A-Infos (en) Canada, Prairie Struggle #1 - Continuing the task of building towards a working Class revolution: the creation of Prairie Struggle organization

Dear comrades, in the last 5 months, some anarchists from Regina have been engaged in the 
difficult process of creating a revolutionary anarchist organization and debating its 
political influences. As a result of these meetings and debates, we are proud to finally 
announce the existence of Prairie Struggle Organization based in Regina. To hopefully 
start a dialogue with anarchists in the west of Canada and beyond, we feel it important to 
let you know why anarchist politics in Regina are taking this direction. ---- The west of 
Canada and the state of the anarchist movement Before we explain to you the specific road 
we have chosen for our organization, we must first look at the state of the anarchist 
movement in Saskatchewan and in the west of Canada.

Since the end of the 80's the majority of the broader anarchist movement has directed its 
energy in building counter culture movements based on life style politics and personal 
activism resembling more ''responsible” consumerism(vegetarianism, veganism, straight 
edge, fare trade movements, dumpster diving ect.) than a mass class based resistance to 
capitalism. We acknowledge that there is no individual solution to a collective problem, 
and even if there were, abstaining from oppressive activities does nothing to replace the 
system and only reinforces it by our collective complacency.

Since the arrival of the individualist tendency within anarchism and the collapse of the
broader left, the traditional areas of agitation and organizing like unions, social 
movements, communities and the work place have been abandoned and in some cases condemned. 
The organizational culture that brought workers so many victories in the past has been 
left behind in the face of movements focusing on identity, and ego. For some, anarchism 
has become a synonym for romanticized politics, and pleasure. Some comrades, fatigued and 
burned out by working class agitation, have turned to propagandist politics while 
neglecting action and movement building.

While Prairie Struggle certainly internalizes some of the elements of these politics as 
vital to the struggle, we hold they cannot be the sole focus of a movement. Speaking 
specifically of the anarchist movement, which used to pose a well organized and formidable 
resistance to capitalism; in some areas, has been reduced to no more then a stereotyped 
image of rebellion that is used against the working class at times to characturize the 
politics of class antagonism.

Today we are told by the elite that there is no class war, or that our western culture is
exceptional to such politics. Sadly, even within the broader anarchist movement we are 
seeing this capitalist influence attack class politics through primitivism, 
anarcho-capitalism, libertarianism and some forms of insurrectionism that deny class as a 
founding principle within anarchism. To further worsen the problem, these counter 
revolutionary tendencies within our movement attack one of the only weapons we still have 
to defeat capitalism, the power of the working class to mobilize within sustained 
organizations.

Movement building and a sustained organization

Over the past few years there have been various revolutionary groups that have been 
created and disbanded. Many other groups focus on only one issue. A majority of groups 
have been coopted by electoral politics and other pro-capitalist, pro- reform groups. 
Thus, reflecting on our history and its consequences,with intention to avoid these 
setbacks, we wanted to organize in a way that would be based on class struggle and 
anti-capitalism in order to fight all oppressions that the working class is subject to. To 
this end, we organize as Anarchist-communists; a tradition that has always focused on 
organizing the working class into a revolutionary force. Anarchist-communism enables us to 
build sustained struggles and organizations rather than starting at ground
zero and constantly having to resort to organization building at the arrival of new 
struggles. Part of this tradition we embrace is Platformism. It is founded on organizing 
as a union of anarchists with a common set of principles. Our platform is not a manifesto, 
nor a set of policies, but a toolbox we use to organize around so that the Prairie 
Struggle Organization can remain longstanding, proactive, and focused on expanding these 
struggles rather than constantly refocusing on our group. Typically, our platform focuses 
on organizing around the areas of theoretical unity, tactical
unity, collective responsibility and federalism. People are not expected to agree on how 
we depart from these stances as that will likely never occur. These points simply allows 
us to build upon our victories, learn from our mistakes and build towards a revolutionary 
working class.

