Love & Rage Archive

From the study section of the Bring the Ruckus website:

Love and Rage and Strategy

This is a summary of my take on L&R in terms of the 4 points we set out at our last meeting. It's only my take; we can amend these points here.

I. Politics

A. Love and Rage was a revolutionary anarchist organization that believed in a world without a state, capitalism, or any form of oppression and in which humans organized cooperatively and freely to meet their needs and to fulfill their desires. It also believed, unlike most anarchists at the time, that a revolutionary struggle for a free society requires the involvement of an organized cadre of committed revolutionaries. This cadre would push existing movements and social contradictions in revolutionary directions and serve as an example of what a free society might look like. Further, we believed that such an organization did not have to be a vanguard nor an "organic collective" that acts "spontaneously" for freedom at some given cue, such as industrial collapse or a natural disaster.

B. L&R developed a politics we called revolutionary pluralism:
A theory that held that since any revolutionary struggle will consist of diverse movements and peoples, any movement to bring them together should build on that pluralism through a deliberate effort to unite them in a radically democratic movement that respects people's autonomy and that challenges the existing power structure. The role of a revolutionary organization in a plural movement is not to lead it but to participate in it as equals with others in order to a) argue for the most democratic mass movement possible, one that gives every person the ability to participate fully; and b) to argue for our anti-authoritarian politics within it.

C. Criticisms of L&R's politics

1. Love and Rage was one of the first primarily-white anarchist groups to take white supremacy seriously. Ultimately, I don't think we went beyond basic left anti-racism. I think a new organization must be based on explicitly abolitionist politics. The "Draft Statement on White Supremacy" is a good start, but L&R split before it could even be debated.

D. Questions

1. Is revolutionary pluralism an adequate theory?
2. Must a future group be explicitly anarchist? As Chris Day puts it, will a new group come from within the anarchist tradition or will it borrow from anarchism?

II. Program

A. Definition of "program": A statement of the goal or demands an organization wants to achieve

B. Love and Rage's program:

1. L&R lacked a program beyond a commitment to an anti-authoritarian international revolution that would overthrow capitalism and all forms of oppression and create a directly democratic, free world. This, along with my two criticisms of its strategy, below, is my main criticism of L&R

C. Political statement

1. We worked for years on developing a comprehensive political statement. We never finished it.

D. Recommendations

1. Any political organization needs a program. A political statement tells the world what a group believes, but it also needs to say what it wants, too. A clear, written statement can guide an organization's actions and attract new members.

III. Strategy and tactics

A. Definitions:
1. Strategy: a plan to achieve a goal.
2. Tactics: devices or methods used to achieve a goal.

B. Why is it important?

1. Strategy, tactics and a program are important because they provide a clear guideline for what we want and how to achieve it. They also provide a way to evaluate our success.
2. An organization can't progress unless it has a clear idea of its strategy, tactics, and program.

C. Love and Rage's strategy

1. It had three working groups (WGs): Mexico, prison abolition, and anti-fascism. Later, these changed to anti-fascism, anti-austerity, and anti-police. These groups were supposed to have been chosen according to what the organization felt were the crucial areas in developing revolutionary struggle in North America, but they were really chosen on the basis of the kinds of activism members were already doing

2. Each WG was supposed to a) build and participate in local groups doing similar work, b) publish propaganda, and c) do surveillance and/or research and analysis.

D. Love and Rage's tactics

1. producing and distributing propaganda
2. semi-legal demonstrations
3. internal debate
4. building relationships with activists in our local area and within L&R.

E. Criticisms of L&R's strategy

1. I argue that the principle weakness of L&R was that it lacked an effective strategy, program, and political agreement on appropriate tactics.

2. It didn't effectively contribute to advancing revolutionary struggle. For example, the Anti-fascist WG's strategy was to build ARAs and pro-choice groups, participate in the ARA Network, collect surveillance on white supremacists, and produce propaganda. All of these things could just as easily be done without L&R or were already being done by left/liberal groups. Nothing L&R did (I'm not talking about what we believed) distinguished us from a radical peace-and-justice group.

3. Our strategies weren't based on quality research, analysis, and debate. We lacked an in-depth analysis of issues published that would have provided a basis for us to make intelligent decisions regarding strategy.

4. The direct action component to L&R's tactics was largely missing. Demos, propaganda and relationships with other activists are vital, but we generally failed to engage in actions that strike at the ability of oppressive institutions (cops, anti-choice groups, etc.) to do their business effectively.

F. What kind of strategy and tactics does a future group need?

1. I believe that any strategy or tactic proposed should have to answer the following question: Will this action directly challenge the existing institutions of power in this world and does it in some way prefigure the new society we want to build? This is what is known as a dual power strategy.

2. If the answer to this question is no, the group should abandon the strategy or tactic, or make sure it is coupled with one that does. A revolutionary organization cannot simply oppose power, it must also assert a counter-power, even a small one.

3. For example, the strategy of the prison abolition WG was Mumia Abu-Jamal support work, participating in local prison/anti-criminal justice system groups, working in Anarchist Black Cross locals, and producing propaganda. The work done was generally steady, committed, and useful. However, none of it met the criteria. In essence, our "prison abolition" work amounted to little more than prisoner solidarity. Solidarity work is vital, but alone it does not threaten the functioning of the prisons, which should have been our goal.

IV. Organizational structure

A. Love and Rage's structure

1. L&R was a membership organization. In order to join, one had to agree with the group's politics, commit to doing political work, and contribute financially. Only members could vote on L&R internal matters, though we often invited non-members to participate in political discussions and to write for the paper.
2. Our structure was democratic: power was distributed among local groups, working groups, a Federation Council (of which each local and working group could select a representative), a Coordinating Committee, and the Conference. All major decisions were made by the entire membership at conferences. Important decisions in-between conferences were made by the Federation Council. The Coordinating Committee, which rotated from city to city each year, was responsible for making sure the day-to-day work of L&R got done.

B. Strengths

1. In a membership organization, there is accountability. Membership comes with responsibilities and members can be held accountable if they don't do them. This is different from a network, in which joining is very easy, involves relatively little commitment, allows individuals to decide whether or not they will go along with each decision by the network, and there is little means to hold a person or group accountable for their (in)activity.
2. We could control our membership. We had a means to determine who could be a member of L&R, who couldn't, and how to kick out folks when necessary. Networks and coalitions often lack these instruments.

C. Weaknesses

1. The membership requirements were still too weak. We were perpetually broke because people didn't pay dues, many folks didn't do any activism, etc.
2. The Federation Council didn't work that well. The process was too cumbersome.

D. My recommendations for a future structure:

1. I think L&R's overall structure is good and could be adopted, with minor revisions. It was democratic, it consciously fought hidden hierarchies of gender, race, class, etc., and it was consistent with the kind of political organization we'd like to see in a free society.
2. Membership requirements could be stronger, the Fed Council could be made to work better.