Part of an ongoing debate in the German syndicalist press. “The curious ‘sketch’ of citizen Marcks | Epilogue to ‘We’d rather live as aliens’ | For an open anarcho-syndicalism.”

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“The principle of the division of labor creates specializations. It is not without reason, therefore, that the necessity of leadership has been compared to the necessity of the medical profession or the existence of expert chemists. Specialization, however, means authority. Just as one obeys the doctor because, by virtue of his studies, he understands the human body better than the patient himself, so too must the political patient submit to his party leader, who possesses the political competence that the patient himself lacks. Ultimately, this would transform democracy into a form of rule by the best, into an aristocracy. The leaders are the best, the most mature both professionally and morally; therefore, they not only have the right, but indeed the duty, to prevail, and not merely as representatives of a party, but, fully aware of their own worth, as individuals.” – Robert Michels: On the Sociology of Political Parties, 1911

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Syndicalist digestive problems

Franz Heuholz || In 2018, former FAU activist Holger Marcks launched a project on direktaktion.org entitled “a contemporary sketch of […] what Rudolf Rocker once called ‘constructive socialism’” ^¹ . Marcks abandoned his programmatic completion of “a constructive social technology that can strategically mediate between reality and utopia” after three of the announced four parts. The three-part series, titled “Sketch of a Constructive Socialism,” focuses on the FAU as a key case study of grassroots organizing. Marcks also accuses other left-wing attempts at organizational development of “covert syndicalistization.”

The ‘sketch’ can be considered a foundational text of contemporary syndicalism in Germany, albeit an undigested one, one that has not been consciously processed. Its conclusions continue to influence fundamental decisions at the political-theoretical, organizational, and operational levels, at least within the FAU (Free Workers’ Union). However, these decisions remain unquestioned in their underlying assumptions, and these assumptions, in turn, remain collectively unquestioned in their plausibility. The only voice raised in the syndicalist discourse desert is the article ‘Revisionist Syndicalism’ by the editors of the anarchist dissent journal Tsveyfl from 2023. They state:

“The separation between syndicalism and anarchism, as well as the narrowing of syndicalism to the economic level, is already problematic [in Marcks’ ‘Sketch’ and Bewernitz’s ‘Syndicalism and New Class Politics’]. Driven to its extremes, this results in a revisionist syndicalism that, in the misunderstood sense of revolutionary syndicalism, renounces ‘all politics and ideology,’ and thus also anarchism. In the next step, revisionist syndicalism falls even further behind revolutionary syndicalism by abandoning a) revolution and b) the syndicalist organizational principle. What remains is syndicalism as a form of stance intended only to express speaking for ‘those at the bottom.’ That this clearly brings it closer to social democracy on the one hand and Leninism on the other is skillfully concealed by this stance.” ^²

The ‘sketch’ thus aptly outlined, however, continues to linger in the FAU’s strategic planning. I believe it requires a deeper examination and further critical clarification. Therefore, I would like to defend the following against the program of the former FAU member Marcks: 1. the content of a libertarian socialism against his deradicalized liberalism ^; 2. an anti-capitalist perspective and, as a comrade noted, moments of revolutionary leap or break; 3. the anarcho-syndicalist form of the marginal workers’ union and its emancipatory nature, or rather, its function as a libertarian federalism; and 4. syndicalist forms of organization and struggle based on direct action and mutual aid.

What, then, is the programmatic intent behind Holger Marcks’s “sketch”? In general terms, and in his own words, it is one of “the strategic transformation of social relations—that is the subject of transformation politics.” This involves not only “proposals for horizontal organizational practices that offer potential for mobilization and social struggles,” but also their embedding “in social theories, with which a program of transformation could be developed. After all, this requires not simply concepts for successful grassroots organizing, but rather concepts for successful transformative grassroots organizing .” The latter must therefore not only “mobilize people and win struggles,” but also “develop structures and institutions from this that enable something like a counter-society.” For Marcks, such an organization for the strategic transformation of social relations can only be one of “broad masses.” Accordingly, grassroots organizing must be oriented and constructed today.

Where Marcks did not explicitly formulate the point of organizing “broad masses,” it follows logically from his program itself, as I will repeatedly demonstrate below: Transformative grassroots organizing must be established here and now as a stable mass membership organization and, through this, increasingly function as a counter-society. This foundational hypothesis leads Marcks to assertions such as the following, culminating in a legitimization of paid expertise within the FAU:

“If syndicalism is not to be rendered absurd by classist mechanisms, it must include representation . Only if members can elect representatives who represent their interests is it possible to involve the masses necessary for transformative politics.”

