America in these past years and decades. Continental Drift and the other groups I am collaborating with are made to do that, it’s an anti-zombification strategy, a way to prolong the autonomy of thought and emotion that’s gained in struggles and street demonstrations. The point is to create social sites where that kind of autonomy can root and ramify and gain resistance over time, to form a real common sense in the face of decay and deepening problems. That’s why I came back to America from Europe, because there seems to be some possibility to do that here, now that the major swindles of the last thirty years are finally bankrupt. So anyway, there’s my two bits on the three questions, hope there was something useful.

Selon un communiqué publié aujourd’hui par le Parti Communiste-Ouvrier d’Iran, plus de mille ouvriers saisonniers de la compagnie agro-industrielle de production de sucre d’Haft Tapeh (ville de Shoush, Khuzestan) ont protesté aujourd’hui contre le non-versement de leur prime annuel. Ces travailleurs se sont mis en grève et se sont rassemblés devant les locaux de la direction.

Dans le communiqué, le PCOI appelle à l’unité tous les travailleurs, saisonniers ou permanents, du complexe agricole et industriel d’Haft Tapeh à s’unir face à la direction et à toute la population de la région à soutenir les luttes des travailleurs.

Environ 400 ouvriers de la Compagnie Iranienne d’Aluminium (IrAlCo), dans la ville d’Arak (Province de Markazi, à 280 kilomètres à l’ouest de Téhéran), ont arrêté le travail lundi pour protester contre le non-paiement des salaires et autres primes comme la prime de vêture ces trois derniers mois.

Les protestations ouvrières se multiplient en Iran. Ces derniers mois, les ouvriers ont protesté dans de nombreuses usines, comme par exemple à Ahvaz Pipe (Ahvaz), à l’usine Mahyamam (Ispahan), à la compagnie Govah (Téhéran), dans les transports publics (Khoramshahr), dans le secteur de la télécommunication (Chiraz), à l’usine Wagon Pars (Arak) ou dans la raffinerie de sucre Haft Tapeh (Shoush). Tous ces travailleurs subissent des retards de salaires allant de 3 à 10 mois et ont d’énormes difficultés pour subvenir aux besoins essentiels de leurs familles.

Militants des Droits Humains en Iran, 5 novembre :

Deux membres du bureau du syndicat des travailleurs de l’usine de sucre Haft Tapeh ont été arrêtés et emmenés en prison pour qu’ils y accomplissent leurs peines.

L’unité ouvrière de Militants des Droits Humains rapporte que deux membres du bureau du syndicat des travailleurs d’Haft Tapeh ont été arrêté jeudi 5 novembre par la sécurité de l’entreprise à 10 heures du matin. Les deux militants syndicalistes, Jalil Ahmadi et Feraydoon Nikoofar, ont été emmenés à 14 heures par les forces de sécurité à la prison de Dezful pour qu’ils accomplissent leurs peines.

Le Tribunal Révolutionnaire de Dezful avait avant condamné les deux militants ouvriers à des peines de prison ferme et de prison avec sursis pour leurs activités. La cour d’appel provincipal avait confirmé le verdict du tribunal révolutionnaire pour les deux militants et transféré leurs dossiers au département de l’application des peines du tribunal de Dezful. Les militants ont été arrêtés aujourd’hui pour que leurs peines soient appliquées.

En octobre, le Tribunal Révolutionnaire de Dezful avait déclaré coupable un groupe de militants syndicalistes et les avait condamnés à des peines de prison ferme. Ali Nejati, Feraydoon Nikoufar, Ghorban Alipoor et Jalil Ahmadi ont chacun été condamnés à 6 mois de prison ferme et à 6 mois de prison avec sursis. Selon des sources sures, les trois autres militants seront aussi arrêtés dans les jours qui viennent pour l’application de leurs peines.

