How far is the Workers' Party of Kurdistan far from Marxism?
October 2, 16:54
Not a bad overview of the ideology of the Kurdish Workers Party based on the scraps of the works of Ozhdalan.
How far is the Workers' Party of Kurdistan far from Marxism?
Recruiters of the PKK offer four short articles by Abdullah Ocalan to all sympathizers and supporters as programmatic, to get to know their ideology. These articles are only translated into English. We bring to your attention a certificate with a brief content of these works, compiled in accordance with the structure of the articles, so that it would be possible to draw conclusions about the class nature of the PKK's ideology and its scientific character.
Article One. War and Peace in Kurdistan: Prospects for a Political Solution to the Kurdish Issue
1. Introduction The
Middle East is a complex and conflict region in which the Kurdish issue is the most important, more important than the Arab-Israeli issue, since the Kurdish settlement covers the present territories of the Arabs (Iraqis and Syrians), Persians and Turk.
2. Etymology of the word Kurds and Kurdistan
Kurds - one of the oldest peoples living at the intersection of trade routes (in particular the "Silk Road"), which played an important role in the development of mankind. Ecalogy Ocalan refers to the Sumerian era.
3. Kurdish territory and Kurdish language
The territory of Kurdistan is 450,000 square kilometers and since ancient times it was surrounded by settlements of Persians, Azerbaijanis, Arabs and Anatolian Turks. This territory is one of the most rich in forest and water resources of the Middle East and is famous for its fertile lands. Kurdish language leads the history from the Neolithic revolution and belongs to the Indo-European family of languages.
4. A Brief Review of Ancient Kurdish History
For the first time, the mention of Kurds as an ethnic group is encountered in connection with the Hurrites (3-2 thousand years BC). In the 216 - 652 gg. n. e. in Kurdistan feudalism was formed. The Kurdish dynasty of Ayyubida (1175 - 1250 AD) became one of the most powerful dynasties in the Middle East. The ruling class of Kurds enjoyed great autonomy in the Ottoman Empire. In the XIX century. there were several major Kurdish uprisings in connection with the oppression of the Turks.
5. Struggle for resources, war and state terror in Kurdistan
Kurdistan was constantly attacked by external powers. Terrorist regimes of the Assyrian and Scythian empires between the 13th and 10th centuries. BC. and the campaign of conquest of Alexander the Great are the most famous examples. The Arab conquest was accompanied by the Islamization of Kurdistan. In the XIII-XIV centuries. The Mongols invaded Kurdistan. Until the XIX century. Between the Ottomans and the Kurdish principalities reigned a relative peace based on a common belief - Sunni Islam.
6. European colonialism and the Kurdish dilemma
European colonialism in the 20th century. brought a new form of oppression of the Kurdish people. The essence of European politics boiled down to the principle of "divide and rule", to the policy of ousting the peoples of the Middle East. During the first half of the XX century. Kurds were only pawns in the game of foreign interests.
7. The ideological basis of colonial oppression and the policy of power in Kurdistan
The development of capitalism and the formation of national states in Turkey, Iraq, Iran and Syria led to the denial of the existence of the Kurdish people. For many Kurds, an open commitment to their origins and culture led to the exclusion of all economic and social relations. For the Arab countries, the Kurdish question did not exist, the problems were solved through forced Islamization. Islam was declared the only "nation". And this nation was Arab.
Compulsory assimilation of Kurds was carried out everywhere.
Instruments of assimilation were: Islam, the prohibition of language and culture, bourgeois nationalism.
Bourgeois nationalism is the most important ideology of nation-states (nation-states). Ocalan compares nationalism with the functions of oppression with religion.
Kurdish identity and Kurdish resistance, the process of identifying Kurds as a nation occurred relatively late - in the second half of the XX century. Only the left-wing student movement of the 1970s (that is, Ocalan himself - from modesty does not die) could make a significant contribution to the realization that there is a Kurdish identity.
