MIM(Prisons) is a cell of revolutionaries serving the oppressed masses inside U.$. prisons, guided by the communist ideology of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism.
Under Lock & Key is a news service written by and for prisoners with a focus on what is going on behind bars throughout the United States. Under Lock & Key is available to U.S. prisoners for free through MIM(Prisons)'s Free Political Literature to Prisoners Program, by writing:
MIM(Prisons) PO Box 40799 San Francisco, CA 94140.
I was recently convicted of a major category offense:
participating/encouraging others in a work stoppage/group demonstration.
My confinement in segregation for 30 days and a loss of 30 days good
time was based on a finding that I encouraged a “stoppage of buying
commissary.”
It is not against the rules to refuse to buy commissary, but I was
convicted of encouraging people to not buy commissary. In other words I
was convicted of encouraging prisoners to do something that is permitted
by the rules.
In the past three years I’ve been convicted of only one other charge,
also a major category offense. I was convicted for refusing to pay
$21.50 to obtain a copy of my birth certificate.
The pigs wanted a copy of my birth certificate to put in a file. I was
told I could neither see the birth certificate nor have a copy of it. I
told the pigs I would give them permission to get a copy at their
expense since it was for their files. The pigs refused and demanded I
sign a paper granting them permission to take $21.50 from my account. I
refused and I was convicted of refusing to comply with programming.
The connection to these two offenses and convictions is the only subject
dear to the soul of a kkkapitalist: profit. $21.50 for a photocopy of a
sheet of paper is a hefty profit when multiplied by 30,000 prisoners.
And multi-million-dollar commissary sales at hugely inflated prices are
orgasmic to these pigs. Destroying the swine is the only option.
Soldiers, the only course is to replace the thug and the U.$.
go-vermin-ent with an authentic proletarian state. The united snakes
kongress and injustice system is kkkorrupted beyond salvation because of
imperialist ideals. Like cancer, imperialism has caused every limb and
fiber to rot. The truth of kkkapitalist greed is found even in the tiny
crevices.
MIM(Prisons) adds: We are seeing
growing
activism in Virginia prisons this year, which is no doubt leading
them to invent these new “offenses” and charge perceived leaders with
them. While we agree with this comrade that the prisons are eager to
extort money from prisoners whenever possible, there isn’t any profit
coming directly from prisons themselves. The
U.$.
prison economy is a money-losing operation, subsidized by profits
exploited from the international proletariat. Any money taken from
prisoners just helps to offset this loss. This point is important
because it underscores the true purpose of the Amerikan prison system:
social control.
In the richest country in the world, access to wealth and material goods
can be a relative strength we have compared to most of the rest of the
world, namely the global proletariat we aim to represent. We must
consider what the best tactics are to leverage wealth to support our
goals. Yet, we must not fetishize money or technology as panaceas to all
our problems. We know people are decisive in social change. How we get
money is mostly a tactical question. How we use it or campaign around
financial issues is generally a strategic one.
We have at least one USW comrade in California who has been pushing the
prison movement in that state to take up a boycott tactic to push the
demands to end torture and group punishment. Prisoners in Virginia
report of money taken from their accounts, decreased wages and have
launched a fast to
protest
the extortion of Keefe Commissary. Also in this issue, Loco1 offers
an alternative tactic on how to relate to commissary. And one comrade in
Texas offers up a different sort of
[url=https://www.prisoncensorship.info/article/fighting-the-system-appealing-the-100-medical-co-pay-in-texa/boycott
tactic around medical co-pays that could help focus our resources.(see
p.X)
We say these questions are tactical, meaning they will vary from time to
time or place to place. One tactic may work well in one prison, or under
certain conditions, which won’t work well in another circumstance. There
are strategic considerations which serve as general guidelines for all
of us and can help us make our tactical decisions. One stratetic
orientation we hold is to not fetishize money, and remember that the
people must change the system. An example of how this strategic
orientation helps us choose tactics is in deciding whether we should
spend more time and energy raising money, or writing letters to
prisoners and developing study groups. If we believed money were
decisive, we would spend more time fundraising or working at bourgeois
jobs to pad our “revolutionary” bank account.
The concept of the “almighty dollar” leads the consumer class that
dominates this country to see consuming as their means of expressing
their political beliefs, and their main tool for promoting the world
they want to see. Consumer politics are very popular in our bourgeois
society, and these boil down to individual/lifestyle politics. Vegans
may feel better about themselves because they know their nutritional
sustenance doesn’t rely on the abuse and murder of any non-humyn animal.
But veganism itself doesn’t challenge the capitalist system that makes
factory farming profitable in the first place. Capitalists don’t care
what industry their money is in so long as they are drawing a profit.
And no matter how many “fair trade”, “local” or “ethical” products one
purchases, capitalism relies on humyn exploitation to function. We can’t
buy our way out of imperialism itself.
Boycotts can easily fall into the realm of individual/lifestyle
politics. Without a strong political movement with clear demands at the
head of a boycott (i.e. the campaign to divest from Israel), our
consumption habits will do nothing to change the structural problems of
imperialism. Boycotting the commissary as an individual is just like
choosing veganism. It may make you feel better about the role you are
directly playing, but it doesn’t actually have an impact on the prison
system. This is partially because your individual $40 per month is a
drop in the bucket of the prison budget, and also because, like the
capitalists, it’s only a matter of policy change to ensure prisons are
extorting the balance they desire from prisoners. If they can’t get it
from you via commissary, then they’ll instill an exorbitant medical
co-pay, or financial penalties for disciplinary infractions. If you keep
your bank account empty to avoid these fees, they limit indigent
envelopes and postage to limit your contact to the outside world.
That doesn’t mean you should pour your money down the drain or that
there is no use for money in our revolutionary movement. But we have to
be realistic about the impact our money is making. Spending $40 on
mail-order fiction books rather than at commissary has no real political
impact. But sending $40 to MIM(Prisons) allows us to send ULK
to forty subscribers. This money allows us to send study group
mail to eighty participants! That’s enough to cover an entire
level 1 study group! Send us $40 twice and you can cover the printing
and postage of a whole introductory study group, both levels. This is a
good demonstration of the political impact money can have on our ability
to build up people’s political understanding, without worshiping money
as the be all and end all of our political work.