Other arguments by von Marcks that build upon that basic premise of a stable mass membership organization are not inherently so anarchistically inconsistent. However, my difficulties with the ‘sketch’ begin right there, at its foundation: it derives its plausibility from an (anarcho-syndicalist) transformation hypothesis that has been tested in certain, already historically established social conditions. The failure of these conditions is not reflected upon in the ‘sketch,’ meaning that it merely appears to reappear as an ahistorical premise in a new guise. In my book ‘Better to Live as Aliens ,’ of which this two-part article is the epilogue, I proposed, by contrast, a more modest strategic, a marginal, and therefore more realistic path for grassroots organizations like the FAU here and now.

“If we want to act as syndicalists, we can fight for improvements for ourselves as wage earners in day-to-day politics and thus gain experience with our principle-based forms of organization and struggle. We can develop the advantages and disadvantages of syndicalist methodology into a program, pass this on as a tool, and thus contribute to visible militant action as a class. We can expand our organizational structures into supportive infrastructures and militant networks, into ‘workers’ unions.’ We can, as the FAU, fly under the radar of management and the public in the workplaces for as long as possible and fight for unofficial recognition as a ‘union’ in the sense of resistant groups of colleagues. This is certainly an admission of our own relative weakness as left-wing radicals and of the limits of our ability to develop power and influence within the social-democratic class compromise […]

The power-political determination built upon such disillusionment is, however, precisely that – it is an attempt, as a political-economic struggle organization, not simply to abandon future participation in the struggle for social power, but to take preparatory action for it today. The ‘insights’ underlying such proposals regarding the function of labor law and the pitfalls that industrial relations hold for an autonomous workers’ movement ‘are actually what a revolutionary organization, in particular, is the most important home for.’ Put another way: It is a matter of carrying militant knowledge, practices, and forms of subjectivation through the approaching social winter and developing them experimentally. In terms of power politics, it is therefore a matter of making a contribution – often merely marginal today – to strengthening a future autonomous workers’ movement. This is achieved through the institutionalization of militant forms of struggle and organization in the here and now.” (LLWAA: E, 9) ⁴

I formulated this alternative strategy proposal in conjunction with earlier texts by Holger Marcks, for example, his 2008 article “The Marginal Union .” I will also venture to speculate about what personal and political changes might have occurred in the past ten years, from comrade in the FAU to the “political doctor” in the “Sketch.” In any case, the strategy proposal formulated in the “Extraterrestrial” book, which itself is anything but new, would not allow for the development of a broad “social base in the lower classes” as Marcks demands in 2018. I maintain, however, that achieving even a remotely close degree of this goal would require the emergence of an independent “workers’ movement” at the societal level. Only in such a context would the aforementioned workers’ unions have the opportunity to exert a potentially mass influence, albeit one that would not necessarily result in a stable membership , through their various forms and content .

That is, assuming they haven’t already reached dead ends in social-revolutionary struggles. Until the cows come home, one could argue in very abstract revolutionary-theoretical terms—excuse me, Holger, “transformation-theoretical” terms—whether Marcks’ proposed strategy of a stable mass membership organization for syndicalism in the 21st century would be a viable path to societal transformation. In my book “Aliens,” co-authored with Gabriel Kuhn, among others, I make no secret of the fact that I don’t think so, and I attempt to explain this in detail there.

In the preliminary discussion of this epilogue, there was considerable disagreement with comrades, particularly regarding the strategic demand for ‘mass organizing,’ which warrants its own debate! However, I think this disagreement stems largely from the fact that the term ‘mass organizing’ has so many multifaceted layers of meaning. It is handled very differently in various left-wing traditions, even within the different (anarcho-)syndical movements ^, and I believe we FAU comrades also have very different ideas about its practical meaning. Last but not least, I suspect that for some fiercely determined ‘aliens,’ this stubborn confidence in ‘mass organizing’ is what keeps them going in their selfless activism after all these years…

I would like to make it clear, however, that I too am interested in an organization that can, or could, develop mass influence. But this can be conceived in completely different ways at various levels, and therefore says very little about a concrete strategic program. Even what exactly “mass influence” means is unclear.

While Holger Marcks never makes his intentions entirely explicit, in his “sketch” he conceives not only of winning small and large battles, but of transforming society at a fundamental level. Therefore, any “internal critique” of the “sketch” can measure it against the standards it sets for itself. In this epilogue, I find it fascinating to trace what proponents of such a specific mass and transformation strategy, which aims to “interest broad masses in an organization,” are striving for, even within small grassroots organizations. I want to show what Marcks’ concept of “mass organizing” is and how it logically emerges from the small, constructive suggestions for organizational development in the “sketch.”

Conversely, however, we must also examine what pragmatic changes are being legitimized and made palatable in grassroots organizations here and now, in the shadow of such abstract programs. How, then, does this very specific conception of ‘mass organizing’ already have a reciprocal effect on the smaller scale? I think the insights that can be gleaned from the constructional mechanics of the ‘sketch’ in this critical way are extremely fruitful for us social revolutionaries and our attempts to build power against capital and the state, and at times simply sobering.

