Anarchy and a Cool Head
Especifismo as the Spearhead

“Revolutions without theory do not progress. We, the ‘Friends of Durruti,’ have outlined our thinking, which may be modified as necessary during major social upheavals, but which revolves around two essential and unavoidable points: a program and rifles.”[1]

Anarchist organizations adhering to the especifista strategy have held our first Especifista Anarchism Encounter. This has been the next step in a journey of self-criticism and reformulation that we began some time ago, separated but within the same context, leading us to affirm especifismo as the framework guiding the revolution we pursue. On this occasion, we want, as militants, to highlight the qualitative contributions that the especifista strategy offers to the broader class struggle. This means explaining the reasons why we organize in this way and not another, as we have a militant commitment to our class that drives us to seek its abolition, as part of the broader abolition of the class system.

The text is divided into four parts plus this introduction. We will begin by explaining that, as revolutionaries, our actions are guided by the assessment of past experiences. We will then explain the concept of dual militancy, a fundamental part of especifismo. In the third section, we develop the concept of especifista organization, and finally, we conclude with the relationship between the especifista organization and strategy.

Before beginning the article, we find it useful to explain that when we speak of the working class, we understand it in its relationship, as a class and not as individuals, to the system that organizes the production and reproduction of our way of life in its entirety. In other words, the working class cannot be understood without comprehending the totality of concrete forms of oppression experienced in terms of gender, ethnicity, etc. This leads us to scientifically analyze reality to uncover the material basis generating the specific conditions in which racist, misogynistic, etc., oppression manifests.

1 — Assessment as a Touchstone

We begin by reaffirming that we adhere to the especifista strategy not out of chance, aesthetic attraction, or surrounding circumstances, but because we believe that “the assessment of one’s own experience is the hallmark of a revolutionary movement,” as stated in Senda[2]. If we adopt the especifista strategy and not another, it is due to our assessment of the previous political cycle, which we aim to surpass to avoid repeating the same mistakes and to overcome the burdens of our previous organizational methods. This past cycle refers specifically to the cycle of struggles that began around 2008 with the bursting of the housing bubble, gained mass character with the 15M movement, and began to wane after the 2014 Dignity Marches and the 2017 Catalan independence process, becoming very weakened after the 2020 COVID lockdown.

This assessment is made in three areas: our specific organizational experience, the current state of class struggle within the Spanish state, and the general state of international class struggle[3].

First, we adopt the especifista organization to overcome the limitations of insurrectionary, autonomist, and synthesist forms within anarchism[4]. At the same time, we position anarchism as the seed of revolution and the abolition of class society.

Second, we adopt especifismo to reject the cross-class strategy of grassroots organizations born from the 15M and national liberation movements. That is, we organize within the especifista organization and movements of our class to fight for the political independence of the working class.

We understand the political independence of the working class (or class independence) as its ability to maintain its own strategy in the class struggle, without being directed by or acting in favor of its enemy’s programs. We oppose class independence to cross-classism, which is the declared strategy of class collaboration for strength accumulation and has dominated the last political cycle. The assertion of class independence is inseparable from what anarchists mean by the unity of means and ends.

Third, historical analysis of the international class struggle leads us to affirm the necessity of a specific organization — a politically defined organization of anarchists sharing a collectively agreed program. This affirmation does not come from mechanically copying the self-critiques that followed revolutionary defeats like the Paris Commune, the Free Territory of Ukraine, Spain in 1936, or the FAU in the 1970s, but from a contextual analysis of their experiences. This allows us to draw valuable lessons applicable to the present. Therefore, we do not uncritically adopt texts like The Organizational Platform of the General Union of Anarchists, COPEI[5], or Friends of Durruti publications in Amigo del Pueblo. An example of this assessment, especially in historical cataloging through theory-practice correlation in global anarchist movements, is Bandera Negra by Felipe Corrêa.

This assessment is being published in our dissemination outlet, Regeneración. This medium also arises from reflection — integrated into our assessment — on the need for a platform enabling us to have our own voice in debates within our class and its militant organizations. We recognize that revolutionary proletarians do not organize solely in a single organic structure, and much revolutionary momentum arises from dialogue, invalidation, and accreditation among multiple revolutionary theses deployed by the organized proletariat.