Any reader of ULK should be familiar with our line on the
inflated
minimum wage in imperialist countries. In line with our criticism of
lifestyle politics above, we don’t say Amerikans should refuse to be
paid more than $2.50 per hour as an act of solidarity with Third World
workers. Instead we say revolutionary comrades should funnel as much
money as they can into the anti-imperialist movement. Get raises and
make bigger donations, but don’t waste all your time in your bourgeois
job!
Prisoners and migrant workers differ from the rest of this country in
that there is a progressive aspect to their struggles for higher wages.
The proletarians currently on hunger strike in an ICE detention center
in Washington have pushed internationalist demands to the front of their
struggle. While they ask for higher wages and better conditions in the
private prison they are being held, their primary demand is an end to
deportations from the United $tates. Facing deportation themselves,
these prisoners have a different class perspective than the vast
majority in this country.
In an article titled
“Sending
a Donation is Contraband” from
ULK 25, a comrade
relates being prevented from sending MIM(Prisons) a donation to the
overall political repression and censorship by the prisoncrats. In a
bizarre interpretation of California’s mail policies, CDCR effectively
and illegally prevented this subscriber from exercising their First
Amendment right to free speech. Similarly, in the
last issue of
ULK, another comrade in California
explains
the direct connection between a stamp drive for the SF BayView,
a New Afrikan nationalist newspaper, and the pigs’ mass disallowing of
stamps and increased terrorist activities in San Quentin State Prison.
The state has an interest in preventing any growth of the
anti-imperialist movement, no matter how small.
Naturally it is among the most oppressed that we find the greatest
support for anti-imperialism. Thus, campaigns for a few more $0.49
stamps for indigent prisoners in Texas are of vital importance. Such a
concern is unfathomable to the vast majority in the imperialist
countries.
Cutting
postage stamps and radio service are not only tactics to further
deteriorate the mental health of prisoners, but are also attempts at
political repression under the thinly veiled guise of budget cuts. Here
we see the oppressor using economic tactics to reach their political
goals. While the material basis of what we’re fighting for is in the
people, we must be smart about finance and other material resources to
end hunger, war and oppression as soon as possible.
In addition to minimum wage studies, what about maximum wages? I think
when we raise the minimum wage in the U.S., we are really just
inflating. Unless we cap each and every person in the top six-digit-plus
earning categories, there will be no end to the misery. I won’t go so
far to say we cap every salary at $25,000, but I would cap at $98,000.
And maybe put a Texas prison in Cambodia and Bangladesh, and send
prisoners there who are caught saying “I’m bored” more than twice. “Sure
you are!”
MIM(Prisons) responds: This writer is responding to the article
in Under Lock & Key 36“Raise
the Minimum Wage to $2.50”. In that article we point out that “The
proposed minimum wage of $10 per hour would … put the lowest paid
Amerikans at 50 times the pay of the lowest paid Bangladeshi if we
account for cost of living.” And so our call for a global minimum wage
is not in the material interests of the vast majority of people in First
World countries. But it is strongly in the interests of the majority in
the Third World.
A maximum wage is an important component to implementing a global
minimum wage. We are fighting to close the dramatic difference in wealth
between exploiters and exploited. Starting with a cap of $98,000 per
person per year is quite generous to the exploiters. As we have
explained previously,
Amerikans
are already in the richest 13% of the world. So if we re-distribute
the wealth equally to all people of the world, we won’t see anyone left
with salaries of $98,000. But it’s certainly a start to place any cap on
maximum wages.
As for putting prisoners of the United $tates into Third World prisons,
we strive to draw connections between U.$. prisoners and the Third World
masses because of the extreme oppression they face. We do not wish to
worsen those conditions. And while many come into prison with spoiled
Amerikan perspectives, prisoners in the United $tates have legitimate
complaints that must be prioritized strategically. It is critical that
we keep an internationalist perspective in all of our work. When we
fight to improve conditions for individuals in prison, we need to keep
the privileged status of Amerikans in mind and always ask ourselves if
the reforms we demand will harm others in order to benefit ourselves.
Getting video games for prisoners, which are made from materials mined
by brutalized proletarians in the Congo would be an obvious example.
Internationalism is fundamental to everything we do, and the economics
of global imperialism is just one aspect of the global inequality of
imperialism.
Aun usando el PPP para ajustar salarios mínimos, todos los países en
esta gráfica excepto México tienen salarios mínimos que están por lo
menos un orden de magnitud más alto que esos en los países más pobres.
Recientemente la pequeña ciudad de SeaTac, Washington, pasó un voto de
medida para aumentar el salario mínimo a $15 por hora. A lo ancho de
Estados Unidos la Union de Trabajadores SEIU ha encabezado un esfuerzo
para exigir $15 por hora para todos los trabajadores en restaurantes de
comida rápida. En la huelga del 28 de Noviembre, 2013, organizadores
dijeron que hubo demostraciones en más de 100 ciudades.(1)
En 2014 el salario mínimo aumentará en muchos estados. El liderato en el
camino lo lleva Washington ($9.32) y Oregon ($9.10), con Nueva York
dando el brinco más alto a $8.00 por hora. La ciudad de Nueva York fue
el centro de los recientes protestantes que trabajan en comida rápida.
Mientras tanto, los Demócratas en el Congreso tienen planes para un
proyecto de ley este año que aumentará el salario mínimo federal de
$7.25 a $10.10 por hora.(2)
Otro lugar donde luchas por un salario mínimo hicieron mucho ruido en
2013 fue la industria de prendas en Bangladesh. Como lo mencionamos en
el último numero de Under Lock & Key, esos trabajadores
tenían una victoria reciente en el salario mínimo que elevado de $38 a
$68 por mes. En Camboya (Cambodia) a trabajadores de prendas se les ha
prometido un aumento en el salario mínimo de $80 a $95 por mes.
Insatisfechos, los trabajadores se han unido a recientes protestas en
contra del régimen actual para exigir $160 por mes.(3)
Con semanas de 48 horas de trabajo, los trabajadores de prendas están
ganando alrededor de $0.35 por hora en Bangladesh, y $0.42 en Camboya.
Aun que no lo crea, estos son los trabajadores privilegiados quienes
tienen protecciones especiales por trabajan para industrias exportadoras
importantes. El Bangladesí común tiene un salario mínimo de $19
mensuales, lo cual es menos de 10 centavos por hora.
