Syndicalism, Anarchism and Marxism

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Author : Iain McKay

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Instead of trying to squeeze Marxism into syndicalism, it would be better to ask why so many “Marxists” rejected the legacy of Marx and embraced positions (revolutionary unionism, primacy of economic struggle, the general strike, unions as the structure of a socialist society, etc.) which were expounded by Bakunin and attacked by the founders of their ideology. Looking at what the syndicalists themselves said, the ideas of Bakunin and what Marx and Engels advocated, it quickly becomes apparently that Marxism was not one of the “core ideological elements” of syndicalism. In reality, syndicalism was simply, as so many syndicalists and others stressed, a new name for the ideas raised in the IWMA and for which Bakunin was a leading advocate.Syndicalism, Anarchism and Marxism

“the anarchists ... do not seek to constitute, and invite the working men not to constitute, political parties in the parliaments. Accordingly, since the foundation of the International Working Men’s Association in 1864–1866, they have endeavored to promote their ideas directly among the labor organizations and to induce those unions to a direct struggle against capital, without placing their faith in parliamentary legislation.”

Peter Kropotkin, The Encyclopedia Britannica, 1910[1]

Introduction

Ralph Darlington[2] tries to defend a provocative assertion in a journal dedicated to studying anarchism, namely that “the traditional assumption ... that syndicalism was simply an outgrowth of anarchism would be an over-simplification”. (p. 30)

He does so by two main lines of argument. Firstly, Darlington suggests that “Marxism also influenced” syndicalism “significantly to varying degrees,” going so far as to list it as one of its “three core ideological elements” (p. 46) alongside anarchism and revolutionary unionism. Secondly, he claims that “many other countries where syndicalist movements also flourished (for example, Britain, Ireland or America), anarchist influence was only of marginal consequence”. (p. 30)

Both claims, I would argue, are deeply flawed. The first is simply assertion, with no supporting evidence, and ignores not only the more obvious influence of Bakunin’s revolutionary anarchism but also Marx and Engels explicit rejection of key syndicalist ideas when raised by libertarians in the International Working Men’s Association (IWMA). It also stands at odds with a well-established scholarly literature that, while admitting the affinities between some forms of Marxism and syndicalism, nonetheless draws a direct and lineal linkage between anarchism and syndicalism.[3] The second confuses the spread of syndicalist ideas and their acceptance by Marxists with a preexisting ideological influence. As such, it crucially ignores the element of time. Just because a few Marxists found syndicalism more appealing than Social Democratic orthodoxy cannot be used to retroactively make syndicalism indebted to Marx and Engels.

Anarchism and Syndicalism

The first assertion is that “syndicalism was always an alliance between at least three core ideological elements,” one of which was Marxism which “influenced it significantly to varying degrees”. More precisely, “a number of syndicalist movement leaders inherited some central components of the Marxist tradition” (with the useful qualifier of “in however a diffuse form”). (pp. 46–7)

This influence was twofold. First was “the Marxist conception of the necessity and desirability of class struggle (of which strikes were the primary expression) as a means of collective resistance to capitalism that could develop the confidence, organization and class consciousness of workers”. Second was “a conception of socialism arising from the need for workers to take power themselves rather than relying on the enlightened actions of parliamentary and trade union leaders who would reform capitalism on behalf of workers”. (p. 47)

As far as the first supposed contribution goes, recognizing the “necessity and desirability of class struggle” is hardly uniquely Marxist as can be seen from Bakunin[4] repeatedly expressing that opinion. It follows, therefore, that that characteristic of syndicalism by no means supports Darlington’s inference and so there is no need to invoke Marxism.[5]

