What’s been happening lately with the people from Occupy, UK Uncut and the rest of the rebellious ‘noughties’ crowd? Whatever activity there is has sunk below the media horizon and therefore dropped off the political agenda, while the restless radical pool continues to evolve into new forms and outgrowths, clustering, merging and diffusing in ways that seem more organic than organised. The big splashes in the morning papers have given way to a grey drizzly afternoon of self-doubt, boredom and endless questions.
What is one to do with a world ‘absolutely in thrall to capitalism’, where most radical groups ‘coalesce around a hollow capitalist meliorism’ or else focus on the bogus rhetoric of having no leaders at the expense of any real strategy, democratic oversight or ability to adapt to changing circumstances?
The UK and other governments have been stepping up efforts to block access to file-sharing torrent sites – those sites which allegedly are responsible for all the evil in the world – but like the game Whac-a-Mole, the legal mallet can’t keep up with the elusive pop-up heads, and many of these sites have now been around so long they are starting to look like permanent fixtures. Two of them, Isohunt and Pirate Bay, have been celebrating 10th birthdays recently, and have things to say which socialists will find particularly interesting. First, Isohunt: ‘Ideals of the Free Software movement and Creative Commons will face new challenges with 3D printed copies of physical objects, replicated from copyrightable digital designs. We are moving into the world of science fiction. Will copyright or even money be relics like in Star Trek, where all material scarcity and wants are gone, replicators can make anything needed, and holodecks can create any world imaginable?’ (Isohunt.com).
In late 2011 moderately large-scale protests broke out in Russia directed against election fraud in particular and, more generally, against the increasingly authoritarian regime of Vladimir Putin. (Putin remained the regime’s dominant figure even when he was taking his turn as prime minister and Dmitry Medvedev kept the presidential seat warm for him.) The protests continue, but on a smaller scale, despite repressive measures adopted after Putin’s inauguration for his third term as president.
It is clear what, or to be more precise, who, the protest movement is against. But what is it for? On May 18 a critical assessment of the movement appeared on the website of the Confederation of Revolutionary Anarcho-Syndicalists, the Russian section of the International Workers’Association (http://aitrus.info/node/2171). An English-language version can be found here (http://stephenshenfield.net/places/russia/current-politics).