El propuesto salario mínimo de $10 por hora en Estados Unidos pondría a
los amerikanos de paga mínima CIEN VECES más alto al ingreso de los
trabajadores de paga mínima en Bangladesh. Por esto es que en el día de
Mayo hicimos el llamado al movimiento de trabajadores blancos
chauvinistas por evadir el asunto de un salario mínimo global.
Ahora, el primer chillido de nuestros críticos chauvinistas será “el
costo de vivienda, se les olvido el costo de vivienda.” Nuestra
propuesta para un salario mínimo global altaría este salario a una
canasta de mercadería. Significa que trabajadores en Estados Unidos y
Bangladesh tendrían los recursos para estilos de vida comparables con su
paga. Tal vez el amerikano agarra trigo donde el Bangladesí agarra
arroz, por ejemplo. Pero el amerikano no agarra una SUV con gasolina
ilimitada mientras que el Bangladesí agarra el autobús al y del trabajo.
Para mantener este tipo de desigualdad el Bangladesí estaría subsidiando
un nivel más alto de vida para el amerikano.
Passa que el Banco Mundial se ha llevado una apuñalada a esta
calculación con su Poder de Compra Equivalente. Usando esta calculación,
el salario mínimo en Bangladesh, el cual aparenta ser de $0.09 por hora
es realmente un enorme $0.19 por hora.(4) Así que, debemos disculparnos
con nuestros críticos. El propuesto salario mínimo de $10 por hora solo
pondría al amerikano de paga mínima a 50 veces más que al de paga mínima
en Bangladesh si consideramos el costo de vivienda.
Recientemente el New Afrikan Black Panther Party (prison chapter)
(Partido Nuevo Afrikano Pantera Negra (División de la Prisión)), acusó
nuestro movimiento de descartar la posibilidad de una organización
revolucionaria en los Estados Unidos por que reconocimos los datos de
arriba. Solo porque luchas por salarios más altos, y otras demandas
económicas, son generalmente pro-imperialistas en este país no significa
que no podamos organizarnos aquí. Pero el organizarse revolucionarimente
no debe reunir a la burguesía menor por más dinero a expensas del
proletariado global. Además, aun en los tempranos días del proletariado
Ruso Lenin tuvo críticas de luchas que buscaban salarios más altos.
Mientras que expresamos dudas acerca de la estrategia electoral de
Chokwe Lumumba en Jackson, Mississippi (ve ULK 33 en ingles),
permanecemos optimista acerca del New Afrikan Liberation Movement
(Movimiento de Liberación Nuevo Afrikano) y sus esfuerzos para movilizar
a la multitud allí. El organizarse para economías cooperativas y
auto-suficiencia es un acercamiento más neutral para movilizar los
segmentos bajos de Nueva Afrika que el clamor del SEIU por más salarios
por servicio improductivo de trabajo. Mientras que nuestras
preocupaciones reposaban en sus habilidades para organizarse de una
manera que fuera realmente independiente de los sistemas existentes,
creando un poder doble, el SEIU mendigando por más botines de los
imperialistas ni siquiera ofrece tal posibilidad. Para realmente dirigir
los desigualdades en el mundo entonces, debemos últimamente llegar a
entrar en conflicto con el sistema capitalista que crea y requiere esas
desigualdades.
Un punto agitacional de los protestas de comida rápida ha sido que 52
por-ciento de las familias de los trabajadores de comida rápida de linea
delantera necesitan apoyarse en programas de asistencia publica(1). Una
de las razones de que esto es verdad es que la mayoría de los
trabajadores de comida rápida no llegan a trabajar 48 o aun que sea 40
horas a la semana. Si le ponemos niños y otros dependientes en la mezcla
y tenemos una pequeña, pero significante, clase baja en los Estados
Unidos que lucha con cosas como comida, renta y cuentas de utilidad. La
mayoría son padres solteros, mayormente madres solteras. Viviendas
colectivas y estructuras económicas podrían (y lo hacen) servir a esta
clase y pueden ofrecer un medio de movilización política. Los programas
sirve a la gente y casas negras (viviendas colectivas) de las Panteras
Negras son un modelo para este tipo de organización. Pero programas
patrocinados-por-el-estado y el incremento general en riquezas desde los
1960s hace el distinguir este tipo de trabajo y el de trabajar con el
imperialismo una tarea mas intimidante.
La campaña para un salario mínimo global tiene poca tracción entre los
trabajadores de paga baja en los Estados Unidos, porque ellos no se
benefician de esto. Esta es una campaña que tiene que ser liderado por
el Tercer Mundo y empujada por medio de cuerpos internacionales como la
Organización de Comercio Mundial (World Trade Organization). La apoyamos
por razones agitaciones, pero no esperamos un apoyo masivo en este país.
Nos permite pintar una linea entre esos que son verdaderos
internacionalistas y aquellos que no lo son.(5)
Cualquier campaña que trabaje para los intereses económicos de la gente
en los países imperialistas va a ser problemática porque el mejor trato
económico será el unirse con los imperialistas, por lo menos en el
futuro inmediato.
Even using PPP to adjust minimum wages, all countries in this
graphic except for Mexico have minimum wages that are at least an
order of magnitude higher than those in the poorest countries.
Recently the small town of SeaTac, Washington passed a ballot measure to
raise the minimum wage to $15 per hour. Across the United $tates the
Service Employees International Union (SEIU) labor union has led an
effort to demand $15 per hour for all fast food workers. For a 28
November 2013 strike, organizers said that there were demonstrations in
over 100 cities.(1)
In 2014 the minimum wage will be going up in many states. Leading the
way are Washington($9.32) and Oregon($9.10), with New York making the
biggest jump to $8.00 per hour. New York City was center to the recent
fast food strikes. Meanwhile, Democrats in Congress have plans for a
bill this year that would raise the federal minimum from $7.25 to $10.10
per hour.(2)
Another place that minimum wage struggles made a lot of noise in 2013
was the garment industry in Bangladesh. As we mentioned in the
last issue of
Under Lock & Key, those workers had a recent victory in
the minimum wage being raised from $38 to $68 per month. In Cambodia,
garment workers have been promised a raise in the minimum wage from $80
to $95 per month. Unsatisfied, the workers have joined recent protests
against the current regime to demand $160 per month.(3)
With 48-hour work weeks, garment workers are making around $0.35 per
hour in Bangladesh, and $0.42 in Cambodia. Believe it or not, these are
the privileged workers who have special protections because they are in
important export industries. The common Bangladeshi has a minimum wage
of $19 per month, which is less than 10 cents an hour.
