On Syndicalism

It would be difficult to deal with the various theories and ideals that are usually confused under the common name of syndicalism under a single heading.

Among those who call themselves syndicalists are men with the most diverse ideas and aspirations. There are those who aspire to a social order that is hardly distinguishable from the ideals of anarchist communists; there are others, more numerous, who, while rejecting in words any authoritarian, state-run organization, ultimately advocate a government, a state that differs from that desired by democratic socialists only in that its organization would be based on trade or industry rather than on territorial boundaries. There are others—and perhaps they are the ones who could most rightly be called the theorists of syndicalism—who have no preconceived ideals and do not want to have any, and who believe that the labor movement itself, as it lives and struggles, gives birth to the program of its action and the institutions that serve to implement it. There are others...

But we do not intend to deal with the theoretical claims of syndicalism in this article.

We only want to say something about syndicalism as a movement, and more especially about its most advanced part, which is usually called revolutionary syndicalism, in order to discuss the position that anarchists should take in relation to it.

It goes without saying that we have the greatest sympathy for this movement of revolt, which affirms and seeks to provoke an irreconcilable antagonism between bosses and wage earners, which calls on workers to take their cause into their own hands and to achieve, through their direct action and against all state interference, the improvement of their living conditions today and their complete emancipation in the near future.

Our sympathy for the syndicalist movement is quite natural, since we can claim, if not exclusively then certainly mainly, the credit for having created it for anarchism. The old International, especially in its anarchist half, was in reality nothing more than a syndicalist movement. And in France, where the current movement originated, those who founded the General Confederation of Labor and gave it its syndicalist orientation were largely anarchists, even if some of them later changed their ideas or believed it expedient to modify their language.

But more than with “syndicalism” (which is either anarchism, in which case it is useless to call it by another name, or it is not anarchism, in which case we cannot accept it), we sympathize with the trade union movement, which we believe can greatly benefit the education of the masses and revolutionary preparation.

And precisely for this reason, we would like to see avoided those errors that were the real cause of the death of the First International and which, we fear, are producing the degeneration of the current movement.

In trade union organizations, there is a fundamental contradiction between the ideas stated in their programs and their methods of recruitment.

Trade unions are open to all wage earners without distinction of religious beliefs or political and social opinions. They must be, it is said, apolitical and non-denominational. And that is fine.

Since trade unions want to bring together all proletarians to train them to fight against the bosses, and since there are all kinds of religious, political, philosophical, etc. opinions among the proletariat, unity is only possible on the basis of common interests. The criterion for recruitment cannot be opinion: it must be social position.

But on the other hand, trade unionists set out as their organizations' program statements which, despite all the verbal artifices, are political and social opinions, futuristic concepts which, if they were understood and taken seriously, would exclude from their unions not only all those who have a different concept of social development, but also, and this is the worst thing, the immense mass of wage earners who, being more unconscious and inert, would have a greater need to receive their first education in resistance and struggle in workers' associations.

At the Modena Congress, which gave rise to the Italian Trade Union, the speaker on the question of proletarian unity said:

"When we talk about unity among organized labor forces, we run the risk of falling victim to a great misunderstanding if we do not specify the meaning of this phrase. Obviously, there can be no sincere unity except among those who have at least the same goal to achieve. This is so true that even the most ardent supporters of unity on our side would disdain to understand unity in the sense of uniting with organized Catholics, because it is clear that the goal of religious confessional organization is not our goal. But if this is true, we must be sincere to the end and ask ourselves whether the goals proposed by the C.G.d.L. have anything in common with the goals we propose for ourselves. Whatever scandal my statement may cause, I answer frankly: no. It is not only a question of method that divides us from the reformists. The different method is determined by the fact that they aim at a different goal. We want the integral, complete, autonomous development of the workers' union, to the point of making it the main constituent element and the governing body of the new society of free and equal producers for which we are fighting. They believe that the union should be nothing more than a tool for partial and illusory improvements, that the working class can obtain more from the benevolence of the ruling class and from state intervention than from its own strength, directed towards a bold conquest. They believe that true social transformation must be accomplished in the state and by the state, through a series of legislative measures and an ever-increasing extension of state powers, which should eventually replace private capitalism, taking over the management of all production and exchange, as well as the distribution of wealth. What is the point of contact between this statist and authoritarian conception of social change and the anti-statist and libertarian syndicalist conception? None. We therefore take the opposite path and have a goal opposite to that of the reformists. We want to abolish the oppressive power of the state; they want to multiply and increase it until it becomes the supreme regulator of all social life. We aim to achieve the autonomy and complete freedom of productive groups and of the individuals within these groups; they aim to establish the most terrible tyranny the world has ever seen. It is not enough to say that we all pursue the dream of a more just, more humane, more beautiful society. Even priests say they want to improve society, but no one thinks that priests can be our allies for this reason alone. The important thing in this case is not to have the will to bring about social transformation. The important thing is to establish how this transformation is to take place and on what basis it is to be achieved. Now, as I have already said, the transformation as we understand it is not only different, but even opposed to what the reformists are striving to achieve. There is therefore nothing in common between us and them: neither the method nor the goal. Joining forces with them would be nothing but hypocrisy and harmful, since either we or they would have to sacrifice our own conception of social change, unless we paralyze each other and make unity a cause not of increased strength but of a loss of strength."

The Congress approved these ideas and, as they express the goal to be achieved, we also approve them for the most part.

But how can this be reconciled with apoliticism, that is, the neutrality of the unions, which was also approved by the same Congress?

If those goals are truly those of all members of the Trade Union, and if their conscious acceptance is a condition for being admitted, then the Union would be nothing more than an organization of more or less anarchist revolutionaries. We could rejoice in this, but we would then feel the need for another truly neutral organization, that is, exclusively anti-employer, which could bring together all workers to be an open field for everyone to propagate all ideas.

