Originally published in French on Paris-Luttes.info on Jan. 11th 2019. Translated by our collaborator in French, Otto Mattik and edited by us at Ediciones Inéditos. It is a glimpse at the looming capitalist crisis to come and how the writer in France figures the Yellow Vests movement within it and what antagonistic developments the movement can bring. What follows is the translation.
General Remarks
We
will not dwell on the usual left-wing debates held between Leftists on
the Yellow Vests movement. Nevertheless, here are some remarks of a more
or less general nature to clarify the place from which we’re talking
about.
We
participated in the yellow vests since the first week of mobilization.
On the 17th, we were skeptical. On the 18th, we were forced to realize
that something else was happening than a simple public demonstration
from the far-right electorate. On the 19th, we had to go and check the
roundabouts and highway tolls closest to us. Since then, our excitement
has not faltered.
The Situation
Macron
and his government are afraid, they sweat, they wear makeup to go out,
they cancel their holidays for fear of being indecent… The yellow vests
would be the one and only reason. Let us take the reflection a little
further.
The
central States of integrated world capitalism are all over-indebted.
This is not new, the observation has been a consensus since 2008. But
since then, what has been the response of the capitalist class to
relaunch a new cycle of accumulation? None of them seem to take over,
since none of them seem serious enough.
Automation,
generalization of the status of self-employed and uberisation of
certain sectors, ideological constructions of independence processes
(regional – Catalonia… – or national – USA, England…) to give a social
meaning to the nationalist problem… All these options, in the end, do
not succeed in masking the only two ones that currently have a real
dynamic at the international level to counter the tendency of the rate
of profit to fall: government and central bank indebtedness (buybacks of
rotten assets, interest-free loans via quantitative easing policies,
etc.) and lowering of labor costs (lower wages, precarious employment
status, cuts in social benefits, etc.).
These
two levers encompass and contain all the others. Automation and
uberization are parts of it, but cannot be imposed on a global scale to
offer a stable economic model, and everyone knows it.
Through
these two levers, the first signs of a major-scale crash are emerging,
of which 2008 was only the trailer. Admittedly, there is still room for
maneuver on the side of lowering labor costs: so far, there are
sufficiently few of those who have really “nothing to lose” for the
State repression to manage to control them.
Attempts
at populist, even post-fascist counter-revolutions, such as the 5-star
movement in Italy, the Brexit in England, the Orban government in
Hungary, and more generally the rise of the far right in the central
countries of accumulation, do not seem to be able to calm the situation
or to catalyze populations in the long term through nationalist
ideology. Even when it works for a while (and, here, we do not
underestimate the dangers of these “times”, however “short” they might
be…), social issues resurface and protest is reborn from its ashes (see,
for example, the fight against Orban’s “labour law” since the end of
2018, despite the weather and the total government control over the
local media).
To sum
up from a historical point of view: the quantitative extension of
capital (extension of the capitalist production process to all social
spheres of human existence, throughout the entire territory of the
planet) seems complete or at least advanced enough to no longer be a
source of new structuring profits; the increase in productivity has
brought about a second cycle of general accumulation (Fordism,
Taylorism…), but had to relocate and slow down its fervor in view of the
conditions of production it introduced; the dissolution of all the
obstacles to the reproduction of the capitalist social relationship
(globalization of the economy, precariousness of the status and jobs,
management of surplus populations, etc.) and the indebtedness of States
have been accumulating since the 1980s, but now seem to reach their own
limits…
This leads us to put a concept on the table: the impossible restructuring.
Populism will not be the counter-revolution, since it does not propose
(at least for the moment) any real economic response. A
counter-revolution is first and foremost a restructuring of the
accumulation cycle, of the foundations on which it is built, extended
and consolidated. However, if not in the realm of ideology, often
rancid, the populist movement never imposes itself on the economic
scene, which is itself ultra-complexified, inter-connected and therefore
immutable in appearance since the restructuring of the 1980s: what else
explains Brexit or the election of Syriza other than the effect of
advertising, followed by retreat? In reality, “protectionism” is
inapplicable in the current state of affairs and everyone up there knows
it, which may also be why they are freaking out….
The few
protectionist/trade war situations lead to a destabilization of product
prices and a disruption of the interconnected (so-called) global
balance that the business world, hand-in-hand with the major
international political authorities, has been struggling to shape for 50
years. All economies are at a standstill, and the possibilities for
recovery are in fact more than limited (see again, Portugal’s scam as a
“revived left-wing economy”1).
