Voice of Revolution - Issue No: 3 (January 95)
26
November and 20 December:
IMPORTANT STEPS FOR A UNITED GENERAL STRIKE AND
RESISTANCE
OF THE WORKERS AND WORKING MASSES
In 1994 Turkey was the scene of
important workers' and labourers' actions and demonstrations. We
must highlight especially the May Day demonstrations, the
"general action" of 20 July, the Ankara march on 26
November and the public employees' actions of 20 December. Each
one of them, in their own right, has the characteristic of
"hitherto the biggest". Since we have already covered
the former two actions in the previous issues, we will point out
only the latter two:
The Ankara march on 26 November
Especially the second half of November was a period when the
workers' and labourers' actions intensified. Following the
demonstrations, walk-outs and marches of the miners,
railway workers, PTT workers and public employees, teachers and
the health workers and public employees, about one hundred
thousand workers marched to the parliament on 26 November. They
expressed their anger and demonstrated their desire to struggle.
This march was called by the Chairs' Councill of Türk-Is (the
chairs of the trades unions affiliated to Türk-Is, one of the
three confederations). Their aim was to limit the increasing
reaction of the workers and labourers against the offensives of
capital and to restrict their protest to some items in the draft
budget for 1995. Therefore, they did not carry out any serious
activities to mobilize the workers. They just wanted to pass over
it with a participation of as little as 5-10 thousand. However,
their plan did not work this time.
Despite the cold weather and snow, tens of thousands of workers,
coming from all over Turkey, went into the streets of Ankara and
chanted their slogans: "Capital, hear our voices; these are
the tramping of feet of the workers", "Down with the
IMF; an independent Turkey now", "The factories belong
to us; no one can sell them", "Long live our struggle
for jobs, bread and freedom", "Workers, unite and
take power", "Workers and public employees hand
in hand for the general strike", "We do not want a
taciturn society", "Down with trade union bosses",
"The government must resign", "Workers to the
parliament", "We do not want the American dogs to sell
state enterprises", "High prices, oppressions,
tortures...Here is the government", "No bread: no
peace", etc. The number of the banners with the slogan
"Jobs, bread, freedom" attracted attention.
Bayram Meral, the chair of Türk-Is who tried to stop the workers
who started to march on the parliament, chanting the slogan
"Workers to the parliament" was saved by police from
the wrath of the workers. The police who came to the traitor
trade unionists' rescue started to attack the workers fiercely
with their truncheons. While the union bosses disappeared by
cars, the workers were resisting the police and chanting slogans.
In the history of Türk-Is, its chair was for the first time
being protested attacked by an angry crowd and found shelter with
the watchdogs of the system. This incident itself demonstrated
the anger of the working class masses for the treacherous
attitude of the union bosses and bureaucrats. It also reflected
the magnitude of their anger and their desire and decisiveness to
struggle.
The 20 December Action of the Public Employees
On 20 December one million public
employees staged a walkout; hundreds of thousands of them went
into the streets, protesting against the government and chanting
slogans regarding their demands for democratic and economic
rights.The principle demand was "the right to a trade union
and the right to strike and be involved in collective
bargaining" ( In Turkey, the right of the public employees
to unionise, to strike and to collective bargaining is banned by
law. Owing to the struggles and actions of the last years the
right to form unions has been obtained de facto. Moreover, some
of these unions in various sectors attempted to initiate
collective bargaining. Although these unions are at present
recognized by the government, their right to strike and
collective bargaining is still halted by law. It is quite obvious
that a union without these rights does not have any effect in the
conditions of Turkey).
This action constituted the biggest public employees action in
the history of the republic [since the 1920s] in terms of the
participation and the willingness to put forward the in demands.
The threats of the government, ministers and the
"security" forces of dictatorship that "public
employees' action will not be allowed", "legal action
will be taken against the public employees who participate in the
action" did not work. Public employees all over the country
took part in the strikes. Some trade union branches which are in
favour of the struggle, especially the Platform of Union Branches
of Istanbul(*), supported these actions by walkouts and
participating in demonstrations. Another reason why the action on
20 December was much broader than previous ones was the
participation of the public employees in the Turkey-Kurdistan
regions where there is a state of emergency.
The demands of the public employees were expressed in these
slogans:
"Our right to unions with the right to strike and collective
bargaining cannot be hindered", "We demand collective
bargaining, not alms", "No to the state-controlled
unions", "No to the 1995 budget", "Down with
the IMF, an independent Turkey", "The workers and
public employees hand in hand for a general strike",
"Jobs, bread, freedom", etc.
Another point that needs to be highlighted is this: With the call
of the Platform of Union Branches of Istanbul the workers'
support to this action indicated to the developing possibility of
a united struggle of the working class and all other labouring
classes, mainly the public employees. The workers not only took
part in demonstrations but also called their children not to go
to schools in support of teachers' strike. That was a serious
indication that this unity could cover all fields of life and the
struggle.
_____________________
(*) PUBI consists of the trade union branches, trade
unionists, representatives of work places, etc. siding with the
class and the struggle. It is the biggest among other platforms
working in the main cities of Turkey.
- THE TASKS AND RESPONSIBILITIES TOWARDS A NEW PROCESS
The "accumulation" of the economical
and political problems of the ruling classes in Turkey, which has
gained a "chronical" character for some time, is on the
werge of a new process. Both the developments confessed and
announced by the ruling classes and the events of the last year
in terms of the workers' and labourers' movement
demonstrate that the process into which we have entered since
1991 as well as the policies accompanying with it have come to an
open non-functional point and that the year of 1995 can
inevitably be defined as a brink of a new process.
The political features that characterized the process after 1991
was determined by the aim of "overcoming the political
weakness", basing on the "compulsary agreement"
between the ruling classes, that is embodied with the coalition
of SHP-DYP (Social Democrat Populist Party and right wing True
Path Party). The fierce terror and tyranny that embodied in the
offensives on "the Kurdish national movement" and
"privatizations" carried out with the accompaniment of
cheuvenist incitement were the main offensives directed to the
workers and labourers. The aims such as "diminishing of
inflation", "resource supply to the economy", etc.
were kept on the agenda together with the political offensives.