Now, the first cry of our chauvinist critics will be “cost of living,
you forgot about cost of living.” Our proposal for a global minimum wage
would tie this wage to a basket of goods. That means the worker in the
United $tates and the worker in Bangladesh can afford comparable
lifestyles with their pay. Maybe the Amerikan gets wheat where the
Bangladeshi gets rice, for example. But the Amerikan does not get a
persynal SUV with unlimited gasoline, while the Bangladeshi gets bus
fare to and from work. To maintain such inequality the Bangladeshi is
subsidizing a higher standard of living for the Amerikan.
It happens that the World Bank has taken a stab at this calculation with
their Purchasing Power Parity. Using this calculation, the minimum wage
in Bangladesh, which appears to be $0.09 per hour, is really a whopping
$0.19 per hour.(4) So, we must apologize to our critics. The proposed
minimum wage of $10 per hour would only put the lowest paid Amerikans at
50 times the pay of the lowest paid Bangladeshi if we account for cost
of living.
Recently the
New
Afrikan Black Panther Party (Prison Chapter) accused our movement of
dismissing the possibility of revolutionary organzing in the United
$tates because we acknowledge the facts above. Just because struggles
for higher wages, and other economic demands, are generally
pro-imperialist in this country does not mean that we cannot organize
here. But revolutionary organizing must not rally the petty bourgeoisie
for more money at the expense of the global proletariat. Besides, even
in the earliest days of the Russian proletariat Lenin had criticisms of
struggles for higher wages.
While we expressed doubts about
Chokwe
Lumumba’s electoral strategy in Jackson, Mississippi, we remain
optimistic about the New Afrikan Liberation Movement’s efforts to
mobilize the masses there. Organizing for cooperative economics and
self-sufficiency is a more neutral approach to mobilizing the lower
segments of New Afrika than the SEIU clamoring for more wages for
unproductive service work. While our concerns rested in their ability to
organize in a way that was really independent of the existing system,
creating dual power, the SEIU’s begging for more spoils from the
imperialists does not even offer such a possibility. To really address
the inequalities in the world though, we must ultimately come into
conflict with the capitalist system that creates and requires those
inequalities.
One agitational point of the fast food protests has been that 52 percent
of the families of front-line fast food workers need to rely on public
assistance programs.(1) One reason this is true is that most fast food
workers do not get to work 48 or even 40 hours a week. Throw children
and other dependents in the mix and you have a small, but significant,
underclass in the United $tates that struggles with things like food,
rent and utility bills. Most are single parents, mostly single mothers.
Collective living and economic structures could (and do) serve this
class and can offer a means of political mobilization. The Black
Panthers’ Serve the People programs and Black houses (collective living)
are one model for such organizing. But state-sponsored programs and the
general increase in wealth since the 1960s makes distinguishing such
work from working with imperialism a more daunting task.
The campaign for a global minimum wage has little traction among the
lower paid workers in the United $tates, because they do not stand to
benefit from this. This is a campaign to be led by the Third World and
pushed through international bodies such as the World Trade
Organization. We support it for agitational reasons, but don’t expect
mass support in this country. It allows us to draw a line between those
who are true internationalists and those who are not.(5)
Any campaign working for economic interests of people in the imperialist
countries is going to be problematic because the best economic deal for
them will require teaming up with the imperialists, at least for the
forseeable future.
Images of a statue of communist leader V.I. Lenin being torn down in
Kiev have been celebrated in the Western press, as hundreds of thousands
of Ukrainians took to the streets to protest the current regime headed
by president Viktor Yanukovych.
Much of the coverage of the recent protests in Ukraine condemn
government corruption as the common complaint of the protestors, linking
it to Ukraine’s Soviet past. The association is that this is the legacy
of communist rule. In contrast, we would argue that this corruption was
the result of economic Liberalism taking hold in the former Soviet Union
where bourgeois democracy was lacking. Today’s protests are largely
inspired by a desire for bourgeois democracy, and the perceived economic
benefits it would provide over the current rule by a parasitic
bourgeoisie with little interest in the national economy.
The rise of Kruschev to lead the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics
(USSR) after Stalin’s death marked the victory of the capitalist roaders
within the Communist Party, and the beginning of the era of
social-imperialism for the Soviet Union. This lasted from 1956 until the
dissolution of the Union in 1991, when Ukraine became an independent
republic. The period was marked by moving away from a socialist economy
structured around humyn need and towards a market economy guided by
profit. This transformation was reflected in the ideology of the people
who more and more looked towards the imperialist countries and their
crass consumerism as something to aspire to. It also led those in power
to have more interest in their local regions than in the prosperity of
the Union as a whole.
Even under capitalism, the Soviet Union was more prosperous and more
stable than after its dissolution. In 1991, an estimated three quarters
of the Soviet people supported maintaining the Union, but the leadership
had no motivation to do so.(1) A move towards strengthening the Union
would awaken the proletarian interests, which were opposed to the
interests of the leadership that was now a new bourgeoisie. Ukraine
played a key role in initiating the dissolution of the USSR. And it was
no coincidence that in Ukraine, in particular, the dissolution was an
economic disaster as the former Soviet nations were tossed to the wolves
of economic Liberalism. A small emerging capitalist class took advantage
of fixed prices that were a legacy of the Soviet economy and sold
cheaply obtained raw materials at market rates to other countries. They
turned around and invested that capital outside in international markets
while tightening monopolies on trade at home. This was one of the most
drastic transfers of wealth from the hands of the producers to the hands
of capitalists in recent decades.(2)
Ten years after the October Revolution of 1917, Stalin wrote, “the
resultant dropping out of a vast country from the world system of
capitalism could not but accelerate [the process of the decay and the
dying of capitalism]”.(3) The inverse of this is also true, to a degree:
the reentry of many countries into the world system breathed life back
into it. While this brought great change at the hands of the newly
empowered national bourgeoisie in those countries, it did not change the
fact that imperialism had already made capitalism an economically
regressive system. Hence they did not develop the wealth of their
nations as the rising bourgeoisie of centuries past had done by
improving production and developing trade. Today’s rising bourgeoisie
restricts markets via monopolies, and heads straight for high-margin
business like drugs, weapons and financial markets. What happened in the
ex-Soviet countries is a good demonstration of why Libertarian ideals
are not relevant in today’s economy.