In that tension between the small and the large, so my thesis goes, Citizen ⁶ will ultimately damage the syndicalist program through peculiar reinterpretations at all political levels. Despite some lip service, Marcks’s underlying concern for updating the class-struggle and libertarian principles of anarcho-syndicalism is no longer discernible.

A small dictionary of ‘sketch’ (I know, it’s hard)

“Metapolitics” (political level of principles)

“Metapolitics here is not meant in the specific sense of the ‘New Right,’ which understands it as acting in the ‘pre-political’ sphere to gain discursive power over concepts and guiding principles, but rather refers more generally to the overarching determination of political principles from which concrete policies can then follow […] They form the programmatic outline against which a transhistorical principle emerges. How that outline can be filled in, and thus how the principle can be developed into a differentiated program, must be answered with regard to political levels that affect the purpose, goal, and means of the transformation.”

“Macropolitics” (political level of objectives)

Macro-analytical questions “identify processes and mechanisms of transformation in a social-theoretical way.” Their specific goal is “the elevation” of people through “structures and institutions […] that enable something like a counter-society” and thus the construction of “counter-power.” Macro-politics deals with “organizations as social institutions.”

“A modern syndicalism should address the multiplicity of classes through multiple unions, thus complementing worker organization with ‘union-based social organizations’ in the rental, consumer, and public sectors, enabling comprehensive transformation policies. Within the framework of an institutional program, these can represent the first building blocks upon which structures of self-governance—such as economic, housing, consumer, and administrative federations—can be built. Only through these federations, which ensure a link to reality, can resources be transferred from the existing system to the emerging one. Unions should indeed be a transmission belt. But not for the party that leads people back to the old order—but for the world of self-governance.”

“Mesopolitics” (political level of goals)

“Meso-analytical questions” address “how to constitute organizations efficiently and dynamically.” They focus on “organizations as collective actors.” The goal is to “engage” people through “efficiency” and “resonance” in concrete struggles. The purpose of mesopolitics is thus to build “agency” through “attempts at mass organizing.” Mesopolitics mediates between utopian aspirations and reality, asking “through which organizations one gains strategic access to reality.”

“Through such a mesopolitics, which attempts to strategically expand the organization and tactically respond to conflicts, micro- and macro-political problems constantly become apparent in practice, based on which the embryonic form can be elaborated: Does the organization function horizontally and inclusively enough to meet the normative demands of the new order; and is it effective and functionally differentiated enough to deal with the empirical problems of a new order? These questions mark a field of tension that compels both restraint and a realistic adaptation of the utopia.”

“Micropolitics” (political level of means)

“Microanalytical questions” address “how organizing and idea dissemination function”; they concern “the concrete structure of transformative organizations.” The goal is the “integration” of people through “connectivity” and “sustainability.” The purpose of micropolitics is the construction of “modes of relationship” that exert “power” on potential new members. It thus deals with “organizations as interpersonal cosmoses.” These modes of relationship must, in turn, be “measured by whether they enable agency,” that is, whether the

“Structures […] are capable of connecting, absorbing, and enforcing enough to assert the interests of some against the will of others. And this, in turn, necessitates giving validity to knowledge that understands how people can be motivated to organize and how their individual differences can be subordinated to collective goals – in order to use this effectively for the most self-determined possible processing of reality.”

The dream of pure agency

Based on this central conceptual matrix of the ‘sketch’, it already becomes clear that Marck’s syndicalist organizing, initially not incorrectly, is conceived from the “mesopolitical” level. At this level, the aim is to gain agency and to “interest” people through collective struggles. None of the observations in the ‘sketch’ were ever as welcome to me, an anarchist ‘alien’, as these:

“The so-called claim making , the fighting for concrete demands, is precisely the crucial ‘vehicle of access’ to reality, with which collective practices can be set in motion in the first place – instead of merely simulating such practices through ‘anti-capitalist’ event mobilizations and impersonal militancy. Anarchism could tell you a thing or two about that.”

Marcks instead advocates for a “politics of the issue itself.” This, in reference to Machiavelli, refers to a method in which one does not approach problems in a principled way, but rather orients oneself within the specific situation by examining the contradictions in order to find an effective approach through trial and error. Of course, from an emancipatory perspective, such a heuristic cannot be conceived in the sense of Machiavellianism, whose sole purpose is to gain or maintain power and which recognizes no principles. The principles oriented toward the emancipatory goal must also serve as a guide , but they must be related to the requirements for agency . This by no means implies sacrificing principles merely for success and abandoning the radical core of utopia.

