Take Over the Factory, or Take Over Power?, 1920
Source: http://www.international-communist-party.org/English/REPORTS/UnionQue/20FactoryOrPower.htm
Archived: 2026-04-23 17:20
Take Over the Factory, or Take Over Power?, 1920
International
Communist Party
The
Union Question
Italian Socialist Party
Communist Abstentionist Fraction
Take Over the Factory or Take Over Power ?
from
Il Soviet
, vol. III, no. 7, February 22nd,
1920
In the labor unrest of the last few days in Liguria a phenomenon
occurred, which has repeated itself with some frequency for some time now
and which deserves to be noted as a symptom of a special state of mind of
the working masses.
The workers. instead of quitting their jobs. have, so to say, taken over
the factories and have tried to run them on their own account or rather
without the presence of the main managers. This means first of all that
the workers realize that the strike is a weapon that no longer corresponds
to the needs of the struggle in the current conditions.
The economic strike, through the immediate harm to the worker himself,
exerts its useful defensive action for the worker because of the harm that
stopping work does to the capitalist by the fact that it diminishes the
product of the work that belongs to him.
This is the case when the capitalist economy is functioning normally,
when competition with the corresponding fall in prices compels a
continuous increase in production itself. Today the industrial sharks,
especially metallurgical industries, are coming out of an exceptional
period, during which they made enormous profits with the least hassle.
During the war the State supplied them with raw materials and coal and was
at the same time the only and safe buyer; the State itself with the
militarization of factories provided for the strict discipline of the
working masses. Could there be better conditions for smooth functioning of
the economy? These people are now no longer willing to face all the
difficulties coming from the scarcity of coal and materials, of the
instability of the market, of the restlessness of the working masses, and
they’re especially unwilling to be content with modest profits, as those
they routinely got before the war, perhaps even less.
So they aren’t too worried about strikes, indeed they’re perfectly happy
about them even if they protest in words against the excessive
unsatiability and absurd demands of the workers.
The workers have understood this and by their action of taking over the
factory and continuing to work instead of going on strike they want to
signify that it’s not that they don’t want to work, but they don’t want to
work as the bosses say. They don’t want to work for them anymore, they
don’t want to be exploited anymore, they want to work for their own sake,
i.e., in the interest of the workforce only.
This mindset that’s becoming more and more precise must be taken into the
utmost account, but we don’t want it to be misled by false assessments.
It’s been said that where factory councils existed, they functioned by
taking over the management of the factories and keeping the work going.
We don’t want the working masses to believe that by developing the
establishment of councils it’s possible to take over the factories without
fail and eliminate the capitalists. This is the most dangerous possible
illusion. The factory will be conquered by the working class – and not
only by the respective workforce, which would be too minimal a thing and
not communist – only after the working class as a whole has seized
political power. Without this conquest to dispel all illusions will be
taken care of by the royal guards, the carabinieri, etc., that is, the
mechanism of force and oppression at the disposal of the bourgeoisie, its
political apparatus of power.
These vain continual thrusts of the working masses that are being
exhausted daily in small efforts must be channeled, fused, organized into
a great united general effort aimed directly at striking the enemy
bourgeoisie in the heart.
This function can and must be exercised only by a communist party, which
has and must have no other task at this hour than to turn all its
activities to making the working masses increasingly aware of the
necessity of this great political action, which is the only path by which
they’ll come to a much more direct possession of that factory which in
vain they’ll strive to conquer by other means.
International
Communist Party
The
Union Question
Italian Socialist Party
Communist Abstentionist Fraction
Take Over the Factory or Take Over Power ?
from
Il Soviet
, vol. III, no. 7, February 22nd,
1920
In the labor unrest of the last few days in Liguria a phenomenon
occurred, which has repeated itself with some frequency for some time now
and which deserves to be noted as a symptom of a special state of mind of
the working masses.
The workers. instead of quitting their jobs. have, so to say, taken over
the factories and have tried to run them on their own account or rather
without the presence of the main managers. This means first of all that
the workers realize that the strike is a weapon that no longer corresponds
to the needs of the struggle in the current conditions.
The economic strike, through the immediate harm to the worker himself,
exerts its useful defensive action for the worker because of the harm that
stopping work does to the capitalist by the fact that it diminishes the
product of the work that belongs to him.
This is the case when the capitalist economy is functioning normally,
when competition with the corresponding fall in prices compels a
continuous increase in production itself. Today the industrial sharks,
especially metallurgical industries, are coming out of an exceptional
period, during which they made enormous profits with the least hassle.
During the war the State supplied them with raw materials and coal and was
at the same time the only and safe buyer; the State itself with the
militarization of factories provided for the strict discipline of the
working masses. Could there be better conditions for smooth functioning of
the economy? These people are now no longer willing to face all the
difficulties coming from the scarcity of coal and materials, of the
instability of the market, of the restlessness of the working masses, and
they’re especially unwilling to be content with modest profits, as those
they routinely got before the war, perhaps even less.
So they aren’t too worried about strikes, indeed they’re perfectly happy
about them even if they protest in words against the excessive
unsatiability and absurd demands of the workers.
The workers have understood this and by their action of taking over the
factory and continuing to work instead of going on strike they want to
signify that it’s not that they don’t want to work, but they don’t want to
work as the bosses say. They don’t want to work for them anymore, they
don’t want to be exploited anymore, they want to work for their own sake,
i.e., in the interest of the workforce only.
This mindset that’s becoming more and more precise must be taken into the
utmost account, but we don’t want it to be misled by false assessments.
It’s been said that where factory councils existed, they functioned by
taking over the management of the factories and keeping the work going.
We don’t want the working masses to believe that by developing the
establishment of councils it’s possible to take over the factories without
fail and eliminate the capitalists. This is the most dangerous possible
illusion. The factory will be conquered by the working class – and not
only by the respective workforce, which would be too minimal a thing and
not communist – only after the working class as a whole has seized
political power. Without this conquest to dispel all illusions will be
taken care of by the royal guards, the carabinieri, etc., that is, the
mechanism of force and oppression at the disposal of the bourgeoisie, its
political apparatus of power.
These vain continual thrusts of the working masses that are being
exhausted daily in small efforts must be channeled, fused, organized into
a great united general effort aimed directly at striking the enemy
bourgeoisie in the heart.
This function can and must be exercised only by a communist party, which
has and must have no other task at this hour than to turn all its
activities to making the working masses increasingly aware of the
necessity of this great political action, which is the only path by which
they’ll come to a much more direct possession of that factory which in
vain they’ll strive to conquer by other means.