Militant anti-fascism

Militant anti-fascism is a form of anti-fascism that advocates the use of violence against fascism. Within the anti-fascist movement, the term militant anti-fascism is often used in contrast to liberal anti-fascism.

Fascists often use violence and depend on a physical presence in the streets, and militant anti-fascists believe that an equal counterweight is essential to stop fascism. While European liberal anti-fascists either call on the state to censor what they call hate speech or prosecute fascists under existing laws, militant anti-fascists either oppose such calls or put no energy into heeding them. In contrast, militant anti-fascists believe that fascism should be tackled by communities rather than by the state. Militant anti-fascists are usually supporters of class struggle, and view fascism as an anti-working class political system. Militant anti-fascists tend to promote radical anti-capitalist transformation of society, rather than defending the status quo of liberal democracy. This often translates into support for some form of socialism or anarchism.

The term antifa

Antifa Demo, Switzerland.

Antifa graffiti.

The term antifa derives from Antifaschismus, which is German for anti-fascism. It refers to individuals and groups that are dedicated to fighting fascism, and some anti-fascist groups include the word antifa in their name. During the 1920s, 1930s, and 1940s, the Soviet Union sponsored various anti-fascist groups, usually using the name antifa. POWs captured by the Soviets during the Great Patriotic War in the 1940s were encouraged to undertake antifa training. Pál Maléter, a Hungarian POW, became a Communist after undergoing antifa training in Kiev.

In the 2000s, the term antifa refers to individuals and groups that are dedicated to fighting alleged fascist tendencies. These include: racism, nationalism, anti-Semitism, sexism, homophobia, and usually also capitalism. There is a network of such groups, but they do not constitute a homogeneous movement. Depending on the particular group or individual, the ultimate goals may be quite different. The terms anti-fascist and antifa are almost exclusively used by left-wing groups. For these groups, the struggle against fascist tendencies is usually associated with a broader view that holds society (or aspects of it) responsible, and therefore seeks radical social change. Many members of antifa groups consider communism, socialism or anarchism as desirable forms of social organization. Some activists who describe themselves as antifa have used violent methods in their campaigns against fascism. According to the German intelligence agency Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz, antifa is a violent left-wing extremist movement.

Germany

Communist Party and Social Democratic Party (SPD) members at different times in the 1920s and 1930s advocated both the use of violence and mass agitation amongst the working class in an effort to stop Hitler's Nazi party. Leon Trotsky was one advocate of militant anti-fascism’s use of violence in Germany. He wrote that "fighting squads must be created… nothing increases the insolence of the fascists so much as 'flabby pacifism' on the part of the workers' organisations… [It is] political cowardice [to deny that] without organised combat detachments, the most heroic masses will be smashed bit by bit by fascist gangs."

Italy

The rise of fascist leader Benito Mussolini in the 1920s was resisted violently by a small fraction of the workers' movement. After the signature by the Italian Socialist Party (PSI) of a "pacification pact" with the National Fascist Party on August 3, 1921, and the embracement by the trade-unions of a legalist and pacific strategy, others components of the workers' movement who disagreed with this strategy formed the Arditi del popolo in 1921. The General Confederation of Labour (CGT) and the PSI refused to officially recognize the anti-fascist militia, while the Italian Communist Party (PCI) ordered its members to quit the organization. The PCI organized by themselves some militant groups, but their actions were relatively minor and the party kept a non-violent, legalist strategy.

Spain

In the Spanish Civil War of the 1930s, the Republican army, the International Brigades and particularly the Workers' Party of Marxist Unification (POUM) and anarchist militias like the Iron Column are examples of militant anti-fascism who fought the rise of Francisco Franco with military force. The Friends of Durruti were one particularly militant group, associated with the Federación Anarquista Ibérica (FAI). Spanish anarchist guerrilla Sabate fought against Franco’s regime up until 1960s from a base in France. (See Anarchist Catalonia, Anarchism in Spain.) The Spanish Maquis also fought the Franco regime long after the Spanish Civil war finished from across the border in France.

The struggle against fascism in Spain attracted strong international support from leftist and working class people. Many went to Spain in support of the anti-fascist cause and joined International Brigade units such as the Lincoln Battalion, the British Battalion, the Dabrowski Battalion, the "Mac-Paps" and the Naftali Botwin Company. Notable anti-fascists who worked internationally against Franco were: George Orwell, who fought in the POUM militia and wrote Homage to Catalonia about this experience, Ernest Hemingway, a supporter of the International Brigades who wrote For Whom the Bell Tolls about this experience, and radical journalist Martha Gellhorn.

United Kingdom

The rise of Oswald Mosley's British Union of Fascists (BUF) was challenged by the Communist Party of Great Britain, socialists in the Labour Party and Independent Labour Party, Irish Catholic dockmen and working class Jews in London's east end. A high point in the struggle was the Battle of Cable Street, when thousands of eastenders and others turned out to stop the BUF marching. Initially, the national Communist Party leadership wanted a mass demonstration at Hyde Park in solidarity with Republican Spain instead of a mobilisation against the BUF, but local party activists argued against this. (However, the campaigns against fascism in Spain and in England were explicitly linked when local activists ralled suppport with the chalked slogan on the streets of East London They shall not pass, taken from the slogan of Republican Spain, No Pasaran.) After World War II, Jewish war veterans continued the tradition of militant confrontation with the BUF in the 43 Group.