The underground economy had been growing for decades before 1991, and
this new freedom to compete was a boon to the criminal organizations
that existed. These mafias were on the ground with direct access to the
resources of the people before the imperialists had time to fight over
these newly opened economies. With rising nationalism in the republics,
Russian imperialism had to keep its distance, while other imperialist
countries had no base in the region to get established. The
inter-imperialist rivalry over the region is playing out today.
In the early years of independence, the Ukrainian state merged with that
criminal class that was taking advantage of the political and economic
turmoil in the country.(4) As a result the GDP dropped to a mere third
of what it was just before the Union dissolved.(5) This came after
decades of declining economic growth after the initial shift away from
socialist economics. The mafias in the former Soviet countries saw an
opportunity to seize local power and wealth in their respective
republics as the super power crumbled. Some were further enticed by
Amerikan bribes, such as Russian President Boris Yeltsin’s family who
received billions of dollars.(6) For a time there was hope that these
changes would improve economic conditions as the bourgeois Liberal
mythology led the former Soviet peoples to believe that they could
follow the advice (and political donations) of the United $tates.
This mess, which the region is still struggling with, was the ultimate
result of what Mao Zedong said about the rise of a new bourgeoisie
within the communist party after the seizure of state power due to their
inherent privilege as directors of the state. A successful socialist
project must combat these bourgeois tendencies at every turn in order to
prevent the proletariat from suffering at the hands of a new bourgeois
exploiting class. At the core of the Cultural Revolution was combating
the theory of productive forces, which Mao had previously criticized the
Soviet Union for implementing. The turn to the western imperialist
countries as economic models was the logical conclusion of the theory of
productive forces in the Soviet Union.
One of the messages underpinning today’s protests in Ukraine is the
desire to move closer to the European Union (EU), as opposed to the
Russian sphere of influence. It seems that looking to the west for hope
has only increased in Ukraine over the last couple decades. But there is
no obvious advantage to becoming a client of imperialist Western Europe
over imperialist Russia except for the higher concentration of
super-profits in the EU. And as other newcomers to the EU can attest,
the imperialist nations in Europe will oppose any perceived distribution
of their super-profits to the east. Similar nationalism is fueling the
Ukrainian protestors who oppose the perceived transfer of wealth from
their country to Russia. In general, increased trade will help a country
economically. But in this battle Russia and the EU are fighting to cut
each other off from trading with Ukraine. As always, capitalism tends
towards monopolies and imperialism depends on monopsonies.
It is little wonder that the masses would be unsatisfied living under
the rule of corrupt autocrats. Yet, it was just 2004 when the
U.$.-funded so-called “Orange Revolution” threw out a previous mafia
boss named Leonid Kuchma.(7) This regime change gained support from
those making similar demands to today’s protestors, but it did not
change the nature of the system as these protests demonstrate. And that
orchestrated movement was no revolution. It was a mass protest, followed
by a coup d’etat; something that the imperialists have been
funding quite regularly in central Eurasia these days. A revolution
involves the overthrow of a system and transformation to a new system,
specifically a change in the economic system or what Marxists call the
mode of production. We don’t see any movement in this direction in
Ukraine from where we are, as nationalism is being used as a carrier for
bourgeois ideologies among the exploited people of Ukraine, just as
Stalin warned against.
Rather than a revolutionary anti-capitalist/anti-imperialist movement,
the criminal corruption in Ukraine has led to right-wing populism in
recent years. This was marked by the surge of the Svoboda party into the
parliament. The men who toppled the statue of Lenin and smashed it with
sledge hammers waved Svodoba flags as they did so, indicating that they
represented not just a vague anti-Russia sentiment, but a clear
anti-socialist one.
Svodoba’s populism challenges the current ruling bourgeois mafia, while
their nationalism serves to divide the proletariat by inflaming various
grudges in the region. This is in strong contrast to the revolutionary
nationalism supported by Lenin and Stalin and by Maoists today. In a
criticism of the provisional government prior to the October Revolution
in 1917, Lenin wrote on Ukraine:
“We do not favour the existence of small states. We stand for the
closest union of the workers of the world against ‘their own’
capitalists and those of all other countries. But for this union to be
voluntary, the Russian worker, who does not for a moment trust the
Russian or the Ukrainian bourgeoisie in anything, now stands for the
right of the Ukrainians to secede, without imposing his friendship upon
them, but striving to win their friendship by treating them as an equal,
as an ally and brother in the struggle for socialism.”(8)
This is a concise summary of the Bolshevik line on nationalism.
A Note on Class and Criminality
Without doing an in-depth class analysis of Ukraine, we can still
generalize that it is a proletarian nation. Only 5.1% of households had
incomes of more than US$15,000 in the year 2011.(9) That mark is close
to the dividing line we’d use for exploiters vs. exploited
internationally. Therefore we’d say that 95% of people in Ukraine have
objective interests in ending imperialism. This serves as a reminder to
our readers that we say the white nation in North Amerika is an
oppressor nation, not the white race, which does not exist.
While official unemployment rates in Ukraine have been a modest 7 to 8%
in recent years, the CIA Factbook reports that there are a large number
of unregistered and underemployed workers not included in that
calculation. That unquantified group is likely some combination of
underground economy workers and lumpen proletariat. In 2011, the
Ukrainian Prime Minister said that 40% of the domestic market was
illegal,(10) that’s about double the rate for the world overall.(11) On
top of that, another 31% of the Ukrainian market was operating under
limited taxes and regulations implemented in March 2005, which were put
in place to reduce the massive black market. In other words, the
underground economy was probably much bigger than 40% before these tax
exemptions were put in place.
One way we have distinguished the lumpen is as a class that would
benefit, whether they think so or not, from regular employment. This is
true both for the lumpen-proletariat typical of today’s Third World
mega-slums, and the First World lumpen, even though “regular employment”
means very different things in different countries. While there is a
portion of the lumpen that could accurately be called the “criminal”
lumpen because they make their living taking from others, we do not
define the lumpen as those who engage in crime. Of course not, as the
biggest criminals in the world are the imperialists, robbing and
murdering millions globally.
For the lumpen, the path of crime is only one option; for the
imperialists it defines their relationship to the rest of humynity.