For Bakunin, like the rest of the revolutionary anarchist tradition, class conflict was inherent in capitalism for there was, “between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie, an irreconcilable antagonism which results inevitably from their respective stations in life.” He stressed that “war between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie is unavoidable” and for the worker to “become strong” he “must unite” with other workers and form “the union of all local and national workers’ associations into a world-wide association, the great International Working-Men’s Association”. Only “through practice and collective experience” and “the progressive expansion and development of the economic struggle” will the worker come “to recognize his true enemies: the privileged classes, including the clergy, the bourgeoisie, and the nobility; and the State, which exists only to safeguard all the privileges of those classes.” There was “but a single path, that of emancipation through practical action” which “has only one meaning. It means workers’ solidarity in their struggle against the bosses. It means trades-unions, organization, and the federation of resistance funds.”[6] Thus “unions create that conscious power without which no victory is possible” while strikes “create, organize, and form a workers’ army, an army which is bound to break down the power of the bourgeoisie and the State, and lay the ground for a new world.”[7]

Bertrand Russell stated the obvious: “Anarchists, like Socialists, usually believe in the doctrine of class war.”[8]

As for the second supposed contribution, the need for workers “to take power” themselves rather than relying on leaders, this was precisely Bakunin’s critique of Marx.

For Bakunin, “the new social order” would be attained “through the social (and therefore anti-political) organization and power of the working masses of the cities and villages.”[9] This meant that anarchists do “not accept, even in the process of revolutionary transition, either constituent assemblies, provisional governments or so-called revolutionary dictatorships; because we are convinced that revolution is only sincere, honest and real in the hands of the masses, and that when it is concentrated in those of a few ruling individuals it inevitably and immediately becomes reaction.” Rather, the revolution “everywhere must be created by the people, and supreme control must always belong to the people organized into a free federation of agricultural and industrial associations ... organized from the bottom upwards by means of revolutionary delegation.”[10] This was because “every state, even the pseudo-People’s State concocted by Mr. Marx, is in essence only a machine ruling the masses from above, through a privileged minority of conceited intellectuals who imagine that they know what the people need and want better than do the people themselves.”[11]

In short, as well as “anti-state, anti-political action, and anti-militarist ideas” and “the notions of federalism, decentralization, direct action and sabotage” (p. 46), syndicalism took from the revolutionary anarchism associated with Bakunin the “necessity” of class struggle and a “conception of socialism” based on workers’ power organized (to use one of Bakunin’s favorite terms) “from the bottom up.”

So to claim that class struggle and workers’ power were the contributions of Marxism to syndicalism means ignoring a far more obvious source for these ideas – Bakunin and other revolutionary anarchists in the IWMA. Given this, it seems odd to invoke Marxism to explain aspects of syndicalism particularly since, as I will show, Marx and Engels explicitly rejected syndicalist ideas when they were raised by those libertarians in favor of forming political parties and utilizing elections.

The redundancy of invoking Marxism to explain syndicalism can also be seen from what Darlington calls syndicalism’s “utter primacy of the working class as the sole agency of revolution that could liberate the whole of society”. (p. 47) Bakunin also argued that the “initiative in the new movement will belong to the people ... in Western Europe, to the city and factory workers – in Russia, Poland, and most of the Slavic countries, to the peasants.” “Organize the city proletariat in the name of revolutionary Socialism”, he stressed repeatedly, and “unite it into one preparatory organization together with the peasantry.”[12] However, “in order that the peasants rise up, it is absolutely necessary that the initiative in this revolutionary movement be taken up by the city workers ... who combine in themselves the instincts, ideas, and conscious will of the Social Revolution.”[13]

Then there is the issue of trade unionism. Here Darlington does indulge in a tautology by asserting that “arguably we can define” syndicalism as “revolutionary trade unionism” (p. 31) and then proclaiming that one of its “three core ideological elements” are “the ideas of revolutionary trade unionism.”[14] (p. 46, p. 47) Yet revolutionary unionism was a core aspect of Bakunin’s ideas: “the natural organization of the masses ... is organization based on the various ways that their various types of work define their day-to-day life; it is organization by trade association.” Once “every occupation ... is represented within the International, its organization, the organization of the masses of the people will be complete.” Then, “when the revolution ... breaks out, the International will be a real force and know what it has to do,” namely “take the revolution into its own hands” and replace “this departing political world of States and bourgeoisie.” [15]