I want to dive right into the critique; later I will further dissect this typically Marcksian maneuver of pseudo-on-the-one-hand-on-the-other-hand analytically: “By no means,” then? Which principles are not to be “sacrificed” for mesopolitical “successes”? To what extent exactly should which principles be relativized “in relation to agency” at which political level? If we follow Marcks’ argument from its foundation, we are initially left only with the premise of the stable mass membership organization as a blurred silhouette of a benchmark. With that in mind, we will become a little wiser elsewhere in the ‘sketch’:

“ [A] policy that is not compatible with the people who are needed for a reorganization of conditions cannot be radical. It is simply pointless. As the council communist Sam Moss already noted in the 1930s, the masses in advanced capitalism are primarily interested in maintaining or improving their living conditions. Actors who are unwilling to relativize their principles in order to successfully mobilize along these lines are doomed to powerlessness.”

And we don’t want to be condemned to powerlessness, do we? If “the masses” are thus inclined here and now, then it follows that corresponding goals and strategies should be set in interest organization. But what influence would such specific objectives, which are solely oriented towards the interest of “maintaining or improving living conditions,” have on the relativization of principles? When it comes to answering this anarchist question of which purposes are present in the means and goals of struggle and organization, Marcks never becomes concrete in his “sketch.” Despite all the rhetoric about the centrality of “mesopolitics,” we will learn nothing directly from the citizen’s own pen about its precise nature.

Incidentally, it is already more than crude to invoke the council communist Sam Moss as a guarantor for the necessity of relativizing principles and, indirectly, for the justification of formal mass organization. This at least suggests, however, which socialist traditions Marcks intends to override. But even the focus on “mass organization” itself remains underdefined in the “sketch,” one could argue. By what numbers of “interested” members could one measure when (which) principles have been sufficiently relativized? Are a few thousand enough? Or must it be a few million, a certain percentage of the population?

When it comes to the question of the standard for relativizing utopian principles in relation to agency, one gains a clearer understanding, as is evident in many parts of the ‘sketch’, by trying to read what was left unstated. Just as ‘anarcho-syndicalism’ is nowhere mentioned, neither are ‘direct action’ or ‘mutual aid’. The ‘sketch’ reveals very little of libertarian socialism, particularly with regard to mesopolitics, that is, the (workplace) level of struggles, their organization, and their interrelationships. We learn nothing explicitly about 1. which specific forms of organization and struggle a transformative grassroots organizing in workplaces and other battlefields should employ, and 2. how this could (not) be justified from a transformational-theoretical perspective. For someone who places so much emphasis on agency, this very agency seems strangely self-evident. It is precisely the forms of “claim making” that remain underdefined in Marcks’ analysis – but whose purely quantitatively measured success is then supposed to determine all other political levels, thus determining the relativization of principles.

Within mesopolitics itself lies the largest and, at first glance, seemingly strange gap in the ‘sketch’. As I intend to demonstrate, all of this harbors an underlying and critically exposed cynicism – and thus also the strategic proposals of his followers, the ‘Märcks’chen,’ within the FAU. In an underdetermined way, ‘agentic power’ is propagated as the central category to which all other levels should be aligned.

“Syndicalism takes […] the meso-level as the starting point of its holistic way of thinking. From there, it thinks its way down to the other levels – and back again. In concrete terms, this means first choosing an organizational form that directly addresses the material interests of the lower classes and is therefore capable of resonating with them.”

Such stipulations, however, also lead us as social revolutionaries into “socio-theoretical” difficulties, that is, to the level of “metapolitics.” The “material interests of the lower classes” are not simply objectively given that one could so easily find, define, and thus “address.” These interests, like the so-called “lower classes” themselves, are riddled with multifaceted contradictions. The political claim of the Wobblies, “An attack on one is an attack on all,” for example, this principle of comprehensive class solidarity, and the corresponding syndicalist forms and goals of struggle and organization, are not simply “resonant” in the pacified and atomized everyday life among us colleagues here and now. A common interest, even against particular interests within the “lower classes” themselves, must first be established in the practice of struggle, with a consistent methodology and the forging of relationships of comprehensive solidarity. And this, to conclude with Sam Moss, is only marginally possible here and now.

The mesopolitical omissions outlined here simply make sense within the context of the citizen’s overall argument: The specific methodology of syndicalist resistance, direct action, let alone corresponding struggle goals, simply cannot “interest the masses” anytime and anywhere. If one does not fundamentally relativize syndicalist mesopolitics—the trade union’s function of association with the social-revolutionary purpose of combating the state and capital as producers (LLWAA: E, 2)—then even hypothetically, “broad masses” cannot be integrated into the organization as long-term members. Consequently, “macropolitically,” that is, on the political level of societal purposes/institutions as described by Marcks, no new, counter-powerful social institutions can be “nourished” with this mass mobilization. The engine of a societal transformation, as the citizen imagines it in a meat grinder fashion, would sputter and stall before it even got started.

In short: To remain consistent with its basic premise, the citizen must discard syndicalist principles at the level of mesopolitics. Based on this, the transformation program of the ‘sketch’, despite all claims of “orientation” towards “suprahistorical” principles, becomes the dream of a liberal social engineer prince of pure agency.

