A-Infos (en) NZ, Aotearoa, AWSM: The anarchist case for abstentionism in elections (ca, de, fr, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

The right to vote is seen by most as a necessary prerequisite for 
freedom across the world. People have fought and died for the right to 
vote in elections. Women across the world fought bitter battles for the 
right to vote. So why should anarchists question this as a right worth 
having? --- The entire electoral show is designed to encourage us to 
believe that not only does our vote matter, but that it is the most 
important decision we could possibly make. Indeed, voting is held so 
sacred by many that the mere mention of not voting is enough to cause 
outrage. Pointing out that our vote makes no difference anyway, will see 
you accused of being apathetic, privileged, immature, and even being 
part of the alt-right!

But as noted anarchist Vernon Richards wrote,

"So long as we have capitalism and government, the job of anarchists is 
to fight both, and at the same time encourage people to take what steps 
they can to run their own lives."["Anarchists and Voting," pp. 176-87, 
The Raven, No. 14, p. 179].

Electoralism ensures that a statist perspective becomes dominant. 
Everything is seen in terms of state intervention and following the 
decisions of the leaders, which has always proved deadly to encouraging 
a spirit of revolt, self-management, and self-help - the very keys to 
creating change in a society. Rather than being something other people 
discuss on behalf of working-class people, anarchists argue that 
politics should not be a specialised activity in the hands of the 
so-called experts (i.e., politicians) but instead lie in the hands of 
those directly affected by it in the process of participation, direct 
action, and self-management. Those that channel any "political" 
conclusions into electoral politics distort discussions into only what 
is possible within the current system. Given this, is it surprising that 
anarchists argue that the people "must organise their powers apart from 
and against the State?"[Bakunin, The Political Philosophy of Bakunin, p. 
376].

Abstentionists get told, "If you don't vote, you have no right to 
complain about the outcome," but we consider the opposite to be true. It 
is those who have voted, who have agreed to the rules, and agreed to be 
governed by the winners who cannot complain. It is those who do not 
participate who have the right to complain about the outcome more than 
anyone else.

We get told that the reality is that voting does change things, but we 
can, and do, deny that. Voting attempts to provide the population with 
the illusion of change while in reality it reinforces the current 
system. A policy here and there may change, the faces may change, but 
the system of a wealthy minority ruling a poorer majority remains. 
People will continually be telling us that abstaining from voting will 
help the right-wing win the election, that it is better if the lesser 
evil wins. This may possibly be the case (although the argument is far 
from convincing), but why should we base our society on a compromise 
with evil? In fact, the "progressive" left wing party you vote for will 
often be ready to take the same actions as a right-wing government when 
it comes to imposing anti-working-class action upon us, (as we shall 
show later in this essay the state has a corrupting effect on those who 
enter politics with high principles). There should be a better way, and 
we say the dismantling of government, in all its existing and potential 
forms is that way.

Most of the left wing in Aotearoa, and quite a few people who claim to 
identify as anarchists, will support reformist parties in the upcoming 
election. You will hear them saying things like "vote Labour (or Green) 
without illusions," or "vote Labour/Green but build a socialist 
alternative." The slogans that these others may shout only reflect the 
idea that change can and should be brought about by a small number of 
elite politicians. Abstentionists do not say things like this. There are 
many problems with our electoral system of democracy, which we shall run 
through, but we must state that first and foremost, as anarchists, we 
see voting as against running contrary to our anti-statist and 
anti-hierarchy principles, and we see electoralism as contrary to our 
goals and practice. It reinforces the idea that society is divided into 
order-givers and order-takers. Famed French anarchist, Elisee Reclus, 
put it well when he said,

"Everything that can be said about the suffrage may be summed up in a 
sentence. To vote is to give up your own power. To elect a master or 
many, for a long or short time, is to resign one's liberty... Instead of 
entrusting the defense of your interests to others, see to the matter by 
yourselves. Instead of trying to choose advisers that will guide you in 
future actions, do the thing yourselves, and do it now!.... Do not vote!"