What is the situation at present?
Briefly, the bourgeois reformism which is represented mainly by
SHP is completely collapsed. This party, far from having the
power "to be a crutch " for the ruling classes, needs
the support of them in order to survive. Among the bourgeois
parties there is no party which has a 25 per cent public support.
All of them are face to face with the danger of becoming
marginalized. The recovery within MHP (fascist Nationalist
Movement Party) is something to do with its open links with the
special terror establishments organized by the state.
The only hope for the ruling classes is the consolidation of
fascist terror institutions rather than the political parties and
the parliament. They, however, are not in a position of
preventing the developments of the struggle of the workers and
labouring classes from gaining new perspectives. The belief is
increasingly diminishing, not only to the political parties but
also gradually to the main state institutions.
Despite the government's partial succees in attacking the Kurdish
national movement, the Kurdish workers and labourers are, in a
more open form, gaining the character of becoming a
"renovated" element of the struggle. Another indication
of the political weakness in which the ruling classes are
engulfed is that they could not dare to renew the elections in
Kurdistan.
The offensives and demagogies which have been based, especially
for the last four years, on "the animosity towards the
Kurdish national movement" are developing towards a process
which reveals the ruling classes' weakness and their dilemmas.
This dilemma in the face of the Kurdish national question turns
into one of the indications of the servitudious submission of the
ruling classes of Turkey to imperialism. That exposes for a
gradually increasing masses the fact that the ruling classes are
deprived of the power "to solve the Kurdish national
question" and reduces the influence of the cheuvenist
demagogies.
The economical indicators, on the other hand, have a character
that gives a further certainty to the political weaknesses and
dilemmas. In 1994, a bigger resource than the budget of 909
trillion TL, in other words, an amount which is bigger 35 per
cent than the budget and 348 per cent than the public employees'
wages, was used for the repayment of debts. The budget is, in a
sense, morgaged. The CIA sources are defining the present
situation as "the gravest economical crisis of the last 15
years". According to offical figures the annual
proportion of poverty is 25 per cent. The bourgeois press
confesses and announces that in the history of the republic
(since 1920s) "such a big proportion of poverty in a year
has never been practised". In 1994 the economy diminished 5
per cent, which is the biggest proportion of the last 45-50
years. 150 per cent inflation rate constituted the highest rate
since 1920s.
It is obvious that the ruling classes of Turkey are undergoing
"political weakness" and "economical
bankruptcy" simultaneously. This is the characteristic
feature of "coming to the brink of a new process".
What does today's situation imply to?
First of all, it implies to an open and self-styled reflection of
the new turning point into which the imperialist system has
entered internationally.
Secondly, it demonstrates where the collaborator ruling classes
economically, militarily as well as politically submitting to
imperialism arrived at in the course of their history. It is a
product of our country's socio-economic development process and
of the historical accumulation of the contradictions and dilemmas
inherent in this process. Therefore, it implies to an open
concretize of the anti-imperialist and democratic demands of our
revolution. The principle demands of democratic revolution are
being placed into the agenda of the daily struggle, in a form
that their objective basis have ripened.
Thirdly, the present situation has unprecedently brought the
working class in our country to the forefront of the
anti-imperialist democratic revolution.
Forthly, it implies to the fact that the present contradictions
and dilemmas cannot be solved within the imperialist system. That
makes it indispensable to tend to socialism together with the
anti-imperialist-democratic character of revolution. It also
demonstrates that without aiming at tending to socialism the
democratic revolution has no chance of succeeding.
The features of the workers' and
labourers' struggle
Despite the partial success of the heavy
attacks and demagogy carried out since 1991, the workers' and
labouring classes' movement did not take the form of an open
retreat but gained a mass character as was the case in May Day
'94, 20 July, 26 November and 20 December actions. Turkey
simultaneously practised a fierce terror, murders, disappearances
and tortures together with the biggest mass workers' and
labourers' actions. In other words:
- The struggle continued to advance despite the unprecedented
terror.
- The workers' movement, through the "platforms" they
created despite the hegemony of the present trades unions,
advanced and strengthened their initiative and dynamics of
organising and struggling. The workers either forced the union
bureaucrats to take action and/or went into the streets despite
their attempts to stop them. The unity in action in terms of the
unions within the rank and file of the principle unions in the
main workers' centres grew stronger, being open to gaining an
open political character. This constituted one of the
characteristics of the workers' movement and concretized.
- The public employees' unions, especially in the main centres of
the struggle, mobilized the masses as many as two fold of their
actual members. They gained a concreat and actual power,
surpassing their present organisations.
- The present conditions are continuing to accumulate the
self-styled elements of struggle also within the ranks of the
producing peasants.
The developments in the workers' and labourers' movement
constituted both an open indication of the disillusionment with
the bourgeois political parties and the factors strengthening
this disillusionment. The tendency of such a disillusionment is
obviously not yet based on an open and indipendent political
character. It has not yet gained a socialist character. However,
it has the objective basis and also the conscious elements for
such a development. Such a leap today is inevitable especially in
terms of the working class movement. In other words, the class
movement, as a political movement, can realize a new leap in its
actions only by laying claim to the demands of all the labouring
classes, including the Kurdish national movement, for democracy
and freedom. That will also be an indication of the socialist
consciousness of the class.
The concreat situation of the workers' and labourers' movement
and its daily development trend, when taken into consideration
together with the economical bankruptcy and political weakness
that the collaborator ruling classes are in, demonstrate that it
has the objective basis to repulse all kind of terror and
offensives. That it strengthens the elements of consciousness and
advances the possibilities in organising practical actions.
Therefore, it makes the daily political tactics that will direct
the practical action of the working class and labouring classes
extraordinarily important.
At present, the organisation and consolidation of daily struggle
requires much more responsibility than it is in ordinary periods.
