Confronting Empire

7/30/2019 Confronting Empire

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Confronting

Empire:

Analysis of contemporary capitalism and ways

to fight it in the U.S.


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[email protected]

Available in .PDF format at http://www.zinelibrary.net

All excerpts and quotes taken without permission orlegitimate research.

Capitalism is not just a social system that exploits

people through work, so that we can think about

ending the exploitation and keeping the work, it is asocial system which subordinates all of life to work

and by doing so alienates those it forces to work

and prevents them from developing their own paths

of self-realization. For example, for those who are

waged during each day of our usual working week

we not only find most of our waking hours taken up

by working directly for capital on the job, but we

also find that much of our supposedly "free" time, or

"leisure" time is taken up preparing for work, getting

to work, getting home from work, recuperating from

work, doing what is necessary so that we can go to

work the next day, and so on. For those who are not

waged, e.g. the unwaged in the home (usually

housewives but often children and sometimes men),

"leisure" time turns out to be mostly dedicated tohouse "work", which in turn is not just the crafting

and reproduction of domestic life but involves the

work of turning children into workers and

reproducing workers as workers. In other words,

women have children but then they (along with

husbands sometimes) must rear them to take orders,

to curb their desires and spontaneity and to learn to

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do as they are told (the same work that teachers

undertake in schools). Children, thus, are not left

free to discover life on their own but are put to work,

the work of turning themselves into workers as well

as that of reproducing their parents as such.Similarly, women qua housewives do not merely

work for/with their husbands, their work reproduces

their husbands as labor power on a daily and

weekly basis through feeding them, cleaning their

clothes, maintaining their environment, providing

sexual and psychological services that make it

possible for them to return to work each day without

shooting the boss, or themselves. Parallel

analyses can be made of the "free" time on

weekends and vacations. In short, what I'm arguing

is not merely that capital has extended its

mechanisms of domination beyond the factory (as

the critical theorists have long argued) but that

what those mechanisms involve is the imposition of

work, including the imposition of the work ofreproducing life as work.

-Harry Cleaver, 1993

Here in the U.S., it often seems impossible to confrontthe social relationship described above by Cleaver.

This relationship is not just that between partners orbetween workers and bosses. Capitalism is the veryessence of which relations are formed. As Cleaver

notes, it is no longer enough to dominate individualsstrictly in their labor. The development of capitalism

has meant expanding control farther and fartheracross the functionality of society. This elusiveness,


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this invisible omnipresence, is the product ofhundreds of years of rebellions, strikes, and strugglesagainst more jackbooted forms of exploitation.

The cubicle worker exists because the peasant revolted.

Deep in the heart of the empire, activists andrevolutionaries march for peace, for choice, as ifthere is anything revolutionary about this. The role

of the activist is a role we adopt just like that of

policeman, parent or priest- a strange psychological

form we use to define ourselves and our relation to

others. So says Andrew X, in a critique whichdoubts the effectiveness of activism when it hasbecome a specialized role which is unrelatable for

most people.

Capital must be understood as the force of all

forces to be reckoned with. There is no existing party

or union which can take on capitalism, nor auniversal strategy. Instead, we must be versatileplayers in this pragmatic system, understanding itstotality and searching for weak points. Furthermore,

the quest for personal liberation from capital mustdepend on attempting to collectively tear a hole in

the geographic continuity of capitalism.

There are certain attributes of capitalism which mustbe articulated. First, it is necessary to understand abasic understanding of capitalism, as this

understanding has evolved in post-Marxist thought.

Capitalism as an international logic began assovereignty was transformed during the 14th and 15th

centuries in Europe. Isolated class conflict emerged

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Reification The conversion of a material or ideainto a product which can be produced andconsumed within the capitalist system.

Reproduction The pattern of capitalism and itssubjectivities in which the multitude constantly worksto create the conditions of society over and over

again in place of a proletariat producing goods.Goods are still produced, but the end product is the

recreation of capitalism. Many of the goods beingproduced by individual groups of workers areabstractions which are only identifiable in the larger

process of reproduction.


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industrialization and mass production in place ofcottage industries. This required that the enclosuresand wage relation become the absolute law of all

land under the sovereignty of capitalist states.

Enclosure is the abolition of communal land, oftenthe social center and communitys heart and soul.

Land that was formerly of cultural and socialimportance was closed off and divided up as

private property. At times this was accomplishedthrough military force, tax code creation andmanipulation, or other coercive means advocated

by the ruling class. The specific example from whichthe term derives is the Enclosures Acts of Britain

which broke up some six million acres of common

fields and common lands from 1760 onwards,

transformed them into private holdings, and

numerous less formal arrangements supplemented

them (Hobsbawn 153).

From the industrialization period, capitals history is

complicated and non-linear. In the endglobalization has become complete, and capital isabsolute relative to all of existence. A few principles

of this period (the transition from modern to post-modern capitalism) should be laid down:

1) The states primary roles are to manage class

conflict and to mediate disagreement betweencapitalist entities.

2) The sovereignty of the state is far superceded bythe logic of capital and the global financial

institutions which plan and manage it.

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Sources

Bonnano, Alfred.Armed Joy, Elephant Editions. 1998

De Angelis, Massimo.An Interview With HarryCleaver. 1993

Federici, Silva. Caliban and the Witch,

Autonomedia. 2004

Firestarter Press (compilation). You Cannot Kill Us,

We Are Already Dead. 2004

Hardt, Michael & Negri, Antonio. Empire,Harvard University Press. 2000

Hobsbawn, Eric. The Age of Revolution,

Vintage Books. 1996

Kurshan, Nancy. Women & Imprisonment.

Monkeywrench Press. 1995

X, Andrew. Give Up Activism,Insurrection, Organization, Activism and

Anti-Politics.http//www.geocities.com/kk_abacus/ioaa/Ioaa.html


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