i've been reading quite a bit about the 1968 paris uprising recently (see poster on the left, "free press"), and pondering the total unexpectedness and swiftness of events. workers, students and radicals were suddenly swept up in a massive struggle that seemed to be too big, too fast. whilst there is no doubt that temporary autonomy was a goal worth fighting for, the total revolution of society hoped for was not obtained.
whilst there is no doubt that french society in 68 was very different to modern society, i imagine any revolutionary attempt in the britain of today would would look more like paris 68 than some of the more famous struggles in this vein (e.g. russia 1917), because we live in a technologically advanced european capitalist state. no doubt there'd have to be a general rebellion of workers in order to halt the machinery of the economy, the seizure of media outlets, and immediate steps to defend the revolutionary forces. no doubt all of this has been theorised and pored over and over by the likes of academic marxists (that seems to be all they do), and no doubt one of the biggest obstacles to change would be the "professional revolutionaries" who'd like to lead the movement, but what about us?
here i'm talking about the small handful of people who i know to read this blog and (as far as i'm aware) are fairly unaffiliated individuals. the problems of leaders and parties are well known to us, but in the event of a sudden uprising in our town/country/planet how would we respond? presumably we'd want to be involved in order to help the changes that we wanted to see. we'd probably need to spread the word about our struggles and counter propaganda, take part in the defence of our comrades against the police, and do our bit in installing alternative social and economic systems.
i'm thinking about this on a purely 'what if i got the chance to be part of something like that' sense. what would you do?
whilst there is no doubt that french society in 68 was very different to modern society, i imagine any revolutionary attempt in the britain of today would would look more like paris 68 than some of the more famous struggles in this vein (e.g. russia 1917), because we live in a technologically advanced european capitalist state. no doubt there'd have to be a general rebellion of workers in order to halt the machinery of the economy, the seizure of media outlets, and immediate steps to defend the revolutionary forces. no doubt all of this has been theorised and pored over and over by the likes of academic marxists (that seems to be all they do), and no doubt one of the biggest obstacles to change would be the "professional revolutionaries" who'd like to lead the movement, but what about us?
here i'm talking about the small handful of people who i know to read this blog and (as far as i'm aware) are fairly unaffiliated individuals. the problems of leaders and parties are well known to us, but in the event of a sudden uprising in our town/country/planet how would we respond? presumably we'd want to be involved in order to help the changes that we wanted to see. we'd probably need to spread the word about our struggles and counter propaganda, take part in the defence of our comrades against the police, and do our bit in installing alternative social and economic systems.
i'm thinking about this on a purely 'what if i got the chance to be part of something like that' sense. what would you do?
