Essay:Crisis Points and why Worse Conditions don't Magically Create Revolution

This essay exists to clarify the nature of crisis and to demystify them away from idealist conceptions of "natural radicalization".

What is a crisis point?

A crisis point is a historical phase wherein a chain of events causes a rupture in the material conditions in which the proletariat exists.

This can be for instance:

• War
• Famine
• Financial crisis
• Political crisis
• Domestic unrest/terror
• Global collapse of a world order
• Annexation
• etc.

All of these events create fundamental shifts in the material conditions of the effected proletariat (or more broadly the local laboring classes).

These shifts have a tendency to present as:

• Mass inflation
• A disorganizing of productive forces (i.e through physical destruction of MoP or mass killing of the proletariat, etc.)
• A rapid shift in the availability of certain commodities (shortage of oil or food, etc.)
• The rapid degradation of the use-value of certain commodities (dirty water, moldy food, low quality oil, etc.)

Important to note is that the intensity of a crisis point is largely related to the vitality of the productive forces or commodities affected and the value placed on them by the dominant culture (i.e a shortage of consumer gaming consoles has generally less of an impact than, say, a shortage of clean drinking water.)

A crisis is, as it relates to praxis & theory, an undefined vector of social movement, it broadly causes rapid social movement, but in a disorganized form, a crisis has no inherent ideology, it is as it first appears, a material shift which causes a rupture in the ideological status quo, a vacuum, of sorts.

The nature of crisis points in their relation to praxis

It is simultaneously the case that crisis points lack a direction, and that crisis points affect social movement, how then, does this contradiction resolve?

The crisis point is given a value via a mechanistic intervention of ideology. For instance, a fascist can take a crisis in the labor market as an opportunity to spread lies about migrant labor, or elite conspiracy, while a communist might take that same crisis and point to it's roots and effects on the proletariat, the liberal however, seeking to uphold the status quo, might take aim at the communists and the fascists, using the crisis as an opportunity to direct praxis against an imagined external threat, or a real internal threat (such as the fascist and/or communist, whichever upsets the status quo more). Ultimately then, because all sides see the crisis point as an opportunity for directing social movement, they come into conflict about the direction. This is the contradiction at hand, it seeks to define the vector of social movement by resolving the ideological struggle, thereby defining the nature of the response to the crisis.

If a fascist succeeds in this struggle, then, we may see an uptick in fascists, if a communist succeeds, we may see an uptick in communists, if a liberal succeeds, we may see a retention of the status quo. Note however that the vector is not entirely hegemonic, whichever side comes out on top, small slivers will be radicalized towards the other side, and a larger proportion will take the "polite" and "principled" stance of upholding the status quo.

The relation of radicals to those who wish to uphold the status quo is decided by the general intensity of social movement already present before the crisis. Note here that the crisis point does not "create" radicalism, it intensifies and highlights the contradictions inherent to the given society, thereby intensifying the ideological contradiction, in essence, it takes the already present social movement and spikes it, it will then either fall back down (but not to the original level, as negation is never full negation) or boil over into a broader societal shift, defined by the cumulative effect of historical crisis points.

A note on crisis points in their relation to ideological preparedness and present social vectors & lines

A crisis point, however, cannot be simply adopted by any unprepared grouping, for, if a group lacks coherent theory and a comprehensive line, their input will be naught but vague noise and fall into the broader chaos. For any given grouping to take advantage of a crisis point, they require a stable structure, a sound theoretical basis and a strong, actively upheld line, which will inform their desired vector definition.

Look at it this way, if we imagine the proletariat as a golf ball, the social movement as the golf club, and the vector thereof as the angle and intensity of the golf-club, would it not be wise to firstly figure out said angle and intensity, rather than ineffectively waving the golf-club around, while masturbating to the thought of "open debate" and "acknowledging both sides" at least those who swing the club falsely still affect the balls trajectory!

The point being, when there is little intensity in the class struggle, we have room to breath and debate and build new ideas and advance the line, etc. But in said times of intense class struggle, we cannot be stuck fighting amongst ourselves over the best approach. If an organization is constantly in intense contradiction over their very definition, then it is not a useful organization, and must be abandoned in favor of a more stable, politically coherent organization, even if it may be smaller in size.