A-Infos (en) Italy, UCADI, #198 - WHERE WERE WE? (ca, de, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

THE SUICIDE OF THE CLASS ---- The results of the referendums of June 8 
and 9 were a debacle, probably the last in order of time but not the 
last in absolute terms, of what was once the presence of a working 
class, albeit battered, but still existing. A class, as they said "in 
itself" and "for itself".
The defeat, first of all, comes from the method itself. Social rights 
are won with social conflict and then, if anything, with political 
mediation becoming law. The Workers' Statute itself, a sacrificial 
victim, arrived after the hot autumn of 1969. Referendums can be useful 
on the great inter-class issues, on civil rights that cut across 
society, on the "great dilemmas" of the people. But when it comes to 
defending or expanding social rights that can, even minimally, call into 
question the socio-economic structure, capital knows how to use all the 
weapons at its disposal (as if it were possible, for example, to win 
elections for a truly communist force).
So a good portion of Italians did not go to vote to restore or defend 
basic rights because media propaganda (aimed at the widest possible 
depoliticization) convinced them that it was useless, indeed, that it 
was putting the "entrepreneurs" in difficulty. After all, in a 
thirty-year narrative in which the diktats of neoliberalism, of 
"everyone thinks for themselves" and the cult of the "entrepreneur of 
himself" are reiterated in a nagging manner, why ever be able to defend 
something so apparently abstract (the masterpiece of the capitalist: 
making real rights abstract and pure abstractions real) like that of 
"not being fired without just cause".
However, there are many to this disarming but intuitive result.

NON-VOTING SCRUTINEERS

First of all, one, completely technical (but technique is never just 
technique). For years now, voters have been decreasing in an impressive 
way. Presidents of Regions elected with the participation of 30% of 
those entitled to vote, percentages in political elections that remain 
that stop at 60% (in a country in which until a few decades ago, over 
80% of those entitled to vote).[1]In this panorama, thinking of reaching 
the quorum on a class referendum like this, moreover decapitated of the 
only question that could have increased participation (namely the one 
relating to differentiated autonomy) was a gamble. It is clear that if 
an institutional battle should be carried forward it is to eliminate the 
quorum or, in any case, modify it significantly.
Having said that, 14 million votes is not a small number. But it is also 
true that no one can put their hat in it. The PD and the other bushes 
are trying, this would mean that they have not understood anything.

NEVER MIND THE BOLLOCKS

Because, perhaps, one of the reasons why Italians did not go to vote 
could also be that they can no longer stand the entire ruling class of a 
left that has given the worst of the worst. Of course, from a rational 
point of view, reasoning like this is like castrating yourself to spite 
your wife, but in the current situation, of true ideological 
desertification, even this could have seemed like some kind of answer.
After all, who abolished Article 18? Who created the legal conditions 
for increasingly widespread precariousness and insecurity in the world 
of work? How can a party like the PD really think it can represent 
rights that it has torn up? When it is in opposition it seems like Che 
Guevara, when it is in government it praises Monti and Draghi. That 
party would have two possibilities: disappear or split up. It will not 
do either because it manages large slices of power and still holds many 
levers in its hands. In the meantime, it helps to distract and send 
adrift what could really be the potential of these millions of workers, 
which is certainly not that of giving support to a center-left 
completely devoid of any perspective. If anything, they could instead 
support more radical mass actions.

EVERYTHING IS CONNECTED

Mass actions that could be joined with the much larger group of those 
who have been protesting against the genocide in Gaza for two years and 
are terrified and outraged by the brutal attack of the terrorist state 
of Israel on Iran, with the usual corollary of civilian deaths, declared 
and usual objectives of this tribal, racist, supremacist and fascist 
entity that has now become the horrendous Jewish state. Everything is 
connected because this battle for social rights[2]cannot be separated 
(and, in the last century it certainly would not have been) from the 
warmongering delirium that is now infesting the whole of Europe and the 
Nazi-like government of Trump.
We need to raise the bar. Peace and work go together (Lenin made a 
revolution there) because the completely crazy goal of 5% of GDP for 
armaments will desertify what remains of the welfare state. Healthcare, 
school, everything will be sacrificed to the god of war. A god that 
generates immense profits.

