Greece and EU have left over 27,000 people to die in Aegean Sea
Investigation finds a staggering number of cases in which the Greek Coast Guard and FRONTEX have ordered migrants to find their own way back to Turkey while stranded
Since March 2020, over 27,000 migrants travelling across the Aegean Sea to Greece from Turkey have faced ‘drift-backs’ – the practice of being abandoned at sea – an investigation by Forensic Architecture/Forensis has revealed.
The study has verified over 1,000 cases of drift-backs in which migrants have suffered inhumane treatment in their quest to reach European shores, with the Hellenic Coast Guard and FRONTEX playing a prominent part in these incidents.
Accounts describe how migrants and refugees are being intercepted in Greece’s territorial waters or arrested upon arrival in the country. Shockingly, 26 cases recorded indicate that the Greek Coast Guard threw people into the sea, two of whom were handcuffed.
There are also accounts of asylum seekers being beaten, stripped of their possessions, and forcefully loaded onto life rafts with no engines, leaving them to find their own way back to the Turkish coast, which often results in injuries or death by drowning.
The investigation was carried out between March 2020 and March 2022, and found precisely 1,018 cases of drift-backs in the Aegean Sea, with 27,464 people being involved in the incidents.
The majority of the 1,018 incidents took place off the shores of Lesvos island (378). A significant number happened off Chios (136), Samos (194), Kos (122), Rhodes (92) while 79 took place in the rest of the Dodecanese.
European border and coast guard agency FRONTEX was found to have directly been involved in 122 of the drift-backs. It often coordinated with the Greek coast guard, where it would alert the national authorities of incoming vessels.
FRONTEX was also aware of a further 417 such incidents, with Forensic Architecture/Forensis having found the group to have noted them in their own archives as ‘preventions of entry’.
“Demonstrating the scale and cruelty of this enduring crime, our study erects a wall of evidence against the Greek government’s increasingly hollow denials,” Stefanos Levidis, a Forensic Architecture researcher, stated.
“It shows how the Greek Coast Guard cynically uses rescue equipment in reverse, to deny access to safety to thousands of asylum-seekers, leaving them adrift to the sea currents.
The Aegean Sea, a global symbol of hospitality and mobility, here shows its dark side. It has been sealed and turned into a weapon, a conveyor belt for people whose lives are measured differently at Europe’s edges.
As citizens of Greece and Europe, we demand that this cruel practice ends immediately. We have seen enough.”
Yanis Varoufakis believes this is a matter that should concern all Europeans.
“With every pushback of non-Europeans in the Mediterranean, Europe loses another fibre of its soul,” he said.
“As Europe’s soul is stripped away slowly, painfully, Europe is prepared for greater inhumanity toward its own citizens.
“No European should sleep easily while non-Europeans are pushed back into the menacing seas. Their nightmare today, tonight, will haunt our dreams forever.”
Drift-backs are an illegal practice that go against a number of international protocols including the inalienable rights to apply for asylum and to seek rescue at sea.
The platform is already supporting ongoing legal action, independent monitoring, reporting, and advocacy, as well as growing demands for accountability and international calls for defunding national border guards and FRONTEX. Explore the platform for yourself via this link.
Corruption? That’s insensitive. It’s called lobbying now
The Uber files remind us that the elite treats public office as an audition for corporate jobs
Most people who have crossed paths with Travis Kalanick seem to be happy to tell you that he’s a terrible person. Kalanick is best known as the ruthless former CEO of Uber, a startup that he grew into an empire thanks to a complete disregard towards regulators, elected officials, drivers, trade unions and his own employees. In 2014, he was being openly called an asshole. But around that same time, someone was calling him “dear Travis”: then-French economy minister Emmanuel Macron.
“Thanks dear Travis,” Macron texted him. “Let us keep in touch and progress together. Best, Emmanuel.”