Crime happens to be the option most promoted for the lumpen by the
corporate culture in the United $tates through music and television. And
in chaotic situations like the former Soviet republics faced it may be
the most immediately appealing option for many. But it is not the option
that solves the problems faced by the lumpen as a class. Ukraine is a
stark example of where that model might take us. As the lumpen
proletariat grows in the Third World, and the First World lumpen
threatens to follow suit in conditions of imperialist crisis, we push to
unite the interests of those classes with the national liberation
struggles of the oppressed nations that they come from. Only by
liberating themselves from imperialism can those nations build economies
that do not exclude people.
Among the bourgeoisie, there are few who are innocent of breaking the
laws of their own class. But there are those who operate legitimate
businesses and there are those who operate in the underground market.
This legality has little bearing on their class interests. All national
bourgeoisies support the capitalist system that they benefit from,
though they will fight against the imperialist if their interests
collide.
So there is no such thing as “the criminal class” because we define
class by the group’s relationship to production and distribution, and
not to the legality of their livelihoods. And we should combat the
influence of the bourgeois criminals on the lumpen who, on the whole,
would be better served by an end to imperialism than by trying to follow
in their footsteps.
While the Ukrainian people push for something more stable and beneficial
to them, the Russian imperialists face off with the EU. The EU is backed
by the United $tates who has publicly discussed sanctions against
Ukraine justified by hypocritical condemnation of the Ukrainian
government using police to attack peaceful protests. Hey John Kerry, the
world still remembers the images of police brutality on Occupy Wall
Street encampments.
The real story here may be in the inter-imperialist rivalry being fought
out in the Ukrainian streets and parliament. While the Ukraine nation
has an interest in ending imperialism, the dominant politics in that
country do not reflect that interest. And one reason for that is the
lasting effects of mistakes from the past, which still lead to
subjective rejection of communism for many Ukrainians in the 21st
century. This only further reiterates the importance of the Great
Proletarian Cultural Revolution and the need to always put politics in
command in building a socialist economy to prevent the future
exploitation and suffering of the peoples of the world. This is likely a
precursor to much more violent conflict over the rights to markets in
the former Soviet republics. Violence can be prevented in the future by
keeping the exploited masses organized on the road to socialism.
The Minister of Defense of the
New Afrikan Black
Panther Party (Prison Chapter) recently
stepped in(1) to defend
Turning
the Tide against our USW comrade’s critiques.(2) We can appreciate
the greater clarity and honesty in Rashid’s piece compared to
Michael
Novick’s, but still cannot forgive him for getting the first
question of importance to communists wrong: who are our friends and who
are our enemies? Like
Jose
Maria Sison and
Bob
Avakian, Rashid has long been exposed to MIM line and writing, and
many attempts to struggle with him have been made. It does great damage
to the International Communist Movement when these people become icons
of “Maoism” in many peoples’ eyes, while promoting chauvinistic lines on
the role of the oppressor nations under imperialism.
Rashid opens his piece with the most common strawpersyn argument of the
revisionists, that the MIM line is wrong because Marx and Lenin never
abandoned organizing among Europeans and Amerikans. Rashid needs to be
more specific if he’s claiming there are groups that are refusing to
work with white people or moving to the Third World to organize. While
our work mostly targets prisoners, we target prisoners of all
nationalities, and similarly our street work is not very
nation-specific. The question we would ask instead of “should we
organize Amerikans?”, is, “what is going to achieve communism faster,
organizing rich people around demands for more money, or organizing them
around ideas of collective responsibility for equal distribution of
humyn needs and ecological sustainability?”
Rashid’s third paragraph includes some numbers and math and at first
glance i thought it might have some concrete analysis. But alas, the
numbers appear just for show as they are a) made up numbers, and b)
reflecting the most simple calculation that Marx teaches us to define
surplus value. To counter Rashid’s empty numbers, let us repeat our most
basic math example here. If Amerikans are exploited, then to end
exploitation would mean they need to get paid more money. Dividing the
global GDP by the number of full-time laborers gives an
equitable
distribution of income of around $10,000 per persyn per year.(3) To
be fair, in Rashid’s article he addresses this and quotes Marx to say
that we cannot have an equitable distribution of income. In that quote
from Wages, Price and Profit Marx was writing about capitalism,
which is inherently exploitative. Our goal is communism, or “from each
according to her ability, to each according to her need.” But we’re not
there yet, Rashid might argue. OK fine, let’s take Rashid’s hypothetical
McDonald’s worker making $58 per 8 hour workday. If we assume 5 days a
week and 50 weeks a year we get $14,500 per year. According to the World
Bank, half of the world’s people make less than $1,225 per year.(4) That
report also showed that about 10% of Amerikans are in the world’s
richest 1% and that almost half of the richest 1% are Amerikans. So
Rashid wants to argue that under capitalism it is just that the lowest
paid Amerikans earn over 10 times more than half of the world’s
population because their labor is worth that much more? How is that?
What Marx was talking about in Wages, Price and Profit was
scientific: a strong persyn might be twice as productive as a weak one,
or a specially trained persyn might add more value than an unskilled
persyn. So Rashid wants to use this to justify paying anyone who was
birthed as a U.$. citizen 10 to 25 times, or more, the average global
rate of pay? We have no idea how Rashid justifies this disparity except
through crass Amerikan chauvinism.
This empty rhetoric is not Marxism. It is ironic how today people will
use this basic formulation for surplus value from Marx to claim people
of such vastly different living conditions are in the same class. No one
else in the world looks at the conditions in the United $tates and Haiti
and thinks, “these countries should really unite to address their common
plight.” It is only pseudo-Marxists and anarchists who read a little
Marx who can come up with such crap.
Rashid later establishes commonality across nations with the definition,
“The proletariat simply is one who must sell her labor power to survive,
which is as true for the Amerikan worker as it is for one in Haiti.” We
prefer Marx’s definition that the proletariat are those who have nothing
to lose but their chains. According to Rashid, we should determine
whether someone is exploited based on different measuring sticks
depending on what country they live in. Apparently, in the United $tates
you must have a $20,000 car, a $200,000 home and hand-held computers for
every family member over 5 in order “to survive.” Whereas in other
countries electricity and clean water are optional. More chauvinism.
Rashid continues discussing class definitions,
“For instance, if there’s no [Euro-Amerikan] (‘white’) proletariat in
the US, then there’s also no New Afrikan/Black one. If a EA working in
McDonalds isn’t a proletarian, then neither is one of color. If there’s
no New Afrikan proletariat, then there’s no New Afrikan lumpen
proletariat either (”lumpen” literally means “broken”–if they were never
of the proletariat, they could not become a ‘broken’ proletariat).”