1970s

In the 1970s, fascist and far right parties such as the National Front (NF) and British Movement were making significant gains electorally and were increasingly confident in their public appearances. This was challenged in 1977 with the Battle of Lewisham, when thousands of black and white people physically stopped an NF march in South London. Shortly after this, the Anti-Nazi League (ANL) was launched by the Socialist Workers Party (SWP). The ANL had a campaign of high profile propaganda, as well as anti-fascist squads that attacked NF meetings and paper sales to disrupt their ability to organise. Margaret Thatcher's successful Conservative Party election campaign in 1979 used a lot of the far right, anti-immigration rhetoric of the NF. The success of the ANL's propaganda and physical campaigns, combined with Thatcher's right wing politics meant the end to the NF's period of growth.

The SWP, whose theoretician Tony Cliff described the period as one of downturn in class struggle, disbanded the ANL. However, many squad members refused to stop their activities. They were expelled from the party in 1981; many going on to form the group Red Action. The SWP used the term squadism to dismiss these militant anti-fascists as thugs. In 1985, some members of Red Action and the anarcho-syndicalist Direct Action Movement launched Anti-Fascist Action (AFA), which was to be the focus of militant anti-fascism in the UK for the next 15 years. Thousands of people took part in militant AFA mobilisations such as the Remembrance Day demonstrations in 1986 and 1987, the Unity Carnival, the Battle of Cable Street's 55th anniversary march in 1991, and the Battle of Waterloo against the British National Party in 1992.

After 1995, some anti-fascist mobilisations did still occur e.g. against the National Front in Dover in 1997 and 1998. Internally, a new AFA National Coordinating Committee was set up. In 1997 an AFA statement officially banned members from associating with Searchlight - and in 1998, Leeds and Huddersfield AFA were expelled by the new Committee, officially for ignoring this policy. Expulsions didn't stop the decline. There were some local re-launches – e.g. Liverpool in 2000. But by 2001 - though probably a long time before - AFA as a national organisation hardly existed.

2000s

Some former elements from AFA regrouped to form a militant anti-fascist group called No Platform in 2002, but this group disbanded shortly. In 2004, members from the Anarchist Federation, Class War, and No Platform founded the organisation Antifa. This largely anarchist dominated group has imitated AFA's stance of physical and ideological confrontation with fascists and has a policy of non-cooperation with Searchlight or any other state-linked agencies. On September 23, 2004, Antifa was involved in a confrontation with David King, a former British National Party treasurer and his BNP security entourage in Basildon, Essex. On January 15, 2005, Antifa was involved in a confrontation with National Front white power skinheads in Woolwich. On March 27, 2005, 30 anti-fascists from a local Yorkshire based Antifa group attacked a British National Party meeting in Halifax. The anti-fascists threw half bricks and rocks at the BNP security, and BNP member's cars were smashed. More recently, other groups across the UK have appeared (e.g. Antifa Scotland, which appeared around September 2006).

Sweden

Militant anti-fascist groups active in Sweden include Antifascistisk Aktion and Revolutionära Fronten. Anti-fascist demonstrations in Sweden often end in riots with the police. Anti-fascist activities in Sweden have included physical abuse of, or counter-demonstrations against neo-Nazis. Some yearly neo-Nazi demonstrations in Sweden that have led to riots with police include the one in Salem on 9 December, and on Nationalday on 6 june.

Criticism of militant anti-fascism

Critics of militant anti-fascism tend to focus on its use of political violence. Pacifists and many liberals consider the use of violence as essentially wrong, and see militant anti-fascists as mirroring the fascists they oppose. This criticism suggests that by mirroring fascist violence with anti-fascist violence, the struggle against fascism is reduced to a game. Historian Dave Renton, in his book Fascism: Theory and Practice, writes that "for anti-fascists, violence is not part of their world view", and calls militants "professional anti-fascists." Left wing critics of militant anti-fascism contrast the violence of small militant groups with mass action. Communist Party of Great Britain leader Phil Piratin denounced squadism and called for large actions. However, most militant anti-fascists argue that the two strategies are complimentary — as exemplified by the combination of mass action (including Rock Against Racism events) and squadism by the first incarnation of the Anti-Nazi League in the late 1970s. Some anti-racists and multiculturalists argue that by focusing on the white working class, the militant anti-fascist movement sidelines issues related to racial minorities' struggles against racism — such as the issue of white privilege. To these critics, militant anti-fascists focus on fascism to the exclusion of racism, and trivialise more pervasive forms of racial prejudice and institutional racism unconnected to organised fascist groups.

Bibliography

• Bullstreet, K. Bash the Fash: Anti-Fascist Recollections 1984-1993. ISBN 1-873605-87-0.
• Key, Anna (ed.) (ed.). Beating Fascism: Anarchist anti-fascism in theory and practice. ISBN 1-873605-88-9. {{cite book}}: |editor= has generic name (help)

See also

• Anti-fascism
• Anti-Fascist Action (UK)
• Antifascistisk Aktion
• Anti-Germans (communist current)
• Anti-Racist Action
• Anti-racism
• Direct Action Movement
• Independent Working Class Association
• Red Action
• Red and Anarchist Skinheads
• Redskin (subculture)
• Skinheads Against Racial Prejudice
• Squadism
• TIGR
• United Front

External links

• British Antifa
• AntifaNet
• Antifa Scotland
• German Federal Agency for the Protection of the Constitution
• KP B3RLIN
• Antifaschistische Linke Berlin