The east wind prevails over the west wind. How long twilight idle and the West, the "international community" of people who still believe the masters of the world, will continue to give lessons of good management and good conduct throughout the planet? Is not it ridiculous to see some intellectuals of the day, defeated soldiers of capitalism, which serves as a haven parliamentary moth-eaten, give their lives to the magnificent Tunisian and Egyptian peoples, in order to teach the savages the abc of "democracy"? What is worrisome persistence of colonial arrogance! In the situation of political misery in which we are the last three decades, is not it obvious that we who have everything to learn from the popular uprisings of the time? Should we not urgently scrutinize everything there is made possible through collective action, the overthrow of oligarchy, corruption, and also and perhaps above all in a state of humiliating vassalage over the western states? Yes, we must be students of these movements and not your stupid teachers. Because they are the ones who give life to the spirit of their findings, some policy principles which obsolete long tried to convince us. And above all, the principle that Marat never tired to remember: in matters of liberty, equality and emancipation, we owe it all to popular uprisings. We have the right to rebel. Just as in politics, our states and those who profit from it (parties, unions and intellectuals servile) prefer the administration, in the rebellion, prefer the claim, and any disruption, the "orderly transition", what people of Tunisia and Egypt remind us that the only action that corresponds to a shared sense of outrageous occupation of state power is the mass uprising. And in this case, the only instruction that can unite the disparate elements of the crowd is: "You know you are there, go." In this case, the exceptional importance of the revolt, the ultimate power, the slogan is repeated by millions of people, is a measure of what will be, certainly and irreversibly, the first victory: the flight of the man and pointed. Whatever happens after this triumph of popular action, illegal in nature, have been for ever victorious.
a rebellion against the power of the state may be quite successful is a teaching of universal scope. This victory marks the horizon over which highlights any collective action which is backing the action of the law, what Marx called "the decline of the state." Namely, that one day, freely associated in the deployment of the creative power they possess, people can get by without the dire state coercion. That is why, for this last idea that the world throws down an uprising that installed authority causes boundless enthusiasm.
A spark can fire to the plains. It all begins with the immolation by fire of a man reduced to unemployment, to whom wants to ban the trade miserable allowing it to survive and who slapped a female officer to make him understand what in the world is real low. In days, weeks, this gesture is extended to millions of people shouting their joy in a place far away and call for the hasty departure powerful tycoons.
Where does this amazing growth? Is the spread of an epidemic of freedom? No. In the words of Jean-Marie Gleize poetically, "a revolutionary movement spreads infection but resonance. Here is something that resonates with the shock wave emitted by something that is there. " This resonance call it "happening."
The event is the sudden creation, not a new reality, but a myriad of possibilities. None of them is the repetition of what is already known. Therefore, it is obscurantist to say that "the movement demanding democracy" (is implied that we enjoy in the West) or "this calls for social improvement movement" (it is understood that prosperity is the average of the petty bourgeois West). Come out of nowhere, the popular uprising resonates everywhere and creates opportunities for everyone unknown. The word "democracy" almost no position in Egypt. It speaks of a "new Egypt", a "real Egyptian", a constituent assembly, the total change of life, unspeakable and previously unknown possibilities. This is the "new plateau" will arrive where it is no longer the one to spark the uprising that eventually caught fire.
come This plain lies between the declaration of a reversal of a strength and take on new tasks. Between a young Tunisian who said: "We, children of workers and peasants, we are stronger than the criminals, "and he said a young Egyptian," Starting today, January 25, I am in charge of the affairs of my country. "
The people, only the people, is the creator of world history. It is extremely surprising that in our Western governments and media that the rebels consider a square of Cairo are "the Egyptian people." What is this? For them, the people, the only people reasonable and legal, is not reduced in general to most of a survey or an election? How is it that suddenly hundreds of thousands of rioters are representative of a nation of eighty million people? This is a lesson to remember, do not forget. Beyond a certain level of decision, persistence and courage, the people can concentrate their existence in a square, a street, some factories, a university ... The whole world will see that courage, and above all of the amazing creations that accompany it. These creations are proof that a people being there. As one Egyptian protester: "I watched TV before, now is the television that looks at me."