We are against is a system that allows for us to tick a box every few 
years for candidates that are selected for us, and policies that are 
chosen for us, which gives whoever received the most X's to make 
decisions that affect our lives in all ways. Much of our so-called 
"democracy" is bogus and undemocratic, as many of the hundreds of 
thousands of kiwis who do not vote understand. Politicians, once 
elected, have no compunction to keep their promises they made while 
campaigning, they can, and do, pretty much what they like because we 
have no power to recall them until the next election comes along, when 
again we will be given a barrage of promises that don't have to be kept, 
and mostly won't be kept. To call this democracy and representative of 
our demands is a blatant falsehood.

So, to continue, voting in government elections is an inherently 
authoritarian activity, and authoritarian means can never yield 
libertarian results. In the words of Emma Goldman, "participation in 
elections means the transfer of one's will and decisions to another, 
which is contrary to the fundamental principles of anarchism."[Emma 
Goldman, Vision on Fire, p. 89]. The very act of voting is an attempt on 
the part of the voters to delegate control over their own life to 
another person. While states of various sorts provide some services and 
benefits to their citizens, the institution of government also maintains 
and makes use of the police, the courts, the prison, the military, etc, 
to coercively interfere in the lives of its subjects. For anarchists, it 
is a basic belief that individuals should not have the authority to 
coerce others, and therefore they should not put themselves in a 
position to delegate such authority to anyone else, which, after all, is 
the essence of voting. Noone, whether in or out of government, should 
have such power. Anarchists who oppose political power and coercion of 
any sort cannot advocate voting in national elections and stay true to 
the principles of anarchism. This is a system that divides us into a 
massive majority ruled by a tiny minority, and which allows for power, 
wealth, and privilege to be ever more concentrated into the hands of 
that minority. The state is not a neutral body which can be used by all 
classes in society to protect their interests, rather it is an 
instrument of class rule that exists to protect the wealth and power of 
the ruling class and enforce their property rights and authority.

What we are offered as democracy is a farce, a dictatorship of capital 
devoid of any real choice. Even worse is that this form of democracy 
gives the illusion that we, the people, have the power to change it, 
while simultaneously reinforcing it. No wonder all politicians agree on 
one point - that we should vote. They want you to sanction the process 
by which they acquire their position, because without that sanction they 
have no legitimacy, and it is that claim to legitimacy they use to 
dismiss any actions taken by oppressed or marginalised groups outside of 
parliament as illegitimate. Before going to cast your vote remember that 
there is a real limit to what governments can do anyway - winning an 
election is not taking power. The real decision-making takes place in 
the boardrooms of corporations, not in parliament. Political parties, 
even in a majority government, can only do what capitalism allows them 
to. The politicians' only argument is to organise capitalism in a 
"kinder way," but anarchists want to smash capitalism, not waste our 
time trying to make it kinder.

MPs are little more than the committee for managing the affairs of 
capitalism. We cannot elect the revolution, or even a radical 
government, because capitalism will use its economic power, in the form 
of things such as sanctions and the flight of capital, to punish anyone 
who wishes to radically reform society, regardless if the majority voted 
for it or not. Even worse, in some situations the elected government may 
well see itself undermined by outside influences, even facing invasion 
and war. Realistically though the nature of the state means that 
capitalists rarely have to use these tactics.

While many radicals may be tempted to agree with this analysis of the 
limitations of electioneering and voting, very few will automatically 
agree with the anarchist arguments of not voting. Instead, they argue 
that we should combine direct action with electioneering, and they will 
suggest that the state is too powerful to leave in the hands of 
right-wingers. Those that say this though ultimately fail to take into 
account the nature of the state and the corrupting effect it has on 
politicians. If history is anything to go by, the net effect of radicals 
using elections is that by the time they are elected to office the 
radicals will happily do what they once would have condemned the 
right-wing for doing.

Given that we have had many decades of universal suffrage, not only in 
Aotearoa but worldwide, and we have seen the rise of Labour and other 
so-called progressive parties aiming to use that system to effect 
change, it is sad to say that we are probably further away from 
socialism than ever. The simple fact is that these parties have spent so 
much time trying to win elections that they have stopped even thinking 
about creating socialist alternatives in our communities and workplaces.