8. Workers' Party of Kurdistan (PKK)
In April 1973, a group of six gathered to form an independent Kurdish political organization. It is interesting that in the official pamphlet of the PKK there is a reference and an explanation of the fact that the PKK was a Marxist organization, and in this article Ocalan is not. Just an independent Kurdish political party ... The main goal was supposedly not a socialist revolution, but gaining national independence. Separate points from the first program of the PKK, so that there was an idea of how things really were:
"The establishment of the workers 'and peasants' government as the first step towards the creation of a democratic people's dictatorship." "Creation of an independent economy of the country. For this purpose, the following activities will be carried out: 1. Management of the economy through central planning. 2. Priority development of socialized heavy industry. 3. Use of natural resources, transfer of the transport system, trade, banks and mass media into public property. 4. Conducting land reform and involving the peasants in collective farms with the help and support of the state. 5. A greeting of private initiatives useful for the development of society, as well as their support and state subsidies allocated to them. " "The use of proletarian internationalism in relation to neighboring peoples and to interethnic issues."
That is, roughly speaking, in the 1980s the PKK offered the NEP. And today Ocalan forgot about it ...
On November 27, 1978, the PKK was established in a small village near Diyarbakir. Twenty-two leading members of the national Kurdish movement participated in the first congress and establishment of the party. The PKK has concentrated its work in rural areas of Kurdistan. The PKK pursued the Turkish authorities. Activists often went to the mountains, hiding from the Turkish authorities. On September 12, 1980, the Turkish military overthrew the civil government and seized power. Many of the remaining PKK activists in Turkey were imprisoned by the military junta. After a short period of reorganization, most of the members returned to Kurdistan and took up armed resistance against the fascist junta. Attacks on military facilities in Eruha and Semdili on August 15, 1984 became the official beginning of the armed struggle.
The bloody war between the Kurds and the Turkish government was fruitful in the 90s - the Turks declared the possibility of recognizing the Kurdish people. In 1993, the PKK announced a cease-fire and the beginning of a dialogue. However, because of the supporters of the continuation of the conflict on both sides, the conflict again escalated. In 1998, the RCP again announced a cease-fire, but the Turkish authorities insisted on a military solution to the Kurdish issue. Then in 1998, the Turkish secret services kidnapped Ocalan, who is currently held in a Turkish prison. This event coincides with the proposal of a new approach of the PKK to the struggle.
9. New strategic, philosophical and political approaches to the Kurdish liberation movement
The bottom line is that Ocalan believes that modern bourgeois states are national states and oppress non-titular nations. To them he refers, of course, to Turkey. The PKK proposes to realize its right to national self-determination not by creating a Kurdish nation-state, but by creating a system of democratic self-organization in Kurdistan based on a confederation in which everyone can autonomously self-organize: religious communities and national minorities and everything, everything, everything. The essence is to limit Turkey's sovereignty in the territory of Kurdistan, not getting, in fact, independence. This is something like autonomy, which the Kurds do not want to call autonomy. Ocalan calls this "semi-state of Kurdish autonomy" (semi-state Kurdish autonomy). In general, a compromise solution. And already in this democratic confederation they will have freedom, justice and equality. In short, the idealization of democracy and complete forgetfulness of the class approach and the isolation of politics from the economy.
According to Ocalan, it is impossible to solve the Kurdish issue by force. "The Constitution of the Republic of Turkey recognizes the existence and expression of all its cultures in a democratic way" and on this basis it demands the freedom of language, culture, the rehabilitation of the PKK fighters and the inclusion of Kurds in Turkey's electoral process.
Article two. Democratic nation.
Introduction
Ocalan is a critic of both capitalism and socialism. The works of Ocalan are based on the analysis of the whole history of mankind and offer a development model alternative to capitalism and a way of life. The works of Ocalan are not limited to ideas about the Kurdish nation, but are universal for all peoples and people.
1. Introduction
The PKK armedly proved the right to the existence of the Kurds and became the leader of the liberation movement. In the 1990s, there were changes in the ideology of the PKK related to the destruction of the USSR. They are as follows. The basis of the hegemony of capitalism Ocalan considers the so-called. state-nation (or "national state", if in Russian). The USSR collapsed, as it tried to build an anti-capitalist society according to the patterns of the national state. The main defect of socialism Ocalan sees in centralization. On the experience of the Kurdish movement, he argues that it is possible to build socialism only by means of a "democratic state". The weakest link in modern imperialism is Kurdistan, in which Ojalan founded the Association of Kurdistan Societies (Union of Democratic Communities in Kurdistan).
2. Capitalist Modernity and the Nation
There are different definitions and concepts of the nation, but the main problem of our time arises from the connection of power and the state with the nation. Ocalan defines a democratic nation as a society formed by the free will of free people and communities.