As such, it is incredulous to suggest that when the CNT was founded in 1911 it “combined syndicalist principles of revolutionary unionism with the more traditional Spanish anarchist principles”. (p. 36) This ignores the well-established recognition that the Spanish anarchists had traditionally organized revolutionary unions. The Spanish section of the IWMA “was from the beginning based upon unions” and organized “by local councils in each town, and national unions for each branch of production.” One leading Spanish anarchist noted in 1910 that only the term “syndicalism” was new.[16] In Zaragoza, for example, anarchist union organizing began in 1871 and when the CNT formed 40 years later that city was the “largest center of anarchist trade-union influence in Spain, outside Barcelona.”[17] As such, syndicalism’s “theoretical and practical links to the nineteenth century are readily apparent.”[18]

As historian J. Romero Maura correctly summarized, for the “Bakuninists” in the IWMA the “anarchist revolution, when it came, would be essentially brought about by the working class. Revolutionaries needed to gather great strength and must beware of underestimating the strength of reaction” and so anarchists “logically decided that revolutionaries had better organize along the lines of labor organizations.”[19]

In short, Darlington is incorrect to suggest that “the core of syndicalist philosophy was not explicitly anarchist in character”. (p. 44) Comparing it with the ideas of Bakunin we discover identical theories and practice:

“Toilers count no longer on anyone but yourselves. Do not demoralize and paralyze your growing strength by being duped into alliances with bourgeois Radicalism ... Abstain from all participation in bourgeois Radicalism and organize outside of it the forces of the proletariat. The bases of this organization ... are the workshops and the federation of workshops ... instruments of struggle against the bourgeoisie, and their federation, not only national, but international ... when the hour of revolution sounds, you will proclaim the liquidation of the State and of bourgeois society, anarchy, that is to say the true, frank people’s revolution.”[20]

As Bertrand Russell summarized: “Hardly any of these ideas [associated with syndicalism] are new: almost all are derived from the Bakunist [sic!] section of the old International.”[21] In this he was echoing the likes of Malatesta[22], Kropotkin[23] and Goldman[24] (a position Rudolf Rocker repeated decades later[25]). Many academics have made the same connection.[26]

If syndicalism is defined as the believe that “unions should go beyond merely attempting to improve workers’ terms and conditions of employment within the framework of capitalist society, to become the instrument through which workers could overthrow capitalism and establish a new society” (p. 48) then it is clear that Bakunin advocated such a theory.[27] Sadly, Darlington does not discuss how syndicalism differs from the revolutionary unionism expounded by libertarians in the IWMA and after.<[28] However, to claim that “syndicalist principles of revolutionary unionism combined with anarchist notions” (p. 38) would suggest unawareness that revolutionary unionism had been advocated decades before “syndicalism” was used to describe these ideas.[29]

As far as Darlington’s second argument goes, that many syndicalist movements developed in countries without a large anarchist presence, he ignores that these movements developed in response to syndicalist movements elsewhere, such as France, where there was significant anarchist influence. Given the role of unions in revolutionary anarchist theory and practice from the 1860s onwards, the rise of these initial syndicalist movements would testify to that very influence.

The Italian syndicalists, for example, “drew considerable inspiration from their French brethren”[30] while “the founders” of the IWW “did draw on the experience of the French syndicalists.”[31] In Britain, syndicalists “drew much from the overseas syndicalist experience”[32] (particularly of the CGT and the IWW). Over time, syndicalist ideas did spread to labor movements in countries without large anarchist movements but that cannot be used to downplay the links of syndicalism to anarchism for, as with George Sorel,[33] these self-proclaimed Marxists utilized the theories and practice of existing syndicalist organizations in countries which did have significant libertarian influence.[34]

So while not all syndicalists considered themselves anarchists, syndicalism itself originally came from revolutionary anarchism which had advocated revolutionary unionism from the start. This was reflected both theoretically and practically, with anarchists producing revolutionary union movements in Spain, Mexico[35], America[36] and elsewhere before the 1890s. Ironically, Darlington himself shows this to be the case when he states that “anarcho-syndicalism became a potent force after the Russian anarchist Bakunin had arrived” in Italy “in the late 1860s”. (p. 35) This admission contradicts the assertion that Marxism was one of syndicalism’s “three core ideological elements”.[37]

Marx and Engels against Syndicalism

In addition to the obvious similarities in Bakunin’s politics and syndicalism, there is the awkward fact for Darlington that while he proclaims Marxism as one of syndicalism’s “core ideological elements” Marx and Engels explicitly rejected such ideas.