The state shapes people. As Noam Chomsky argues, "within the constraints 
of existing state institutions, policies will be determined by people 
representing centres of concentrated power in the private economy, 
people who, in their institutional roles, will not be swayed by moral 
appeals but by the costs consequent upon the decisions they make - not 
because they are 'bad people,' but because that is what the 
institutional roles demands."

It was Bakunin who predicted in 1869 (three years before Marx hoisted 
his parliamentarianism onto the First International) that when "the 
workers ... send common workers ... to Legislative Assemblies ... The 
worker-deputies, transplanted into a bourgeois environment, into an 
atmosphere of purely bourgeois ideas, will in fact cease to be workers 
and, becoming Statesmen, they will become bourgeois ... For men do not 
make their situations; on the contrary, men are made by them."[The Basic 
Bakunin, p. 108]Similarly, Krotpotkin argued that "in proportion as the 
socialists become a power in the present bourgeois society and State, 
their socialism must die out."[Kropotkin's Revolutionary Pamphlets, p. 
189]. History has undoubtedly proven the anarchists correct.

We cannot repeat this often enough, electioneering results in the party 
using it to become more moderate and reformist - indeed the party often 
becomes the victim of its own success. In order to gain votes, the party 
must appear "moderate," "responsible" and "sensible" and that means 
working within the system. This has meant that (to use Rudolf Rocker's 
words),

"Participation in the politics of the bourgeois States has not brought 
the labour movement a hair's-breadth nearer to Socialism, but thanks to 
this method, Socialism has almost been completely crushed and condemned 
to insignificance... Participation in parliamentary politics has 
affected the Socialist Labour movement like an insidious 
poison."[Anarcho-Syndicalism, p. 49]

Every time a so-called or Labour party has come to power, they have 
acted in a way that makes them almost indistinguishable from their more 
right-wing opponents. Despite their promises to act for the working 
class, once in government they always seem to be more concerned with 
being 'respectable' and 'reasonable,' and not doing anything that would 
offend the rich, the real rulers of our society. Nowadays we have 
'progressed' to the stage where parties do not even pretend to campaign 
on the basis of representing the working class, limiting themselves to 
saying they are more "trustworthy," or are a "safe pair of hands" to 
control the economy. Socialism is an embarrassment from the past.

The Labour Party in Aotearoa has been one of a history of compromise 
with capitalism and anti-working class action. Three quotes from Peter 
Fraser, early once a self-proclaimed revolutionary socialist and Labour 
prime minister 1940-49 demonstrates this. In 1913 Fraser was writing: 
"Industrial Unionism plus revolutionary political action, in my opinion, 
provide the most effective and expeditious means of 
reaching[socialism]." By 1918, Fraser had moderated his views. Instead 
of revolution he called for "the peaceful and legal transformation of 
society from private to public ownership and the increasing of 
democratic control over land and industry." By the early 1930s Fraser 
saw Labour's main objective as a simple one: jobs for the unemployed.

Janet Biehl sums up the effects on the German Green Party of trying to 
combine radical electioneering with direct action:

 "The German Greens, once a flagship for the green movement worldwide, 
should now be considered stink normal, as their de facto boss himself 
declares. Now a repository of careerists, the Greens stand out only for 
the rapidity with which the old cadre of careerism, party politics, and 
business-as-usual once again played itself out in their saga of 
compromise and betrayal of principle. Under the superficial veil of 
their old values - a very thin veil indeed, now - they can seek 
positions and make compromises to their heart's content... They have 
become 'practical,' 'realistic' and 'power orientated.' This former New 
Left ages badly, not only in Germany but everywhere else. But then, it 
happened with the S.P.D. in August 1914, then why not with Die Grunen in 
1991? So it did."["Party or Movement?," Greenline, no. 89, p. 14]

Here in Aotearoa the effect has been the same on our own Green Party, 
whose evolution has seen it tie itself firmly to sensible budgeting and 
relying on market forces to solve our problems and moved from something 
of an activist party to one of "professional politicians."