Due to the laws of capitalism, the modern nation seeks to acquire a national state. But this state does not solve social problems, as all the apologists of capitalism assume, but only multiplies them. The state-nation directs the exploitation and suppression of the nation. Capitalist modernity replaced traditional religion and built a deified national state. The phenomenon of a secular state, according to Ocalan, is nothing more than the deification of the state itself. Therefore, the ideological hegemony of capitalism, whose essence - in achieving maximum profit, consists in the sacralization of such concepts as the motherland, the nation and the market. Means of worship include, among other things, the execution of an anthem before sports competitions and the like.
3. Democratic modernity
An alternative to capitalism is a democratic nation. This means: an economy free from monopoly, harmony with the environment, that is, technologies that are friendly to nature and humanity. Ocalan argues that the democratic movement, of which the democratic nation is the embodiment, was in one form or another always, and he only formulates the forms that are able to displace the nation-state-democratic confederalism.
4. Democratic decision
The national state was called upon to solve the problems of nations and their conflicts, but this proved impossible. Socialism of the USSR not only did not become an alternative, but even more confused issue. The right of nations to self-determination also only increases hostility and tensions. The problems of any nation, including the Kurdish one, can be solved within the framework of the democratic process that Ocalan essentially reduces to autonomy and the absence of powerful and cultural centralism. The PKK is the embodiment of this process and demands the recognition of the Kurds' right to self-government and democracy. Ocalan considers the Constitution a compromise between the people's, democratic movement and bourgeois power.
Stalin's definition of the nation Ocalan rejects, believes that it is descriptive and caused the collapse of the USSR.
5. The model of a democratic nation
The definition of a democratic nation that is not bound by rigid political boundaries and a single language, culture, religion and interpretation of history means pluralism and the totality of communities, as well as free and equal citizens who exist together and in solidarity. According to Ocalan, a democratic nation is the opposite of a nation with its national state. Further, Ocalan denounces the nation-state for the woes of capitalism (exploitation, oppression, nationalism, wars, environmental problems, etc.) and praises the democratic nation as a socialist alternative.
The EU states have moved from nation states to legal nations. And if in the democratic nation the main thing is autonomous governance, and in the state-nation - the rule of power, then in the legal nation - the law. According to Ocalan in the United States, Japan and Germany - the economic nations, that is, the main thing in them is the economy. He calls the example of a socialist nation Cubans, however, stipulating that this is the same state-nation, only under state capitalism.
5.1 Formation of the Kurdish Nation
Kurds became a nation thanks to Kurdish thinking and Kurdish culture, including language. A distinctive feature of the Kurdish nation is that people share the thinking of a just, free and equal world based on diversity. The basis of Kurdish identity is freedom of expression and social structure in the form of democratic autonomy.
5.2 Democratic autonomy
Democratic autonomy can be achieved in two ways: by compromising with nation-states and by fighting for state sovereignty. Ocalan cites the example of the EU as a way of compromise.
5.3 The PKK and the formation of the democratic nation of the
PKK in the establishment of a democratic Kurdish nation set the following goals.
1 - freedom of the individual in a small community. Rejecting the liberal understanding of personal freedom, Ocalan insists that individual freedom can be limited to the nearest small collective. The community forms the personality, and the personality is realized only in the communities. Morality is respect and commitment to the community and community life. Under the community, Ocalan, apparently, understands something like a commune, local government and public associations.
2 - moral policy. Moral and political society according to Ocalan is the main fundamental unit of civilization. To put in the basis of politics, morality means to be in harmony with one's own development and existence. The implementation of such a policy is democracy. The basis of democracy is self-government and diversity.
3 - a new way of life. A democratic nation is not tolerant of exploitation, oppression, including women, commodity and real fetishism and the like.
4 - free partnership. The PKK, rejecting male chauvinism, proclaims the emancipation of women as the most important process on the path to the formation of a democratic nation. Ocalan proposes to build relations between men and women on the basis of partnership and respect.
5 - economic autonomy. The society can not be free without control over the means of production and the market. Economic autonomy is not capitalism or state capitalism. It is based on the environmental industry and the communal economy - the form in which democracy is reflected in the economy. Industry, technology, business and property are linked by the principle of environmental friendliness and democracy. Ocalan proposes to minimize the accumulation of capital. He does not reject the market, the variety of products, competition and productivity, but rejects the dominance of profit and capital accumulation. Finance and financial instruments are used only to the extent that they serve productivity and functionality. In short, it is for small-scale economy and collective property, against industry and modern technologies.
