Jacques Camatte

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Jacques Camatte
Born1935 (1935) (age 89)
Plan-de-Cuques, Alpes-Maritimes, France
NationalityFrench
Main interests

Jacques Camatte (born 1935) [1] is a French writer and former Marxist theoretician and member of the International Communist Party, a primarily Italian left communist organisation under the influence of Amadeo Bordiga. After Bordiga's death and the events of May 68, his beliefs began to fall closer to the tendencies of anarcho-primitivism and communization, and would later influence accelerationism.

Contents

Biography

Jacques Camatte was born in 1935 in Plan-de-Cuques, [2] and worked as a teacher of earth science at a school in Rodez. [2] During his time as a teacher, he often took stances that align with his politics, and rather than oppressively disciplining problematic children, he would recover them using methods relying on the cooperative spirit which he saw inherent in every human being. [3]

He lives on an isolated permaculture farm in rural France with his daughter and grandson. [3]

Political activity

Camatte became involved with radical politics from an early age, first joining the Fraction Française de la Gauche Communiste Internationale (FFGCI), a left communist organization linked to Marc Chirik and Onorato Damen, in 1953. [2] Afterward, he became involved with the closely linked International Communist Party (ICP) where he was introduced to the work of Roger Dangeville, Suzanne Voute, and most importantly, Amadeo Bordiga, who he began corresponding with in 1954. [1] However, he had several disagreements with the party, especially in regards to the question of National Liberation, and wrote several articles in the party's organ, Il Programma Communista, relating to this issue. [2]

In 1961, Camatte began to perform a growing intellectual role within the ICP, opening up a real intellectual exchange with Bordiga himself. His text "Origin and Function of the Party Form" published in 1962 showed a certain convergence with Bordiga. For the latter, it was important to differentiate between the "formal party" (the organized real party) and the "historical party" (the group carrying a communist historical program). Bordiga, fleeing all activism, proclaimed that Marx's theory was primarily the theory of the proletariat. For Camatte, the historical party was a materialized organ in a formal organization of the proletariat, whatever its size. Consequently, Camatte believed that in a counterrevolutionary period, as before May 1968, the "internationalists" should not fall into the trap of activism, but should develop the communist program, concentrating first and foremost on the critique of political economy. [2]

After moving to Paris in 1964 and becoming involved with their local branch of the ICP, he became opposed to what he considered Trotskyist activism developing within the party, including the formalization of meetings, bureaucratization of party membership, agitation being centered around a party newspaper, and the agitation for Communist trade unions. [2]

In 1966, after further controversial writings within the party, Camatte and Dangeville split from the party along with eleven other members. This split was particularly painful, because as Camatte recalls, "whoever leaves the party is dead to the party." [2] Since Camatte was the librarian of the ICP's periodicals and literary collection, he had to barricade himself inside of his apartment to keep them. [2] Eventually, he was forced to burn the entirety of the collection that was not written by Bordiga, to prove that he was not an "academic". [2] Bordiga later referred to this as "an act of gangsterism." [2]

After the split, and then conflict with Dangeville leading to a second split, Camatte founded the journal Invariance , which sought to protect the purity of revolutionary theory. [2]

Theories and beliefs

Camatte saw Invariance as the daughter of the events of May 1968, claiming that 1968 was "the end of the counter-revolutionary phase... May '68 is not the revolution, it is its emergence. An emergence which had been prepared by the Vietnam War, the international monetary crisis..., the struggle of the guerrillas in Latin America, and especially that of the black workers' movement, provoked by the consequences of automation." [2] Significantly, Camatte early on rejected the class-based concept of proletariat. The future "party" of tomorrow was "an impersonal force above generations" and classes, because "it represents the human species, the human being who has finally been found. It is the consciousness of the species. And any attempt to prematurely form artificial organizations, as the ICP and other 'ultra-legal' groups did, was tantamount to a 'gang' or 'racketeer'." [2]

During this time, Camatte produced his most notable work, Capital and Community, [4] which analyzes Marx's Results of the Direct Production Process, the subject of capital as totality, and Communism as the formation of a Gemeinwesen, or a human community.

After collecting and publishing a great amount of historical documents from left communist currents, and analyzing the most recently discovered writings of Marx, in the early-1970s Camatte publicly abandoned the Marxist perspective. He decided instead that capitalism had succeeded in shaping humanity to its profit, and that every kind of "revolution" was thus impossible; that the working class was nothing more than an aspect of capital, unable to supersede its situation; that any future revolutionary movement would basically consist of a struggle between humanity and capital itself, rather than between classes; and that capital has become totalitarian in structure, leaving nowhere and no one outside its domesticating influence. This pessimism about revolutionary perspective is accompanied by the idea that we can "leave the world" and live closer to nature, and stop harming children and deforming their naturally reasonable minds.