Prefiguring in social revolutionary dead ends

In the next step, how should the meso-level of agency, goals, and strategy, which has been thus established as dominant, interact with the other levels in Marcks’ own conception? He writes:

“The means or tactics mediate […] between micro- and mesopolitics, the goal or strategy between meso- and macro-politics, and the purpose or political ambition between macro- and meta-politics. At the same time, the associated goals and means must be consistent with the purpose if prefigurative politics is to succeed. Fundamentally, tactics ask about the right mobilization for strategic interactions, and strategy asks about the right interactions for political goals. Prefigurative politics, in particular, must always reflect the political ambition back into the tactics, beyond this linearity—that is, think circularly—if the purpose is not to be undermined by choosing the wrong means.”

The “consistency” of mesopolitical “goals” in relation to the “political claim” is thus supposed to be ensured in the transformative prefiguration process, Marcks claims. However, as demonstrated in his program, this does not mean that the political principles are conceived as a more or less limiting framework : “The […] principles are also to serve as a guide, but must be related to the requirements for agency.” In practical comparison with agency, they are something that can be “relativized.” He further writes:

“Therefore, a comprehensive program is needed in which micro-, meso-, and macro-politics interlock. If the program fails at even one of these three tasks, it will not work as a whole. Such a holistic approach is circular because it must constantly reassure itself in theory and practice that one level does not misalign another. It thus differs in its ambition from some other prefigurative transformation approaches that merely consider whether macro-political goals are reflected in micro-politics. But precisely because of this, these approaches lack the strategic interface with reality through which communication is established.”

However this circling through the political levels is supposed to be reconciled with the preceding assertions about the means-ends axis, the citizens have bequeathed us in the FAU such a conceptually elaborate method—one that apparently no one else seems able to truly grasp. In discussions with comrades, many gray hairs have certainly been pulled over these inflated terms. Accidental mystification in someone who, as I intend to show in Part 2, places so much value on the professionalism of social change? (LLWAA: F, 3)

Prefigurative politics in the libertarian socialist sense should certainly not be undermined by choosing the wrong means and tactics, nor the wrong goals and strategies . A more coherent, anarcho-syndicalist prefiguration based on Marcks’ matrix—though perhaps the problem lies within this matrix itself—would therefore proceed in parallel as follows. Starting not from the meso-level, but from politically determined forms of mediation within a liberated society: macro – meso – micro – meta – macro – and so on. In full, this sounds like this:

What new forms of mediation for a liberated society do we anticipate based on our political aspirations? With what methodology of struggle and organization can these be consistently fought for and shaped without straying from the anarchist-communist path—among other things, through unintended side effects and shifts in purpose (LLWAA: E, 4)? With this in mind, what short- and medium-term goals can realistically be considered? Exactly how many people with what capacities, interests, and needs can be engaged in and involved in joint struggles? And what do these people need to be integrated “horizontally and inclusively” into interest groups in the short or long term? Consequently, what can be said about the concretization of the fundamental framework, that is, the political aspiration in general, and the principles of “horizontality” and “inclusivity,” based on the (lack of) success in achieving “effectiveness” here? And so, from the meta-level, back to the beginning of the circle at the macro-level, etc.

This might sound even more abstract than it does to the average citizen. But what I mean can hopefully be illustrated: Informed by the political aspirations of libertarian socialism, we conceptually define a framework of institutions for counter-power and corresponding utopian-social forms of mediation. For example, one could mention a free-market economy with the aim of satisfying needs . From this, in the next step, together with an analysis of social trends and power relations, a determination of goals and strategies for struggle and organization follows; likewise, the establishment of organizational and combative forms—that is, the tactics or means—necessary for the transition to such a mode of production against the resistance of the existing order. These would include comprehensive control over the labor process, the development of skills for self-management, and the cultivation of relationships that can sustain this self-management under the banner: “An attack on one is an attack on all!”

Under the fundamental banner of “the abolition of wage labor!”, we are also implementing a syndicalist-based, resistance-oriented organizing program at this “meso-level,” independent of collective bargaining agreements and works councils. We are thus defining a methodology of structural power resources that does not exchange direct power within the workplace for concessions regarding wages and working hours. This methodology is consistent with the aforementioned objective and therefore maintains the possibility of implementing the macro-politically desired mode of production and not being co-opted by the dominant one. The expropriation of the expropriators through a general strike or a wildcat movement of occupations must be targeted as long-term strategic goals.

In concrete workplace disputes, conducted with appropriate forms of organization and struggle, and with corresponding long-term strategies, we examine, on the one hand, the everyday agency of such a constructed interest group: How many colleagues can be “engaged,” that is, are willing to fight alongside us as solidarity colleagues and external supporters for their interests? Conversely, and in parallel: Where can compromises be made, i.e., where can the fundamental principles be relativized , without straying from the syndicalist path under the dominant influence of class compromise? Which internal organizational aspects of activism and the union’s representative function can be adopted in a controlled manner by a related movement? Which must be qualitatively transformed, and which must be completely curtailed or discarded?

