INTERNATIONAL ANARCHIST MOVEMENT:

ANARCHIST COMMUNISTS ON THE ECONOMIC CRISIS:

Here from the Anarkismo site is a statement from several of the international anarchist communist organizations. Molly has to point out that she doesn't agree with the "cause" of the present crisis as it is presented here. That may be understandable. Most academic economists not only failed to predict the crisis; they are also only now scrambling to explain it. the cause is one thing. the response is another. The following is valuable in terms of response.

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Anarchist Communist Statement On The Global Economic Crisis And G20 Meeting:
Sunday November 16, 2008 21:36 by Anarkismo Editorial Group

International anarchist communist statement on the global economic crisis and G20 meeting, endorsed by Alternative Libertaire (France), Federazione dei Comunisti Anarchici (Italy), Melbourne Anarchist Communist Group (Australia) and Zabalaza Anarchist Communist Front (South Africa).

Anarchist Communist Statement On The Global Economic Crisis And G20 Meeting

1.The current crisis is typical of the crises that regularly appear in the capitalist economy. "Overproduction", speculation and subsequent collapse are inherent to the system. (As Alexander Berkman and others have pointed out, what capitalist economists call overproduction is actually underconsumption: capitalism prevents large numbers of people from fulfilling their needs, and so undermines its own markets.)
2.Any solution to the crisis prepared by capitalists and governments will remain a solution within capitalism. It will not be a solution for the popular classes. Indeed, as in every crisis, the workers and the poor are paying – while financial capital is being bailed out with huge sums. This is likely to continue. No change within capitalism can resolve the problems of the popular classes; still less can such a solution be expected from individual politicians, such as Barack Obama. The most such politicians can do is play a part in offering the capitalists a way out, and perhaps in throwing the working class some crumbs.
3.The bank bailouts show not only whose interests the state serves, but the hollowness of capitalist commitment to free markets. Throughout history, capitalists have stood for markets when it suits them, and state regulation and subsidies when they need it. Capitalism could never have existed without state support.
4.In the US, the UK and elsewhere, the bailouts have taken the form of nationalisation of troubled financial institutions – with the full support of capital. This shows that capitalists have no fundamental problem with state ownership, and that nationalisation has nothing to do with socialism. It can also be a method of screwing the working class. We ourselves, not the state, need to take control of the economy.
5.Owing to the globalisation of capital under neo-liberalism, the ruling class recognises that the solution must be global. The G20 is meeting from 15 November to discuss the crisis. This is significant. The rulers of the US, Europe and Japan are coming to realise that they cannot handle the crisis on their own; that they need, not only one another, but other powers, notably China (which is emerging as a top industrial producer, and is on its way to becoming the world's third-biggest economy). India, Brazil and other "emerging" economies will have seats at the table. This may mark a recognition – under discussion for some years – that the G8 alone are no longer the world's economic decision makers. It is likely to signal a shift in the running of the global economic system.
6.We place no hopes in the inclusion of new capitalist powers. China's rulers may claim to be socialist; others, such as Lula of Brazil and Motlanthe of South Africa, may present themselves at times as champions of the poor. But in fact, all are defenders of capitalism, exploiters and oppressors of the people of their own countries, and, increasingly, imperialist or sub-imperialist exploiters of the people of other countries.
7.If the crisis is to lead to anything other than complete defeat for the global popular classes, poverty, exploitation and war, the popular classes must mobilise. We must demand bailouts, not for the capitalists, but for us. We anarchist communists will fight for those who got homes on subprime mortgages to be bailed out and keep their homes. We will continue to engage in and support struggles for jobs with better wages and shorter hours, housing, services, health services, welfare and education, protection of the environment. We fight for an end to imperialist wars and to repression of our class and its struggles.
8.We present these demands in response to the G20 meeting, and will continue to present them in the future. Through such demands, and through direct action to bring them about, we will work towards building a global movement of the popular classes that can put an end to capitalism, the state and the crises they create.
Signed:
Alternative Libertaire (France)

Federazione dei Comunisti Anarchici (Italy)

Melbourne Anarchist Communist Group (Australia)

Zabalaza Anarchist Communist Front (South Africa)

ANARCHIST MOVEMENT:

MAYDAY 2008: AN ANARCHIST COMMUNIST STATEMENT:

The following is a joint statement on the part of three platformist organizations, the Italian Federazione dei Comunisti Anarchici, the Irish Workers' Solidarity Movement, and the South African Zabalaza Anarchist Communist Front on the occasion of Mayday 2008.