Lumpen is usually translated as “rag.” Even in the United
$tates we have a population of people who live in rags, who have very
little to lose. However, we completely agree with Rashid’s logic here.
And that is why MIM(Prisons) started using the term “First World lumpen”
to distinguish from “lumpenproletariat.” There is little connection
between the lumpen in this country and a real proletariat, with the
exceptions being within migrant populations and some second generation
youth who form a bridge between Third World proletariat, First World
semi-proletariat and First World lumpen classes. Rashid continues,
“Yet the VLA [vulgar labor aristocracy] proponents recognize New Afrikan
prisoners as ‘lumpen’ who are potentially revolutionary. Which begs the
question, why aren’t they doing work within the oppressed New Afrikan
communities where they’re less apt to be censored, if indeed they
compose a lumpen sector?”
This is directed at us, so we will answer: historical experience and
limited resources. As our readers should know, we struggle to do the
things we do to support prisoner education programs and organizing work.
We do not have the resources right now to do any serious organizing
outside of prisons. And we made the conscious decision of how we can
best use our resources in no small part due to historical experience of
our movement. In other words we go where there is interest in
revolutionary politics. The margins, the weakest links in the system,
that is where you focus your energy. Within the lumpen class, the
imprisoned lumpen have a unique relationship to the system that results
in a strong contradiction with that system. The imprisoned population
could also be considered 100% lumpen, whereas less than 20% of the New
Afrikan nation is lumpen, the rest being among various bourgeois
classes, including the labor aristocracy.
“And if the lumpen can be redeemed, why not EA [Euro-Amerikan] workers?”
Again, look at history. Read
J.
Sakai’s Settlers and read about the
Black
Panther Party. Today, look at the growing prison system and the
regular murder of New Afrikan and other oppressed nation youth by the
pigs. Look at where the contradictions and oppression are.
The only really interesting thing about this piece is that Rashid has
further drawn a line between the MIM camp and the slew of anarchist and
crypto-Trotskyist organizations who are still confused about where
wealth comes from. They think people sitting at computers typing keys
are exploited, and Rashid accuses our line of requiring “surplus value
falling from the sky!” We already told you where the high wages in the
imperialist countries came from, Rashid, the Third World proletariat!
That is why the average Amerikan makes 25 times the average humyn, and
why all Amerikans are in the top 13% in income globally. As the
revisionists like to remind us, wealth disparity just keeps getting
greater and greater under capitalism. The labor aristocracy today is
like nothing that V.I. Lenin ever could have witnessed. We must learn
from the methods of Marx and Lenin, not dogmatically repeat their
analysis from previous eras to appease Amerikans.
1 de Mayo, 2013 – El llamado movimiento obrero en los países
imperialistas ha tenido un respaldo social e influencia muy limitados
desde hace mucho tiempo debido a las condiciones increíblemente
privilegiadas en las que la mayoría de los primermundistas viven. Así,
en un intento de parecer relevantes, y tal vez para ocultar su
nacionalismo blanco, éstos proclaman su “solidaridad” con las luchas de
los trabajadores alrededor del mundo. En el peor de los casos, esta
“solidaridad” se utiliza de forma activa para dirigir erróneamente la
lucha del proletariado hacia el economismo y el seguimiento del modelo
de desarrollo del primer mundo. Pero incluso cuando esa “solidaridad” se
queda en palabras, se utiliza para defender el privilegio de las
poblaciones explotadoras del primer mundo. En este Primero de Mayo, la
entrevista principal del programa Democracy Now! (¡Democracia Ahora!)
resumió esta tendencia.(1)
Charlie Kernaghan del Institute for Global Labour and Human Rights
(Instituto para el Trabajo Global y los Derechos Humanos) fue
entrevistado en un segmento sobre la reciente tragedia en Bangladesh y
la lucha obrera en general. Kernaghan nos informó que 421 personas han
sido confirmadas muertas y otras 1,000 están aún desaparecidas,
queriendo decir que probablemente han muerto bajo los escombras de la
fábrica que se derrumbó. Explicó que los trabajadores no sólo fueron
amenazados con no pagarles el mes, lo que significaría pasar hambre,
sino que también se enfrentaban a la amenaza inmediata de matones con
garrotes. Como nos enseñó la reciente explosión de fertilizantes en
Texas, la búsqueda de los beneficios en el capitalismo pone en riesgo la
vida de todos. Aún así, hoy una diferencia cuantitativa entre ser
forzado a base de golpes a volver a una situación peligrosa, y el no ser
consciente de que esa situación peligrosa existe. El riesgo relativo al
que se enfrentan los trabajadores en el tercer mundo es más alto.
Como MIM y otros han mostrado en numerosas ocasiones, hay una diferencia
cualitativa entre el salario que ganan los primermundistas y los
proletarios explotados; el salario de los primeros está por encima del
valor que generan, lo que los convierte en explotadores de los
segundos(2). La conversación acerca de la tragedia en Bangladesh
degeneró en nacionalismo blanco cuando la entrevistadora Amy Goodman
comenzó a preguntarse sobre lo que deberíamos hacer. Después de defender
la protección de los salarios Amerikanos, el invitado comenzó a pedir
aranceles comerciales para las mercancías provenientes de países como
Bangladesh hasta que puedan cumplir con ciertos estándares laborales
similares a los de los Estados Unidos. Tal oposición al libre comercio
organiza a los explotadores a costa de los explotados.
El tema tabú se hizo más difícil de ignorar cuando el invitado comenzó a
hablar de trabajadores ganando 21 centavos a la vez que hablaba de la
inmiseración de los trabajadores Amerikanos. Cuando Goodman empezó a
danzar alrededor del tema de los salarios el invitado respondió: “Bueno,
como dije con la legislación, no es nuestro trabajo el establecer
salarios alrededor del mundo. Esto depende de los habitantes de cada
país. Lo que si podemos hacer es exigir que si quieres traer productos a
los Estados Unidos, debes dar a los trabajadores que los producen
derechos legales.”