Let’s then look at the “micropolitical” side, examining exactly who has approached grassroots organizing: What do they need to be integrated into grassroots democracy, what is needed to free up resources for this? What kind of relationship structure is needed within the FAU itself to become “effective” even at the micro level, and where do we need to put things into perspective? What new impulses do the new comrades bring to organizing? If we accordingly reshape the relationships between union activists and resistance colleagues, as well as between the latter and militant comrades, this will allow us to draw further conclusions about our libertarian socialist principles.

‘Horizontality’ might then appear to us as a concept we have so far understood far too formalistically, one that also requires substantial ‘equality’ among FAU members, that is, the release of resources for participation. And then we might realize that we haven’t yet considered certain areas of society in our macro-politics, for example, the institutions of care work. And so on.

Such principle-driven prefiguration does not appear in Marcks’ work, despite his casual assertions. In his ‘sketch,’ however, a “relationship of non-relation” prevails between “political aspiration” and “mesopolitics.” The far-reaching consequences that inevitably arise from this for the entire project of societal transformation at all political levels are neither explicitly articulated by the citizen, nor even by Marcks’ followers in the FAU.

So, with the prefigurative program of the ‘sketch,’ what would still constitute the “radical core of the utopia”? A “transformative grassroots organization” would ultimately have to discard all syndicalist principles at all political levels, except for a shrunken grassroots democracy as a recurring farce of liberal federalism. It must do this in order to be able to convince even a few thousand people, theoretically, of a long-term and stable membership here and now, while simultaneously remaining consistent with the standard of pure agency. But even that stump of grassroots democracy will ultimately be, for Marcks, a principle to be completely amputated at the “micropolitical level” when compared with social democratic strategic planning.

A clear stance against misunderstandings

Elsewhere in the ‘sketch,’ however, it still seems as if the citizen is addressing the methodology of ‘direct action’ in a “mesopolitical” way. He had initially won me over as an incorrigible anarcho-syndicalist: “As Negri […] de facto syndicalist […] clarified, struggles for concrete improvements such as higher wages are ‘not revolutionary in themselves’; the crucial factor is ‘ what form the struggles take .’ […] The fundamental idea of ​​syndicalism, even before Negri and Hardt sold it as their theory, has always been to institutionalize the everyday rebellion that emerges in social conflicts in a way that expands rather than contains it.”

Is the citizen speaking here of the syndicalist determination of workplace organizational and struggle forms? Is he, in fact, qualifying mesopolitics when he writes that the decisive factor in syndicalism is “what form the struggles take”? Let’s see what he makes of this further: ” What is decisive […] are not so much the struggles themselves , but the modes of relating that are formed in their context. The prerequisite for this, as Schapiro once explained, is to place the interaction between everyday struggles for interests and the development of structures of social reorganization at the center of thought.”

It is dawn, but day has not yet broken on the constructive construction site of citizen M. Before we clarify the meaning of the term “modes of relating” in Marcks’ work, let us first direct the hopeful green beam of our flashlights back into the darkness. Back to that Alexander Schapiro, “Kropotkin’s secretary, Rocker’s companion, and political mentor of IISG founder Arthur Lehning.” Schapiro is another figure of reference that speaks to the entire line of argumentation in the ‘sketch’. He is Marcks’s great syndicalist authority, the forgotten figurehead from the days of the syndicalist IAA, his mythical ancestor. It is through this lineage that the self-presentation as a syndicalist cultural bringer in a chaotic, “neo-anarchist” FAU can be explained. All the more so since “Schapiro’s unfortunately forgotten thought” is itself hardly accessible outside of archives. But what exactly was the program of this Mr. Schapiro, whose political fortunes were so severely battered by the times? An excerpt from his article ‘The Politics of the International’ from 1932:

“The IAA is the only workers’ organization founded on the cornerstones of a libertarian socialism. Consequently, it is the only organization capable of undertaking the task of reconstruction. What, then, must be the policy of the IAA with regard to the vital problems that concern the world in general and the working class in particular today? It must first consist of a thorough study of the current conditions of agricultural and industrial production, the exchange and distribution of products, and the intervention of workers’ organizations in the production process through the establishment of control committees in factories, workshops, offices, and agricultural enterprises.”