Therefore, it is very important to put forward concreat demands,
rather than irresponsible and abstract empty slogans, and the
forms and means of organisation and struggle which advance and
correspond to the concreat situation of the movement.
We must be aware of the tasks and
responsibilities of the day
The facts demonstrate that one cannot consider the class
struggle from the aspect of political groups, no matter it is a
big or small one. That degenerated narrow-minded approaches of
such circles, on the one hand, show their incapability and, on
the other, implies to a reactionary position, no matter behind
what rhetorics they are hiden, that pushes the movement backward
and causes destructions within the advanced sections. The
position of the petit-bourgeois circles is an example of this.
Our party bears the heavy responsibility of hundreds of thousands
of people, millions of people and it has to shoulder and realize
these tasks and responsibilities in organising and advancing the
practical actions of these millions.
The conscious and initiative of the masses and their might and
energy are obviously on the rise. The responsibility here is to
unify this with the most advanced demands and with the forms of
organisation and struggle which embrace the most advanced and the
broadest masses.
The demands for "jobs, bread, freedom" and
anti-imperialist-democratic revolution, which are expressed in
our programme and our platforms of struggle, must be appropriated
for the masses. The relation between every developing struggle
and the principle demands of revolution must be explained openly
and concreatly to the broadest masses.
Having been aware of the power of the mass movement, none of the
economical demands must be degraded. On the contrary, they must
sincerely be taken into account and considered as demands through
which the broad masses will realize their links with the
principle demands of revolution with their own experiences.
"The platform of trade union branches", which is a
product of the hitherto development of the class struggle, must
be advanced, strengthened and supported as a means of the
organisation and struggle of the broader masses.
The practical unity of action within the advanced sedtions of the
class must be attached, under any circumstances, a great
importance. One should struggle against the irresponsible
attitudes of the petit-bourgeois reformist currents and their
attempts to withdraw the movement into their traditional
reactionary platforms, in a way that will strengthen
self-confidence of the class. Such attitudes must be exposed
mercilesly before the advanced sections of the class.
The open revolutionary press that will serve the daily
development of the movement must be supported. We must also learn
to utilize effectively the possibilities created by this
press as a revolutioanry means for the class movement to gain a
political character.
In the present conditions, we must consider the open political
movement of the working class as one of the principle componants
and means of the party's activities and assist its development.
While doing this we can also re-build our party's basic
organisations and apparatus on a stronger basis and
guarantee the continuoity of the movement.
Our position within the movement of the working and labouring
classes and the tasks and responsibilities that we try to
shoulder with no hesitation constitute the sound basis of the
confidence, which has been verified by concreat developments, to
our party's ideological and theoretical basis and its practical,
political and organisational line.
We can clearly state that our party is on the brink of a new
period, too. That is a result of its historical basis and its
development. We will struggle to go forward and to succeed. No
matter what blows we face, the objective basis of the practical
movement and our party's position within this movement create the
possibilities of reorganising the struggle and strengthening it.
Obviously, we will always realize our responsibilities with the
hope of success.
THE KURDISH PEASANTRY AND THE IMPORTANCE OF THE STRUGGLE AGAINST BIG LAND OWNERS
Sedat Bucak, a Kurdish land owner and an MP in
the Turkish parliament, stated that he can shortly make the PKK
(Kurdistan Workers Party) ineffective by means of his private
armed men, "providing the security forces do not
interfere". With the 30 villages and one thousand armed men
that belong to him, Bucak is one of the big land owners who
oppose the PKK's proposals for a compromise.
The large Kurdish land owners are being backed by the Turkish
reactionary forces and imperialism. The Kurdish peasants are
being exploited and oppressed by the Kurdish land owners and
tribe chiefs as well as the fasicst dictatorship. With the
penetration of capitalism into the rural areas of Kurdistan, the
feudal system of land owners dissolved and weakened. In the mean
time, the power that this system was getting from the closed
village economy dispersed. However, its structure and position as
an exploiting ruling strata did not change. The Kurdish peasants
are suffering under the traditional oppression and exploitation
of large land owners.
The majority of the Kurdish peasants have either no land or just
a small holding. According to the last census, in the Southeast
region 2,5 million people (46% of the local population) live in
rural areas, and 80% of land in this region belong to large land
owners who constitute 0.5-2.6 % of the local population. The
government's operation to depopulate the Kurdish villages is,
obviously, strengthening the position of these large land owners,
who are collaborating with the state, in terms of land
accumulation.
Their political attitude is directly linked to their position in
the face of the means of production (land). They, therefore,
preserve their class interests by taking part in the class
alliance of the Turkish and Kurdish reactionary forces. They are
aware of the potential danger posed by the peasants who have no
lands and who constitute 21-45 % of the rural population in the
Southeast. Although the platform of the Kurdish national movement
(PKK) reject the peasants' demands for land, the big land owners
are worried about the possibility that the peasants may, in
the course of developments, occupy their lands. They, therefore,
try to prevent any possible development from the beginning.
The poor peasants, those with either no land or small holdings,
constitute the main social base of the struggle in Kurdistan
against the fascist national oppression. Despite the fact that
the PKK's bourgeois-reformist platform excludes the peasants'
demand for land, the large Kurdish land owners are opposed to the
national movement, as they take into account the fact that
their class interests contradict with the possibility of the
national movement expanding into a workers-peasants revolution. A
movement with just national demands, on the other hand, is not
antagonistic to their interests, as was the case in many other
countries, and according to the conditions and balance of
power, they do not refrain from taking the leadership of
such a movement.
The dictatorship's attacks on the Kurdish people is based on the
Kurdish reactionary forces, to such an extent that the Turkish
government closes its eyes to the establishment of local tribal
armies by the Kurdish land owners, even though that seems
"contradictory" with the sovereignity of the state.
Moreover, it equips them with modern arms, and uses them against
the Kurdish peasants. The paid army of 60 thousand village guards
was founded by the alliance between the Turkish and Kurdish
rectionary forces. The armed tribal forces of the Kurdish land
owners constitute an additional force on which the government is
basing its attacks on the Kurdish national movement.