All
this to get to the point: for Christmas, Wall Street was at its lowest
level since 2008, we just avoided a small crash thanks to the artificial
closure for the holidays, the Tokyo stock exchange panicked in turn and
plunged by 5%… In short, it would seem that the conditions for a major
world depression to come are shaping up at a speed that is not
surprising (the lessons of 2008, from a strictly reformist point of
view, have not been taken at all… But is it possible to only
change the course given the enormity and international interpenetration
of our ways of producing, distributing, distributing and financing our
activities?).
Some signs in bulk:
- Europe: British goods exports have collapsed to levels not seen in three years (manufacturing industry is down, see the significant decline in car production and sales). In Germany, the implementation of a minimum wage has not reduced the number of mini-jobs (especially since they have just reduced the threshold of hours worked for these precarious part-time jobs limited to 450 euros, without any social security contributions nor pensions). Italy and its “populist” economy, in conflict with Europe, seems to be sinking into a budget deficit… Logically, its interest rates are rising. How far will the conflict go and what will be the real consequences? Let us recall the Greece of Syriza….
- Trade tensions are not without consequences in China: a sharp drop in job openings in the manufacturing sector; a fall in retail sales growth (in November it was at its slowest pace in 15 years); the lowest industrial production in the last three years…. The country’s annualized official growth is at its lowest since 2009, and China is forced to correct its financial excesses and over-capacities, which is dragging the entire Asian region into its slowdown (e.g. loss of momentum in Malaysia, Taiwan… See South Korea/China export decline in December). The slowdown in the Chinese economy also threatens to remove essential support for the global export and import sectors. In Asia too, Japan is heading straight toward a debt crisis of a scale we not even know here…. If it will not be the trigger, how will it get his head up in the middle of the international slump that is coming?
- The world’s largest economy (USA) is being hit, despite growth driven by tax cuts and seemingly lower unemployment than ever2, by very low productivity and a high dependence on external capital and goods. The illusion of the “Trump Plan” will soon fade away; investors already share their fears for the future. Ray Dialo, founder of the largest hedge fund Bridgwater Associates, estimates that the dollar (the world’s leading reserve currency for foreign investors) could fall by 30% in the next two years. “As in 1929-1933, after the 2007 crisis we increased debt to support markets and economic activity”3
As the massive injection of liquidity into the financial sectors cannot last forever, as central banks no longer have any ammunition, and as the risks of falling growth are accentuated both by geopolitical tensions and by major ecological challenges (climate change and the energy question – oil in particular), it seems obvious that what is to come over the next ten years is not funny at all.
The yellow vests as a sign
Thus,
we believe that the Yellow Vests movement is a precursor of the
struggles to come in this depressive cycle. On the one hand, in its
language and mobilization, both heterogeneous and spontaneous: the
populist grammar, that of a “people” against its “elites”, surely
represents the ideological offensive closest to a counter-hegemony at
the present time. This is not a bad judgment: we think that in action,
when this ideology leads people to rise up, it leads to improbable
encounters and moments of struggle that transform subjectivities and
direct thoughts quite logically towards social issues. However, the
dynamics are not so simple or clean, since “populism” and its language
carry within them a multitude of possibilities that mix the political
spectrum in length and breadth.
On the
form (blocking of flows, wild occupation of roundabouts, tolls and
highways, riots not legally declared and combativity), it seems obvious
that the G-J movement is significant for what is coming. Inter-union
“social movements” have not won anything, or almost anything, for more
than twenty years. The tradition demonstrations, resulting from the
workers’ counter-culture and its identity prior to re-structuring, will
no longer be able to be hegemonic.
The
impossibility for politics to get out of periods of crisis except
through repression, propaganda and the ideological construction of
rancid national units, will at one time or another lead these dynamics
of struggle to their own overflow. Repression is creating generations of
revolutionaries to come; propaganda is pushing thousands of households
to desert their television sets. As the economic lever is by nature
unstable, because it has become uncontrollable from a sovereign and
national point of view (even more so than it has ever been), politics
will gradually come up against a wall.
Economic
nationalism, in its failures, will have to prove itself in the
“societal” field, particularly in the hunting of migrants. The fact that
struggles are breaking out at the moment must be taken seriously: the
intensity of these occasions, the encounters it allows, represent the
best tools against racist and nationalist ideology… unless we leave the
racists and nationalists with the “apolitical” insurgents! It is our
responsibility to get involved, as part of the proletariat, in the
movements of insubordination that our period carries. All the more so as
things, on this side, will also accelerate (mixing of populations;
future migrations driven by climate change and repeated wars, etc.).