Voir aussi la campagne de l’UITA “Liberté pour les leaders du syndicat du sucre en Iran !“

In Defense of Marxism, 5 novembre 2009 :

Le lundi 2 novembre, les boulangers de Sanandaj, au Kurdistan iranien, ont gagné une hausse de salaires. Après plusieurs rencontre et correspondances sans résultat avec le bureau du gouverneur et d’autres autorités de Sanandaj pour des augmentations de salaire, les boulangers de Sanandaj avaient finalement annoncé une grève de trois heures le 2 novembre.

La grève a conduit les officiels du gouvernement, et en particulier le gouverneur de Sanandaj, à aller tôt le matin dans les boulangeries et d’essayer par différents moyens d’empêcher que les boulangers se mettent en grève.

La grève a eu lieu après décision collective et préparation minutieuse par les travailleurs. Ils avaient annoncé que s’ils n’obtenaient pas de hausses de salaires, ils se mettraient en grève à une échelle plus élevée.

Après la grève, les travailleurs ont eu plusieurs rencontres avec le gouverneur de Sanandaj et autres officiels. Le même jour, à la fin des heures de bureau, les boulangers ont obtenu une hausse de salaire. Une liste détaille les hausses de salaires des cinq différentes qualifications des ouvriers boulangers. L’augmentation moyenne des salaires est comprise entre 15,7% et 18,9% (le chiffre actuel officiel, et sous-estimé, de l’inflation est de 18,5%).

Source : Comité de Coordination pour la Formation d’Organisations Ouvrières, 2 novembre 2009.

groß ist die partei, der wir alles verdanken, was wir sind und haben und ein unermesslicher freudentag für alle werktätigen in stadt und land ist heute ins land gezogen. gleichzeitig ein tag, der auch die genossin dr. benjamin in höchsten tönen frohlocken ließe, da es seit den goldenen tagen ihres glorreichen wirkens kaum noch auf so hoher ebene eine entscheidung eines gerichts gegeben hatte, die von einer so glasklaren und kompromisslosen parteilichkeit und lebensverbundenheit gekennzeichnet war wie die heute veröffentlichte entscheidung des europäischen gerichtshofs für menschenrechte.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxiTj-qAkAw

hatte die faschistische italienische regierung des bush-freundes und bluthundes des monopolkapitals, silvio berlusconi, es im lande der erben mussolinis noch geschafft, die unabhängige und kritische justiz so weit zu unterwandern, dass dem humanistischen bestreben der ehrenwerten genossin und heldin der arbeit ehrenhalber, solie lautsie, die behelligung ihrer kinder mit symbolen eines wissenschaftsfeindlichen aberglaubens zu unterbinden, innerstaatlich der erfolg versagt blieb, blieben die genossinnen in straßburg unbeirrbar und bahnten in einem wegweisenden urteilspruch dem humanismus den weg für ganz europa.

die anbringung von kreuzen, also symbolen, die über jahrhunderte hinweg das weltproletariat im interesse der herrschenden klasse daran gehindert hatten, das richtige bewusstsein zu entwickeln, könne auf kinder, die dieser bourgeoisen gehirnwäsche nicht unterzogen wurden, verstörend wirken. übrigens nicht nur auf kinder, ist man versucht zu ergänzen. der staat müsse das recht besonders schützen, an keine religion zu glauben. und aus sicht unseres autorinnenkollektivs ist es nicht nur das recht, sondern auch die pflicht jedes denkenden menschen, diesem menschen- und wissenschaftsfeindlichen aberglauben auf allen ebenen entgegenzutreten.

endlich hat die elite der kommenden vorhut der weltrevolution, getragen durch die eudssr und den egmr, europa an seine wahren wurzeln und seine wahre größe erinnert und damit jene großen geister des humanismus und der wissenschaftlichen weltanschauung geehrt, die es zu dem gemacht hatten, was es lange war und was es bald wieder sein wird: es lebe das europa enver hoxhas, hilde benjamins und jossif wissarionowitsch dschugaschwilis!

