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

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      What is it that those anarchists, who do not believe that organisation should be along state lines, want? They will say that they practice Anarchism so as to arrive at near perfection. Might it not be the case that the comrades back in ’68 and ’73, in their congresses and despite their sectarian practices, foresaw and understood that the economic side to Anarchism might be implemented immediately? I reckon the answer is yes.

      Certain facets of the issues raised by Anarchism can be put into effect. Who but the workers were in a position to understand this new thinking? Who but the workers can carry out the overhaul?

      But I doubt there is anybody who thinks he is watching the defeat of the bourgeois capitalist world’s economic values; that he is witnessing the collapse of phony old ideas that are likewise bourgeois and being replaced by values and ideas such as the issues that Anarchism poses in the round. Let us say, for we owe it to the truth, that we are moving towards the posing of some of the problems raised by anarchism.

      Anarchists have a mission to perform within the unions, watching over their survival and orientation. By not neglecting trade union activity, their influence will grow; the organisation will be that much more libertarian and will trigger the advent of a new society that much sooner. Anarchists should act out their anarchist ideals within the trade unions. It is suicide for anarchists to hold aloof from trades organisations. Everything should and can be done within the Unions.

      Which is not to say that they should dissolve the groups already in existence. No, not at all. On the contrary, these can amalgamate with the Unions. The greater the influence they wield, the more Anarchism and the more anarchists. These days, Anarchism is not the bogeyman it once was, and this is because of the persuasive work carried out. It was thanks to anarchist influence that, at the regional congress in Catalonia and at the national congress in 1918 and 1919, respectively, the trade union organisation embraced the emphatic statement that our sights are set on achieving libertarian communism, something that might well have been rejected in 1914 since anarchists kept their distance from the ­organisations then.

      The Russian state. The role of the unions.

      Production should be organised and regulated, not by the anarchist groups nor by state organizations, but by the unions.

      We are not Leninists, in that we do not believe that the State, no matter how revolutionary and socialist it may purport to be, should have the usufruct of the means of production.

      [We believe] that the only ones equipped for that are the Unions, because, for one thing, they are more moral. And for another, because they are more competent.

      Ángel Pestaña (watch-maker) was equally blunt:

      Of all the issues raised in the Unions, this one, relating to officials or persons paid for handling administrative and secretarial business, may well be the one that provokes the gravest and most serious difficulties […] Experiences elsewhere should caution us against using our hard-saved pennies on the upkeep of the harmful beast that would devour us: the bureaucrat.

      How are we to get around this snag and break out of the vicious cycle in which necessity has us trapped? By switching away from the approach used in other countries. Elsewhere, the permanent official is still the general secretary of the Union who is in charge of the organisation and of leading it, until he turns into a bit of a lordling imposed on the Union.

      The approach we should take, since we cannot get by without standing officials, is to ensure that the latter are mere employees, in the strictest sense of the term. They would have no vote and no voice at committee meetings and would attend those in order to take the minutes, offering an opinion only if asked. A functionary… a ­functionary and nothing more.

      The general secretary, like the treasurer and like all the members of the committee, must work for a living and report to the workshop every day, lest they lose touch with the workers. They must also show that they are not living off the union dues. If anyone is to be paid out of those dues, it should not be the committee proper, and some comrade employed out of the union’s necessity, but one who has no say in the union’s decision-making.

      This should apply also to the Local Federation and Regional Confederation.

      The Sindicato único

      This is one of the most interesting issues raised by the congress, which recognized the enormous implications, and two whole sittings were set aside for its discussion and approval. The unanimity by which the resolution was carried is clear proof of the proletariat’s yearning for change, in respect to organisational matters related to workers’ associations. It was an oddity that groups of workers, drawn not from a similar sector or industry, but from a given trade or profession, should have launched two, three or more unions for that trade or profession within the same locality. The drawbacks to such organisational arrangements were exposed time and time again when those bodies were defeated by the bourgeoisie, and on other occasions when, without quite failing, the success of our struggle was compromised for the want of unity among workers. It was because of this that the congress saw fit to render more compact and close-knit through its resolution on the sindicato único, which ­embraces an entire sector or industry.

      There is no question that this amendment to organisational methods is very important, but it would be childish to argue that we can implement it fully in a very short period of time as some have suggested. Within some sectors and industries implementation is not going to be feasible until such time as genuine enthusiasm is consistently invested in efforts to achieve the desired end. So there is no question of eliminating the time factor from a matter of such overwhelming significance […]

      Furthermore, we hold that this mode of organisation is futuristic in that its very simplicity will, if necessary, make it feasible to compile complete figures for overall production, as well as to proceed with the distribution of said production.

      It is, therefore, understandable if the sindicatos únicos should be the most faithful expression of the constructive, offensive and defensive provision sought by us producers.

      Its organisational make-up

      A sine qua non of the establishment of sectoral and industrial unions is for at least half of the sections (still trade unions at present) to be in favor of their establishment. Let us imagine that in some locality there are six organised sections engaged in the same branch of activity. Three are all for amalgamation and three against it or, for the present, not disposed to follow the example set by the three amalgamating sections. The latter should proceed as quickly as they are able with the launching of a sindicato único. In any case, it is imperative that they not turn their backs on those sections that are not currently joining the newly created body. On the contrary, the former need to keep the latter briefed on all the business and activity they carry out; it is our belief that such ongoing and amicable liaison will better serve the purpose in mind. Keeping to themselves would exacerbate the differences already in existence, which we would wager were the effective cause of the failure to reach an accommodation. Those sections that fail to amalgamate from the outset must not be marginalised or labelled as ‘scab’. Scabbing is inconceivable other than in organisations that blatantly betray the workers’ cause during strikes, by means of denunciations or other serious actions that well merit the label […]

      We

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