Is the campaign participatory?
Are the campaign’s goals built in to its methods?
Is the campaign resistant to cooption?
The first point grows out of the analysis of capitalism from a nonviolence perspective in chapter 3, which pinpointed three key ways in which capitalism is maintained: by ultimate resort to violence, through supportive belief systems and by crushing or coopting alternatives. An effective nonviolent campaign could be expected to address one (or possibly more) of these three key areas.
Point 2, that a campaign is participatory, can be seen as an outgrowth of the principle of nonviolence, given that any nonparticipatory approach is open to challenge by nonviolent action.
Point 3 about the compatibility of methods and goals also can be interpreted as an aspect of the principle of nonviolence, in that both the methods and goals are nonviolent. Point 3 also applies to participation, which is part of the goals and methods.
Point 4 grows out of the analysis of capitalism and especially of the failures of conventional anticapitalist strategies. Leninist strategies are now largely discredited. The dominant mainstream strategies, which involve working through the system to promote reform or gradual transformation, are highly susceptible to cooption: they become taken over by the system itself, so that there is little or no change in the structure of capitalism. Therefore, it is wise to pay special attention to a campaign’s ability to resist cooption.
Others may wish to revise the points on the check list or add their own. There may be points that are specific to a particular country, issue or action group. The aim here is not to provide a definitive list, but rather to illustrate how such a list can be used.
It is important to remember that check lists and sets of principles are simply tools to use to try to improve effectiveness. They should not be treated as rigid prescriptions or as means to end debate. Quite the contrary: they should be used to encourage discussion. If they are a good choice, they will encourage discussion of things that make a difference.
In the following chapters, campaigns and methods of various types are analysed. Chapter 7 looks at workers’ struggles, focussing on campaigns for better wages and conditions, jobs, workers’ control, green bans and whistleblowing. Chapter 8 looks at sabotage, which is a method of struggle often perceived as operating at the border between nonviolence and violence. Chapter 9 deals with environmental campaigning, focussing on the issues of pesticides, nuclear power and local antidevelopment campaigning. Chapter 10 deals with social defence, namely nonviolent community resistance to aggression as an alternative to military defence. Although social defence is not normally seen as having economic implications, it is relevant since it challenges the system of violence that supports capitalism. Chapter 11 covers examples relating to global trade, specifically the Multilateral Agreement on Investment and genetically modified organisms. Finally, chapter 12 examines three economic alternatives — community exchange schemes, local money systems and voluntary simplicity — assessing them as strategies. In each case, the check list is used as a foundation for discussing the potential of campaigns to challenge capitalism using nonviolent action.
The campaigns examined in chapters 7 to 12 are some of the important avenues for a nonviolent challenge to capitalism, but there are certainly others, including some feminist and anti-racist campaigns, squatting[1] and culture jamming.[2]
What knowledge is needed in order to assess campaigns? Obviously it helps to have both intimate experience of campaigning plus a full knowledge of history, arguments and outcomes. But to demand such a comprehensive understanding would mean that only a few experts and experienced campaigners could make assessments. Actually, the questions on the check list do not require such a comprehensive understanding. Often the answers come immediately from an awareness of general features of the issue and methods.
Let’s look at the questions on the check list to see what it’s helpful to know for answering them.
Does the campaign help to
• undermine the violent underpinnings of capitalism, or
• undermine the legitimacy of capitalism, or
• build a nonviolent alternative to capitalism?
For answering this question, it is necessary to understand how capitalism is sustained by violence, as described in chapter 3; what is involved in people accepting or rejecting capitalism; and what a nonviolent alternative to capitalism might look like, such as described in chapter 5.
Is the campaign participatory?
This question is straightforward: how many and what sorts of people are involved, and what roles do they play?
Are the campaign’s goals built in to its methods?
This is the ends-means question. It can be tricky, since goals and methods are so often different. In some instances answering the question is easy: if a goal is participation, then the methods should be participatory. Answers are more complex when there are multiple goals and methods. The examples in the following chapters illustrate ways to use this question for making assessments.
Is the campaign resistant to cooption?
This question can be difficult to answer, since cooption can occur in many ways, some of which look like success from the point of view of a particular campaign. It is important to keep in mind the ultimate goal, namely transforming and replacing capitalism. If the campaign does not continue to make a significant contribution towards attaining this goal, then cooption could well be responsible. The examples in the following chapters illustrate how this question can be answered.
What I have done in the chapters 7 to 12 is to present rough assessments, based on my own experiences and analysis, relying on studies when appropriate. These assessments are certainly not definitive. Rather, they are intended to illustrate the process of using the check list.
There is a vitally important qualification to the assessments in the following chapters. They are for the purpose of challenging, transforming and replacing capitalism — not for other purposes. A campaign might be extremely worthwhile even though it doesn’t oppose or hurt capitalism. So this process of assessment is for a specific anticapitalist purpose, a point that will be emphasised on various occasions.
7. Workers’ struggles
The industrial revolution caused incredible hardship on many workers and their families, with long working hours, harsh and unsafe conditions, poor pay and brutal treatment on the job, which can be summed up by the word exploitation. In many parts of the world such exploitation continues today. These conditions — a commonality of experience — helped form a collective identity and a unity of purpose to change the situation.
This commonality of identity and purpose was the foundation for the rise of the organised working class. Most of its gains were achieved through the power of nonviolent action, supplemented by enlightened employers and governments. Nonviolent action by workers includes strikes of various types, bans on certain types of work, workplace occupations, working-to-rule and pickets, plus a host of other actions that are less specific to the workplace such as ostracism, meetings, marches and fasts.[1] Violence by workers has played only a small role in workers’ action, though violence by employers has been frequent.