THE BOAT

One thing the left should say, if it still exists and if the blows it 
hits are not those of nails in a coffin: we are not all in the same 
boat. Social conflict is a conflict between different, opposing 
interests and in the absence of a State capable of at least mediating 
(imagine that) our interests are against those of the class enemy. What 
is good for us is not good for them. Here, if there is a faint hope, it 
certainly cannot come from a party that has not yet been able to say a 
serious word, not only on work, but even on the genocide in Gaza. A 
party that has characters like Emanuele Fiano (unworthy son of the 
deported Nedo) and the left for Israel. A kind of lobby that defends the 
terrorist state no matter what it does. Or it has Picierno, a die-hard 
warmonger (and not by chance against referendums).
We must take note, as the writer has been saying for decades, that that 
party must be abandoned and not confuse human relationships or even 
simple education with collaboration.

IN THE WORLD

But we are not really stupid, we know very well that on the electoral 
level today as yesterday there would not be numbers to send home the 
neo-fascist government of Meloni. But the question arises spontaneously. 
To what end should we opt (or rather cheer) for one coalition instead of 
another. Where are the real differences? Of course this government is 
doing its part with the security decrees and the repression in the streets.
However, we understand that there would be some mediation to be done on 
alliances, and, perhaps, like the second Conte government, something 
remotely anti-cyclical could also come out, even if we must remember how 
the media system massacred the very timid experiment of the citizen's 
income.

FASCIOCAPITALISM?

The original fascism died in 1945. So looking for a mathematical and 
geometric repetition of that phenomenon in today's events is not only 
wrong, but also misleading. Also because it was born in another 
historical era and when it appeared to the world it represented an 
absolute novelty. Even looking for recurring elements, in my opinion, is 
really of little use. So why this title? For a reason that is perhaps 
intuitive. Today, as then, we read the things of the world based on our 
experience and we cling to the images, to the Roman salutes to Acca 
Larentia, to the bust of the Duce by La Russa. Historical fascism itself 
is represented, both on the right and on the left, as a kind of violent 
bullying and not as a formidable destroyer of the working class, not as 
a successful experiment in consensus and targeted violence. Not as a 
weapon of capital.
So, having no other words that come to mind, I would like to point out 
that the era of triumphant capitalism today appears easier than in the 
past, more open to civil rights, to gender quotas. But if you scratch 
the surface, you will always find the same stuff. Whether there is 
Trump, Meloni, Macron or Merz, capital does not care. The important 
thing is that the manipulator is not disturbed. And when some timid 
disturbance seems to appear on the horizon, all weapons are deployed: 
propaganda, repression, the invitation not to participate.
The goal of the referendum was to win. Because those rights that it was 
going to restore or create from scratch have a real impact on people's 
lives. But people did not vote, for the reasons I mentioned above, but 
also probably for others. Maybe in southern Italy the problem is not 
art. 18 but having a job. Maybe there is a huge tiredness and a great 
poverty for which these rights seem to have become a luxury. If seen in 
these terms, as an exclusively defensive war, maybe 14 million are not 
really a small thing. Votes that should not be wasted, judged, 
sponsored, but understood.

[1]https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grafico_delle_elezioni_politiche_in_Italia
[2]Regarding the question on citizenship citizenship I would like to 
clarify a question, completely excluded from the discussion (and not by 
chance). I am horrified by +Europa and I am horrified by the 
justifications on the equation immigration need for labor. Citizenship 
instead serves to eliminate the fundamental element of every migratory 
phenomenon in the era of capital. That is, illegality (partial or total) 
which is an integral part of every phenomenon of exploitation and is 
what allows immigration to be a "mass of maneuver" of capital itself.
Just as it happened in Italy after the Second World War where immigrants 
from the south made the fortune of the north with the presence of a 
fascist law against urbanism (that is, without a job you couldn't move 
but you couldn't move if there was no job. Obviously everyone moved, but 
illegally). I gladly leave the "spiritual" anti-capitalism of the good 
old days of the pulley and the craftsman to national socialism (to be 
read in reverse) and to the Rizzi brands that have no problem making it 
to the end of the month.

Andrea Bellucci

https://www.ucadi.org/2025/06/22/dove-eravamo-rimasti/
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