Apart from the fact that Kurdistan as a whole is under siege, 80
% of the arable land is in the hands of the big land owners and
the state. While the Kurdish bourgeois-feudal reactionary forces
own tens of villages, extensive lands and private armed forces,
hundreds of thousands of peasants live in poverty, with the
status of slave. Having manipulated the assaults on the Kurdish
people, these war lords have been expanding their lands and
strengthening their position. The government eliminated the land
owners who were weak or did not want to collaborate through
exiles, executions, etc. The position of the collaborators,
however, has been consolidated.
It is claimed that the GAP project (Southeast project; a complex
of dams and irrigation tunnels) will initiate a "new"
and "modern" agriculture and "lifestyle" in
Kurdistan. However, the Kurdish peasants cannot benefit from this
project at all, as all the lands there have already been
subdivided by foreign or national monopolies and their
collaborators, the Kurdish bourgeoisie and land owners. The
Kurdish peasants, at best, will work there as paid slaves. Even
if that implies to "a new lifestyle", in a sense that
the peasants will enter into the process of becoming workers and
the economic infra-structure for the expansion of the struggle
for national freedom will ripen towards class emancipation and
social revolution, the capitalist-feudal oppression and
exploitation on peasants and agricultual workers will continue
and increase "absolutely".
Unless the land owners' system, which constitutes the social
basis for imperialist exploitation and national slavery, is
liquidated, freedom cannot be gained in Kurdistan. A fundamental
change in the lives of the Kurdish labouring peasants and a true
national freedom can only be realized by a class struggle against
imperialism and both the Turkish and Kurdish reactionary forces.
It is also necessary to combine the struggle for land and freedom
with the working class' struggle for socialism. It is obvious
that political movements like the PKK, which is concerned
"not to divide the national forces" and pushes back the
revolutionary peasants' movement as well as their demand for
land, block the Kurdish struggle for freedom and tie it to the
policies of the ruling classes, via the reformist platform of the
Kurdish bourgeoisie. So long as the capitalist and feudal
oppression and exploitation goes on, there will be no change in
peasants' lives. The emancipation of the Kurdish labouring
peasants, therefore, lies in the eradication of imperialist
oppression and exploitation, the bourgeoisie and big land owners.
Such a line of struggle can be advanced by the working
class of Kurdistan, led by the class conscious workers. The
expansion of the struggle for national freedom to a
workers-peasants' revolution can be accomplished through a line
of struggle that targets also the Kurdish rectionary forces and
addresses the peasants' demands for land. The only guarantee for
that is for the proletariat, as an independent political force,
to carry its class character to the movement and to form unions
with the peasants, especially the poor and middle strata
peasants, that can advance their common interests and demands.
The Kurdish working class, undoubtedly, has a great
responsibility. Their attitude, as a vanguard and revolutionary
class, is the principle social and political factor that will
determine the direction of the developments in Kurdistan.
Therefore, the class conscious Kurdish workers and Kurdish
Marxists bear an immense task in participating in the struggle of
the peasantry, mainly the peasants who have no land or
small holdings, against the fascist occupier, imperialism and the
exploitaion and repression of the large land owners, showing them
that their interests require unity and solidarity with the
working class and the peoples of Turkey, assisting them to
clarify their objectives of struggle, and to comprehend the
importance of organised struggle, and combining the work within
the urban labourers with the one in peasantry. The objective
conditions for organising a workers-peasants' movement are
more ripe today. The question is whether the class conscious
workers and communists will be able to utilize this situation in
advancing the struggle of the workers and labourers for freedom
and socialism.
(This article is translated from the 45th issue of Denge
Þore_'li Kurdistan - the Voice of Revolution in Kurdistan-, the
organ of the TDKP Kurdistan Organisation, dated November 1994. It
has been illegaly published and distributed for four years. The
circulation of this monthly paper is 12-15 thousand.)
THE OFFENSIVES DIRECTED AT THE PARTY WORK AND HOW WE MUST RESPOND
Despite all its shortcomings and weaknesses,
the working class is advancing to the centre of social struggle
and development. In this process our party is taking further
steps towards becoming a political and material force and focus
within all fields of the struggle in general, and especially in
the factories and workplaces where it is carrying out its
activities in accordance with its political and organisational
line and tactics. Our party's calls for and slogans of struggle
are being adopted by large working class masses.
The situation of the workers' movement and of our party within
this movement is also giving rise to the mobilization of the
forces of counter-revolution and the dictaorship. The
dictatorship is directing wider and more organized offensives
than ever on the workers' movement, our party and its
organisation. Our party, its organisation, cadres and militants
carrying out activities at all levels must consider these attacks
as a part of the offensive directed at the workers'
movement, its informed sections and its organisations.
Having pointed out this, we can now speak about the offensive of
the counter-revolutionary forces and the attitude that the party
organisations, its cadres and militants should have to these
offensives. We can also speak of the elimination of the
weaknesses and shortcomings that appear in our daily struggle and
weaken both our activities and our party organisation.
Having centralized the information that they obtained from the
blows they struck on our party so far in different fields and at
different levels, the dictatorship and the political police are
implementing broader and more organized offensives on our party.
These offensives can result in restricting our work and even
temporarily making our organisations non-functional.
Are these blows of the bourgeoisie and of the political police,
and their offensives on our party preventable? Of course, they
are. Almost none of the blows that we have faced so far were
inevitable. Almost all of them took place not because the police
were skilled and professional, but as a result of our
organisations' and cadres' clumsiness and irresponsible
attitudes, and sometimes because of violations of the basic rules
of underground activities.
The following examples give an idea about why and how these
attacks took place which resulted in restricting our activities,
and whether they were preventable or not: One comrade went to see
another one who was in charge while the police were following
him. Another comrade had on him and at home uncoded, open phone
numbers and other information about the people with whom he had
contacts and caused them to be found by the police. Some comrades
in the same field went to a meeting together while the police
were after them, etc.