2 — Dual Militancy

From the historical assessment we discuss, we understand that the specific organization must maintain constant contact with mass organizations, spontaneous forms, and potential organizations of the working class. This relationship must be one of empowerment, once again, within a strategic framework.

This relationship is mainly needed to empirically verify revolutionary hypotheses — to observe which organizational forms are useful, which are not, what needs are widely felt among large sectors of the working class, etc. This leads us, organizationally, to adopt dual militancy: involvement both within the specific organization and in multiple fronts arising from capitalism’s contradictions[6].

Initially, dual militancy ensures that we positively drive a front without co-opting it. Dual militancy ensures that the especifista organization is one of militant cadres who work to make their front as useful as possible to the general interest of the class struggle. In their militancy within the especifista organization, militants in the fronts aim to place the particularity of their struggle at the service of a total strategy, overcoming isolation in their own field.

This articulation is not a tactic born out of nowhere or dogmatically replicating other periods of struggle. It responds to the independence and “autonomy for the sake of autonomy”[7] seen among various organizations and sectors of the labor struggle. It aims to overcome the varied forms of coordination from the last cycle, which partly led to compromises, renunciations, and internal conflicts, ultimately serving petty-bourgeois programs[8].

3 — The Especifista Organization

Unlike traditional party organizations, the especifista organization prioritizes the advancement of struggle fronts in concrete battles, positioning itself as a tool for these fronts. But this is not the defining feature of the especifista organization. Its distinguishing trait is its ability to generate a total strategy, participating in and drawing lessons and wisdom from all the fronts of our class’s struggle to tackle capitalism as a whole.

As part of this total strategy we aim to build, we do not uncritically accept the current form of class struggle, which we call the front-form. This form is organized around fronts that are de facto disconnected, reflecting the current fragmentation of the working class and the bourgeois conception of reality as compartmentalized. We organize as anarchists in these fronts and shape the especifista organization accordingly because the reality is given, and if we want it to change, we must engage with it to transform it, adapting our tools as best we can.

Consequently, based on our materialist analysis, we aim today to unite and organize within the especifista organization those who share the political positions we’ve publicly expressed in this medium. In building social force, our militancy in broader spaces is not necessarily where most people gather around a given issue. Rather, following the especifista strategy, we participate in spaces whose qualitative characteristics favor accumulating sufficient strength under a class-based program that builds structure with democratic foundations. In this way, we aim to avoid reproducing the dominant discourse shaped by bourgeois ideology in the spaces we engage in.

Through the especifista organization, we seek to overcome the current front-form, moving toward unifying struggles in a way that prefigures the organic unity of the working class. This organic unity, as the organization of the class in its totality, may appear in different forms. Still, it is the balance of militant experience, the current context, and the needs of the struggle that will determine its shape.

Regardless, we consider the content of this organic unity more important than its form, understanding that form and content are inseparable. The strongest organizational form is inadequate for the ultimate goal of abolishing class society if its content does not reflect the revolutionary struggle of the working class. For this reason, we intervene in today’s fronts of struggle to, beyond partisan battles, win and defend the political independence of our class. Following the principle of unity between means and ends, only by providing a class-based program to the fronts of struggle can they achieve an organic unity of the working class that overcomes their current form.

Though the proletariat has been the protagonist of early 21^st-century struggles in terms of sheer numbers, it has not necessarily defended its own interests. Once again, we see that a social group can lead a movement, organization, etc., without necessarily advocating for positions that benefit it. That is, the class-in-itself does not intrinsically carry its own emancipatory program. We must recognize that some progress improving our class’s quality of life has come under the form of autonomous social struggle. However, to surpass ourselves as a class, our future struggles must necessarily move toward the horizon of libertarian communism. For this, our main task as an especifista movement is to hegemonize the discourse of class and the revolutionary program. This revolutionary program will be the product of the collective effort of the class, the dialogue among multiple sectors, and the necessary organic debate that ends in democratic decision-making and reopens only in light of new scientific advances that challenge previously agreed-upon positions.