It is not enough to blame the individuals elected to office for these 
betrayals, arguing that we need to elect better politicians, or select 
better leaders. For anarchists nothing could be more wrong as it is the 
means used, not the individuals involved, which is the problem. Writing 
of his personal experience as a member of Parliament, Proudhon recounted 
that,

 "[a]s soon as I set foot in the parliamentary Sinai, I ceased to be in 
touch with the masses; because I was absorbed by my legislative work, I 
entirely lost sight of the current events ... One must have lived in 
that isolator which is called a National Assembly to realise how the men 
who are most completely ignorant of the state of the country are almost 
always those who represent it. "There was "ignorance of daily facts" and 
"fear of the people" ("the sickness of all those who belong to 
authority") for "the people, for those in power, are the 
enemy."[Property is Theft!, p. 19]

Ultimately, as syndicalist Emile Pouget argued, this fate was inevitable 
as any socialist politician "could not break the mould; he is only a cog 
in the machine of oppression and whether he wishes it or not he must, as 
minister, participate in the job of crushing the proletariat."[quoted by 
Jeremy Jennings, Syndicalism in France, p. 36]

Ultimately, supporters of using political action can only appeal to the 
good intentions and character of their candidates, and hope for the 
best. Anarchists, however, in contrast to Marxists and other radicals, 
continually give an analysis of the structures of government and the 
other influences that will determine how the character of the successful 
candidates and political parties will change. Only anarchists 
continually present an analysis of the effects of electoralism and its 
effects on radicals. History is our proof, electoralism, as Bakunin put 
it, "inevitably draws and enmeshes its partisans, under the pretext of 
political tactics, into ceaseless compromises with governments and 
political parties; that is, it pushes them toward downright 
reaction."[The Basic Bakunin p. 288].

Not only is making use of the ballot box as a tactic harmful to 
politicians and their parties, but it also has a negative effect on the 
rest of the population too. Support for electioneering is at odds with 
us being in favour of collective mass action. It hinders the arguments 
for collective organisation and action as the voters expect their 
representative to act and fight for them. Political actions become 
solely considered to be parliamentary activities, made for the people by 
their representatives. There is no other role for the people than that 
of passive support and spectators. So, instead of working-class 
self-activity and self-determination, there results in a 
non-working-class leadership acting for the people. The real causes and 
solutions to the problems we face are not understood and ignored by 
those at the top of the party and rarely discussed in the open, less 
they damage their chance of re-election.

There is nothing more isolated and individualistic than voting. It is 
the act of one person in a booth by themselves. It is the total opposite 
of collective struggle. The individual is alone before, during and after 
the act of voting. Indeed, unlike direct action, which, by its very 
nature, throws up new forms of organisation in order to manage and 
coordinate the struggle, voting creates no alternative forms of 
working-class self-management. Nor can it. It simply empowers an 
individual (the politician) to act on behalf of a collection of other 
individuals (the voters). Political parties forsake direct action in 
favour of success in elections (indeed, winning elections will soon 
enough become the be-all and end-all of their activity). Also, if 
radicals are elected the whole focal point of struggle changes. Rather 
than direct struggle against the state and the boss, this is seen as 
being no longer needed as the elected representatives will act, or 
people will think they will act, and so do not act themselves. They have 
elected someone to fight for them and so do not see, or realise, the 
need to fight themselves.

In a lot of ways, direct action is a more effective means for people to 
have a say in society than voting is. Voting is a lottery, your 
preferred candidate may not get elected, and all the time and energy put 
into supporting them is wasted. With direct action, you can be sure that 
your work will offer some kind of results, and the experience you gain, 
the lessons learnt, and networks and connections built up in the 
process, cannot be taken away from you.

Also voting is only possible when election time comes around, direct 
action can be applied whenever the need rises. Relying on electoralism 
means you can only address whatever topics are current in the political 
agendas of candidates, while direct action can be applied to deal with 
the issues in every aspect of your life.

