The challenge of June 18th

One of the biggest issues of contention about June 18 in the City has been that of violence. It seems likely - whatever the opinion of the police and right-wing media, that the organisers of the day did not set out to plan and encourage a riot. On the other hand, it was clearly more than just a ‘small minority’ who participated in at least some level of violent confrontation on the day.

A complication here is one’s definition of the word ‘violence’. In the eco-anarchist tradition, which seems widely accepted within the movement, violence means damage to living things. So while chopping down a tree is violence, burning a digger is not. However, there is a different meaning to the term - and one which is closer to how the word is understood within mainstream society. This ‘violence’ is any action which could endanger the security of human beings, and includes intimidation or threats - broadly speaking, it means the use of force.

By either definition, June 18th’s Carnival Against Capital was violent. Objects were thrown at police with the intention to cause injury (which they did - to both sides). Fist-fights broke out with LIFFE traders. Cars were set alight and major damage caused to buildings (the official estimate is £2 million worth). People in vehicles were intimidated. Of course, the police were more violent than we were - but that’s their job. And two wrongs don’t make a right.

So do we seek to justify this violence, or at least to explain why we condone it? Or should we ignore the fact that it occurred and seek instead to emphasise the exciting and diverse global movement which seemed to coalesce on June 18? It is too easy just to accuse the media of exaggerating the scale of the riot. Because it did happen, and the ethical issues it raised do need to be dealt with.

What June 18 emphasises is that the direct action movement is in danger of losing touch with the society on whose behalf it claims to act. So far we have maintained a convenient ideology to get around this unsettling issue.

It seems that we are a vanguard, acting on behalf of the biosphere and wider human society (including unborn generations) against exploitation and oppression. To quote some old Reclaim the Steets ‘agit-prop’: “We believe in … taking back those things that have been enclosed within capitalist circulat-ion and returning them to collective use as a commons.”

Stirring stuff: protecting the commons has been an enduring theme of working class resistance to oppression throughout British history. The most obvious examples are the agrarian risings against the Enclosure Acts, and the eighteenth century Luddite movement against the destruction of autonomous cottage industries and its replacement by wage slavery in factories.

But unlike the Luddites, we are not a popular movement. Nor are we working class people seeking to protect our livelihoods from the encroachments of capitalism. We are indeed a vanguard, acting on behalf of what we assume to be the wider interests of society and the planet. This was a concept (minus the planet bit) taken to an extreme by Lenin’s Bolsheviks, who claimed to act on behalf of an ignorant peasantry by setting up a dictatorship of the proletariat. Whilst the UK direct action movement is a long way from that situation, it does illustrate the dangers of acting on behalf of a group of people whilst at the same time not really caring what they think.

There are times, such as in the campaign against genetics and in the later stages of the anti-roads movement, when we gain genuine popular support. This is bolstered by events that are both radical and genuinely inclusive - such as the rally at Watlington and the crop trashing that followed it. It is then that our battles can be won.

Let’s face it - the campaign against capitalism is not popular. There is some case for saying that in targeting financial institutions we are acting on behalf of the billions of people in the Third World who are denied their basic rights. But who asked them? There is perhaps some small mechanism of accountability to the South through the People’s Global Action network – but it’s very tenuous. The basic issue is one of who makes the decisions – and the targets in the City on June 18 were decided in London, not Lusaka.

The reality is that the movement is accountable to no-one. We’re drunk with our own power, titillated and ego-tripped by all the notoriety and media attention. Many want a repeat of June 18, where we can cost the capitalists millions and all feel empowered at the same time.

But what about everyone else? What about all those who either out of dignity or necessity feel they must work for a living, and that they have some stake in the system that we’re setting out to destroy? Surely this is the crux of the issue. Take the perennial media debate. For anarchistic ideological reasons almost everyone involved refused to participate in any attempt to project a positive image of June 18 through the mainstream media.

Ultimately this kind of purism is surely counter-productive. Like a cult, it alienates all but the strongest of believers, and undermines diversity in its push for total obedience. It condemns us to the margins of political influence when we should be pushing at the mainstream.

Our heroes the Zapatistas are way ahead of us. They have faced up to the responsibilities that their success has forced upon them. They have called meetings and referendums. They have spent days and weeks consulting with the widest possible sections of mainstream Mexican society. There is legitimacy in their claim to be fighting alongside all those who are marginalised by the naked violence of semi-feudal landlord-ism and free trade. Of this legitimacy, we have none.

This, then, is surely the most critical meaning of June 18. And the key message is not to the capitalists, it is to us. It says this: ‘If you aim to be a truly revolutionary movement, you must work with the people. You must listen, and not assume that you know best. Then, and only then, must you act.’

Reclaim the Streets have produced a compilation of viewpoints on June 18th – see contacts