At the start of an event The village consists of those who know how to solve the problems that the event poses. As in the occupation of a place: food, place to sleep, monitoring, banners, prayer, defensive battles, so that the place where everything happens, the place becomes a symbol, is reserved to the people at any price. Problems with hundreds of thousands of people came from everywhere, seem intractable, and more so because the state has disappeared.
without help solve intractable problems of the state is the target of an event. And this is what makes a people, suddenly and for an indefinite period, where there decided to join. Without the communist movement, there is no communism. The popular uprising which does not speak clearly hegemonic party or organization or recognized leader. There will be time to assess whether this feature is a strength or a weakness. In any case, this is what makes that in a very pure form, without a doubt the most pure from the Commune of Paris, has all the features of what is necessary to call a communist movement. "Communism" means here: joint establishment of common goals. The Common has two particular features.
First is generic, because it represents, in one place, to all mankind. There, are all kinds of people that compose a people, all voices are heard, all current proposal, any difficulties addressed by what it is.
Second, above all major contradictions, according to the State, he is uniquely able to handle, but never leave them behind, between intellectuals and manual workers, between men and women, between rich and poor, between Muslims and Copts, among the inhabitants of the provinces and the inhabitants of the capital ... Thousands of new possibilities, related to these contradictions, arise at any time, possibilities that the State, every state, is completely blind. We see young doctors, coming from the provinces to heal the wounded, sleep in the middle of a circle of youth violence, and are quieter than they have ever been. They know that nobody will touch a hair. We also see an organization of young engineers go to the suburbs and ask them to defend the place, to protect the energy movement in combat. We see a row of Christians to stand guard to look after the Muslims inclined to pray. We see traders feed the unemployed and the poor. We see all neighbors talking to strangers. Read thousands of posters where everyone's life is seamless blend with the great story of all. All these situations, these discoveries is the communism movement. Two centuries ago that the only political issue is this: how to establish a lasting discoveries communist movement? And the only reactionary statement remains: "That's impossible, even harmful. Trust in the state. "
Glory to the people of Tunisia and Egypt, which remind us of the true and only political duty: from the state, organized loyalty to communism movement. We do not want war but we are not afraid. Has spoken in all parts of the peaceful quiet of huge demonstrations and that calm has been associated with the ideal of elective democracy attributed to the movement. We note, however, that there were hundreds of dead and still there every day. In many cases, the dead were fighters and martyrs of the movement's initiative and after protection. Political and symbolic places of the survey had to be protected at the cost of fierce fighting against militants and police threatened regimes. And who paid with his life but the young people coming out of the poorest populations? That the "middle classes" of our unexpected Michele Alliot-Marie said that the democratic outcome of events in progress depended on them and only them, remember that at the crucial moment the continuity of the uprising was only guaranteed by the commitment unrestricted popular detachments. Defensive violence is inevitable. It continues in difficult conditions in Tunisia, after being sent back to the misery of young activists from the provinces.
Can anyone think that this number of initiatives and these cruel sacrifices fundamental aim only lead people to "choose" between Suleiman and ElBaradei, as well as in our country, we sadly resigned to choosing between Sarkozy and Strauss-Khan? Is that the only lesson of this splendid episode? No, a thousand times no! The people of Tunisia and Egypt, we say, rise, build the public space of communism movement, defend by all means, imagining the successive stages of the action, that's real popular policy of emancipation. Indeed, the Arab states are not the only ones that are unpopular and, at bottom, unlawful, with or without elections. Whatever happens, the surveys of Tunisia and Egypt have universal significance. Create new possibilities whose value is international.
© Le monde, 2011.
Trad. Elisa Carnelli.