es kann nicht hoch genug bewertet werden, dass der egmr in dieser sternstunde sozialistischer rechtsfortbildung vor allem auch deutlich gemacht hat, dass recht in einer dem fortschritt verpflichteten gesellschaft immer auch eine frage des klassenstandpunktes ist und kein recht entstehen kann ohne die beachtung revolutionärer disziplin, unverbrüchlicher treue zu den lehren von marx, engels, lenin und stalin oder ohne die unverzichtbare parteilichkeit, die eine justiz im interesse des humanismus von einer justiz im solde der finanzmonopole unterscheidet.

das allerwichtigste ist nämlich, dass elternrechte und religionsfreiheit abseits dieses urteils als das erkannt werden müssen, was sie sind, nämlich einfallstore für reaktionäre einflüsse der konterrevolution, fortschrittsfeindliche kriegshetze und faschistische regression.

insofern war es auch wichtig, zu wissen, dass das urteil des egmr diese rechte gerade nicht so verstanden wissen möchte, dass sich asoziale parasiten und volksschädliche elemente aus den reaktionären klassen auf diese berufen könnten, wenn es darum geht, das aufklärerische wirken eines sozialistischen schulsystems zu untergraben. es gibt kein recht, aus religiösen gründen oder um das recht von eltern, kinder nach eigenen vorstellungen zu erziehen, zu strapazieren, notwendige maßnahmen im interesse des staatlichen bildungsauftrag (wie sexualaufklärung oder die vermittlung wissenschaftlicher erkenntnisse über die entstehung des lebens) zu obstruieren.

diese tragende säule des doublethink haben die straßburger richterinnen völlig richtig erkannt und angewendet. denn es zeigt die genialität und die treffsicherheit der fürsorglichkeit eines der sozialistischen perspektive des revolutionären weltproletariats verpflichteten humanistischen bildungswesens, entscheidungsfreiheiten der bürger dort zuzulassen, wo sie dem aufbau einer menschengerechten gesellschaft dienlich sind, gleichzeitig aber in einem akt prophylaktischer weitsicht eltern dort die entscheidungen abzunehmen, wo diese wegen ihres falschen bewusstseins oder ihrer verfangenheit in unwissenschaftlichem aberglauben gefahr laufen, falsche entscheidungen zu treffen.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-KqN5DCpMY

auf diese weise hatte es die nationale front des demokratischen deutschlands bis zur zerschlagung unseres staates durch die faschistische konterrevolution geschafft, bei wahlen regelmäßig 99% des volkes geschlossen hinter sich zu vereinen. und das muss der restaurierte kapitalismus erst mal zu stande bringen!

UPDATE: das autorinnenkollektiv dr. hilde benjamin freut sich, dass das urteil des egmr mittlerweile bereits von engagierten kritischen zeitgenossinnen auch in deutschland umgesetzt wird – und das sogar in eigenregie!

Dans un communiqué, le Parti Communiste-Ouvrier d’Iran indique que les ouvriers de l’aluminium d’Arak se sont mis en grève lundi 2 novembre pour protester contre le retard dans le paiement de salaires et la distribution des vêtements de travail par la direction. La direction a alors promis aux ouvriers que l’argent dû serait versé dans les prochains jours. On peut noter que c’est la deuxième protestation cette année des ouvriers de l’aluminium d’Arak. Ces travailleurs s’étaient en effet déjà rassemblés le 8 août contre les menaces de suppressions d’emplois.

Dans un autre communiqué, lui aussi daté du 2 novembre, le PCOI fait part d’une assemblée de protestation des travailleurs du nettoyage en contrats précaires de la ville de Hajiabad (Hormozgan, province située au sud du pays) contre la décision du conseil municipal et du gouverneur de supprimer leurs emplois.

mit größter wonne erfüllte es unsere proletarischen herzen, kürzlich die videomitschnitte aus chile in augenschein nehmen und auf diese weise trotz der weiten entfernung zusammen mit der großen genossin margot honecker den ehrwürdigen 60. jahrestag der gründung eines antifaschistischen staates unter führung der arbeiterklasse und ihrer partei in deutschland feiern zu können.

