Question for Anarchists: What is your strategy for achieving a revolution against the capitalist state and ensuring its overthrow without a centralized vanguard party?
I am not an anarchist
59.5%
I am an anarchist (answer below)
40.5%
Poll ended at .

@Radical_EgoCom The global capitalist system doesn't need to be overthrown, because at some point it will inevitably fall by itself. Its unsustainability is a known fact. IMO the more important question to focus on is how to cultivate the resilience to not let it drag us down with it. As the old systems start to slowly decay and crumble, local networks of mutual aid will grow to fill in the cracks out of necessity. I hope that at some point such local and communal solutions will overtake capitalist states as people witness the old systems failing to protect them.

Now, an argument could be made that we can't afford to wait around for fossil capitalism to cause things to get that bad. I'm much too pessimistic to think that any large scale revolution could be achieved before the masses start to lose their bread and circuses. Things will have to get worse before they get better, but they're already slowly getting worse and will continue to do so for a long time. May we live in interesting times.

@aumalatj

That's false. Capitalism will not fall by itself. Capitalism has ways of self-sustaining itself and prolonging its existence. When capitalism is in decay, fascism arises to maintain capitalism's existence through force, specifically by smashing proletarian movements that would otherwise push for the abolition of capitalism and the creation of socialism. If we just wait around for capitalism to die on its own, fascism will arise and destroy any chance of it dying.

@Radical_EgoCom Fascism is just capitalism in decay, ergo a more extreme, totalitarian form of late stage capitalism. As such it will continue to be unsustainable and therefore it can't be sustained. Widespread fascism is most certainly to be expected, we're seing it creeping in already. Yet I stand by what I said. All the resources the system pours into enforcing itself through violence will be off the plates of ordinary people, who will then increasingly seek alternatives.

@aumalatj

You're claim that fascism, being capitalism in decay, will destroy itself is untrue. Tell me, is Germany still capitalist? What about Italy or Spain? Yes? But they were fascist countries, so by your logic, capitalism shouldn't exist in those countries. Fascism is unstable, but when it inevitably fails, it doesn't result in the abolition of capitalism. It results in the restoration of the old, or very similar, capitalist order, which is literally the whole point of fascism.

@Radical_EgoCom I'm not talking about the stability of a political system in and of itself. I'm talking about sustainability in the context of a global climate crisis, soil degradation, overfishing, global biodiversity loss etc. etc. In a word, polycrisis. Switching between unsustainable capitalism and unsustainable fascism won't change the fact the underlying capitalist mode of production is unsustainable and thus by definition has to end at some point, willingly or not.

And so I return to my original comment: The problem then is to not let the system take us down with it.

@aumalatj

Still, your claim that capitalism will abolish itself isn't true. Capitalism is inherently unsustainable and will inevitably end, but if there's no working-class movement to actually abolish capitalism when it's weak, then capitalism will just continue to sustain itself through its various tactics of prolonging its survival, such as fascism. Ultimately, capitalism will have to be forcefully overthrow by the proletariat because it's not going to die by itself.

@Radical_EgoCom I think abandonment is more accurate than abolition to describe what I'm thinking of.

Economy exists within ecology. Historically, when capitalism has ceased to benefit the commoner, fascism has swooped in. Tyranny requires constant effort. My hope is that at some point in the future the ecological and environmental stresses applied on the economic system will force the state to spread its resources so thin that cracks open for communal solutions to grow in. Solutions that meet the needs of the people better than the increasingly strained state struggling to maintain control at the larger scale.

Sure, that could result in a collection of syndicates forming an armed opposition against the state, but that may not be necessary. If the state is so strained that it can't take care of its citizens, at some point it would just become irrelevant in the shadow of the communal networks.

@aumalatj

Your "solution" for getting rid of capitalism isn't a solution at all. It amounts to waiting for capitalism to mess up the environment and society to a severe degree and then hoping that it just dissolves by itself. Any solution that relies on hope doesn't have the assurance necessary for me or many other rational people to take it seriously.

@Radical_EgoCom @aumalatj I think his "solution" doesn't really need your or other peoples seriousness to work anyway (; but if you are looking for a "solution", whatever that might be, a theory, a critique, a prognosis I think you are a hunting a ghost. In the end, mostly what you can do is to built more robust and complex relationships and, and that is the more abstract part, you have to critique the living shit about this joke of an society. I think the first step is to make power relationships transparent, in the end people don't want to be ruled, neither today nor in a future centralized vanguard party.

@Bl4ckst4r @aumalatj

What people want doesn't change what has to happen in order for a proletarian revolution to be successful. People may not want to live in a vanguard one-party state, but that doesn't make it any less necessary.

@Radical_EgoCom @Bl4ckst4r @aumalatj no what people want does effect the stakes. And to say a vanguard is necessary is an opinion. Some will disagree and resist the actions and ideas that say we need statehood and will act accordingly in a way where they do not use statehood to resist capitalism.
@Radical_EgoCom @Bl4ckst4r @aumalatj I personally think capitalism and statehood is unsustainable and will collapse on itself, eventually.Building communities that R decentralized With a focus on social responsibility and cohesion that is hostile to coercion May lead us to a just solution but there’s so many possibilities that IDK, where the solution, revolution will follow suit but ignoring people who say they don’t want 2 b ruled is not a solution in my opinion. All perspectives must be equal
@Radical_EgoCom @Bl4ckst4r @aumalatj also if the proletariat party tries to oppress, suppress, or force people to abide by its rule and attempts to force people to accept the rule of a one party state. There will be even more injustice that gets added to the pot in my opinion

@Madaligned @Bl4ckst4r @aumalatj

1/3 The idea of a vanguard party being necessary isn't just opinion (it is not a subjective belief based on personal feelings), it's a hypothesis, a proposed explanation for how a revolution realistically has to be done, one that is based on logic and evidence. The logic behind the necessity of a vanguard party derives from the fact that the revolutionary people need ideological unity and strategic/tactical cohesiveness in order to be successful, and...

@Madaligned @Bl4ckst4r @aumalatj

2/3 ...therefore, supporters of vanguard parties conclude that a vanguard party that promotes revolutionary ideology, organizes the masses strategically and tactically, and helps guide them towards their revolutionary goals is a requirement for a revolution to succeed. The evidence for this comes from practically every single successful revolution in history, all having some kind of political organization that led the revolutionary masses to success.

@Madaligned @Bl4ckst4r @aumalatj

3/3 There may have been successful revolutions that had no kind of vanguard party, but given that the vast majority of them did, I would say that those instances are the exception and not the rule.

@Radical_EgoCom @Madaligned @Bl4ckst4r @aumalatj the exceptions also prove that the Vanguard is not "necessary".