Introduction

The following article is from the April issue of Battaglia Comunista, journal of the Italian affiliate of the International Bureau. It is an analysis of the role of Italian imperialism in Albania. (A country the Italian ruling class have historically seen as within their legitimate sphere of interest, having twice "intervened" there this century already.) In addition our comrades have also pointed to the tragedy of a situation in which the crisis of the capitalist state is not accompanied by a clear consciousness on the part of the working class. The crisis in Albania may have led to a "popular insurrection" but it is not one of proletarian revolution as leftists like the Socialist Workers' Party and the various remaining Maoist sects have so loudly tried to maintain. According to the SWP the committees which have appeared in the Southern cities of Albania were "proto-soviets". Only a Lewis Carroll view of the world could have arrived at such a fantasy. Far from being the seeds of workers' self-government, these “citizens” committees became a barrier to the possibility of workers developing their own political alternative. Revolution is not about armaments (although these will be necessary) but about class consciousness. Unfortunately there was no sign of this during the Albanian insurrection. In fact, as we said in Internationalist Communist 15, there is no evidence that the “armed citizens” - with their calls for EU intervention - had any intention of imposing their own political solution. So without any kind of socialist aim, and without mass assemblies where workers could thrash out their demands the committees soon became the fiefdoms of gangsters. There is a message here too for the anarchists and spontaneists who think that the breakdown of the old political order automatically leads to the birth of the new. The working class needs a political programme and that programme can only be defended by the permanent anti-capitalist organisation, i.e. the poltical party. Currently the Albanian working class is disoriented by the collapse of Stalinism (which the bourgeoisie still portrays as “communism”) and this accounts for the re-establishment of some kind of stabilty without further trouble for the international order. However the crisis which created the outburst has not disappeared and the working class in Albania have seen that the state is not all powerful. It is a lesson which could be dynamite in the hands of a more conscious working class...

Italian Imperialism and the Collapse of Albania

Within the last few months the situation in Albania has come to a head. Hit by the extremely grave crisis of the pyramid finance companies which have squandered 90% of national savings, the Albanian State has collapsed beneath the blows of a ferocious civil war.

In the February issue of Battaglia Comunista we wrote regarding the swindle of the savings schemes, that President Berisha would have great difficulty in refunding the investors, and in fact the promise to reimburse those who were swindled, starting from 5th February, remained an empty promise, as we predicted. The economic difficulties of the country, aggravated by the total abandonment of the productive apparatus, were too severe to think that the government could shoulder the burden of refunding those who were swindled. After the first waves of demonstrations the presidential promises brought a relative calm to the country. When the sensation that no refund would be made became certain, the protests began again with renewed violence. A huge wave of rebellion arising from the Southern cities swept away within a few days the entire State apparatus; the barracks deserted, the army and police dissolved, naval forces with white flags handing themselves over to the Italian Navy, entire cities under the control of bands of rebels, masses fleeing from the civil war towards the Italian coasts, a complete absence of a governing force.

In the recent history of global capitalism, despite the intensity of the political and economic crisis, the State had always remained intact as the ultimate bulwark for the protection of the bourgeoisie. The crisis in the countries of the ex-Soviet bloc, for example, is a demonstration of this. During the events which led to the collapse of the USSR and her satellites, the presence of the State which guarantees capital never diminished, neither did the central activity of the government and the presence of the military and police apparatus. That ís not all; thanks to a very subtle act of political transformation, almost the same men of the old governing ÒNomenklaturaÓ succeeded in placing themselves in positions of control within the new regimes. However, in the Albanian case, the leading structures of the State have collapsed. The most important cities in Albania are, at the time of writing, still in the hands of the citizens' committees of rebels and for many days the country has been the stage for inter-gang fights, some of which have made plunder their only reason for existing. Clashes between bands, which have destroyed the little active remnant of the productive apparatus have been numerous and very violent. Amongst the illustrious victims of the destruction were the "fearless" Italian entrepreneurs. The same ones who before the crisis praised Albanian workers for their keenness to work for very low wages, now call for Italian government aid to defend their investments from the assault of the rebels.

From the ashes of the bourgeois State, unfortunately, there has only emerged a war of all against all, a material expression of the barbarism which Marx foresaw in the Communist Manifesto. When a society enters into crisis the alternatives are these: either the revolutionary class succeeds in voicing its political programme and fights for the formation of a new social formation, a socialist society, or society gradually falls into some form of barbarism. In Albania, given the total absence from the political scene of the proletariat as an independent class, as a class in itself, the latter has occurred.

We have always maintained that even the most acute capitalist crisis can be brought back onto the terrain of the bourgeoisie if the political guide of the proletariat, (the party) is lacking. The Albanian case shows once again that the class party is not a simple intellectual whim, but the fundamental instrument to guide the class struggle, supplying it with the legitimate anti-capitalist message. Without a revolutionary vanguard capable of working incessantly within and for the class, events like those taking place in Albania are, sadly, destined to occur more frequently in the future, with incalculable damage to the renewal of the class struggle on a world scale.

The destruction of a bourgeois State is, however, a social phenomenon of historical importance. Taking place, as it does, amidst the new processes of economic globalisation, it presents worrying aspects for world capitalism. This is happening in the heart of Europe, a Europe committed to the creation of the most important economic-monetary area in the world. Moreover, the problem has another dimension. Since the European and Italian bourgeoisie have succeeded - thanks to the absence of a clear class perspective on the part of the working class - in transforming the bombshell represented by the intensification of emigration from Albania into a pretext to justify their own military intervention in the country. It is enough for a few thousand refugees from the "country of the eagles" to land on the Apulian coasts to unleash a ferocious racist attack against “the Albanian invader”. The media have been anxious to transform thousands of refugees fleeing from hunger and war into filthy criminals to be expelled by any means. Throughout all this the parliamentary forces have put the accent on the necessity to put an end to the wave of immigrants by intervening at the place of origin and have therefore supported the formation of a European expeditionary force. The Stalinists of Rifondazione Comunista (Communist Refoundation), whilst not supporting the direct intervention of the Italian Army, have declared themselves in favour of military intervention led by a European delegation (see their statement of 3rd April 1997). The Italian naval blockade and the sinking of a boat loaded with refugees, though not the specific responsibility of the Italian marine forces, were the obvious and logical consequences of this climate created to justify the armed intervention. Officially this would be in order to distribute humanitarian aid to the population whilst in reality it seeks to protect the European, and in particular, Italian capital which recently has poured into Albania, attracted by low wages and the absence of any limits to the exploitation of labour power. Unfortunately, up to now the proletariat has not been politically able to impose its own revolutionary project in response to the siren song of Italian Imperialism. Although the collapse of the Albanian State and the resulting mass flight of the population were clearly the consequences of the speculative activity of the financial pyramid societies, its victims have allowed themselves to be caught in the net of the most filthy racist propaganda and the most miserable war between the poor. This is a confirmation, a tragic confirmation, of how urgent and necessary is the reconstruction of the revolutionary party. Without a class party, not only is there no socialist revolution, but only the inevitable triumph of the interests of imperialism and therefore of barbarism.