To Camatte, the Communist perspective remains postponed indefinitely: "Human society can only survive if it transforms itself into a human Gemeinwesen. The proletariat no longer has a romantic task to accomplish, but restoring its human centrality." [2] Camatte proposes the concept of "inversion" as being the only way to accomplish this, a concept which he draws from Bordiga's later works. [5]

Legacy

Invariance was particularly influential after it was first published, with new editions typically selling around 4,000 copies. [2] It found a wide audience in the left-wing of the French Trotskyists, and especially among Italian Autonomists, most notably with Antonio Negri claiming to have been "inspired" by the journal when he was reading it while in prison. [2]

Camatte's views came to influence the anarcho-primitivists, who developed aspects of Camatte's line of argument in the journal Fifth Estate in the late-1970s and early-1980s. [6]

In the 21st century, his views also went on to influence accelerationism, and his essay Decline of the Capitalist Mode of Production or Decline of Humanity? was featured in #Accelerate: The Accelerationist Reader [7]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Leninism</span> Political theory developed by Vladimir Lenin

Leninism is a political ideology developed by Russian Marxist revolutionary Vladimir Lenin that proposes the establishment of the dictatorship of the proletariat led by a revolutionary vanguard party as the political prelude to the establishment of communism. Lenin's ideological contributions to the Marxist ideology relate to his theories on the party, imperialism, the state, and revolution. The function of the Leninist vanguard party is to provide the working classes with the political consciousness and revolutionary leadership necessary to depose capitalism.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Trotskyism</span> Variety of Marxism developed by Leon Trotsky

Trotskyism is the political ideology and branch of Marxism developed by Russian revolutionary and intellectual Leon Trotsky along with some other members of the Left Opposition and the Fourth International. Trotsky described himself as an orthodox Marxist, a revolutionary Marxist, and a Bolshevik–Leninist as well as a follower of Karl Marx, Frederick Engels, Vladimir Lenin, Karl Liebknecht, and Rosa Luxemburg.

<i>Invariance</i> (magazine)

Invariance is a French magazine edited by Jacques Camatte, published since 1968.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Amadeo Bordiga</span> Italian communist politician and Marxist theoretician

Amadeo Bordiga was an Italian Marxist theorist, revolutionary socialist, founder of the Communist Party of Italy (PCI), member of the Communist International (Comintern) and later a leading figure of the International Communist Party. Bordiga was originally associated with the PCI, but he was expelled in 1930 after being accused of Trotskyism.

Marxism is a political philosophy and method of socioeconomic analysis. It uses a materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as "historical materialism," to understand class relations and social conflict. It also uses a dialectical perspective to view social transformation. Marxism originates from the works of 19th-century German philosophers Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. Marxism has developed over time into various branches and schools of thought, As a result, there is no single, definitive Marxist theory. Marxism has had a profound impact in shaping the modern world, with various left-wing and far-left political movements taking inspiration from it in varying local contexts.

In Marxism, ultra-leftism encompasses a broad spectrum of revolutionary communist currents that are generally Marxist and frequently anti-Leninist in perspective. Ultra-leftism distinguishes itself from other left-wing currents through its rejection of electoralism, trade unionism, and national liberation. The term is sometimes used as a synonym of left communism. "Ultra-left" is also commonly used as a pejorative by Marxist–Leninists and Trotskyists to refer to extreme or uncompromising Marxist sects.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Communist Workers' Party of Germany</span> Political party in Germany

The Communist Workers' Party of Germany was an anti-parliamentarian and left communist party that was active in Germany during the Weimar Republic. It was founded in 1920 in Heidelberg as a split from the Communist Party of Germany (KPD). Originally the party remained a sympathising member of Communist International. In 1922, the KAPD split into two factions, both of whom kept the name, but are referred to as the KAPD Essen Faction and the KAPD Berlin Faction.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">International Communist Party</span> Political party in Italy

The International Communist Party (ICP) is a left communist international political party.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Communization</span> Term describing mixing of radical anarchist and ultra-left tendencies

Communization theory refers to a tendency on the ultra-left that understands communism as a process that, in a social revolution, immediately begins to replace all capitalist social relations with communist ones. Thus it rejects the role of the dictatorship of the proletariat, which it sees as reproducing capitalism. There exist two broad trends within communization theory: a ‘Marxist’ one and an ‘Anarchist’ one.

Marxism is a method of socioeconomic analysis that originates in the works of 19th century German philosophers Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. Marxism analyzes and critiques the development of class society and especially of capitalism as well as the role of class struggles in systemic, economic, social and political change. It frames capitalism through a paradigm of exploitation and analyzes class relations and social conflict using a materialist interpretation of historical development – materialist in the sense that the politics and ideas of an epoch are determined by the way in which material production is carried on.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Left communism</span> Political ideology

Left communism, or the communist left, is a position held by the left wing of communism, which criticises the political ideas and practices espoused by Marxist–Leninists and social democrats. Left communists assert positions which they regard as more authentically Marxist than the views of Marxism–Leninism espoused by the Communist International after its Bolshevization by Joseph Stalin and during its second congress.