This exchange was revealed as part of the Uber files, a trove of internal communications leaked by a whistleblower and published by UK newspaper The Guardian. Alongside Macron, many other senior officials are shown to have secretly met with company executives or lobbied for Uber, including the former EU top official on internet policy Neelie Kroes and the current President of the United States, Joe Biden.
If you’ve ever seen a carefully prepared statement by a prominent politician embroiled in a scandal – and who hasn’t? – you know what to expect. There’s the classic “these allegations are completely false”. Or “the truth is being distorted to create headlines”. There’s also the rare “I apologise for past mistakes, but I’ve changed”, and finally the magical but improbable “I hereby resign”.
Ever the champion of innovation, though, Macron came up with something very different in his official response: he’s “extremely proud” of having used his power to lobby for Uber in France.
When we think of corruption, our minds are likely to materialise cartoonish images of politicians sticking manila envelopes full of cash into their pockets in a parking lot, or drunk in some yacht enjoying a bunga bunga paid for by their cronies. They’re likely to look and sound anything but northern European. And make no mistake – these images are easily found in the real world. But everyday corruption tends to be much more sanitised, low-key, and, as a result, harder to combat.
At the heart of the problem is this: the elite that sits in parliaments and ministerial offices is the same that sits in corporate board meetings across the street. Many of them move freely between both worlds. Before becoming economy minister and later president of France, Macron was an investment banker with Rothschild & Co. David Cameron resigned as UK prime minister and became a lobbyist for the financial company Greensill Capital. The aforementioned Neelie Kroes – you’re not going to believe this – is now part of the Uber advisory board. The list goes on and on, both in Europe and across the Atlantic.
If there’s a revolving door between the highest levels of government and the highest-paid echelon of corporations, that means that public officials – the people whose job is to serve our interests – have zero incentive to use their power to go against the interests of big corporate players, especially when those interests go against ours, as they practically always do. Why would they get on CEOs’ and shareholders’ bad side and shut the door on those cushy, 600,000-euros-a-year jobs when they inevitably leave public office? Their interview process for these begins the moment they’re sworn in. They have a LinkedIn profile to build, and they need to build it fast.
Seen under that light, Macron’s response is logical. In any truly democratic system, the revelations involving him would be career-ending. As it is, he knows that his next employer is out there, somewhere, watching closely. If, by some miracle, his brazenness spells the end of his time as president, so what? The perks may be great, but the job doesn’t pay that well, and his contract runs out in five years anyway.
A brown day for Europe
Gas and nuclear energy are being painted green, but we will not stop in our efforts to bring about a genuine renewable energy transition
The European Commission has agreed with EU parliament members not only to slow, but to dispute, the green transition. The taxonomy has become brown – gas and nuclear energy are labelled as ‘green’ energy.
We at DiEM25 warned the public that nuclear energy is a starting point for nuclear weapons, and that it’s unreliable, expensive, dangerous and slow to install; while gas is finite, destructive, and contributes to the problem that the Commission claims to want to solve.
We’ve collectively put a lot of work and resources into our Don’t Paint It Green campaign which offered the chance to sign our petition, tweet to the president of the Commission and send an email to MEPs and others. And we didn’t stop there. Our comrades appeared right in front of the parliament in hazmat suits with a barrel expressing concern and stating loudly: Overthrow the oligarchy!
However, this is not the end. We definitely value all of your efforts in helping us and we won’t give up. DiEM25 is going to endorse any type of a legal action against this brown taxonomy, and we will be present on the streets and in online spaces to oppose this charade. You can expect more news from us on this matter soon.
But, as you know, we need the funds to make this happen. We don’t rely on any institutions or government money, as we are solely grassroots funded. If you’d like to see more of our direct actions, like the one above that we did in Strasbourg, please donate.
Or even better, if you’d like to join us to plan and run our Don’t Paint It Green campaign: sign-up here and get in touch!
We won’t let the Commission and the parliament put a final nail in the coffin of a green Europe – the only Europe that has a future.
Boris Johnson is gone – now let the Tories go too
Real change can only come once the UK has a people’s government
The Boris Johnson era exposed the UK establishment as never before: their self-serving motivations, their incompetence and their sense of entitlement became plain for all British people to see, one scandal at a time.