Marx attacked Bakunin for thinking that the “working classes must not occupy itself with politics. They must only organize themselves by trades-unions.”[38] Engels dismissed the general strike as “the lever employed by which the social revolution is started” in the “Bakuninist program” while suggesting they admitted “this required a well-formed organization of the working class”[39] (that is, Bakunin aimed to “organize, and when all the workers ... are won over ... abolish the state and replace it with the organization of the International”[40]).

Likewise, they routinely mocked the notion, popular in the libertarian wing of the organization, that the International should both prefigure and become the future structure of a socialist society. For Bakunin, the “organization of the trade sections and their representation by the Chambers of Labor ... bear in themselves the living seeds of the new society which is to replace the old world. They are creating not only the ideas, but also the facts of the future itself.”[41] For Engels, the Bakuninists told the proletariat “to organize not in accordance with the requirements of the struggle ... but according to the vague notions of a future society entertained by some dreamers.”[42] For Bakunin, the “future social organization must be made solely from the bottom upwards, by the free association or federation of workers, firstly in their unions, then in the communes, regions, nations and finally in a great federation, international and universal.”[43] For Engels the “democratic republic” was “the specific form for the dictatorship of the proletariat”[44] (although the Paris Commune showed that “the victorious proletariat must first refashion the old bureaucratic, administrative centralized state power before it can use it for its own purposes”[45]).

If “the essence of syndicalism was revolutionary action by unions aimed at establishing a society based upon unions” (p. 31) then this is found in Bakunin, not Marx and Engels. Indeed, they highlighted these aspects of Bakunin’s ideas – the centrality of union organization and struggle (including the general strike) – and expressed their opposition to them.

Moreover, as well as rejecting key syndicalist ideas, Marx and Engels also advocated what many revolutionary socialists, as Darlington admits, came to consider as the “dead-end of electoral and parliamentary politics”. (p. 46) The subsequent development of social democracy confirmed Bakunin’s fears on using elections rather than Marx’s hopes.[46] So when Darlington correctly suggests that when “many syndicalists dismissed” political action they were “rejecting” electoral politics he fails to note that they adopted the same “narrow definition of political action” (p. 47) as had Bakunin in the First International.[47] It was precisely this “narrow definition of political action” which Marx and Engels inflicted upon the IWMA against the libertarians.[48]

It is true, as Darlington suggests, that many Marxists became syndicalists as “a reaction” against social democracy.[49] (p. 47) Sadly, he fails to raise the question of why social democracy became reformist, instead stating that these were “reformist socialist parties” (p. 47) so ignoring that, at the time, there were not – they considered themselves as revolutionary parties explicitly following the ideas of Marx and Engels on “political action.” True, a substantial revisionist tendency existed within these parties and, moreover, their rhetoric was not reflected in their practice, but it should not be forgotten that they prided themselves in being revolutionary.

So if social democracy put the “emphasis on parliamentarism at the expense of the direct action of the workers” (p. 47) it is fair to say that the focus that Marx and Engels placed on “political action” helped this process immensely.[50]

It is hard not to conclude that if syndicalism is marked, as Darlington suggests, by a “rejection of political parties, elections and parliament in favor of direct action by the unions” and a “conception of a future society” based on “the economic administration of industry exercised directly by the workers themselves” (p. 29) then not only were Marx and Engels not syndicalists, they were explicitly opposed to it. Given this, to claim that Marxism is one of syndicalism’s “core ideological elements” seems rather strange.