Federalism and the need to organize beyond our local cities

In the past year, the occupy movement has revealed many of our weaknesses and challenges 
to overcome. Between our individual cities, there are few radicals involved in anarchist 
politics, and when we try and build struggle, we often don’t have the resources, 
experience and people power to win our battles, let alone be influential. In the areas 
where the situation is less dyer, we are often disconnected due to our isolation and never 
reach beyond our individual cities. Thus far, the anarchist movement in the prairies, due 
to its juvenile state in most areas, holds little opportunity for broader cooperation, 
coordination and networking. Funds,resources and experience are in short supply which 
leads to most of us in the long run burning out quick. This is a situation that is a 
barrier to building towards revolution, and especially to envisioning a better world on 
anarchist lines. We believe that the west of Canada would benefit greatly
from some form of anarchist organization that spreads beyond the local
sphere. Federalism aims to achieve this by allowing us to work together,
build together and participate in each other’s struggles in a way that
overcomes the barriers geography presents. We may be few in our respective
cities but we would be stronger under the same roof.

Our platform also focuses on federalist direct democracy, and
aims to combat authoritarianism through the direct democratic principles
of anarchism rather than subjecting those who participate in it. Also, a
special note should be made on the point of federalist direct democracy.
Federalism has been badly bastardized by states, NGOs and many others,
so it is important to understand anarchist federalism as fundamen-
tally different from these groups.Anarchist federalism is based on a free
agreement to work collectively towards common goals, and depends on
the strength of direct democratic organizing. Critics accuse anarchist fed-
eralism as being a form a hierarchy but nothing can be further from the
truth. Decision making power and free choice still lies in our own local
groups, and communities; afterall, it is our local groups and community
members organizing our local struggles. However, federalism is an ac-
knowledgement that vast geographies have a disorganizing, and alien-
ating effect. Federalism overcomes this by connecting struggles despite
vast geography so that we can collectively fight common oppressions
that know no boundaries.
Many of the most productive anarchist groups today are
founded upon federations. These include Common Cause based in On-
tario, The Union of libertarian communists based in Quebec, Common
Struggle based in the North eastern United states,The Workers’ Solidarity
Movement in Ireland, and the Zabalaza Anarchist Communist Federation
in South Africa. These federations cooperate, coordinate, and support
eachother's struggles through Anarchismo, a global network of Plat-
formist organizations.

Conclusion

Our hope for Prairie Struggle is that something similar can be built in the
prairie region, and potentially further west. This is our focus and we will
strive for a closer collaboration with Common Cause in Ontario, UCL in
Quebec, The IWW in Edmonton, and various radical groups and unions
in the Canadian and American west. We also hope that the relationships
that will come of this collaboration will spark willingness to move forward
as a movement and possibly bring about the creation of a federation.
One that we will build together.

We encourage everyone reading this who are interested or even
intrigued by this introduction to learn more about our politics as stated in
the Prairie Struggle principles and aims document, and our platform. In-
quiries into these documents can be sent to:
prairie_struggle@riseup.net

We believe that revolution in the west is possible, but only if we
can escape the confines of our geographical prison. The time is ripe to
organize a unified anarchist movement.

In Solidarity,
The Prairie Struggle Organization

---------------------------------------

Prairie Struggle is the publication of
the Prairie Struggle Organization; this maga-
zine is about the theory and practice of anar-
chism in the platformist tradition with the aim
to further these ideas and put them into prac-
tice.
We identify ourselves as anarchists
within the platformist tradition as we broadly
believe in its theoretical base and organiza-
tional practice, but not needfully in everything
that has been done in its name. The primary
ideas of this practice, namely theoretical and
tactical unity, collective action, and federalism,
are what we strive to develop.
We are revolutionaries that come
from all walks of life, identifying deeply with the
struggles of the working class, of which all our
members are a part. The organization's activ-
ities are centred around not only theoretical
development, but also direct action and edu-
cation surrounding the struggles of the work-
ing class and furthering the goal of a
federation of anarchist groups across Canada.
As anarchist communists, we strive
for a classless society, free from the shackles
of a hierarchy put in place long before us. We
are bold enough to see an international feder-
ation of radically democratic, self-managed
communities and workplaces. We work
against the divisions of labour that promote a
life of limited activity dictated by the commod-
ity economy. The abolition of markets will fa-
cilitate the satisfaction of basic human needs
that elude so many – we believe, in keeping
with the principle, “from each according to abil-
ity, to each according to need.”

V i s it P ra ir ie s t ru g gl e or co n t a c t
us o n t he we b a t :
www.prairiestruggle.org
prairie_struggle@riseup.net
_________________________________________
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