Johnson is now gone, but that alone represents little cause for celebration as the Tories are still in power, as they have been for the past 12 years. For as long as that remains the case, British people can only expect more hardship inflicted upon them to fatten the pockets of the oligarchs that own the Conservative party, as Cabinet member Nadine Dorries recently admitted.
But moments like this can be what we progressives need to build the momentum necessary for real change. Let Johnson be the first in a long line of dominoes to fall in the UK establishment – one that includes the Tories, their oligarch backers, and a Labour frontbench that seems set on selling Tory-lite ideas, completely lacking the will or the courage to address the urgent needs of common people in any meaningful way.
As our ‘Your NHS Needs You’ campaign has shown, DiEM25 is growing rapidly in the UK in order to influence and implement that change. Economic justice, social justice and bottom-up democracy are our goals. If they are yours too, join us.
DiEM25 joins Free Assange Committee Belgium to protest for Julian’s freedom
The Botanical Garden in Brussels played host to Assange’s 51st birthday ‘celebrations’ which were used as an opportunity to call for his release
DiEM25 Belgium, which is part of the ‘Free Assange Committee Belgium’, took part in a joint protest on Julian Assange’s birthday last Sunday, to once again voice our demands for his release.
The committee celebrates Julian’s birthday every year at a park in Brussels. The Botanical Garden in the Belgian capital was the venue chosen to mark the occasion of his 51st birthday last week, which saw numerous activists come along, including those from the city of Namur, to call for his freedom.
Attendees bore placards with various messages, particularly highlighting the fact that it was his fourth birthday spent inside the UK’s high-security Belmarsh Prison, as well as wearing Assange masks with the US flag covering his mouth to symbolise the freedom of speech that has been stripped away from him.
Fittingly, the afternoon came to a close near the Congress Column, a monument that honours the first legislative assembly that drafted the constitution after Belgium’s independence in 1831 and where the tomb of the Unknown Soldier of the First World War is located.
Four statues represent freedoms guaranteed by the 1831 Constitution, including press freedom, which seems to have been abandoned given the mistreatment of Julian Assange over the course of the last decade.
The committee’s commitment
The Free Assange Committee has been demonstrating every Monday at 17:00 local time in Julian’s name since April 2019. The first Monday of every month sees gatherings in front of the British embassy, while protests take place on subsequent Mondays at the Place de la Monnaie in Brussels, and sometimes in front of the American embassy.
In January 2020, with the support of DiEM25, statues of Assange, Manning and Snowden were unveiled in the presence of officials from Brussels.
In addition to constant activity on the web and the continuous spread of information regarding Assange’s situation, as well as court proceedings, the Committee organised petition campaigns against his extradition to the United States.
Akamas: Cyprus’ ecological treasure is under attack from its government
The peninsula, which accounts for 15 percent of the island’s greenery, has become the target of private investors, facilitated by opaque government redevelopment plans, which threaten the area’s broad biodiversity and forests
The Akamas peninsula is a unique area not only for the island of Cyprus, but worldwide. It is located at the westernmost tip of the island and is a refuge for over 200 species of endemic birds and countless types of flora and fauna. The area hosts species unique to earth such as the loggerhead sea turtle, as well as a nesting area for the fastest animal on the planet, the peregrine falcon, that has a diving speed of up to 300 kilometres per hour.
The diversity of the region’s terrain is the reason why it is home to so many different kinds of life. The territory of Akamas includes hills, gorges, bays, streams and valleys. Despite the ruggedness of the area, the peninsula has been inhabited since ancient times, hence the ruins of settlements and temples that can still be seen there. The area, therefore, apart from its natural beauty and ecological value, also has historical worth.
