Some Roveretan anarchists

The Illusion of a Center

Capitalism is a social relationship and not a citadel for the powerful. It is starting from thins banality that one can confront the question of summits and counter-summits. Representing capitalist and state domination as a kind of general headquarters (it’s a question of the G8, the WTO or some other such organization) is useful to those who would like to oppose that managing center with another center: the political structures of the so-called movement, or better, their spokespeople. In short, it is useful to who propose merely a change in management personnel. Besides being reformist in essence and purpose, this logic becomes collaborationist and authoritarian in method, as it leads to centralization of the opposition. This is where the concern of these leftist adversaries, so anxious to make themselves heard by the “masters of the world”, in investing money and political hype on the summits in which those in power more and more frequently set the dates with them comes from. In the course of these summits decisions that were made elsewhere are merely formalized, but this certainly does not disturb the various representatives of the social forums; after all, their opposition is also completely formal, consisting mainly of paid seminars in which it is shown that neoliberalism is wrong and humanity is right, or, for the more lively, in some combative performance opportunely agreed upon with the police. Besides, how could an opposition subsidized by institutions, represented by municipal and parliamentary councilors and protected by the grave-diggers of the workers’ movement (we’re referring to the monitoring patrols entrusted to the CGIL in collaboration with the cops) be real? The paradox is that people are called into the streets in the name of another possible world, but with the intention that… absolutely nothing happens.
Continue reading Notes on Summits and Counter-Summits – 2009 →