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LET'S GET ORGANIZED!
Dear Friends and comrades:
Recently I completed a coast-to-coast speaking tour to promote my
newly reprinted book Anarchism and the Black Revolution, and also to raise
funds for the legal defense in the Chattanooga 8 racist frame-up case. I
spoke in 25 different cities to thousands of persons, and gave over 90
separate presentations. The tour not only allowed me to go to new places
and meet many friends and comrades, it also allowed me to size upthe North
American Anarchist (and anti-authoritarian) movement, the struggle around
political prisoners, and the state of the Black movement today. I would
like to give you my assessment of where we are, and what I think can be
done to make changes.
The Anarchist and other anti-authoritarian forces are currently in
"ghettos" which are almost all-white, all youth-oriented, all middle-class,
and generally disconnected from the surrounding communities (many of which
are majority African or Hispanic). This cannot be allowed to go on if
anti-authoritarian politics are to become a real force in North American
social life. We must become more ethnically diverse, more action-oriented,
and more community based--if we are serious about a struggle for a social
revolution on this continent. My idea is for the creation of an
Anti-Authoritarian Network of Community Organizers (AANCO), a "united
front" of all those Anarchist forces who think we must build a broader,
more militant movement, which includes "ordinary" people and deals with the
revolution of everyday life. We need a movement of more than "punks",
college youth, or even like-minded Anarcho-activist types in another narrow
"federation".
AANCO is a worker/student/youth alliance; a direct action community based
organization to fight the crippling of capitalism: economic exploitation,
unemployment, homelessness, poverty, police brutality, racism and other
ills of a system in decline. We want to build a movement of thousands--and
ultimately millions--of persons to resist this corrupt system and fight for
a better life, which can only come with a new society.
We believe the old radical Left and syndicalist ideals of the "industrial
working class" grouped into large work sites serving as a revolutionary
class vanguard is outdated, and that the structure of capitalism has
produced a new class of "super-poor" persons who are marginalized and
divorced from any hope of gainful employment under this system. AANCO
believes that because of structural unemployment, caused by automation,
corporate downsizing, de-industrialization and a host of other factors, the
primary site of struggle has now shifted from the workplace to the
community. In fact, we believe that it is in the cities themselves where we
can build a movement to overthrow capital. But while we fight back against
the capitalist state, we must build a new counter-culture and new community
institutions.
We also believe poverty has become "racial-ized" in this country, with
millions of Black and other people of color bearing the brunt of the
current capitalist depression, and now constituting the majority of the new
poor and homeless. Because we recognize that this poverty is no "accident"
and does not hit everyone equally, but is rather a class and race
phenomenon, we realize that we need a Poor Peoples' Survival Movement which
unites the poor of all races, but especially the non-white communities in a
fightback movement. In that sense this movement would "fight racism", while
understanding that fighting racism is more than counter-mobilizations
against the Klan or Nazis, because white supremacy is more than a fascist
vanguard. All the institutions of capitalism are racist, and white
supremacy is an intrinsic part of the ideological and socio-economic
foundations of this system. So we have to fight to destroy the system
itself in order to truly destroy racism. White people must help fight for
the rights of people of color--on the job, on the campuses, and in the
community, and not passively allow the "white power" state to destroy them
with government "anti-crime" programs, "weed and seed", "commmunity
policing" and other repressive initiatives. The state has always depended
on the white population to be accomplices to its criminal activities, AANCO
says NO!
The Poor People's Survival Movement would be a program started by AANCO,
(which is primarily a group of Anarchists and anti-racist activists), and
supported by the Federation of Black Community Partisans, Roots of
Resistance, and a number of local groups in the communities, on college
campuses, in prisons, in workplaces and other institutions all over N.
America. PPSM is a direct action movement of the poor, which will take over
abandoned housing for homeless persons, engage in mass urban squatting,
sit-ins at welfare offices and government buildings, and other acts of
civil disobedience. However, although all of these examples are
non-violent, this is not a pacifist organization; we expect to see food
riots, street fighting, general strikes and ultimately social revolution
break out. We support all of this as leading to our freedom.
The most important objective of our work now is designed to build
revolutionary dual power institutions in the community to counter
capitalist state power and begin to constitute an infrastructure for
Anarchism and freedom. Whether we call it a "workers council", "peoples'
assembly", "community-economic workshop or other neighborhood
self-governing structure, these local institutions could unite into
national and international federations to destroy capitalism and the
institution of the nation-state. The local groups would be autonomous, but
united in free association on a larger scale. This idea of the self
sufficient "eco-city" and the bioregional federation is no pipe dream of
mine; many are starting to realize that it can be built under today's
conditions. In fact, I believe that we must start building a commune now
which exists in the belly of the living capitalist beast, that covers the
U.S., Northern and Latin America, and stretches to fit the rest of the
world. This intercommunalism is the way forward.
So, where do we start? I think we should begin now in a realistic way in
our own communities to break out of the Anarchist ghetto, and establish a
social revolutionary movement which cannot be ignored and cannot be
resisted. A movement which can become a real force in people's lives. Let
us make it happen. Please join the Anti-Authoritarian Network of Community
Organizers, and help us build the Poor Peoples' Survival Network. If you or
your organization would be interested in working with us, please send $10
for an individual membership or $20 for an organization to the address
listed below.
I think it is important that I maintain as high a profile as possible in
order to push the more militant politics, and to serve as a pole of
attraction for those who want to engage in a more serious effort than the
Anarchist youth counter-cultural "Punk" scene. So I also intend to continue
my speaking tour in 1994-95, in order to make new contacts with those
Anarchists/anti-authoritarians that I have not met and also to spread the
ideas of a federation of community organizers. I will be conducting a
number of workshops on anti-racist politics and community organizing, for
booking information please call the voice mail # below.
In solidarity,
Lorenzo Komboa Ervin
AANCO
145 Park Drive
Decatur, GA 30030
(404) 717-4074 (voice mail)