Cyprus is referred to in ancient writings as ‘Dasoessa’ (Forest covered island), in reference to the proportion, density and variety of forests that covered the island. Since then, however, fires, invasions and wars, in addition to the spread of livestock farming and later industrial and touristic development, have led to a reduction in the forestry from 93 percent in antiquity to just 18.7 percent today. The forest area of Akamas constitutes about 15 percent of the remaining greenery of the island.
UNESCO and Natura 2000 recognition
However, despite the fact that it is widely accepted that the area in question is an ecological treasure, efforts have been made for decades to undermine and restrict it, with the aim of its economic exploitation. It is indicative of the fact that, between 1987 and 1995, the Akamas Peninsula was proposed as a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve, with a land area of 23,000 hectares, and between 1998 and 2003, the Akamas Peninsula was mapped and proposed for inclusion in the Natura 2000 network as a Special Area of Conservation, with a territory of 17,690 hectares. Eventually, in 2018, the National Forest Park of Akamas (7,762 hectares) was inducted as part of the Natura 2000 Sites of Community Importance (SCI) and Special Protection Areas (SPA). This latest development is very far from the area that the relevant scientific studies indicate as its actual size, which leaves the species reported to the authorities to be nesting, hunting and living outside the Natura 2000 area to be endangered on a daily basis.
Government’s shady development plans
Since 2018, state plans started to be submitted in cooperation with private entities which include specific provisions for the creation of eight main entrances and 14 amenity hubs, the construction of seven refreshment facilities and three souvenir shops, as well as the development of forest roads and paths with a total length of 85 km within the Akamas National Forest Park and the SCI (CY4000010) and SPA (CY4000023) Natura 2000 sites of the peninsula. At the same time, the government’s proposed Akamas National Forest Park Sustainable Development Plan does not include any proposals for the declaration of natural reserves, forest monuments and natural micro-reserves. Furthermore, the Forestry Law and the Forest Policy Statement of the Republic of Cyprus do not include any provisions for the declaration of wildlife areas, as well as protected terrestrial and marine landscapes.
After widespread public opposition, this plan did not go ahead, except in isolated incidents, which were either cancelled after further protests or went ahead despite them, especially in the Akamas area, which is criminally not included in the Natura 2000 framework. Now, however, a new local plan is being formulated, in which it is known that references are being made to extensive touristic developments, which are a far cry from the ‘soft development’ framework that the Ministry of the Interior claims to be preparing.
At this point, we can only refer to substantiated reports or rumours, since the Ministry stubbornly refuses to disclose the content of the local plan – even claiming that doing so would be “potentially illegal” – even though, according to the international convention of Aarhus, which was ratified by the Republic of Cyprus decades ago, does not mention anything of the sort.
There have also been authoritative reports of cases where the Ministry has shared the contents of the drafted local plan with private individuals who have major financial interests in the area, while denying this right to environmental organisations and collectives.
DiEM25 joins the protests
Within 10 days, in the wake of these developments, two large peaceful demonstrations took place in the capital Nicosia and Paphos, with hundreds of protesters – including DiEM25 members – chanting slogans such as “Akamas belongs to our children”, “We want our forests” and “Enough destruction”.
The “destruction” in this case is in reference to the housing developments in vulnerable natural zones, such as those that have led to the collapse of sea caves, the death of at least one seal, developments on turtle hatching beaches, and numerous fires (some intentional) that in the last six years have burned thousands of hectares of rich flora and fauna.
Take action
As members of DiEM25 we demand the full protection not only of Akamas, but of all natural habitats in Cyprus. This demand does not conflict with the right of the inhabitants of the wider areas to maintain a decent living and equal opportunities. It is time for the state to ensure both the integrity of our natural wealth and the provision of infrastructure and empowerment for the residents of the neighbouring areas, without electoral or speculative influence from large private interests and the island’s oligarchy.
Greek referendum anniversary: The battle goes on
Seven years have gone by since the Greek referendum on July 5, 2015. There are some who will not recall those heated summer weeks when the world watched a European drama, or rather a Greek tragedy, play out. And yet, the European Union of today was born in the summer of 2015; shaped by the decisions made at the time. To understand what we are facing in 2022, we need to understand what happened in Greece in 2015.