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May Day 2008
Towards a new international movement of the exploited,

Against neo-liberalism, against war, against hunger and poverty,

For peace, food and housing for all, for safe and secure jobs,

Towards the libertarian alternative!

A harsh reaction has been unleashed by States around the world against the cycle of social, labour and political struggles which have been carried on by the movements of opposition to neo-liberalism since the late 20th century, with a consequent general worsening of living conditions for millions of proletarians who are increasingly enslaved by capitalist exploitation.

In every country, the primacy of finance as the motor of the economy, with its lethal rules based on interest rate increases, credit clampdowns and social dumping, is provoking a grave crisis. Its results can be seen in millions of families falling further into debt and impoverishment and losing their homes and their economic security. The workforce is being concentrated into more intensive and highly flexibilized units of exploitation in order to strengthen supply and competition in macro-economic areas (EU enlargement, the re-launch of Mercosur and ASEAN, the WTO crisis, etc.). The concentration of production into monopolies on an international basis (motor industry, energy, telecommunications, agro-chemical/pharmaceuticals, etc.) is destroying social wealth and jobs and producing a food crisis without precedent. Economic development is tending to create a neuron-like network of privileged sites and related corridors of capital and raw materials around which public and private investment can coagulate, thereby impoverishing the large areas in between. And the background to all this is the state of endemic war generated by the USA for control over the system of imperialist dependencies, the increasing use of militarism and nationalism (and all its religious and ethnic varieties) in order to control/de-stabilize an area which goes from the Middle East throughout Asia and Africa and to destroy the autonomy of the exploited classes by forcing them to side with a particular State, religion or elite to whom they entrust their present and future destiny of exploitation.

In this difficult situation, the social, labour and political struggles of the proletariat in every country are seeking to resist the various forms of capitalist exploitation and the harsh repression that the States have unleashed, making it increasingly evident that today we need to:
*ensure the total independence of all mass struggles and movements from all political and economic institutions (no State, government or market has any interest in fighting neo-liberalism);
*demand peace, so that it can the cradle for the re-emergence of civil society and allow the development of struggles for the emancipation of today's downtrodden classes;
*work to rebuild the autonomy and the role of the exploited classes, the defence and reconstruction of their free and independent organizations, as a condition and indispensable factor in the struggles against neo-liberalism and war in every country of the world.

Anarchist Communist and Libertarian Communist organizations support, promote and assist every initiative aimed at rebuilding a large international movement
*against neo-liberalism, denouncing the crimes of exploitation and bringing solidarity to proletarian organizations and local movements fighting against local or foreign bourgeois aggression;
*against war, demanding ceasefires, demilitarization and disarming by every State and ethnic or religious elite, who are united in their contempt for the lives of proletarians;

a great international movement whose heart and whose base lie in the grassroots social, labour, cultural, political and anti-militarist organizations, and also in their ability to federalize the struggles that develop, on a national and international level.
To that end, we support:
*the horizontal creation of networks, coalitions and forums inspired by the practice of self-organization, self-management and direct action, which represent the collective capacity for acting against the contradictions and violence of neo-liberalism and develop the greatest possible international solidarity;
*all efforts to contribute to the development of the international class-struggle anarchist movement, by supporting its political networks and its capacity for social insertion in the struggles and struggle fronts in support of popular power, so that we can spread the anarchist communist project and put the libertarian alternative into practice.
Federazione dei Comunisti Anarchici (Italy)

Workers Solidarity Movement (Ireland)

Zabalaza Anarchist Communist Front (South Africa)