Assessing success

Darlington argues “revolutionary syndicalism was short-lived and ultimately unsuccessful in achieving its overall aims – particularly when compared to the architects of the Russian revolution”. (p. 49)

That raises the obvious question of what counts as success. If we look at the “overall aims” of “the architects of the Russian revolution” then this revolution was “ultimately unsuccessful” – unless you assume that the “overall aims” were to create within one year a one-party dictatorship presiding over a state capitalist economy or that this counts as a “successful” socialist transformation. So while it may be correct to say that the Bolshevik Party successfully seized and held onto power this was utterly unsuccessful in creating socialism which was the whole point.

Darlington is partially correct to suggest that “it was the seizure of state power by Russian workers under the leadership of the Bolshevik Party ... which was to prove a decisive ideological and political challenge to the revolutionary syndicalist movement”. (p. 49) Partially, because squeezed between fascism and Bolshevism (and then Stalinism) syndicalism did become marginalized as the negative influence and abundant resources of the Comintern (particularly, but not exclusively, under Stalin) and the illusions generated by the Bolshevik Myth sidetracked revolutionary movements across the world. The dream of socialism realized allowed far too many to blind themselves to the realities of Soviet Russia under Lenin and then Stalin.[51] This cannot be ignored when evaluating why syndicalism did not flourish after the First World War as it had beforehand.[52]

I would suggest that Darlington’s summary of the Russian revolution shows that the Bolshevik Myth still has its adherents. As anarchist and syndicalist critics of Bolshevism explained, a key problem was precisely that it had been the Bolshevik Party which seized power, not the Russian workers[53] – with predictable (and predicted, by the likes of Bakunin) consequences.[54] While many in the revolutionary movement did expose the failings of Bolshevism,[55] not enough believed them. Luckily, today these are too well known in radical circles for this to be repeated.

Ultimately, the Bolshevik revolution has associated socialist ideas with their exact opposite. It is a legacy which the socialist and labor movements have still not recovered from. This, by any objective measure, must be considered far more “unsuccessful” than the syndicalist movement.

Conclusion

Instead of seeking elements of syndicalism in Marxism, I would suggest that “the traditional assumption” that syndicalism was “simply an outgrowth of anarchism” is no “over-simplification”. All of Darlington’s supposed contributions of Marxism to syndicalism can be found in Bakunin’s ideas. Moreover, other key elements of syndicalism identified by Darlington can also be found in Bakunin and, ironically, were denounced by Marx and Engels.

Rather than see unions and direct action as the key as Bakunin did, Marx and Engels advocated the creation of socialist political parties and use of (bourgeois) elections. So strongly did they feel about this they shattered the IWMA by making those mandatory policies for it. If syndicalism is marked, as Darlington says, by a “rejection of political parties, elections and parliament in favor of direct action by the unions” and a “conception of a future society” based on “the economic administration of industry exercised directly by the workers themselves” then it seems strange to seek a “core” ideological influence on it in the ideas of people who explicitly rejected this.

Kropotkin, therefore, was right to point to “the closest rapport between the left-wing of the International and present-day syndicalism, the close rapport between anarchism and syndicalism and the ideological contrast between Marxism and the principles of Social Democracy and syndicalism.”[56]

Instead of trying to squeeze Marxism into syndicalism, it would be better to ask why so many “Marxists” rejected the legacy of Marx and embraced positions (revolutionary unionism, primacy of economic struggle, the general strike, unions as the structure of a socialist society, etc.) which were expounded by Bakunin and attacked by the founders of their ideology. Looking at what the syndicalists themselves said, the ideas of Bakunin and what Marx and Engels advocated, it quickly becomes apparently that Marxism was not one of the “core ideological elements” of syndicalism. In reality, syndicalism was simply, as so many syndicalists and others stressed, a new name for the ideas raised in the IWMA and for which Bakunin was a leading advocate.

I have shown that there are very good reasons why “[m]any historians have emphasized the extent to which revolutionary syndicalism was indebted to anarchist philosophy in general and to Bakunin in particular”. (p. 29) We need only compare Bakunin’s politics and revolutionary syndicalism. Marxism, in conclusion, need not be invoked to explain revolutionary syndicalism.

Bibliography

From : TheAnarchistLibrary.org.

Chronology :

February 11, 2021 : Syndicalism, Anarchism and Marxism -- Added.

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