Where will this movement go?
It’s
impossible to predict. Will last week’s real surge resist the revised
and corrected measures of January 12? Will decentralized and local
actions, blockades, occupations held during the week persist? Will they
succeed in reviving themselves, or is the rhythm getting tangled up in
Saturday’s dramatization? Will targeted repression and mutilation give
rise to a people who are certainly insurgent, but who are still a
minority on the streets?
These
are all questions that are not interesting to answer, since we are not
prophets. That said, one wonders why so many people accustomed to social
movements refuse to involve with a mass they seem to despise? On our
side, we had the impression that the unionized masses and hippies of
Nuit Debout were just as confused in their ideological postures.
The
question is: let us stop limiting ourselves to ideology. Books don’t
bring consciousness. The action, fervor and intensity of the
pre-insurgency periods, lead multiple consciences to structure
themselves in radicality. Without playing the bad Leninists, we have a
say in this structuring: not as an enlightened vanguard, distributing
good and bad points, bringing its new language norms and militant
obligations (professional militants are never far from the priesthood),
but as participants forced to sell their labor-power and being just as
worried about our future as anyone else. Our militancy has provided us
with an experience that is not to impose, but rather to adapt and bring
in support, to propose.
Locally,
however, we have seen leftism get entangled in its worst acts. The
worst of them consists in trying to impose centralized General
Assemblies by region, against the will of most of the participants in
the movement (who understand that an occupied roundabout becomes an
Action Committee on its own, and that the only questions to be asked are
not ideological but practical, they are those of the measures to be
taken, the supplies, the organizations to carry out the occupation and
the actions it gives itself). Others can be mentioned, such as these
Alternatiba activists who are determined to trade the criticism as an
act of production (via the blocking and multiplication of sharing) for
abstract/ideological criticism of consumption and consumers
(anti-advertisement actions, brand blockages accompanied by militant
messages…).
The
desire to put an end to representations, mediations, and to intensify
the struggle for struggle, beyond ideological presuppositions
(presuppositions that are always shifting and uncertain… except among
closed Leninist militants and post-modernists), is indeed the strongest
gesture of the yellow vests movement. The multiplication of anchoring
points, designed as meeting points, materializes this gesture. That’s
what we have to grow.
Disseminate
our collective art and memory (not that of the old workers’ movement;
but for example, photos of wounded people of the movement printed in
large format, glued on posters or in the streets before/during
demonstrations; or our funny and evocative graffiti); propose
reflections and reports in the form of info-kiosks (not those inhabited
by activists’ pamphlets, but rather by booklets made occasionally, about
the movement, for movement); bring care/protection/defense equipment to
demonstrations (we already see yellow vests bringing their own
reinforced banner, their own teams of street medics, etc.); participate
in Facebook groups as lambdas participants (ideological debates are at
game there); come to the places of blockages to be more numerous…. It is
in these actions that our participation has made sense, has carried
meanings.
A little strategic suggestion….
Why
not propose to all the local groups in which we participate that Act 10
be the one for the reconquest of local anchorage points? Imagine: 400
points recaptured in a single day, a hundred of (re)built cabins in the
afternoon, all over the country, big meals shared in the evening,
concerts, parties, balls (depending on the context)! No riot porn, to be
sure, but maybe a new breath!
In any
case, the next breath is the crisis that is coming. It will not be easy.
It’s not going to be happy. At least not only. But certainly, the
existing order will be transformed. It’s not necessarily reassuring, but
at least exciting, right? Unless we prefer the already dead and buried
History, militancy for militancy in a world frozen by the triumph of
liberal democracies…? Come on, let’s wake up!1« Alternatives Economiques », Pourquoi le Portugal ne va pas si bien qu’on le dit, 30 août 2018.
Without accounting for how the article does not go into the problems of
endemic corruption nor surplus populations – which are very numerous and
definitely remain “outside” of any statistics.
2 We
know that this decline is illusory: there is a fall in the rate of
participation in the job market, with a growing number of inactive
adults, men in particular (23 million inactive adults from ages 25 to 45
years are totally left out of all employment statistics), a rise in the
amount of older adults returning to work, concordant with the rise of
precarity among the elderly. See : Libération, États-Unis : chômage, un taux trop bas pour être vrai, Frédéric Autan, 30 septembre 2018
3Les Echos, Le fondateur du plus gros hedge fund livre sa vision des marchés, Nessim Ait-Kacimi, 27 décembre 2018, mis à jour le 7 janvier 2019
taken from here