Italy. About the Youth Protests

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The numerous youth protests of recent weeks are a symptom of the crisis in bourgeois society, which is preparing to mobilize young people and adults for war between states—against which, in the long run, the only solution will be class war between the proletariat and the ruling bourgeoisie

Italian squares—just like those in France, Spain, Belgium, and Albania—have been filling up for weeks with young and very young people who are protesting vehemently against the rising cost of living, the deterioration of schools, social marginalization, increased military spending, and the criminalization of their demonstrations, and who are raising a critical issue: a future they cannot see—a future they would like to have in this society. Most schools have emptied out, and teachers have joined their students’ protests.

In the absence of a social movement with a proletarian and class-based character, it is inevitable that the protests will express a general sense of unease on the part of a social class that, broadly speaking, amounts to what is called the middle class—that is, the petty-bourgeois strata who, having been deceived by the ruling bourgeois class with the promise of a future of well-being, social privileges, and social mobility, as well as the chance to distinguish themselves from the wage-earning masses and immigrants, now find themselves confronted with a society incapable of keeping its promises—a society that, as it cyclically enters into crisis, has continually eroded this “social well-being” that was supposed to be passed down from father to son and which, in reality, should have been better and more satisfying than that of their parents. A “social well-being” that high schools and, above all, universities should have “guaranteed” to the majority of today’s young students in a country that ranks among the world’s major capitalist powers, but which has proven incapable of offering this “future” to the younger generations in whom their families have invested money, time, and hopes.

For years, the media and “experts” have been pointing out one fact: young people in the 1950s and 1960s could look forward to a better future—economically and socially—than that of their parents; after the great crisis of global capitalism in 1975 and beginning in the 1980s, the economic and social prospects to which high school and college students could aspire began to narrow more and more, until they became unattainable goals. The public school system—which the ruling bourgeoisie created to educate young people according to the principles and values of a civil and democratic society, and which was meant to prepare them to take over from their parents with cultural, technical, and scientific knowledge far more advanced than that available to their parents—and, consequently, far more satisfying both socially and economically—has in reality turned out to be a grand charade: from a springboard for social advancement relative to the working and peasant classes, it has turned into a temporary holding pen, awaiting the chance to seize an opportunity—neither planned nor planable—through which to ultimately place oneself socially above the simple and wretched condition in which the working class is forced to live and survive. In the past, it was said that young people had to create their own jobs and futures, because society was unable to offer them one that would bring them satisfaction. But in a capitalist society, what kind of job can a young person create that does not depend on the economic foundation upon which the entire bourgeois society is based?

Its economic foundation is capitalism—that is, the mode of production based essentially on the exploitation of wage labor, on the exploitation of the labor of workers, of the proletarian class, from which capital—that is, the capitalists who own it, defend it tooth and nail, investing in it to accumulate more capital, more wealth—derives its profits, its very existence, and its enduring survival over time as a value in and of itself, and upon which the present and future lives of every human being depend. Consequently, if the visible range of jobs at a certain level—and within the reach of high school and college students—is becoming increasingly limited, what activities in capitalist society can offer the certainty of lasting well-being? The answer is not difficult: only a portion—and an increasingly small portion—of young people who aspire to high-level social positions will actually be able to occupy those positions (whether in the economic, social, or political sphere), whether in the country where they were born and raised or by emigrating to other countries, while the vast majority of school-age youth are forced to remain on the margins, settling for jobs that fall short—or even far short—of the expectations raised by their academic training.

How does bourgeois society react to this situation? Essentially in three ways: 1) by creating private schools and private universities, whose mission is to train the “leaders of tomorrow” (in all fields where capital’s profit-making activities take place), where the much-vaunted “merit” is elevated to the status of a preventive discriminatory criterion; 2) by encouraging the most diligent students to focus on their studies—particularly in the fields that capitalist development increasingly prioritizes (business economics, human resources management, advertising and marketing, computer programming, technological and aerospace engineering, banking economics related to investments and the stock market, etc.)—without allowing themselves to be distracted by family, social, or humanitarian concerns; 3) by delivering the vast majority of students into the clutches of small, medium, and large entrepreneurs who offer them jobs under conditions of permanent precariousness—and, in general, jobs that are far removed from—or even diametrically opposed to—the profession for which they have devoted years of study and harbored so many hopes.