A conservative union
It has long been debated whether it is possible to be economically progressive within the legal constraints of the EU. The regulations that govern it, such as its single market laws and its Common Agricultural Policy all benefit big business and the economies of financial and industrial powerhouses, such as the Netherlands and Germany.
This problem is exacerbated by the euro which keeps the German industrial behemoth moving, tethering the rest of Europe’s nations to its fate. This would of course not be so bad if Europe was governed by a political union which ensured that the gains were then distributed among all Europeans equally. Alas, the reality could not be further from this.
For all of its conservative biases, there were a series of ambitious attempts to deepen and widen the integration of the European project. However, since the start of the economic crisis in 2008, these were all replaced by desperate measures, of an increasing authoritarian character, designed to keep the architecture of the EU unchanged at any cost.
It was within this environment that the Greek negotiating team, under the leadership of Yanis Varoufakis, had to renegotiate Europe’s handling of the Greek debt in 2015. This was stand against oligarch-enriching privatisations and economy-crushing austerity, and towards policies that would allow the Greek economy to recover and honestly have a chance at one day repaying its debts.
An unfaithful champion
Alexis Tsipras was elected prime minister of Greece with the clear mandate to end the austerity opposed by the country’s lenders and their local allies.
Unfortunately, within a few months, he started having parallel discussions with his European counterparts which undermined the efforts of Varoufakis in Brussels, slowly signalling that he was willing to capitulate to the EU and continue the austerity programmes.
Once Greece’s lenders sent the government a take-it-or-leave-it austerity deal, Tsipras organised a referendum on whether to accept the deal that contained the policy he was elected to oppose. As history shows us, he hoped he would lose it.
A betrayed revolution
In the lead-up to the referendum, Europe was abuzz. Propaganda portrayed the referendum on whether to accept further austerity as a decision on whether Greece would stay in the euro or not.
Others took it a step further: it was a question of whether the country would stay in the EU. Greeks were bombarded with scaremongering stories of potential shortages in food and medicine, not to mention financial ruin.
Then, something unheard-of happened: while debates raged for and against the austerity deal, the European Central Bank cut off access to liquidity for Greek banks, leaving Greeks without access to cash. The atmosphere in the country was truly warlike.
To this day, the consultation on whether this action was legal has never been published by the ECB, despite efforts to force the central bank to share the document they procured with public money.
Greeks were clearly being blackmailed. Thousands of people took to the streets across Europe in support, which developed into a movement that recognised that the future of the EU itself was at stake: would it be an authoritarian institution that bullied citizens into submission, or a true union of people tied together through policies aimed at shared prosperity and solidarity?
It was during those hot summer months that the spirit of DiEM25 was born, as some of us realised that the EU should either be democratised or it should disintegrate.
The fact that the Greeks voted against austerity, despite the pressures exercised on them by foreign and local elites, is testament to the depth and strength of the movement that led their struggle.
Tsipras’ complete betrayal of this powerful stance by his people and their allies from across the world did not just handicap the Greek Left’s credibility; it undermined people’s belief in change, leaving one of the most politicised and radicalised societies in Europe numb and disillusioned. To this day, abstention has not dropped to pre-referendum levels and the mainstream political debate is controlled by parties that have accepted Greece’s subjugation, with parties that still seek a resolution to the colonisation of the country, like MeRA25, being limited to the political fringes.
A continued fight
The task of MeRA25 in Greece is to re-energise the people who voted for ‘NO’ in 2015. Those who, in the face of impossible odds, stood resolute for a better Greece, in a better EU.
It is a hard sell: people feel betrayed and hopeless. It is a struggle that can only be won through patience and continuous proof that our party is loyal to people and democracy, while having credible solutions to the many existential issues faced by a country that’s been in crisis for over a decade. As the cost of living skyrockets and the European economy becomes destabilised by the rising energy prices and inflation, we will once more enter into a period where the radical, yet common-sense, solution of MeRA25 and DiEM25 will have an increasingly wider appeal.
