Anarchism and Workers' Self-Management in Revolutionary Spain - Frank Mintz

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extraction; they were petit bourgeois intellectuals like Lenin or Trotsky or Bukharin, etc., and their chief concern was with devouring one another at the expense of the workers, just as Makhaiski had forecast that they would, back in 1905.33

      The second factor accounting for the CNT’s strength was its organization, which was rooted in three things: direct action and the sindicato único, federalism and globalism.

      Direct action, as defined and spelled out by the French anarcho-syndicalists at the beginning of the twentieth century, means rejecting State interference in negotiations with the bosses, and insistence upon all demands being met. In the face of it, the bosses are left with only two options: to give in, which meant success for the union and more members for it; or to stand firm, which usually triggered a flurry of strikes. Time and again the boss would hire scabs and strike-breakers who had to be persuaded to show solidarity. A violent response from the bosses, in the form of drafting in scab labour, often triggered violent pressures by a number of groups or individuals that would persuade the bosses to cave in to worker demands.

      A typical example of this was the La Canadiense strike mentioned earlier. The very same tactics persisted between 1931 and 1936. When employees of the Telephone Company across Spain came out on strike, the peasants’ union in Ronda decided to support them, and its militants severed many of the telegraph posts across the region. These were union members, most of them illiterate but with a clear and effective political outlook. Lots of folk, highly educated by the standards of formal bourgeois culture, lacked any such sense of the practical.

      Federalism guaranteed great flexibility of action, which was crucial given the differences between the regions. Each comarcal (county) or local committee was free to embark on action without having to consult with central committees that might have been more or less au fait with the issues. There was a example of this in 1934: the CNT and UGT could not agree on a joint approach. In Asturias, though, the two UGT and CNT regional organisations entered into a pact of alliance (which just goes to show how influential anarcho-­syndicalist tactics were within the UGT), but within the Asturian regional CNT, the CNT’s local federation in La Felguera rejected the pact. This might, at first glance, seem like a contradiction and a weakness, but it reflected the local situation and actualities of the UGT and CNT. In Aragon between 1934 and 1936, cooperatives and farming ventures were boosted, which was unheard of in other regions.

      The third especially distinguishing feature is what we might refer to as globalism.

      Another target for criticism was marxism (of the Leninist variety), its theory and practice within the USSR, which were depicted as what they were: the new ideology of the exploiter classes, a cloak donned so that they might continue their rule over the workers. The lessons of Bakunin, Kropotkin, Reclus, Rocker and Nettlau were published in book and pamphlet format. And there were lots of books and pamphlets examining marxism from the theoretical viewpoint (Bakunin, Kropotkin, Cafiero and Rocker) as well as from the practical, including the writings of Russian anarchists (Yartchuk, Gorelik, Voline, Arshinov, Makhno) and those of a number of cenetistas who had been to Russia (people such as Pestaña, Pérez Combina, Martín Gudell and Horacio Prieto). Not to mention propaganda arriving from Latin America (Mexico, Argentina and Uruguay), relations with which were very close indeed.

      However, the CNT fell well short of flawlessness: hence the notion of the sham pyramid.

      In hierarchical systems, power and the ruling class sit at the top and the exploited majority make up the base. The whole set-up might be represented as a pyramid, a battery of orders emanating from the top down.

      But what has this to do with the CNT, which, in theory, adopted a more horizontal arrangement?

      Some things in history represent anomalies: the creation of the FAI, anticipating the provisions of the Arshinov Platform, i.e. control of the trade union by an outside, foreign body (See Appendix IV below), the flirtations with alliances in the 1920s and the damaging controversy between faístas and treintistas. A few remarks about the latter should help explain the two preceding ones.

      Certain cenetistas had their suspicions as to unspoken horse-trading going on between a group accused of reformism (Peiró and Pestaña and the so-called treintistas) and the republicans. The FAI became the home of attacks on reformism. In actual fact, a third tendency emerged, a group made up of Durruti, Ascaso, García Oliver, etc., who craved social revolution and cashed in on the popularity of the FAI whilst setting up a group that was answerable to nobody.

      In what way was this falling-out any different than the falling-out between Trotskyists and Stalinists at around the same time?

      Inside the CNT, the opinions of all the membership were actually sounded.

      The tactics of attempted revolution, heralded by numerous spontaneous ventures spearheaded by the rank and file (see Appendix II below) demonstrated that some of the membership was in step with the FAI, but that there were serious and highly damnable shortcomings when it came to laying the groundwork for attack.

      In fact, the Spanish left could not

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