Classical Marxism is the body of economic, philosophical, and sociological theories expounded by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels in their works, as contrasted with orthodox Marxism, Marxism–Leninism, and autonomist Marxism which emerged after their deaths. The core concepts of classical Marxism include alienation, base and superstructure, class consciousness, class struggle, exploitation, historical materialism, ideology, revolution; and the forces, means, modes, and relations of production. Marx's political praxis, including his attempt to organize a professional revolutionary body in the First International, often served as an area of debate for subsequent theorists.

Revolutionary socialism is a political philosophy, doctrine, and tradition within socialism that stresses the idea that a social revolution is necessary to bring about structural changes in society. More specifically, it is the view that revolution is a necessary precondition for transitioning from a capitalist to a socialist mode of production. Revolution is not necessarily defined as a violent insurrection; it is defined as a seizure of political power by mass movements of the working class so that the state is directly controlled or abolished by the working class as opposed to the capitalist class and its interests.

In Marxist philosophy, the dictatorship of the proletariat is a condition in which the proletariat, or working class, holds control over state power. The dictatorship of the proletariat is the transitional phase from a capitalist and a communist economy, whereby the post-revolutionary state seizes the means of production, mandates the implementation of direct elections on behalf of and within the confines of the ruling proletarian state party, and institutes elected delegates into representative workers' councils that nationalise ownership of the means of production from private to collective ownership. During this phase, the administrative organizational structure of the party is to be largely determined by the need for it to govern firmly and wield state power to prevent counterrevolution, and to facilitate the transition to a lasting communist society.

Marxist philosophy or Marxist theory are works in philosophy that are strongly influenced by Karl Marx's materialist approach to theory, or works written by Marxists. Marxist philosophy may be broadly divided into Western Marxism, which drew from various sources, and the official philosophy in the Soviet Union, which enforced a rigid reading of what Marx called dialectical materialism, in particular during the 1930s. Marxist philosophy is not a strictly defined sub-field of philosophy, because the diverse influence of Marxist theory has extended into fields as varied as aesthetics, ethics, ontology, epistemology, social philosophy, political philosophy, the philosophy of science, and the philosophy of history. The key characteristics of Marxism in philosophy are its materialism and its commitment to political practice as the end goal of all thought. The theory is also about the struggles of the proletariat and their reprimand of the bourgeoisie.

A socialist state, socialist republic, or socialist country, sometimes referred to as a workers' state or workers' republic, is a sovereign state constitutionally dedicated to the establishment of socialism. The term communist state is often used synonymously in the West, specifically when referring to one-party socialist states governed by Marxist–Leninist communist parties, despite these countries being officially socialist states in the process of building socialism and progressing toward a communist society. These countries never describe themselves as communist nor as having implemented a communist society. Additionally, a number of countries that are multi-party capitalist states make references to socialism in their constitutions, in most cases alluding to the building of a socialist society, naming socialism, claiming to be a socialist state, or including the term people's republic or socialist republic in their country's full name, although this does not necessarily reflect the structure and development paths of these countries' political and economic systems. Currently, these countries include Algeria, Bangladesh, Guyana, India, Nepal, Nicaragua, Sri Lanka and Tanzania.

Proletarian internationalism, sometimes referred to as international socialism, is the perception of all proletarian revolutions as being part of a single global class struggle rather than separate localized events. It is based on the theory that capitalism is a world-system and therefore the working classes of all nations must act in concert if they are to replace it with communism.

Permanent revolution is the strategy of a revolutionary class pursuing its own interests independently and without compromise or alliance with opposing sections of society. As a term within Marxist theory, it was first coined by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels as early as 1850, but since then it has been used to refer to different concepts by different theorists, most notably Leon Trotsky.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Roger Dangeville</span> French translator

Roger Dangeville was a left communist activist most noted for his translation of Karl Marx's Grundrisse and his work with Jacques Camatte.

References

  1. 1 2 el-Ojeili, Chamsy (28 April 2015). Beyond Post-Socialism: Dialogues with the Far-Left. Palgrave Macmillan UK. p. 92. doi:10.1057/9781137474537_6. ISBN   978-1-137-47453-7.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 "Entretien avec Jacques Camatte (notice biographique)". Youtube. Archived from the original on 21 December 2021.
  3. 1 2 Ermini, Armando (9 August 2016). "Conversando con Camatte". L'interferenza. Retrieved 9 December 2020.
  4. ↑ Camatte, Jacques (December 2020). Capital and Community. Raleigh: Pattern Books. ISBN   978-4-550-93284-4.
  5. ↑ Camatte, Jacques. "Bordiga and the Fate of the Species". Libcom. Retrieved 24 February 2021.
  6. ↑ Millett, Steve (2004). Purkis, Jonathan (ed.). Changing anarchism : anarchist theory and practice in a global age. Manchester: Manchester Univ. Press. pp. 79ff. ISBN   0719066948.
  7. ↑ Mackay, Robin; Avanessian, Armen (4 April 2014). #Accelerate: The Accelerationist Reader. [Falmouth, United Kingdom]: The MIT Press. pp. 131–146. ISBN   978-0-9575295-5-7.


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