der wohlklang der glockenhellen stimme der genossin margot, die in beethovens revolutionärer oper “fidelio” immer noch eine prächtige “leonore” abgeben würde, und die inbrünstige ergebenheit der anderen versammelten revolutionäre in fortschrittliches liedgut, dazu die messerscharfen analysen der derzeitigen lage im imperialistischen großdeutschland zeigen, warum es der reaktionären klasse nie gelingen wird, das feuer, das ernst thälmann in der partei entzündet hatte, zum erlöschen zu bringen:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mp_nbCBA4aw

und wie recht die genossin margot mit ihrer einschätzung hat, zeigt der antiregressive aufbruch der genossinnen in den bezirken frankfurt, cottbus und potsdam. so verachtenswert auch die zugeständnisse sind, die das faschistische regime der brd der neuen regierung des so genannten “bundeslandes brandenburg” abverlangt – die spd behält im vergleich zu 1946ff. ihren parteinamen bei und in der präambel wird das fortschrittliche wirken der genossinnen als “sed-diktatur” geschmäht -, so positiv ist beispielsweise zu bewerten, dass das heikle amt des justizministers – ein amt, das immerhin die große genossin hilde benjamin einst ausgefüllt hatte – nun in den händen eines genossen ist, der mit deutlichen worten die kapitalistische klassenjustiz geißelt, die erbarmungslos gegen alles gewütet hatte, was 40 jahre lang die souveränität der deutschen demokratischen republik gegen saboteure, hooligans, menschenhändler und agenten des ausländischen monopolkapitals verteidigt hatte.

auch der ehrenwerte genosse axel henschke, der lange jahre die sozialistische gesellschaftsordnung mit mut und entschlossenheit gegen die phalanx der klassenfeinde verteidigte, wird künftig die politik in potsdam mitgestalten.

kein wunder, dass der aufschrei letzterer und ihres sprachrohr, der “vereinigung der opfer des stalinismus”, groß ist. aber er wird den beginn des wiederaufbaus der sozialistischen gesellschaftsordnung nicht behindern können!

und hier noch ein gruß an die genossin margot: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JfiJRUBOoJU

I hated to be a tease with this post and not show the final product but it looks like we’re in the clear now. Selectism informed us today that Proletariat has finished things up with their new webstore and is set to launch November 1st. This poster is one of 11 exclusive items that will be featured in the initial launch and is limited to 25 copies so keep hitting that F5 button until Sunday when you can buy one. Don’t forget to check out the video that Kerry put together while you’re waiting. Word has it these will only be available for purchase through the website, but locals can still do pickup at the store after ordering.

Think Levi’s will want one for their new pop-up shop?

Anti-wage labor, 27 octobre 2009 :

Plus de 600 travailleurs de l’usine de boissons Eram Noush (sous licence de 7-Up International) sont dans une situation particulièrement infernale, confuse et pleine d’inquiétudes. Cela fait des années que ces travailleurs vendent leur force de travail aux capitalistes et produisent la plus-value et le capital sous des pressions indescriptibles et dans un désespoir extrême avec des contrats blancs (Ndt : forme de contrats de travail particulièrement précaires en Iran) et sous les formes les plus méprisantes et misérables de l’esclavage salarié. Chaque jour, les capitalistes étendent leur mépris et intensifient l’exploitation à cause de la situation désespérée des travailleurs.

Cette année, les travailleurs ont annoncé qu’ils n’accepteraient plus de “contrats blancs” et ont établi leurs revendications pour la garantie de l’emploi, et en réaction les propriétaires du capital, en entendant de telles choses, ont commencé à licencier des travailleurs. Ils ont publié des ordres de licenciements pour des centaines d’ouvriers et déclaré qu’ils licencieraient tout travailleur qui refuserait de signer le “contrat blanc”.