Furthermore, building upon this, revolutionary forces must be trained for reconstruction (economic stormtroopers) which, on the day of capitalist collapse, will be practically capable of establishing a system based on the aforementioned principles and uniting the entire working world, which will desire nothing more than to work for the benefit of all, without losing sight of increasing its own well-being […] [The IAA] further declares that the working class should already now, without prejudice to its daily demands regarding the improvement of its present working conditions, work out a political, economic, and social system which, after the overthrow of the old regime, can actually represent capitalism and the state and abolish economic exploitation as well as political, religious, and social oppression.” ⁷

“In light of this clear stance,” Schapiro continues, “which leaves no room for misunderstanding,” the ‘sketch’ that refers to him as a progenitor does indeed appear as a programmatic rewriting. Marcks certainly conceives of “the interplay between everyday struggles for interest and the development of structures of social reorganization.” At such a general level, the two theorists still find common ground. Marcks himself even refers, loosely and abstractly, to “classical mass anarchism” as a “socialism from below that develops the organisms of social movements into an economic-political system.” But, as always, the devil is in the details. Elsewhere in the ‘sketch,’ the citizen writes:

“A reflexive theory of practice works with contradictions, even if this entails the risk of integrating the nascent form into the existing system. Consider, for example, the established trade unions, which failed to capitalize on the shift in dominance and instead positioned themselves as a corrective to reality. This was also due to the Marxist concept of the division of labor between party and trade union, which reduced the latter to a mere compensatory procedure. Syndicalist history, with its many uprisings and revolutions, certainly cannot confirm that trade union work must lead to integration.”

At this point, the citizen commits an internal logical fallacy in his own argument: what saved historical syndicalism from integration into the existing order were “uprisings and revolutions.” These were the politically organized and simultaneously spontaneous mass responses to the “collapse of capitalism,” ^which his patron saint Schapiro still envisioned as a means, a strategy, or a window of social possibility. However, in Marcks’s transformational perspective, these revolutionary “ruptures,” and the syndicalist mass organizing that only becomes possible through and within them, are theoretically rejected. He exemplifies this under the heading of an “anti-chaos reflex,” but also repeatedly and implicitly in a “metapolitical” way elsewhere. His irony towards Bini Adamczak’s theory of revolution speaks volumes in this regard: “In her theory, revolutions are not made, but rather erupt—precisely to open history to all sorts of options.” His preferred term is not ‘revolution’, but rather ‘change of function and dominance’.

It is not incorrect when Marcks, at the beginning of his ‘sketch’ on current left-wing grassroots organizing, observes that their proposals “act as if existing forms of the left simply need to be repackaged”—an analogy that is, incidentally, somewhat misleading and devoid of content—and “that their isolation might have something to do with precisely those forms remains unconsidered.” What Marcks then actually develops programmatically, however, is to abandon: 1. the fundamental content of the anarcho-syndicalist understanding of the methodology of direct action; 2. central revolutionary-theoretical assumptions of Schapiro; and 3. and as a consequence of the first two points, the concrete content of a “free, communist society organized on the basis of liberal federalism,” ^as Schapiro still defined it as a goal.

In Marcks’ program of pure agency, on the one hand, only the trade union aspect of the “compensation procedure” for “concrete improvements such as higher wages” remains. On the other hand, however, this is also supposed to serve as a “transmission belt” for “the world of self-governance,” that is, the “spaces of freedom” beyond these social-democratic combat organizations.

“Trade unions should indeed be a transmission belt. But not for the party that leads people back to the old ways – but for the world of self-management […] In fact, a combination of different interest groups and self-management structures could provide the foundation for a counter-society whose social relations override state and capitalist structures.”

This is precisely what Marcks means by “modes of relating,” by “the form that the struggles take.” He is referring to the macrostructures of a counter-society through which “the people” are to be mediated via various conflicts of interest. The citizen then ascribes the same antagonistic quality to these structures of self-governance as to interest-based fighting organizations . He has to do so if he wants to maintain any semblance of social-revolutionary antagonism in his program: those cooperative structures of the “world of self-governance,” the “modes of relating” that form the actual core of his “program of counter-power,” could “permanently address conflicts of interest” and “avoid integration.”

“In the medium term, the task of contemporary syndicalism is not only to advance this organizing, but also to integrate it into a program of counter-power that sets the grassroots in contrast to existing institutions via an institutional foundation. This is the transformative moment through which the contradictions can be maintained, from whose dynamics shifts in dominance are possible and integration is avoided. In this respect, syndicalism differs from established trade unions, which are a symbiotic reflection of existing institutions – and thus possess no transformative potential […] Embedding social struggles in a transformative form of trade union that permanently addresses conflicts of interest remains […] essential.”

The citizen asserts this as if there hadn’t already been a socialist cooperative movement with millions of members, which encountered considerable difficulties in “overwriting capitalist structures.” What remains, then, is the conclusion of the “symbiosis,” which isn’t even explicitly formulated: “[T]he work with institutional reality [is] a prerequisite for further action.” What exactly this means, the citizen conveniently remains silent about… Marcks is a proponent of symbiotic spaces, as I will explain in detail in the next section, particularly with regard to his affinity for (corruptible) functional elites. He is a partisan of the liberated symbiosis, through which the dominant society is somehow supposed to be “overwritten.”

