Revolution again on the agenda!

I am writing this at 1:23 am on February 3 and I can not ignore the Internet television Al-Jazeera, which broadcasts directly to Tahir Square in Cairo, where fierce fighting. Now it seems that on this night the people defeated the supporters of the authorities, but the final outcome of the battle are not yet clear.

This spectacle - the coolest in my life, never seen anything like it. And touchingly, as events in Egypt have joined the elite of the whole world, no "democratic country" does not provide any support for the Egyptian movement, on the contrary, velikobritanets David Cameron has just called Mubarak "trusted friend".And outside of twitter and facebook, wherever possible to climb from China, Chinese people are rejoicing in the comments - characters can not understand, but the exclamation points unequivocally say that the promise they have one - "China will be next!".

But at the same time I feel the joy and sadness - in fact it is clear that at the moment the democratic revolution has not yet has no potential to become social. Even the most spectacular victory will only mean a new "democratic" government, which may increase the democratic freedom, but does not affect the relations of production.

However, leave the moralism of the "lack of efficacy of the events" sectarians and discuss how we, the libertarian communists should do in case of such events.After all, in fact, the regime in Russia is quite a lot in common with authoritarian regimes in the Arab countries, far more than the regimes of Western Europe.Algeria is not on the brink of revolution, but there is a significant rise of folk and country, such as oil, as well as ours. In Tunisia, it all started with protests against the lawlessness Cop - a question that in Russia very much grieved.

In fact, all rebellion "developed" or "medium-developed countries," the last 30 years there was a "democratic" slogans. These revolutions can be divided into 3 categories on the basis of the rigidity of the official response to the rise:

1) A smooth transfer of power, a low level of confrontation - this category includes almost all the "color revolutions" (except Kyrgyzstan), events during the collapse of the eastern bloc, including Russia, in August 1991 (except in Romania and Chechnya).
2) The transfer of power from violence, but the confrontation was between factions of the elite rather than between the state and structure of the national self.This category includes events in Romania, Chechnya and Kyrgyzstan, as well as in Tunisia.
3) The confrontation, in which government agencies are fully replaced traditional structures of self-organization.This category refers only to revolt against the military junta in South Korea, in the city of Kwangju in May 1980, which was brutally poddavleno.

On which depends what level of radicalism will reach the "democratic" revolution? Partly for this may affect the level of awareness of the protest movement began to escalate, but by and large determines the level of radicalism of the authorities' willingness to actions. The events in Kyrgyzstan would not develop without a police brutality;
Revolution on a regional scale in Gwangju would not have been possible if the military did not shoot dozens of protesters May 21, 1980, after which the people defeated the police stations and expropriated the machines to respond to the fire.

We must understand that the real potential to inflame we do not, and after any such attempt we will assume simply provocateurs.We must always adequately assess the situation, what level of legitimacy and what level of attack will be approved by the people.We should always be slightly ahead of "mass" in terms of radicalism, but if we run away too far ahead, we will simply be marginalized and immediately destroyed. Sometimes we can only accept the fact that almost unable to influence the situation. So often it is in the case of the "democratic" revolutions of the first kind. Through repetition of events, such as those that occurred in Ukraine in 2004, there is little we can do except distribute leaflets and calling for social demands.But the likelihood that people hear us, small, in fact, in such cases, the confidence of the people of the legitimacy of the system is high, more than ever, because he really feels that the streets can change one government to another. And the warnings about anarchists is that the new
power will not be much better, very few people will remember a year or two later, during the general disappointment of the new government.

But when the level of confrontation increases, immediately there are new
opportunities.

The first thing that anarchists need to do in the event of such disturbances, it is added to the democratic demands and even social.If the democratic change can actually leave the structure of society intact, then any social demands he always threatened. I am glad to read about the horror of the Egyptian elite, when there were beggars in their neighborhoods. But when the level of confrontation will increase, we will have chances to convert theory into practice.

We are talking about the capture of resources. And the very first - is a resource of communication.In recent days, a lot of talk about Twitter, social networks and the Internet in general, but it's all bullshit - benefit from them only in the very early stage, and, as the example of Egypt, they soon will be completely disabled. Should develop other, more decentralized system of digital transmission. During the events in Moscow in 1993 Fidonet has played a major role in disseminating information about what is happening. Maybe he will have a new life? In Egypt, the landline phones are not switched off until now, perhaps, every revolutionary must think about how to set yourself this, with good old dial-up, maybe even a BBS.You should also think about satellite phones - if not to buy, then at least of where this can be stole, if necessary.

Well, in these circumstances will certainly come back and paper media. Consequently, when an anarchist get a job in the office, he should first think about how you can make from there you can Xerox. Buying risograph may make sense in the counter-revolutionary times, but the rebellion, he becomes even indispensable.And still should be a plan of development of huge quantities of paper.

All of these communication tools are necessary not only for the nomination is anarchic demands, but also for organizing the protests in general. Thousands of singles - the individual atoms in the streets and the best guarantee that nothing will change. Anarchists should, first of all, away from meaningless massovok that serve only the ambitions of politicians on the podium, and put forward the idea of organizing in the workplace (if possible, then declare a general strike - an idea that is rarely like politicians), in their own areas or at least some barricades.And the structure of such an organization - general advice that works on the principles of direct democracy. If we manage to organize a similar structure, then it is anarchism in practice, and instead of publishing leaflets and petitions on behalf of political and ideological groups, we can distribute them on behalf of the Board. Once people have gone the way of self-organization, they will stand firmly on it until at least the end of the rebellion, and often the rest of his life, regardless of the old ideology and identity.Consequently, at this point labels largely ceased to play a role.

Everything else is well described in "Bread and Freedom" by Kropotkin and other classics, so no need to repeat it. It is written as advice to distribute food, as we shall expropriate the weapons and organize the guards, which prevent looting - because shoplifting is cool only in the conditions of capitalism, but in mass recovery from it should only be unfair distribution of resources.Well, a lot of writing and how to avoid another failure, "October", the use of a revolutionary situation authoritative for the usurpation of power (a matter of course, also relevant in Egypt, considering the fact that the influence of the Muslim Brotherhood there exceeded the influence of the rest of the Opposition) . We all read about, but often do not see where it ends, our familiar reality and the reality of the Paris Commune, in which the rules of the game, opportunities and threats are very different.Just the fact that the "democratic" revolution rarely reach the situation that describes Kropotkin, but also between them and the dismal reality of our daily existence of the capitalist is a great "intermediate" space, which is just now in Egypt. When choosing the right steps in such "intermediate" conditions, we are unlikely to push the event to a real revolution, but nonetheless, we can prepare for her ground and reach the perfecta new level of motion.