Cette intransigeance des capitalistes a dû faire face à une vague de résistance des ouvriers. Six cents travailleurs ont décidé de se lever contre cette demande injustifiée du capital. Il y a quelques jours, ils se sont mis en grève et aujourd’hui (NdT : 26 octobre) ils se sont rassemblés devant le Ministère de l’Industrie de la capitale. Tous les travailleurs des deux secteurs (production et vente) ont participé à ce rassemblement. Ils ont souligné qu’ils continueront leur lutte jusqu’à satisfaction de leurs revendications.

Source : Comité de Coordination pour la Formation d’Organisations Ouvrières, 26 octobre

Campagne lancée par l‘UITA, fédération syndicale internationale des travailleurs de l’agriculture, de l’agro-alimentaire et de l’hôtellerie.

Dans une mesure visant à détruire le syndicat indépendant constitué l’an dernier par les travailleurs de l’immense complexe de plantation / raffinerie de sucre de Haft Tapeh dans le sud de l’Iran, un tribunal a condamné le 12 octobre dernier six leaders syndicaux à des peines de prison immédiates sur la base d’accusations portées en octobre 2007. Les sentences prononcées l’an dernier contre trois dirigeants syndicaux condamnés pour activités syndicales et pour avoir “mis en danger la sécurité nationale” ont été renversées en appel en septembre. Deux dirigeants syndicaux, le président Ali Nejati et l’agent de communications Reza Rekhshah, qui risquent tous deux de lourdes peines d’emprisonnement, attendaient toujours le résultat de leur appel lorsque le tribunal de la ville de Dezful a prononcé les sentences contre les six dirigeants pour les accusations similaires portées en 2007.

Ghorban Alipour, Feridoun Nikoufard, Jalil Ahmadi, Nejat Dehli et Ali Nejati ont tous reçu une peine de six mois d’emprisonnement ferme immédiat, assortie à un sursis de six mois supplémentaires pour les cinq prochaines années; au cours de cette période, il leur est interdit de se livrer à des activités syndicales. Mohammmad Heydari Mehr a été condamné une peine de quatre mois d’emprisonnement ferme, assortie d’un sursis de huit mois. Ali Nejati doit purger son sursis en prison, ce qui signifie qu’il pourrait passer un an complet en privation de liberté. Si l’appel de sa condamnation de 2008 est rejeté, sa peine d’emprisonnement pourrait atteindre plus de deux ans.

Au cours des dernières années, les travailleurs de Haft Tapeh ont dû recourir régulièrement à des grèves et à d’autres actions syndicales pour obtenir le paiements d’importants arrérages salariaux et protester contre la détérioration de leurs conditions de travail. Le syndicat a été officiellement constitué en juin 2008 après une grève de 42 jours pour obtenir le versement d’arrérages dus depuis longtemps. Le syndicat de Haft Tapeh est affilié à l’UITA.

Le président du syndicat de Haft Tapeh, Ali Nejati, n’a pu reprendre son poste au complexe et a son nom a été placé sur une liste noire de l’emploi dans toute la région depuis sa libération en avril, après un mois de mise au secret dans un centre de détention des services de renseignement. Les autres leaders condamnés le 12 octobre ont aussi été forcés de quitter leur emploi et avisés de se présenter à la prison.

Le régime est clairement déterminé à écraser le syndicat en mettant l’ensemble de sa direction derrière les barreaux.

Le sort réservé aux activistes emprisonnés des syndicats du transport et de l’enseignement montre que les prisonniers de Haft Tapeh risquent d’être victimes de sévices physiques et psychologiques prolongés. L’UITA appelle tous les défenseurs des droits démocratiques et syndicaux à se mobiliser pour les défendre.

Agissez maintenant! – CLIQUEZ ICI pour envoyer un message aux autorités politiques et judiciaires iraniennes, afin d’exiger l’annulation immédiate et inconditionnelle des sentences prononcées contre les syndicalistes de Haft Tapeh! Veuillez noter que certains messages pourraient être refusés par les serveurs – ne vous découragez pas! La surcharge des serveurs est une situation fréquente en Iran. Certains messages seront transmis, faisant savoir que les syndicalistes persécutés jouissent du soutien de la communauté internationale. Les dirigeants syndicaux de Haft Tapeh ont aussi le soutien d’Amnesty International.