Across Europe, DiEM25 recruits those who recognise that the EU’s actions in 2015 proved that it’s willing to go to any length to maintain the status quo and protect the interests it serves. It needs to be confronted, embattled and forced to change, and DiEM25’s mission is to create the pan-European movement that will lead that battle. A battle against oligarchs and the politicians that serve them. Greece in 2015 showed us both the strength that a determined people can have, and the dangers of entrusting our struggles to those undeserving. MeRA25 in Greece and DiEM25 across Europe need to learn from that and build a tool for political representation that can be trusted, through strong ties with society and mechanisms that ensure the party and its representatives stay true to the policies we champion.
Julian Assange will celebrate his 51st birthday in Belmarsh prison
DiEM25 Advisory Panel member has been kept at the high-security facility since 2019 following seven years inside the Ecuadorian embassy
Journalist, activist and DiEM25 Advisory Panel member Julian Assange is set to spend his 51st birthday (July 3) in Belmarsh prison.
After spending seven years inside the Ecuadorian embassy in London amid fears of US prosecution, he has since been kept at Belmarsh – a high-security prison – where his health has significantly worsened.
Assange remains behind bars in the harshest of circumstances for leaking classified documents in 2010 and 2011 that revealed war crimes, while the crimes which he exposed remain unpunished.
In what is clearly a tactic from the UK and the US governments to censor others from coming forward and revealing similar crimes, Assange is being made an example of.
The abhorrent decision made by UK Home Secretary Priti Patel to approve his extradition to the United States is only further evidence of this.
We would like to wish Julian Assange a happy birthday, although it is hard to imagine that there could be anything ‘happy’ about it given the horrendous predicament he has been placed in.
The only way any sort of happiness regarding Assange was to prevail would be, firstly, for his extradition to be overturned and, above all, that he is released immediately.
Support Assange by organising an action in your local area
Julian Assange’s life is in danger and, at this crucial moment, we call on all DiEM25 local collectives to take to the streets of European cities on his birthday, Sunday July 3, to call for his freedom.
We ask you to print and use the Assange masks (PDFs provided below), take your DiEM25 banner(s) and make as much noise as you can in your town or city. If possible, we recommend you organise your action(s) in front of the UK embassy in your country.
What to do
- Print out a mask in your language. The masks can also handed out as flyers to the public. We recommend printing on DiN A4 200g paper double-sided.
- Mobilise people in your Local Collective / your local area and take your DiEM25 banner (if you have one) out to the centre of your town or city or straight to the UK embassy.
- Action Wear your mask and stand in solidarity, demanding the release of Julian Assange! Make sure to distribute the masks as flyers to passers-by, to spread the word of DiEM25 and our fight for Assange.
- Alternatively Create your own We Are Millions exhibition by printing out the following materials.
- Document Make sure to take photographs and videos and post them on your Local Collective social media using #DiEM25 and #FreeAssange, or send them to our Comms team at [email protected].
Radically changing the world of work: Different political movements and a common programme
“Anti-capitalist struggles must unite, and define a common programme to follow through as a united front among different movements from different countries, thus it must also have a transnational character to fight the transnational capitalist elite.” João Hermeto gives his thoughts on the future of the work on the back of the ‘Lavoro Se’ event that DiEM25 hosted in Milan.
On June 21, 2022, DiEM25 hosted an event in Milan, Italy. The theme of the gathering was: ‘Work if…: Our proposals to radically change the world of work’ (Lavoro se… Le nostre proposte per cambiare radicalmente il mondo del lavoro). The two words ‘Work’ and ‘If’ reveal not only that the question of labour is central but also that one should not regard offering his or her labour in an unconditioned fashion to the capitalist class.
Among the speakers, some associates from the following organisations were present: Fridays for Future, Laudato Sì, Rete dei Numeri Pari, UDU, and DiEM25. I want to provide the reader with my perspective from tonight both as a viewer and a member of DiEM25.