In our country, which deprives us of political freedom and where
there is a fascist dictatorship, it is very likely to come across
with the pursuit, attacks and blows of the dictatorship and of
the political police. The bourgeoisie attacks in order to protect
its power from the working class and their organisations which
constitute a threat to it. In other words, it attacks in order to
destroy the work, struggle and organisations directed against its
power. The special organisations of the dictatorship such as
political police, M‹T (National Intelligence Agency),
counter-guerrilla force, etc. are all founded and equipped for
that end.
Therefore, it is necessary and obligatory that we must learn
lessons from our mistakes and from the positive and negative
things of the past so that we can, in the future, face the tasks
and responsibilities that are required for the development of the
workers' movement and advance and strengthen the
revolutionary-communist work by preventing the attacks of the
dictatorship, which will possibly intensify. We must also develop
our experiences in the struggle against the political police.
We may come face to face with new, more intense and stronger
attacks in the struggle for the revolution and socialism.
However, as a party which is able to continue its struggle and
its communist activity under any circumstances, we can disrupt
the dictatorship's and the political police's offensive which
result in restrictions and disruption to our work, if we
consolidate and advance our skills to become an organisation of
professionals.
For this reason, in consolidating and strengthening underground
and illegal work, we must place it into the centre of our
understanding that we are a party which does not have any
interests other than the short and long term interests of the
working class and whose reason for existence is the working
class' cause of revolution, socialism and a society where there
are no classes. We must eliminate traces of an outlook of a
self-serving organisation, as it is a narrow petit-bourgeois
understanding isolated from the masses and the mass movement. For
them, organisation and illegal activities are not a means but an
end.
In our basic party documents and periodicals we explain our line
and understanding of illegal organisation and work. When carrying
out illegal activities, it is not enough to just accept that
certain technical rules and measures should be obeyed. On the
contrary, we must understand that an illegal action that is
linked to the class and its movement, as an organisation of the
conscious sections of the class, takes its power and
aspirations from the class and its movement. An illegal
action is strengthened by the unification of the people who
are devoted to communism, with the new forces of the working
class and of the masses that have begun to act and struggle. Only
with such an understanding can the technical rules and measures
have a function of protecting illegal action and work, preventing
attacks and minimising damage.
In other words, with all its problems, the workers' movement must
be the chief item on our agenda. All party organisations and
cadres that take up positions and work must agree with this
perspective, with the factories where the heart of the workers'
movement beats, and with the tasks required for the development
of the movement. The party's approach to the workers' movement
must have such a perspective in order to penetrate the movement;
forge links with the conscious workers and the new forces that
have been awakened and advanced by the movement; develope and
broaden existing links and organise them as forces of socialism,
and of the party; and realize the task and the responsibility to
assist the working class to become a class for itself,
directly aiming the power, and the movement to be a movement for
themselves.
Illegal action and the illegal work can be consolidated by such a
position, and by the possibilities created by that work. In the
mean time, the cadres who are educated by the same work and are
devoted to the cause of revolution and communism constitute the
forces that will strengthen illegal work. A party, which is
organised with the conscious sections of the class, as an
organisation of professionals, has wide links with the working
class masses, can continue to carry out its work and its struggle
under any circumstances.
All this is said not because the rules of illegal work are being
degraded, but to place them in the correct context. In such
activities rules and measures are necessary and they are to be
obeyed carefully. On the other hand, political and organisational
developments must be open to new styles of work.
If we look at the attacks we have faced so far and their
consequences we can say that almost none of these blows was
caused by the expansion of the links with the workers' movement
or the links we built up in the factories. (Some narrow,
petit-bourgeois organisations which are self-serving consider the
blows they had to their top ranks were an "inevitable result
of the expansion of the links with the working class and
with the masses". Such an evaluation is an open expression
of the petit-bourgeois marginal position.)
On the contrary, we can say that almost all the blows were the
results of the organisation (and illegal work) not being
strengthened by new forces and possibilities and being bound by
limited links with the work class; lack of attention in
commisioning in technical apparatus; relations among the cadres
becoming the most time consuming occupation; the increase of
unnecessary meetings; the organisational knowledge being
centralized in leading organs; weak supervision; and relaxation
(especially if no blow occured for a while) in the
application of the rules and working practices governing illegal
activities.
As a conclusion, it is obvious that in the forthcoming period,
the workers' movement will need more than ever, the assistance
and the guidance of our party in finding its own way in every
stage of its development (ebbs, flows or stagnation) because
of its structural shortcomings (its spontaneity and the
majority of the advanced workers not being organised in the
party), despite the expansion of its demands and of the increase
of the forces taking part in this movement. For this reason, our
party is face to face with the realization of the tasks and
responsibilities of being the only communist focus within the
workers' movement. It also has to demonstrate the skill and the
energy to meet the requirements of the development of the
movement.
The realization of these tasks and responsibilities lies on the
advance of the struggle against the understandings, tendencies
and habits that prevent us from going forward. That involves an
uncompromising attitude towards the following disorders:
indifference to the party's duties and its instructions, the
tendency of deviation to right or left at the ebbs and flows of
the movement, liberal and unconcern attitude towards the mistakes
and shortcomings, relaxed attitudes to the security of the party,
etc. It also involves purifying the party, without hesitation,
from those who insist on this kind of disorders.
We must be aware of the tasks and responsibilities put onto our
shoulders by the development of the workers' movement, the
sincere orientation of our party to the class and its movement
and by the work it is carrying out. With this conscious we must
reconsider our positions within the class and its movement and
rearrange them in a form that takes as a basis the big factories
and workplaces in which the heart of the movement beats.
In the party and in every field of the work we must make the
professional work dominant. We must change the existing
understanding of "professionality" and the situation
imposed by the amateurs who claim to be professional and become a
true organisation of professional.
We must benefit from all the open/semi-open (legal/semi-legal)
possibilities created and advanced by the development of the
movement. We should not waste even very small possibilities that
might contribute to this development. We must ensure a correct
combination of open/semi-open work and illegal work in a way that
will advance and consolidate each other. We must adopt our
party's positions, means and possibilities in both field of work
and utilize them in a way that will strengthen the movement and
our work.