If the Union intends to admit all workers, on the sole condition that they do not go to the “shop across the street,” then it would be founded on a lie.

The mass of members would be made up of unconscious contributors, and the Union's official program would always be dependent on the majority, real or fictitious, at any given moment.

Revolutionary at its inception, because it was founded by the revolution and composed of the most militant minority in the most advanced countries, the Union would become increasingly moderate, increasingly reactionary, as it developed and expanded.

When an organization's program is more advanced than its members and recruitment is done without demanding strict adherence to the program, one of two things happens:

Either the initiating nucleus develops its program and becomes increasingly revolutionary, while on the other hand the mass swells with increasingly conservative elements, and then the divergence between the standard-bearers and the mass of members widens to the point of incompatibility and the organization falls apart. This is what happened to the old International. Or the leaders, in order not to lose their influence over the masses, adapt and become tame, and then the organization loses all its revolutionary and educational value and ends up becoming a factor of social conservation. This is what happened to the large workers' organizations in England and America, and it is a constant threat to trade union organizations.

From this we deduce that those who say that “trade unionism is sufficient in itself,” that the workers' movement is sufficient to produce social revolution, are mistaken.

Trade unionists rely heavily on what they have called “the automatism of instinct-guided interests.” That is to say, when workers are pitted against their bosses on economic grounds, they automatically, almost without realizing it, acquire class consciousness, place class solidarity above all considerations of party, religion, or country, and end up treating their bosses as enemies, because they are bosses, even if they are party comrades, co-religionists, and compatriots.

This is true, but unfortunately it is not the only automatic effect produced by the workers' organization when there is no element within or outside it to spur it on, excite it, and, if necessary, fight it, an element that rises above strictly economic issues and is ready to sacrifice material interests to moral ones, today's interests to tomorrow's, the interests of the “worker” to the higher interests of “man.”

In order to fulfill its purpose and unite as many workers as possible in the struggle against the bosses, the workers' organization must look after the current and immediate interests of its members. As long as these interests are in line with the general interests of the proletarian class and the interests of the revolution, all is well.

But this is not always the case; in fact, in everyday life it is rarely the case. Harmony is the aspiration, the desire that must be realized through revolution, but it does not exist today, not even within the oppressed class itself. And the struggle for revolution, far from being favorable to the immediate interests of individuals, is a work of devotion and sacrifice.

The workers' organization, being a grouping of interests and having to fight for the satisfaction of those interests, naturally and automatically tends to sacrifice tomorrow's interests to today's, the interests of the whole class to the more real and more deeply felt interests of each category. As a result, it tends to develop corporate exclusivism and antagonism between those categories of workers who, in the current organization of production, find themselves in economic competition. Thus it gives rise to, or justifies with specious reasons, antipathy towards foreigners who come to ‘take bread’ from the natives, puts obstacles in the way of unskilled workers who try to learn a trade, wants to restrict the number of apprentices and prohibit women from working. It tends to judge the value of an interest not by its social importance but by the wages it provides to those who exercise it, and if the prosperity of a given industry depends on the prosperity and tranquility of the bourgeoisie, the unions belonging to that industry automatically produce a desire for the bourgeoisie to prosper and feel secure. Thus, workers in luxury trades are tempted to view with suspicion any unrest that, by disturbing the public “order,” distracts the wealthy classes from their parties and revelries. The union of workers who manufacture weapons and warships, or otherwise live off war preparations, is tempted to desire and often demand increased military spending and the undertaking of colonial brigandage. The guilds that derive, or imagine they derive, advantage from customs protection demand the tightening of the respective tariffs—and so on.

In short, if the workers' organization tends on the one hand to develop antagonism between workers and bosses, it tends on the other hand to separate a part of the workers from the mass and make them a new privileged class.

Knowing the above, we must try to extract from the workers' organization all the good it can give and fight the evils it can generate. We must take advantage of the fertile ground it offers for our propaganda, of the powerful means it can be for our action, but we must be careful not to believe that it alone can bring about the revolution and automatically produce a society based on solidarity and justice for all. We must, always and everywhere, remain above all anarchists.

Trade unionists should also—and perhaps would like to—follow a similar tactic: extracting from the organization the maximum it can give in favor of the revolution and combating its reactionary and conservative tendencies.

But can they do so if they expect everything from the organization itself? If they become official representatives of the organization and have to look after its material and day-to-day interests? If they have to adapt to the wishes of the majority? If they accept a salary and with it the moral obligation to serve the interests of those who pay them and in the way that those who pay them intend?

For example, trade unionists certainly think, as we do, that bosses are thieves, towards whom the robbed, the workers, should have no regard. They think, as we do, that the employment contract, being under current conditions a leonine contract, does not morally bind those who have been forced by hunger to accept it. They must therefore tell the workers that when they are forced to come to terms with the bosses, they must do so with the intention of violating the agreement as soon as they have the opportunity. But if they preach this, can they then serve as intermediaries in negotiations and bargain with the bosses over the wages and working conditions of the workers?

British syndicalists have adopted a tactic that seems to us superior to that of Italian and French syndicalists.

They do not seek to form syndicalist unions, but have formed a “Syndicalist Education League” intended to propagate syndicalist principles and methods in workers' associations, which remain neutral, that is, open to all.

In any case, trade unionists should do as they see fit. We anarchists must not accept from the various workers' organizations anything other than the common principle of the struggle against the bosses, and we must join all of them in order to bring the ferment of our ideas and the example of our action.

Another time we will discuss in more detail what our practical action in the organizations should be.