6 - a new legal system. Ocalan rejects a unified system of law, offering in return a law based on diversity. In essence, we mean our own autonomous legal system.
7 - a new culture. Contemporary bourgeois culture Ojalan branded as patriarchal and masculine. The culture of a democratic nation is a friendly set of diverse cultures of communities. Variety is wealth, beauty and tolerance. Common values are only equality and freedom.
8 - self-defense. Every democratic nation needs a system of protection and internal control, which are usurped in the nation-states. A woman must serve in dislocation and be thus free. Kurdish autonomy does not exclude the Kurdish army.
9 - new diplomacy. Old diplomacy is the pre-war activity of nation-states: the logic of profit, manipulation and hostility. New diplomacy is the activity of the Democratic National Congress, the essence of which is to achieve peace and solidarity. Instead, the United Nations is proposed by the Global Union of Democratic Nations with the corresponding objectives.
6. Searching for ways to a democratic nation
Building a democratic nation is an ongoing process. Kurds are free from the illusions of the nation-state and do not recognize power over themselves. Other nations must follow the example of the Kurds and fight for a democratic nation. This will be the output of humanity from the crisis of capitalism.
7. Conclusion
It is necessary for all socialist parties and movements not to fight for state power, but to develop the policy of a democratic nation and the corresponding social forms. Democracy can be defined as the self-government of a non-state society - and this should be the goal of all nations. Ocalan defines his ideology as a non-state-oriented democratic socialist theory. And democratic confederalism as a multi-political formation of multiple identity and multiculturalism.
Article three. Democratic confederalism
SECTION I. FOREWORD
For more than 30 years the PKK has been fighting for the legitimate rights of the Kurdish people, this struggle has acquired international significance. In the 1970s, when it was created, the PKK was inspired by the socialist movement. The PKK has always viewed the Kurdish issue not as an ethnic or national issue, but as a project for the liberation of society and its democratization as a whole.
SECTION II. NATIONAL STATE (STATE-NATION)
A. Foundations The
formation of capitalist relations in the Middle East and the birth and strengthening of the nation state go hand in hand. The nation-state destroys the old feudal orders and state formations, replacing the dominion of European empires.
1. The state-nation is the maximum form of power, maximum exploitation, monopoly on power and ideology. One of the main reasons for strengthening the nation-state is that the upper layers of the middle class are increasingly connected with the process of monopolization.
2. In the nation-state, despite the declared secular nature, the power and the title nation are deified. To the cult elements, Ocalan includes a flag, anthem, emblem and the like. Sacralization of the unity of the nation and the steadfastness of its territorial boundaries are sacrificed.
3. The state-nation has a huge military-bureaucratic apparatus through which it subordinates all spheres of society's life to itself.
4. In the cultural and ideological sphere, the state-nation suppresses all diversity, engenders assimilation, which reaches the genocide. The concept of "citizen" is an example of ideological dictates. Homogeneous national society is the most artificial society that has ever existed.
5. The nation-state does not care about the people and is a vassal of the imperialists. All the cities of such a state are subordinated to the capital and serve the process of capitalist exploitation. The nation-state is the enemy of the people.
B. The ideological foundations of the nation-state
1. The main weapon is nationalism. Ocalan considers nationalism a quasi-religious ideology. Nationalism subordinates science and art, thus indirectly influencing the spiritual life of society.
2. An important ideological pillar of the nation-state is positivism. The transformation of science into a set of descriptive methods simplifies the implantation of nationalism and the spiritual enslavement of the people.
3. Another ideological pillar of the nation-state is sexism.
4. The next ideological support of the nation-state Ocalan calls religion, which continues to influence society or its individual strata.
V. Kurds and the National State
The creation of a separate nation-state for the Kurds does not make sense.
SECTION III. DEMOCRATIC CONFEDERALISM
Such a government can be called a democracy without a state. It is a flexible, multicultural, anti-monopoly and consensus-oriented political form. Ecology and feminism are the central links of democratic confederalism. In the framework of such self-government, an alternative economy will be needed that increases the resources of society, rather than exploits them.
A. Diversity of the political landscape
The contradictory composition of society requires the presence of political groups of both vertical and horizontal formations. Thus, it is necessary to balance the central, regional and local groups. Everyone should have the right to make decisions.