In consolidating illegal organisation and work we must not allow
any relaxity, ensure a comradely reliance and the tightest
dyscipline in creating the attitude of complying with the rules
in accordance with this reliance.
As the revolutionary communist party of the working class, we are
facing the tasks and responsibilities of which realization is an
absolute inevitability. Our party, our organisations, cadres,
militants and supporters have the ideological and political base,
the power and possibilities to cope with these hard tasks and
responsibilities.
(This article is translated from the 179th issue of Devrimin
Sesi, the central organ of the TDKP, dated September 1994)
LET US ESCALATE THE STRUGGLE AGAINST FASCIST TERROR, EXECUTIONS AND DISAPPEARANCES!
While the economic offensive which came into
operation with the 5 April decrees is being implemented quickly,
the dictatorship is getting ready to intensify these offensives
in 1995. In the mean time, the political terror of the
dictatorship is escalating.
The dictatorship is intensifying and expanding its terror in
Kurdistan by waging a total assault on Dersim that it could not
intimidate so far, by burning down and emptying villages,
detentions, tortures and murders by "unknown
perpetrators".
The prisoners in Diyarbak›r prisons were attacked with arms;
Ramazan Öztürk was shot dead and 70 prisoners were wounded as a
result. Some of the prisoners who resisted were transferred to
Antep prison. During the journey two prisoners
"disappeared". In prisons hunger strikes, some to
death, against these attacks and this oppression are going on.
The attacks on the press and mass organisations are also
increasing. Every day a revolutionary press organ's building or
centre is being raided, the people working there are being
detained and newspapers and magazines are being confiscated.
Every day a mass organisation is being closd down.
Lawyers, who, according to the hypocrite bourgeois laws,
constitute, one of the most important branches of the
judiciary system, are being detained unlawfully, questioned under
torture, arrested or even killed in the middle of the streets.
Another section of the society on which the offensives are
escalating is the advanced sections of the working class and the
trade unionists who are in favour of the struggle. It first
started with the imprisonment of Münir Ceylan and continued with
Atilay Ayçin's, the general chairman of Hava-‹_ (Airport
Workers' Union). In the previous months, the opening of the
‹zmir Fair turned into a demonstration where the working
class' demands were chanted. On the same night, the trade union
leaders who were on duty during the day were detained by the
mid-night operations of the terror teams. Hasan Biber, who was
detained by the same method, was arrested later. The general
chairman of TÜMT‹S (Transport Workers' Union) was taken to
court.
The revolutionaries, communists and the Kurdish labourers are
increasingly being detained all over Turkey. One can hear every
day news about deaths under torture, "disappearances"
under detention and murders by "unknown perpetrators".
According to the news reached to the Human Rights Association,
about one thousand people were detained in September. 27 people
were killed by torture and extrajudicial executions and 17 people
were murdered by "unknown perpetrators". The number of
people who "disappeared" in detention is 34. These
figures demonstrate the size of the on-going wave of offensive
and terror.
The dictatorship's offensives on our party is also intensifying
for they are getting ready for new economic offensives directed
at workers and labourers. During their expedition to Dersim, on
21 September, Mahsuni Kanar and Mehmet Uluta_, two party
militants, were fired at openly and killed brutally in order to
intimidate the poor Kurdish peasants.
On 12 September comrade Kenan Bilgin was detained as a result of
the operations on our party organisation in Ankara and was
"disappeared". From the beginning the police denied his
detention. However, the witnesses who were in detention in the
same period stated that they saw comrade Kenan, weeks after his
detention date, shouting "they want to eliminate me".
All these prove the fact that comrade Kenan was not suddenly
killed as a result of torture, but that, as part of a plan, he
was selected as a special target and subjected to heavy and
systematic torture in order to get information about his comrades
and his organisation.
It is not a conincidence that the dictatorship selected comrade
Kenan as a target. He was a Kurdish communist and a party worker
who emerged from the hard struggles of the Kurdish people and
confronted the tortures and prisons of the dictatorship
courageously. He did not show any sign of hesitation in
shouldering the heavy and complex tasks of the revolution.
Through this wave of terror, the dictatorship is aiming at
smashing the communists and revolutionaries and the vanguard
sections of the working class and popular movement, and
intimidating the working class, public employees and all
labourers. Thus, it is trying to pave the way for the new
economic offensives that it is preparing to implement in the
forthcoming period.
The working class and the public employees must realize that this
wave of offensives is a part of the preparations for implementing
the methods of open terror against the struggles for economic and
trade union rights. This open terror involves, in Rahmi Koç's (a
big businessman) words, the attacks with "bazookas" on
the resistance against privatization.
The immediate task for workers, public employees and the youth is
to confront these offensives and to consider the struggle against
the offensives and tortures on the informed sections of the
working class and of labourers, trade unions, revolutionary and
communist forces, Kurdish people and prisoners, as a part
of the daily struggle for "jobs, bread and
freedom".
The only thing that will put an end to this political terror will
be the working class and all labourers and youth, under its
leadership, escalating a united struggle for economic demands and
political democracy. This fact, however, does not exclude the
necessity for organising a special struggle against the attacks
and arrests in the trade unions, widespread detentions, murders
and disappearances under torture, street executions and the
attacks on prisoners.
One should take as example the struggle in the neighbourhood of
Gaziosmanpasa in Istanbul against the murder of Bayram Duran
under torture (He was just an ordinary labourer who the police
detained as they thought he was someone they were looking for).
This type of struggle should be initiated and expanded to the
schools and workplaces.
The struggle against torture, detention and the increasing
political terror must be turned into the means for
developing the political education of the workers and
labourers and their movement into the struggle for political
democracy. There lies the preparation of the movement for the
forthcoming hard resistance and the confrontation of these
attacks.
(This article is summarized from the 182nd issue of Devrimin
Sesi, the central organ of the TDKP, dated November 1994.)
