Black Flag 217 index
Italy - Striking Against the War
On Thursday 13 May, important sectors of workers took part in the strikeagainst the war organised by the rank and file unions. Over 100,000 peopledemonstrated in more than 40 cities, and 1 million workers went on strike.The strike was significant despite its explicitly political nature, the mediasilence, the scanty support of many political and union forces who havedeclared themselves against the war, the sabotage of public administrationsand employers' threats.
10,000 people, almost all of them workers, demonstrated in Milan. More than5,000 demonstrated in Rome, while thousands took to the streets in Florence,Turin, Bologna and other cities. In Florence, the police set about provokingdemonstrators, firing tear gas canisters at head height. In Turin theadministrations' sabotage was massive, and the media silence deafening.Despite this, the strike and demonstration were complete successes.
These facts allow us to conclude that:
- opposition to the war is broader than it seems, and seeks precise occasionsto manifest itself;
- the self-organisation of struggle is the principal way to construct aneffective opposition to war beyond Italy's borders, and to that which withinItaly is being waged against workers through taxes, the reduction of rightsand conditions, the limitation of political and union freedoms;
- this opposition must extend itself, strengthen itself, enlarge itself, andis in need of places to meet and further ground itself;
- the initiative must be kept and pursued with new mobilisations, decidedupon collectively.
For example, the Initiative Centre against the war in Turin called for acoordinated effort by all those forces which stand for:
- radical opposition to the war; - the refusal of all forms of nationalism; -international solidarity between workers; - rank and file direct action.
This was backed by the CUB (a ranka nd file union), the Base Committees andthe Anarchist Federation.