In other words, our support for direct action is linked with our 
rejection of voting, and our call to not vote stresses the importance of 
direct action, as well as having an important educational effect in 
highlighting that the state is not neutral, but serves to protect class 
rule, and that meaningful change only comes from below. So just not 
voting is not enough, we need to organise and fight. In the words of an 
anarchist member of the Jura Federation writing in 1875,

 "Instead of begging the State for a law compelling employers to make 
them work only so many hours, the trade associations directly impose 
this reform on the employers; in this way, instead of a legal text which 
remains a dead letter, a real economic change is effected by the direct 
initiative of the workers ... if the workers devoted all their activity 
and energy to the organisation of their trades into societies of 
resistance, trade federations, local and regional, if, by meetings, 
lectures, study circles, papers and pamphlets, they kept up a permanent 
socialist and revolutionary agitation; if by linking practice to theory, 
they realised directly, without any bourgeois and governmental 
intervention, all immediately possible reforms, reforms advantageous not 
to a few workers but to the labouring mass - certainly then the cause of 
labour would be better served than ... legal agitation."[quoted by 
Caroline Cahm, Kropotkin and the Rise of Revolutionary Anarchism, p. 226]

So, we urge people to not vote in order to encourage activity, not 
apathy. Instead of spending our time urging people to vote for one set 
or another of groups offering slightly different ways to manage 
capitalism, we raise the option of choosing to rule yourself, to 
organise with others in your workplace, in your community, everywhere. 
We offer the option of something you cannot vote for, a new society. 
Instead of waiting for others to make some changes for you, along with 
all anarchists we urge people to do it themselves. In this way, we can 
build an alternative to the state, which can reduce its power now and, 
in the long run, replace it. This is the core of our anarchist 
principles and why anarchists say do not vote.

By making the principled choice not to participate in the election, we 
open an opportunity to question the acceptance of the status quo. We 
consider it is important to stand up and remind people what is wrong 
with voting. Maybe by consciously not voting, and explaining to others 
why we are not voting, we can change people's beliefs about government. 
We use this opportunity to say that there are better, more meaningful 
ways to achieve a fairer, freer, more meaningful life; that we do not 
need to resort to the state to solve problems.

As anarchists we simply think that our policy should be the destruction 
of the State rather than looking to work with it. We believe this stance 
is essential if we are to be able to promote anarchism, and if we are 
going to mark a divide between others and ourselves and place ourselves 
firmly outside the activity and the political games of all the other 
parties. We believe this is essential so as not to be seen as another 
bunch of leftists after votes, and to avoid being tainted by the 
inevitable failure of any government to meet our needs. We believe in 
revolution and have a revolutionary ideology and we want to win people 
over to anarchism. If people started associating Anarchism with the 
political parties, then it would be difficult for people to understand 
what Anarchism actually is.

By arguing for our anti-electoral position, we can get our ideas across 
about the nature of the current system, how elected politicians are 
controlled and shaped by the state, and how the state acts to protect 
capitalism. In addition, it allows us to present our ideas of direct 
action and encourage those disillusioned with political parties and the 
current system to become anarchists by presenting a viable alternative 
to the sham of party politics. For, after all, a sizeable percentage of 
not just non-voters but voters too are disillusioned with the current 
set-up. Many who do not vote do so for essentially political reasons, 
such as being fed up with the political system, failing to see any major 
differences between the parties, or recognition that the candidates do 
not represent their interests. Many who do vote do so simply against the 
other candidate, seeing them as the least-worst option. This is an 
opportunity when people are talking a little more about politics to 
challenge the notion that important decisions can only be made by a few 
and put across our anarchist ideas.

This essay started with a quote from Vernon Richards, and will finish 
with one,

"If the anarchist movement has a role to play in practical politics it 
is surely that of suggesting to, and persuading, as many people as 
possible that their freedom from the Hitlers, Francos and the rest, 
depends not on the right to vote or securing a majority of votes 'for 
the candidate of one's choice,' but on evolving new forms of political 
and social organisation which aim at the direct participation of the 
people, with the consequent weakening of the power, as well of the 
social role, of government in the life of the community."["Anarchists 
and Voting," pp. 176-87, The Raven, no. 14, pp. 177-8]

So... Do not vote and let us start making a real difference.

the anarchist case for abstentionism in elections _ now available as 
downloadable pdf
https://thepolarblast.wordpress.com/2023/09/16/the-anarchist-case-for-abstentionism-in-elections-_-now-available-as-downloadable-pdf/

https://awsm.nz/the-anarchist-case-for-abstentionism-in-elections/
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