4 — A Strategy for Revolution

The especifista organization is a catalyst to unify the working class around a revolutionary theory. The cornerstone of the especifista organization’s aforementioned functions is its ability to serve as a center for the creation of discourse and strategy for the working class in its entirety. This means that, with dual militancy and social insertion[9], the especifista organization allows the working class to assess its position, its experiences of struggle, and its enemies — and apply these assessments to continue advancing toward its own abolition.

“We propose that, rather than being led by common sense, the revolutionary working class, at every moment of class struggle, has decided its direction rationally and scientifically — that is, by evaluating its position, possibilities, available information and knowledge, and acting accordingly.”[10]

One of the objectives of the especifista organization, then, is to be the conscious organ of the revolutionary working class.

As Senda states, the lack of a strategy of its own has been one of the reasons for the victory of cross-classism within the working class, and the especifista organization arises as a response to this defeat. It is only logical, then, that the especifista organization seeks to organize its activity through revolutionary strategy.

We believe that the especifista organization provides a coherent and total response to the need for revolutionary organization in our time. It can take on, drive, and develop all revolutionary-potential fronts where our class can intervene. We argue that this framework can accumulate strength both qualitatively and quantitatively within a revolutionary theory, starting the path toward revolution. It is our militant responsibility to move forward, advancing the proletarian cause until class society is abolished.

Conclusion

In summary, we understand especifismo as a theoretical framework with concepts defined through practice and rooted in a balance of experience. This framework is adaptable, and the concrete form of our organization will respond to our specific situation. Through social insertion, carried out via dual militancy, we can contribute to the advancement of the class struggle, transcending the specific and elevating it to the totality of the proletariat’s political struggle for the abolition of class society and all oppression.

[1] Balius, J. (n.d.). A Revolutionary Theory. El Amigo del Pueblo, 5. www.grupgerminal.org

[2] www.regeneracionlibertaria.org (Senda: Militant Balance of the Experience of the Libertarian Student Federation)

[3] For a deeper look into the concept of “balance,” see serhistorico.net (History is Another Battlefield in the Ongoing Class War)

[4] For an introduction to critiques of autonomist and synthesist approaches, see www.regeneracionlibertaria.org or blackrosefed.org. For an introduction to critiques of insurrectionary conceptions of anarchism, see www.regeneracionlibertaria.org or www.regeneracionlibertaria.org

[5] Internal strategy documents from the Uruguayan Anarchist Federation. Available at: federacionanarquistauruguaya.uy and federacionanarquistauruguaya.uy. Our sister organization in Colombia, Vía Libre, offers further reflection on these documents at grupovialibre.org

[6] www.regeneracionlibertaria.org (Anarchism Facing the New Political Cycle)

[7] “By ‘autonomy for the sake of autonomy’ we refer to the enshrinement of each movement’s assembly, nucleus, or chapter to independently decide theory, strategy, discourse, positions, etc.” This was the norm in the previous cycle. We oppose this kind of autonomy with discursive, tactical, and strategic unity built through honest and effective debate: “[The effects of autonomy for the sake of autonomy] result in an organization incapable of fulfilling its mandate: to multiply the anarchist forces that form it, to make the whole more than the sum of its parts. The will to be a general organization is not enough: mechanisms are needed to unify positions, conduct proper analysis, and resolve conflicts.” — Excerpts from Senda, previously cited.

[8] We do not attribute the resignations and compromises in the fronts to autonomy for autonomy’s sake, nor to the diversity of actors involved in these spaces, but rather to the abandonment of class independence and the lack of a total and revolutionary strategic program — conditions that foster the emergence of reformism. As our class did not have a clear vanguard reference capable of challenging hegemonic ideology during this period, demands for better living conditions took shape within a petty-bourgeois ideological framework, tinted with redistributive social democracy, which we do not consider social democratic as it denies the existence of the proletariat.

[9] For an introduction to the concept of social insertion and other key concepts in specific anarchist organization, see Foundational Concepts of the Specific Anarchist Organisation: Spanish translation: mega.nz Original: theanarchistlibrary.org

[10] https://www.regeneracionlibertaria.org/2024/06/04/el-programatismo-y-el-abolicionismo-en-el-recorrido-de-la-lucha-de-clase (Programmatism and Abolitionism in the Trajectory of the Class Struggle)