From my perspective, the event presented two main lines of thought that we can reflect upon and learn from – a contemporary form of promoting social change and a classical one.
The contemporary form hoped that the COVID-19 pandemic would enable some conscious reflections about the many existing problems in society and, that with such a gain of awareness, some changes would hopefully come about. In reality, what we saw was a very different picture, the augmentation of the precarity of the many, on the one hand, and further enrichment and broader privilege of the few, on the other. How come this caught off guard those promoting social change under the contemporary form?
Additionally, some demands have also been advocated – namely, the need to reduce labour hours while simultaneously increasing salaries, or even guaranteeing them by the means of a universal basic income. Not only that, but the reversal of steeling back from machines the work that they have stolen from the labour class. How radical are these claims?
On a very positive note, the contemporary form presented a great diagnosis of social exploitation and the unsustainable use of natural resources and, accordingly, that we must put an end to these perils.
The extent of these problems portrays a quite realistic view of our reality and the existing social decay in Europe. The lack of illusion in these diagnoses is very important if one wants to try to create feasible solutions for social transformation. Solutions, moreover, start with another crucial aspect of the event: people were physically present, exchanging thoughts and critiques, this means, they are organising and debating ideas. It is time to leave the defence and go into the offence.
Yet, while the diagnosis seems correct, the contemporary form seems to fall into a trap, when deciding how to combat capitalist threats. The reason why, to some, it was a surprise that the immediate aftermath of COVID-19 did not bring about positive changes is the same reason why mild reformist measures now could appear revolutionary. The past is being projected into the future while the essence of capitalist social relations is not being fully realised.
When a tractor is introduced and thus replaces many manual workers, or when any great development in production takes place promoting a similar outcome, then the production of life becomes more social. Labour becomes more specialised. Thus individual isolated labour loses social meaning. Individual labour becomes more attached to social production, for its role is only a small and isolated part of a totality. Furthermore, science, which is by definition a social development, production integrates more deeply, thus making the whole process of production even more social.
This means that labour, as it was previously known, disappears, and people can potentially work much less with much greater output. As exchange value decreases so does the importance of money. With abundance, markets become obsolete since they only come to play when scarcity exists. The conflict arises, however, by the fact that history has granted a small class the privilege to control this whole process of production, and distribution. While the private property of the means of production helped to bring labour together during early capitalism, its development also fostered the socialisation of production, making the very private ownership of the means of production an obstacle to the further development of production and a social problem.
Thus, the classic form of promoting social change understands that neither the machine nor the reduction of labour represents the problem. Instead, property social relations that enable the private property of the means of production are.
Wanting to go back to the past and introducing palliative measures does not meet the necessary conditions for the working class to face the continuous challenges posed by the capitalist class struggle. Instead, the romanticisation of the past and analgesic measures gives the impression of capitulation. If the labour class wants to succeed, it cannot afford to fetishize labour; it also cannot idealise the state, which is by definition a tool controlled by the elite. Further, it must understand the class conflict between the capitalist class and those who do not own the means of production, the so-called working class.
In this sense, the notion of factories without owners, or working cooperatives, can help to point out the direction for new property social relations. However, one must not forget the great power that the capitalist monopolies still hold. Thus, the fight cannot be simply economic, where isolated companies can abandon the exploitative structure and become economic democracies (working co-ops), the main stage of the struggle for social change lies at the political level. Only when the working class fights as a class instead of isolated and separated units can it face the challenges posed by the capitalist class.
The contemporary fight is being crushed, hence, we must learn from the classic form of social struggle. But contrary to the classic form, we cannot afford to create divisions among our groups – the struggle cannot be monopolised by one organisation at the expense of others. Anti-capitalist struggles must unite, and define a common programme to follow through as a united front among different movements from different countries, thus it must also have a transnational character to fight the transnational capitalist elite.
Live in Italy? Visit lavoro-se.it/ and join us in taking a few, simple online actions to protect labour rights in the country.