Vous pouvez aussi envoyer un message à l’ambassade ou à la représentation diplomatique de l’Iran dans votre pays -ou lui rendre visite! La liste complète des ambassades / consulats est disponible ici , et vous pouvez généralement trouver les adresses de courriel en faisant une recherche sur internet pour trouver la représentation diplomatique iranienne dans votre pays.

Information publiée dans “The Bridge n°4“, journal qui peut être téléchargé en PDF à cette adresse ou être commandé pour le recevoir régulièrement en écrivant avec la mention “SUSCRIBE” comme objet à thebridgejournal@gmail.com.

Les ouvriers boulangers de Sanandaj, Kurdistan, se sont mis en grève contre la loi sur leur salaire mensuel et le manque d’amélioration de leurs terribles conditions de travail le 26 octobre.

Ils avaient annoncé que leur protestation resterait au départ limitée afin de répondre aux besoins de la population. Mais, si leurs revendications n’étaient pas satisfaites, ils commenceraient une grève illimitée à partir du jeudi 29 octobre.

Il y a plus de 4.500 ouvriers boulangers à Sanandaj et ils ne peuvent pas faire face aux besoins de leurs familles. Les travailleurs sont réprimés et des responsables et militants de leur syndicat sont arrêtés pour éviter les protestations.

Le 14 octobre, toujours au Kurdistan, avait eu lieu une protestation des ouvriers boulangers à Saqez.

Dans un communiqué, le Parti Communiste-Ouvrier d’Iran indique que dans la matinée du 27 octobre (5 Aban), les forces de répression du régime ont empêché les ouvriers d’Ahvaz Pipe de sortir de l’usine pour manifester en ville comme ils l’avaient fait ces derniers jours. Les autorités ont également annoncé que les salaires en retard (entre 10 et 13 mois de retard selon les ouvriers) seraient payés graduellement dans un délais d’un mois ou deux.

Photo : Manifestation du 25 octobre à Ahvaz

Les ouvriers arrêtés lors de la manifestation du 26 octobre auraient tous été libérés après plusieurs heures de détention.

Les travailleurs de l’usine d’Ahvaz Pipe sont en lutte depuis une dizaine de jours pour le paiement de leurs salaires et ont lors de plusieurs manifestants bénéficié de la solidarité de la population de la ville d’Ahvaz (Khuzestan).

Dans un communiqué, le Parti Communiste-Ouvrier d’Iran indique que plusieurs centaines de travailleurs des télécommunications se sont rassemblés le 26 octobre à Chiraz pour protester contre neuf mois de retard de salaires.

Photos du rassemblement des travailleurs des télécommunications :

Dans un communiqué, le Parti Communiste-Ouvrier d’Iran indique que le 4 Aban (26 octobre), les travailleurs d’Ahvaz Pipe, en lutte pour le paiement de leurs salaires en retard de dix mois, ont à nouveau manifesté et protesté au centre-ville d’Ahvaz (Khuzestan). Comme lors des précédentes manifestations, les ouvriers ont bénéficié de la population de la ville. Les slogans étaient “mort au dictateur”, “mort aux capitalistes”, et “nos dix mois de retard de salaire doivent être immédiatement payés”.

Cette fois, les forces de répression du régime ont attaqué la manifestation. Les travailleurs ont résisté et des affrontements ont eu lieu entre les ouvriers et les forces de répression. On compte une cinquantaine d’ouvriers arrêtés.

En conclusion du communiqué, le PCOI dénonce la répression et le non-paiement des salaires, appelle à la solidarité avec les travailleurs d’Ahvaz Pipe et indique que cette lutte peut servir de modèle à tous les centres industriels du pays pour ouvrir une nouvelle phase de luttes contre le gouvernement capitaliste islamique.