The report of Human Rights Association
of Turkey on the
human rights violations between January '94 - August '94
Deaths as a result of torture in custody
and extrajudicial executions
............................. : 212
Allegations of disappearances in custody ......... : 202
Trade unions and associations raided ............... : 118
Murders by "unknown
perpetrators"................ : 230
Villages burnt down and destroyed................... :
1,254
Publications confiscated
................................. : 287
Total sentences given for convictions ..............
: 236 years,
Total of fines levied
.......................................... : 55.9 bn TL
Possible from cases pending
........................... : 528 years; 330.8 bn TL
Journalists, publishers, writers, scientists,
artists and trade unionists imprisoned ............... :
100
Disappearances in police custody
1980-1990 : 13
1991
: 4
1992
: 8
1993
: 23
1994
: 8, allegations : 239
(Source: Human Rights Association's press release on 1
December.)
ON THE COMMODITY CHARACTER OF FETISH
(Evrensel Kültür -Universal Culture- is a
monthly periodical and has been published since December 1991. It
is one of the most circulated cultural and arts magazines,
including the bourgeois ones. Evrensel Kültür states that
"it begun to be published, having seen arts and culture as a
field of the ideological struggle between the classes and known
that this fact has been valid throughout history. Its principle
objective is to re-establish at a higher level the link between
the revolutionary politics and the revolutionary arts." The
following article, written by Ayd›n Çubukçu, the editor of
Evrensel Kültür, is translated from the December 1993 issue.)
In dictionary, the meaning of fetish is "an object to be
worshiped". In primitive society fetish is mostly a product
of man; an idol, a totem. However, fetish, irrespective of its
form, is an object or being from which man expects to obtain the
benefits beyond his might or his possibilities. The principle
character of fetish is that it has taken on the function of
realizing the deeds that are beyond man's might and his
possibilities.
On the other hand, fetish, as a produced article, can also be
interpreted as a symbol of man's respect to his labour and the
production he created. Thus, fetish can be considered as an
indication of the primitive man having realized that he could
survive before the nature only with his own deeds and that he
could maintain his existence only with the mights that he
creates. If so, fetish is, on the one hand, a production of
weakness and on the other it also implies, in a hidden form, to
demonstration of power, to a brag and pride.
According to Marx, when the article is produced by labour in the
condition where it is no longer an article that meets only the
requirements of its producer and becomes a commodity, it gaines a
different character of fetish through another mediation. In
capitalist society, man works not only for himself but also for
others and his labour has a social character. Thus, the
production has found its condition of existence in its
circulation in the market, has become independent from the
consciousness and will of its producer and gained a character
which dominates him. Marx speaks of the old Germens measuring the
land by one day's crop. The value of land was being measured by
its crop, in other words, by the labour expended on it. Whereas,
in the capitalist conditions, the articles are no longer measured
by another production: the equivalent of labour was no longer
another labour. Money, which is the general equivalence, has
equited all labours and the relations between people has been
replaced by other articles that do not represent man indirectly.
On Rembrantd's painting called "the moneylender" we see
an old moneylender whose whole world consists of bonds, account
books and scales for weighing gold. This moneylender, who
witholds the candle light from the viewer and holds it as a light
of a special world that needs to be illuminated and considered
important, is like a new time's magician who controls all
mysterious powers of the "new world".
In Capital, the chapter "The Fetishism of Commodities and
the Secret Thereof" starts as following:
"A commodity appears, at first sight, a very trivial thing,
and easily understood. Its analysis shows that it is, in reality,
a very queer thing, abounding in metaphysical subtleties and
theological niceties."
The reason for this is the social character of the man's labour
that commodity involves. When labour passes beyond the production
of an article for personel requirements and starts producing for
other's requirements, too, the mutual relations between the
producers are turned into the form of mutual relations between
products-commodities. In other words, the relations between men
have turned into that between commodities. "There it is a
definite social relation between men, that assumes, in their
eyes, the fantastic form of a relation between things."
The fantastic form of a relation... In order to express the
alteration of man, Marx now gives importance to the concept of
fetish-commodity instead of alienation that he used very often in
his early writings. Fetish, as a being which causes alienation,
demonstrates its impact at the moment it plunges the producer
into a fantastic relation with his product.
It is, at the same time, this moment that gives the opportunity
to capitalism of loading a character of commodity onto the
article that has a character of fetish and of putting it on the
market.
The primitive man could never think of selling his fetish. Before
capitalism, it could not be the subject of discussion to worship
an ordianry object that can be sold or purchased in the market or
to lay the functions that are beyond man's might and his
possibilities onto an object which can be purchased by money. The
character of fetish that the commodity has gained made the
circualtion of fetish as a commodity not odd. However, apart from
the market, there was another source resulting from the general
life-style of capitalism: In accordance with capitalism's having
itself considered to be an "immortal" thing, the man's
feeling that he is bound to the world of dream, of genies,
spirits and religions.
"The form of wood, for instance, is altered, by making a
table out of it. Yet, for all that, the table continues to be
that common, every-day thing, wood. But so soon as it steps forth
as a commodity, it is changed into something transcendent. It not
only stands with its feet on the ground, but, in relation to all
other commodities, it stands on its head, and evolves out of its
wooden brain grotesque ideas, far more wonderful than
'table-turning' ever was." In the German edition of Capital,
this pargraph goes on as following: "While the whole
remaining world seems standing still, it is recalled that China
and the tables started dancing in order to encourage
others."
In this paragraph, which is full of very important discoveries,
Marx establishes the relations between commodities and fetish at
two levels: The first one is related to the fact that directly
the article of labour starts to have a power of social impact
when it has turned into a commodity. The wood, which has changed
into the form of table, is as if it were a being which has a
thinking brain. The second one is related to the fact that
the fetish character of commodity appears in the form of a new
effect by passing through another mediation,
ideological-metaphysical mediation. The words
"table-turning" and "starting to dance with
China" are not only metaphors; they also point to the social
source of the excessive adiction to fetish and of the
metaphysical orientations. In Europe, following the defeat of
1848-49 revolutions, the sessions to call spirits and of
"table-turning" became widespread, especiallket.y
within the aristocrat and bourgeois circles. Whereas in China,
the great anti-feudal revolution of Taiping was going on. At a
time millions of peasants were revolting in China for freedom,
what left for Europe of which revolution had been defeated was to
gather around the tables which were walked by spirits.