In reality, the bourgeois school has one primary, fundamental objective: to train young people to live in society according to that society’s norms and laws. And if it is true that the law of this society is not the same for everyone, but that everyone is subject to the “law of the jungle”—where dirty tricks, betrayals, ruses, deceit, and so on are commonplace, even to the point of “mors tua vita mea”—then the bourgeois school must teach young people to survive according to this law. Even if it is claimed that competition, in whatever field, is the main incentive to “do better,” to “stand out,” to “give one’s best”: the goal of capitalist society is not to improve the intrinsic qualities of every human being, nor to ensure that the social life of all human beings is the result of genuine solidarity offering no benefits other than those that are entirely impersonal and shared, but rather to pit people against one another—the strongest against the weakest, the richest against the poorest, the physically and/or intellectually gifted against the less gifted. On the other hand, we are talking about a society divided into classes, and the classes in this society are antagonistic to one another both economically and socially; they are certainly not different classes situated on the same level and comparable to one another, as democracy would have it—on the contrary, they carry entirely different weights in every respect: economically, socially, politically, culturally, and even physically. The ruling bourgeois class uses all the instruments, all the institutions, and all the means it has put in place—from the economy to politics, from schools to religion and culture—to increasingly accentuate the social antagonism between itself and the other classes. The fact that social antagonism is not always obvious does not mean that it does not exist, that it has diminished over time—perhaps thanks to democracy—or that it can be managed by satisfying the needs of every class and every social stratum.

The economic crisis of capitalism is the most striking proof that social antagonism not only exists and is becoming increasingly acute, but that it constitutes a weapon that the bourgeois political establishment uses against the lower classes, the oppressed classes. A weapon that the ruling bourgeoisie attempts to camouflage, to conceal under the guise of laws systematically enacted in the name of public order—what it continues to call “the rule of law ”—but in which the rule of law is guaranteed only to the ruling bourgeois class, which justifies itself every time the lower classes—from the proletariat to the petty-bourgeoisie ruined by the crisis of capitalism—raise their voices, demonstrate in public squares, and respond with violence to the systematic violence that the ruling bourgeois class uses to reestablish its order in society.

Since September, the streets have begun to fill with disadvantaged masses, whether due to sky-high housing rents, a cost of living that keeps rising, schools falling into disrepair, and overcrowded classrooms, or even a “future” that has become so distant in the eyes of today’s youth that it has turned into a meaningless word, devoid of any weight which, consequently, also robs the masses of young people of meaning and social significance; when they shout and protest violently, they are regarded as scum—as ignorant, spineless masses who can easily be manipulated by perverse minds, terrorists, criminals, and, of course, foreigners.

These social upheavals, which show no signs of ending anytime soon, involve segments of the petty bourgeoisie rebelling against a social malaise caused, specifically, by the lack of prospects for social mobility. The reasons for their protest are fully justified, given the social expectations with which they were raised and educated. But the change they are demanding is, once again, a superficial one: they are demanding attention and support to improve their current living conditions from the very same political powers that pushed them into these degraded living conditions—not out of malice, nor through mismanagement of available economic resources, but because the laws of capital and capitalist profit compel the ruling bourgeois classes to shift the full brunt of the economic crisis—which cyclically affects the capitalist economy—onto the lower classes and youth in general.

On Friday, October 30, a general strike organized by the USB and other grassroots unions took place to protest the rising cost of living and military spending. According to reports, largely peaceful demonstrations took place in 70 cities, but clashes with police occurred in Rome and Turin, while in Genoa and Trieste, dockworkers blocked ships carrying weapons. It is worth noting that participation in this strike, which coincided with the student protests, was particularly high: estimates put the number of demonstrators at one million across Italy. This discontent is, of course, not limited to young people who see no future for themselves, but also affects workers who, even if they still have a job, earn a pittance!

The economic crisis of capitalism, ever since its inception, has been inherent in its very mode of production. Capitalism develops, economically and structurally, through a perpetual process of technical and technological revolution in the production and distribution of goods, but it is inevitably confronted with crises that are increasingly acute, increasingly severe, and increasingly international, because the anarchy that characterizes capitalist production drives competition between companies, between monopolies, and between states to increasingly disruptive levels. In the past, those most affected were primarily the populations of the weakest countries, the colonies, and the nations on the periphery of European and American imperialism. But the capitalist crises that, since the end of World War II, have followed one another without interruption—with increasingly severe and international repercussions, sparking wars in every corner of the world—have also begun to undermine the “well-being” of the populations of the most industrialized and wealthiest countries; a well-being due essentially to the appalling exploitation of the populations and working classes of the countries on the imperialist periphery—a well-being that, at present, the imperialist bourgeois classes are no longer able to “guarantee” either to their own petty bourgeoisie or, even less so, to their own working class. Forced to wage an unrestrained trade war on an international scale, every imperialist bourgeoisie is driven to exploit its own productive working class more and more, seeking to minimize labor costs as much as possible. This is why, for decades, wages have not kept pace with inflation and the rising cost of living; and the unrestrained exploitation of immigrants undoubtedly contributes to this situation: they are labeled “illegal immigrants” by the wealthy bourgeoisie for the simple reason that, no longer able to survive in their countries of origin, they flock en masse to the countries that once colonized, massacred, and horrifically exploited them.