B. The legacy of society and the accumulation of historical knowledge
Democratic confederalism is based on the historical experience of society and its collective heritage. This is not an arbitrary modern political system, but, rather, accumulated history and experience. All the trends and forms of centralism Ocalan refers to the negative experience, and the entire struggle and forms of self-organization - to the positive experience of mankind.
B. Ethics
Economic, political, ideological and military monopolies are structures that contradict the nature of society, simply seeking to accumulate surpluses. The correct ethic according to Öcalan is the many diverse ethics of different communities and societies.
D. Political system
Unlike a centralized and bureaucratic understanding of governance and the exercise of power, confederalism is a type of political self-government where all groups of society and all cultural identities can manifest themselves in local assemblies, general conferences and councils. The structures of democracy should be viewed not as hierarchical levels of government of a nation state, but as central instruments of social expression. All decisions are made exclusively at the local level.
D. Self-Defense
Instead of militarizing the nation-state, Ocalan offers self-defense. The composition of the military leadership should be selective on the part of both political institutions and confederal groupings, that is, communities.
E. Democratic Confederalism Against Hegemony
Any kind of hegemony is rejected.
J. Global structure of democratic confederalism
Instead of the UN and against the UN, there is a need for an international organization of democratic confederations.
H. Conclusion
Democratic confederalism can be characterized as a kind of self-government in contrast to state governance. Ocalan does not rule out the peaceful coexistence of the two systems, until the state-nation intervenes in internal affairs. No revolution will bring freedom. In the long term, freedom and justice can only be achieved through a dynamic process of democratic confederation.
SECTION IV. PRINCIPLES OF DEMOCRATIC CONFEDERALISM
1. The right to self-determination of a nation includes the right to its own state. However, its national state does not increase the freedom of people.
2. Democratic confederalism is a non-state social paradigm. It is not controlled by the state. At the same time, democratic confederalism is the cultural organizational plan of a democratic nation. He is an alternative to the right to self-determination.
3. Democratic confederalism is based on the broad participation of the masses. All decisions are made by the communities, and the central structures set up over the communities are needed only to coordinate the political will of the communities.
4. The only way out of all problems in the Middle East is democratic confederalism as an alternative to capitalism.
5. Democratic confederalism is an anti-nationalist movement.
SECTION V. PROBLEMS OF THE PEOPLES OF THE MIDDLE EAST The
national question is the key problem of the peoples of the Middle East. It can be solved with the help of democratic confederalism.
1. There are more than twenty Arab states that share the Arab community and inflict damage on wars. The reason is in the nation-states that sow nationalism and Islamism for the sake of competing with each other.
2. The Turks and Turkmens form another influential people, which are suppressed by the nation-state and exploitation.
3. Kurds - the most numerous people in the world without their own state. The resolution of the Kurdish question on the PKK templates will become a guarantee of freedom for all peoples and the entire region of the Middle East.
4. The Iranian people suffer from capitalism and the nation-state. The Iranian society is multi-ethnic and multi-confessional and has a rich culture. This diversity contrasts sharply with the hegemony of theocracy. Azerbaijanis, Kurds, Baluchis, Arabs and Turkmens are interested in the project of the Democratic Confederation of Iran. A special role will be played here by the women's movement and the communal traditions of Iran.
5. The Armenian national question is connected with the history of repression of this Christian people by the Muslim majority. Confederative structures could solve the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict without redistribution of the borders of these states.
6. A democratic confederation could solve the problems of the Assyrians, who, like Armenians, were oppressed by Muslims. Their real salvation can be the separation of their mentality from the capitalist modernity and the adoption of a democratic civilization by updating their rich cultural tradition to recreate the "Aramaic democratic nation".
7. The problems of Israel show the complete failure of the solution of the Jewish question within the framework of capitalism. Jews are taking revenge by the war over centuries of exile, pogroms and genocide. Their transformation into a democratic nation, as well as for Armenians and Aramaeans, will facilitate their participation in the democratic confederation of the Middle East. The project of the "Eastern Aegean Democratic Confederation" is proposed.
8. The destruction of Hellenic culture in Anatolia by ethnic cleansing, organized by the Turkish and Greek nation states, is an irreplaceable loss for humanity.
9. Democratic confederation is also able to solve the problems of Caucasian ethnics living in the Middle East.
https://prorivists.org/pkk_marxism/ - zinc (article about the role of a woman in the Kurdish state did not fit in size, so that it can be read by reference)
PS. The review material on the fighting in Syria will be in the evening.
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https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/3719042.html