¿Cómo es que podemos obligarles a aplicar leyes sobre trabajo infantil,
pero en lo que se refiere a sus salarios el tercer mundo se las tiene
que arreglar por su cuenta? ¿Cómo puedes hablar de “solidaridad
internacional obrera” sin hablar de un salario mínimo internacional? La
idea es ridícula y la única razón por la que esto sucede es porque los
líderes obreros Amerikanos saben que el salario medio en el mundo está
por debajo de lo que ellos ganan. Quieren seguir ganando más de lo que
les corresponde y al mismo tiempo poner aranceles comerciales a los
productos fabricados con mano de obra explotada.
Suponemos que las personas del Sur de Asia no confundirán a aquellos que
ganan 20,000 dólares al año, o mucho más, como miembros del
proletariado. Pero conforme nos acercamos al corazón del imperio la
perspectiva de clase proletaria distorsiona más y más. No hay mejor
ejemplo de ello hoy en día que el de Aztlán, donde trabajadores
inmigrantes observan la enorme riqueza que les rodea y la posibilidad de
obtener parte de ella. Después de que las naciones oprimidas tomaron el
control del Primero de Mayo en los Estados Unidos hace siete años, el
ala izquierda del nacionalismo blanco trabaja horas extra para infundir
a este nuevo movimiento proletario en el corazón de la bestia con la
linea política de la aristocracia obrera.
Hoy, conforme el gobierno federal declara estar cerca de promulgar una
“reforma de inmigración” que equivaldrá a más excepcionalismo y
favoritismo Amerikano, nosotros preferimos un enfoque basado en la
reunificación de las familias que algunos ya defendieron en este Primero
de Mayo en Los Ángeles. Este es un asunto que enlaza perfectamente con
la cuestión nacional y no con las peticiones economicistas para un mayor
acceso a salarios propios de los explotadores. La reunificación desafía
la frontera represiva que mantiene a familias separadas, y mantiene a
naciones completas alienadas de las riquezas que producen. Al igual que
la integración dentro de los Estados Unidos ha avanzado, el desafio a la
frontera y la lucha contra el nacionalismo blanco, o mejor dicho contra
el primermundismo, necesita estar en el centro de un movimiento
proletario progresivo en Aztlán. Estos son los problemas que realmente
movilizaron a las masas en las manifestaciones del Primero de Mayo en
2006 en respuesta a la Amerika pro-Minutemen(3). Este es el espíritu con
el que celebramos este Primero de Mayo.
The petit-bourgeoisie is not only the white nation people. Anyone who
posses the ideological and social behaviors or the political views that
are influenced by private property interests are in fact part of the
petit-bourgeoisie. In Amerikkka those whose ideological principles are
on this level are part of the oppressor nation. Many TTT constituents
fail under these principles.
And as for the individual claiming to have been dropped by MIM(Prisons),
it sounds like that person never was attempting to build. For those who
want to attack an organization that has been staunch in true struggle
and who’s line is correct in many ways, needs to, as the komrade who
address this issue said, investigate before hs/she has the right to
speak. Komrade Soso did well in the response and TTT should engage in
“righteous” criticism not some back door attack on MIM(Prisons).
MIM(Prisons) must keep their energy on educating those who want to
learn. Let’s not waste energy on fictitious attacks. MIM(Prisons) has
been doing revolutionary work for many many years and has proven
results. As said, history will tell.
MIM(Prisons) responds: We agree with this comrade that TTT
demonstrates a petit-bourgeois political line, though we must be careful
with our definitions of this term. We define the petit-bourgeoisie by
their relations to the means of production, as an economic status, not
just ideological principles. The fundamental point of debate with TTT is
around the MIM(Prisons) scientific analysis of classes in imperialist
countries, concluding that the vast majority of people in these
countries are part of the petit-bourgeoisie. This is not because they
have political views aligning with private property interests, but
rather these views stem from their economic interests.
I want to comment on your article
“Soulja
Boy Dissed by Amerikan Rappers,” featured in ULK22. Personally it is
a grave disappointment to witness what hip hop has morphed into. We went
from “Fuck da Police” and “Don’t Believe da Hype” to “A Milli” and “Arab
Money.” Ironically the vast majority of the people that these modern day
braggarts grew up around don’t even have U.S. middle-class money, let
alone “Arab Money.”
Modern day hip hop artists seem unable and/or unwilling to move beyond
this brag-about-my-wealth style of rap. Of course there’s exceptions to
this but in general there’s no longer any social consciousness or depth
to the lyrics of these mainstream hip hop artists. I’m no hater and I
love to see people prosper and enjoy life but an album has to go beyond
an artist detailing his or her good fortunes, to really have merit.
But pertaining specifically to the article, is it any real surprise that
these artists ostracize an associate for something as simple as speaking
his mind? The one main thing that the Black nation has been consistently
good at throughout the years is attacking one another and embracing
division, internal division.
Additionally all, or most of, the major hip hop artists are personally
benefiting from the current system and establishment so naturally they
stay in tune with it. They don’t care that the overwhelming majority of
people who look like them have been systematically discriminated against
and oppressed from the very origin of this racist and corrupt country.
The Hollywood set of the Black nation, which most of these hip hop
artists integrate to, would sell their mothers and sisters for the
crumbs their “massa” throws to them.
In part it goes all the way back to their forefather’s house, which is
Uncle Tom’s cabin. A place where anybody who opposes “massa” is the
enemy. And these descendants of Uncle Tom are the same today, they will
go the extra mile, extra 1,000 miles, to protect their imperialists
masters’ interests; chiefly because they perceive some sort of shared
interests and maybe even camaraderie.
Many people, even some in the underprivileged class, accept and embrace
the glaring inconsistencies and contradictions which permeates U.$.
society. They willfully embrace the lie that the establishment means
good for them and the rest of the world, and when they’re being pacified
with their “Arab-Money” there’s little chance they’ll think any
different.
MIM(Prisons) responds: While we share this comrade’s dismay at
the current state of politics from major hip hop artists, we don’t see
them as quite so isolated in their benefits from the current system.
While the New Afrikan nation certainly faces ongoing national oppression
within U.$. borders, they also enjoy the wealth of an imperialist
country and can see that they are better off than the majority of the
world’s people. The vast majority of U.$. citizens, regardless of
nation, are earning more than the value of their labor and are part of
the labor aristocracy. So in a way, hip hop artists who speak about
their good fortune, do represent something real to their audience, even
if their level of wealth is unattainable for most of their listeners.
And the shared interests with the imperialists are real: the wealth of
the labor aristocracy is won from the exploitation of the Third World.