We have witnessed, in Turkey, too, the fact that following the
defeated revolutions, a massive tendency arouse towards
metaphysics and its various forms, astrology, parapsychology and
mysterious things like augury, incantation, etc.
Following 12 March [coup in 1971], the book called "The Cars
of the Gods" reached to a circulation probably as many as
"Speared Catechism". This charlatan book, which asserts
that the history of humanity had been created by the creatures
came from the space, and which tries to express the world of
archeology -which is, in itself, already fascinating with an
unknown, was read with a belief that its content was
"expressing everything" by the people who lost their
confidence in their own power and sarted to seek for the
realization of the hope for a social change elsewhere from their
own power. The quick recovery of popular opposition, however, put
an end to the rush of similar publications to "The Cars of
the Gods". The purchase of imitated books diminished and
their impacts eradicated.
From the aspect of such publications and relations, one can say
that 12 September [coup in 1980] defeated in a more fundamental
way the hope for a social change. This state of psychology,
combined with the bombardment of the state and all reactionary
focuses, paved the way to fortune-telling, sorcery, etc. ,
finding a widespread market. Countless astrology publications,
together with the increasing religious ones, without paying any
attention to the Islamic assertion about the so-called
contradictions between them, started to reach to the same
purchaser. Fetish, after all, has become the commodity of a
market where there is a grand circulation of money. Everything
that is a product of the alienation of man to himself was, again
and again, put into circulation as a source reinforcing this
alienation.
All contemporary opinion polls suggest to pessimism and despair
in all sections of the society. The people is disillusioned with
the political parties and has no trust in anybody regarding the
ruling of the country. The elimination of inflation, better
living standards, etc. seem to be the aims that cannot be
reached. The people is persuaded that they are facing such
problems that they cannot overcome by their own forces and
possibilities. In other words, the period in which we live is a
heaven for the fetishes of all kinds.
The concept of fetish has gained a new meaning in the hands of
Freud, the founder of psychoanalisis. He described individuals'
sexual interests and desires, tending to an inanimate object or
the non-sexual parts of human body, as a deviation and called it
"fetishism". The capitalist market succeeded, in these
conditions, in transforming the excessive interest to sexuality,
another indication of social defeat, into a commodity. Following
12 September [1980] the magazines of the international marketing
experts of woman's sexuality began to be published in Turkey,
too. The principle monopolies like Playboy, Penthaus,etc. got the
right to be published in Turkey. They were followed by the
publications produced by second hand. Countless magazines,
brochures and "novels" filled up bookshops and
newsagents. Together with the books such as "Minyeli
Abdullah" [a religious book], "Your Star and Your
Fate", and the magazines like
"S›z›nt›", "Bilinmeyen"
[religious, idealist magazines], etc., which tried to send
science, as a field of unknown things, next to magic, religion
and scourcy, they benefited from the same "state of
freedom" and were presented to the purchaser. Woman had been
turned into a sexual commodity and that, in the end, came to them
being marketed in the form of a commodity as a fetish in a
Freudist sense.
There is a discomposing similarity between the photograph of a
woman behind a mask made up of pearls, quite likely fake ones,
and the face of the woman on the picture called Li II made by
Giger, an American artist. Giger is from the American '68
[generation]. He, during the world scale retreat of a
revolutionary attempt, started to make similar paintings and took
up the work of reflecting the world of debris and of corruption
in which death, mechanism and sexuality are combined. Giger, who
is one of the main creators of the famous film called
"Alien", can be defined as a story-teller of a world in
which all meanings and impacts of the concept of fetish are
countless times being re-produced within themselves, are created
one from anotherand turned into each other. However, in his
paintings, we can see not only the movement of the concept of
fetish, but also the process in which fetish turns into a
commodity as well as the characters of the type of the purchaser
who wanders in the market of fetish that became a commodity. In
this world which constitutes a whole with its purchaser and
seller, whether the identity of woman is adorned with pearls or
presented to us as a body decaying in the grave of rusty
machines, it reflects a single essence as the woman who is made a
commodity in the form of sexual fetish.
In the capitalist market, fetish has lost all its interesting and
respected characters that it had in the primitive world and is
wandering as his very self of the alienation of man to himself.
The primitive fetish, even though in a hidden way, implied to
demonstration of power as well as a strut and pride. Fetish in
the form of commodity, however, represents an inferiority complex
as well as schizophrenic growing apart. Man believed, through
primitive fetish, that he could affect the forces of the nature
which were against him and change the world in a beneficial way
to himself. Whereas, through all contemporary fetishes which have
been turned into commodities, man embraces all the forces that
are against him and shows these idols as a proof of the
unchangability of the world.
NEWS UPDATE: "OZGUR
ULKE" WAS BOMBED
The bombing of
"Özgür Ülke", a pro-Kurdish daily newspaper, is
another striking example of the fascist dictatorship's attacks on
the opposition press. On 2nd December '94, bombs planted in
Özgür Ülke's three offices, two of them in Istanbul and one in
Ankara, exploded almost at the same time, especially damaging its
central office in Istanbul, killing one person working for the
newspaper and wounding many others. No one has any doubt,
including the bourgeois press, that it was done by the
dictatorship's counter-guerrilla organisation. The National
Security Council met on 6 January '95 passing new resolutions
against the "opposition press" and others. According to
these resolutions the offensives on the "opposition
press" will be increased. However, in order to mislead
public opinion, these offensives will be organised without
banning them directly. Instead, the papers will be confiscated in
the printing house, before their distribution, as was the case
with Özgür Ülke's issues on 7th and 8th January.
"Gençli¤in Sesi", a Marxist-Leninist magazine for the
youth, was temporarily banned for a month last December by a
verdict of State Security Court.
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