RECLAIM THE INITIATIVE!
WORKSHOPS
The main institutions of capitalist modernity in Europe (NATO, the EU, etc.) are among the main perpetrators of crises within as well as beyond the continent. Understanding and resisting contemporary militarism and imperialism in the context of Europe today is therefore an urgent task of internationalists and freedom-loving peoples around the world. This working group aims to be a space to discuss and organize around this task.
The global trend of rising right-wing nationalism, from India to the USA, from Turkey to Argentina, demands an understanding of the forces at play. How can we frame the European situation within this broader context? What can we learn from the past, and how can we overcome the legacy of 20th century fascism that still lingers in the European mentality and remains at the heart of the capitalist system.
There is still the illusion that states can be allied to limit the ecological destruction of capitalism, or that the development of new technologies will enable an ecological turnaround of the system. From these considerations emerges the need for ecological movements to develop their own alternative worldview to the capitalist one, capable of criticising its ideological, political and economic pillars.
Women are striving to uncover their hidden history, recognise other struggles, enrich their methods of resistance, and grow stronger and more conscious by relying on each other rather than the system. Women are crafting their future, seeking the intersections of multiple struggles, and learning how to defend themselves. In short, women are searching for answers to the question: How should women live?
Whether it is the resurgence of European militarism and the growing threat of war, the ecological catastrophe or the growing danger of fascism, as young people we are the first and most affected. Therefore, we have to think about the role of organised and autonomous youth in the revolutionary struggle.
In our workshop we will focus on the subject of construction of autonomous self-governing structures. How can we enable the self-sufficiency of society in the autonomous spaces we create? How can we effectively defend these autonomies against external attacks? How can we overcome the contradictions and challenges we face in our own movements? What forms of organization, initiatives and methods can we use to build a system from the bottom up?
In order to develop paradigms of empowerment through decentralization beyond liberal individualism and to create a digital democratic society, we need to establish a common understanding. For this, we should come together from different fields of knowledge to discuss how to build self-sovereign technical capacities, how to create secure open hardware capacities, tools to defend security and anonymity against nation-state surveillance, and share knowledge on mesh networking.
As the world watches in horror over the mounting death toll of oppressed people around the world especially civilians in Palestine, Kurdistan, Africa, Latin America and in Asia, the carnage in Gaza and Kurdistan gives us a ghastly window into the rapidly escalating crisis of global capitalism. Connecting the dots from the merciless Israeli destruction of Gaza and Turkish occupation in Kurdistan to this global crisis requires that we step back to bring into focus the big picture.
We must bring left, democratic socialist ideas back into the mainstream of society by organising democratic media from below. Political civil society – women, youth, workers and the oppressed – and their search for truth and discussions about a just and good life is our base for this. There are a large number of radical journalists, newspapers, free radio stations and new digital media technologies, and a long tradition of alternative media on which we can build for a much-needed renaissance of democratic media serving the self-organisation of society.