Thus, the crisis that once struck the weakest countries is now returning with disastrous effects on rich countries (and the rise in absolute poverty in these countries is one of the most obvious indicators of this crisis). As has happened in the past, these crises first and foremost shake the social foundations of the petty bourgeoisie, which is accustomed to living off the bourgeois exploitation of the proletariat. Through its rebellion, the petty bourgeoisie warns the big bourgeoisie that the crisis could set the working class—the proletariat in general—in motion, a class that normally constitutes a significant portion of the consumers who keep stores, shops, department stores, neighborhood markets, small retailers, and so on, in business. If the proletariat does not have enough money to buy what it used to buy ten or five years ago, it is not only the proletariat that suffers the consequences, but also the merchants who depend on these consumers, the farmers who supply fruit, vegetables, milk, meat, etc., to stores, the small business owners who, with their limited resources, supply retail outlets in cities and villages, as well as the entire range of leisure, sports, and entertainment activities that must be abandoned due to lack of money… Thus, the petty bourgeoisie suffers not only from the ruin caused by big capital, monopolies, and large-scale economic and distribution conglomerates—which are causing stores to disappear one after another—but also from the fact that its most “loyal” customer base, that is, the proletariat, is forced to cut back on its purchases.

The protests of recent weeks have brought together many discontented people: from shopkeepers to farmers, from high school and college students to overworked and underpaid workers, from small business owners crushed by rising prices for fuel and a whole range of products essential to their businesses, to parents who see the future they had hoped for their children slipping away. This is a social sign of a general malaise that could also spread to the working masses, who for decades have been subjected to job cuts, offshoring, ruthless competition among workers, furloughs, and layoffs. But the working class remains at the mercy of the opportunistic policies of the former “workers’” parties of yesteryear and today’s “left-wing” parties, as well as the opportunistic policies of the major unions—CGIL, CISL, and UIL, which complain that governments do not listen to them—governments that know perfectly well what the demands of the collaborationist unions are: a meeting here and there, and a minor economic measure that the unions can present as a “won” concession, which is always better than nothing…

However, as long as they fail to rid themselves of the burden of the collaborationist forces that present themselves as their “spokespersons” and “defenders,” not only will workers be unable to wage a struggle worthy of the name to defend their immediate class interests, but they will also be unable to free themselves from the influence that the petty-bourgeois rebels still manage to exert over them. The poisonous plant of reformism continues to claim victims: the petty bourgeoisie cannot conceive of their own well-being except through reforms that protect them from the negative effects of crises—perhaps through a fiscal policy more attuned to their needs and a less stifling bureaucracy; as long as workers remain subject to the ideological, political, and organizational influence of the petty bourgeoisie—whether it disguises itself as “workers” or “rebels”—they will never succeed in embarking on a struggle capable of truly expressing their class interests, a class antagonistic to the bourgeoisie, a struggle that demands a genuine break with the apparatuses of political and union collaborationism, a struggle based on demands incompatible with bourgeois interests and requiring an organization that is entirely independent of the apparatuses, ideology, and politics of the bourgeois class, as well as of the conservative forces devoted to it.

The same is true for young people who are taking action today against the rising cost of living, exorbitant rents in college towns, and for a future of tangible well-being—and who delude themselves into believing they can achieve concrete results regarding their professional and social futures by demanding them from the dominant bourgeois power—are in reality treading on thin ice, where their energy and struggle are exploited by that very same bourgeois power to prepare for the criminalization of far more decisive struggles, those of the working class, which has finally recognized itself not only as a class antagonistic to the bourgeoisie, but also as a class that truly represents the future of human beings who will no longer be slaves to capital, its competitive ideology, its illusions, and its deceptions: the future of the anticapitalist revolution, of the antibourgeois and proletarian revolution.

Thus, the energy of a rebellious youth—instead of being used merely as an outlet for genuine discontent, while waiting for the bourgeois authorities to “do something” to meet their demands—can be channeled toward goals that are far more substantial and decisive in history: those of the proletariat’s class struggle, those of the proletarian and communist revolution—a goal that stands in stark contrast to the preparation for bourgeois war, that war between states toward which the bourgeois ruling class is steering, a war it criminalizes today only to mobilize it tomorrow in defense of a murderous fatherland.

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