Viewing this Marcian social commentary through the lens of Brecht’s “Herr Keuner,” one cannot help but conclude that the bourgeois “gave some objects a very idiosyncratic form […] ‘Some artists, when they contemplate the world, are like many philosophers. In striving for form, the substance is lost .'” One of the greatest strengths of the “sketch,” therefore, is that it has refocused attention on the mesopolitical maxim of grassroots organizing, on agency. One of its greatest weaknesses, beginning with the specifically inarticulate selection of means of struggle and organization and the sanctification of agency, is that, with a view to the horizon of a stable mass membership organization, it abandons the liberal-socialist path in defining goals and strategies.

It is right, as Marcks suggests, to consider grassroots organizing from the perspective of agency. However, if one ventures into the social-democratic undergrowth of the existing system with the citizen, one must sooner rather than later “relativize” all those political provisions that constitute the core principles of communist anarchism and syndicalism that must be preserved.

Syndicalism as an untainted social parasite

How could the relationship between the different political levels in a grassroots organization be conceived from a social-theoretical perspective so that it becomes more coherent from a social-revolutionary standpoint? Because, unlike in Marcks’ theory, all principles and political demands are not simply “ahistorical” ^truths from the bourgeois realm of ideas, the ruling society must become a more consistent part of our prefiguration formula. But okay ^, folks, what I’m about to write will surely make all Hegelians’ hair stand on end once again — feel free to copy it, feel free to do it better, seriously, I mean it. Let’s become smarter and stronger together!

We formulate political principles 1. by negating the existing deplorable conditions and, specifically at the meso level, their mechanisms of coercion . I have attempted to explain in detail in ‘Better to Live as Aliens’ (LLWAA: D, 3) that we as radical leftists cannot simply make use of the latter without derailing the entire journey towards a liberated society. Furthermore, inspiration can be drawn from the forms that, among others, an independent workers’ movement has historically produced in the struggle against capital and oppression, and which still produces in small groups .

However, we would first need to develop a theoretical debate on how exactly this glimpse of utopia, or rather the specific negations of the existing order, could be brought into dialogue with the experiences we are actually having in our organizing here and now. In the preceding section, I conceptually attempted to assign this moment to the provisional endpoint of the prefiguration cycle: from the macro-level through the meso- and micro-levels to the meta-level of political aspiration and its reformulation .

For this to work, the dominant society must become part of the prefiguration equation in an even more mediated way. For it structures our everyday lives and ourselves in its own image. We must take its subjective shaping, everyday and structural constraints, and rewarding forces of integration—which dominate any alternative model—just as seriously as, on the other hand, the historically developed powerlessness of us radical leftists, which threatens to make us bourgeois and stupid. The latter arises from

“the social context of the social-democratic class compromise, a culture of passivity and the loss of other everyday resistance practices, the attacks of neoliberalism on our subjectivity, the four waves of capital’s attack on workers’ control over the labor process, as well as the weaknesses of an autonomous workers’ movement and lack of legitimacy as a syndicalist interest organization.” (LLWAA: D, 4)

To counter this with even a marginal degree of strength, “the principles oriented towards the emancipatory purpose” must not merely “serve,” as with Marcks, as an ultimately too weak “orientation” in the prefiguration equation. Rather, they must also exercise a limiting function at all political levels of grassroots organizing, that is, they must define specific limits to the relativization of the principled content.

The citizen, however, will ultimately have erased with his ‘sketch’ the notion that left-wing grassroots organizing should be measured not only by its capacity for action, but also by its conceptualized macro-political relationships. It should be more precisely limited by the (im)possibility of pre-shaping a counter-society that corresponds to our aims in the here and now, through the relativization of principles. What thus enters into this prefiguration are not simply “deductively established principles,” as Marcks claims. They are fundamental determinations arising from a specific critique and analysis of the existing order.

As the ‘sketch’ continues, it becomes clear how society (does not) come into play in the citizen’s circle of prefiguration: for Marcks, society is merely the external aspect of organization. This external aspect, in Marcks’ conception, oscillates between adversary, symbiotic partner, and host body. The social engineer prince writes in line with the latter view:

“The real-utopian social technology of syndicalism can also be understood as one of the alternating steps. On the one hand, one works with reality, indeed, draws it along, and on the other hand, one builds on the utopia to be nurtured, without rushing too far ahead. Ensuring that the field of resonance between the two worlds is not torn apart, that the utopia interacts with reality in a way that enables an increasing flow of resources from the existing to the emerging, is the task of practice theory.”

Here, Marcks’ strategy of “free space” becomes most apparent. He thus exposes another, voluntaristic dark side of anarcho-syndicalism, which sought to “build the new society within the shell of the old.” Like a parasite, this new society feeds on the old, but otherwise remains enclosed and, above all, isolated within it . Historically, for example, considering the millions of anarchists in the workers’ movement, its organizations, its everyday culture and shared world in 1930s Spain, as well as the production relations of that time, it may still have made sense to exclaim with Buenaventura Durruti: “We are not afraid of the ruins, for we carry a new world in our hearts, and it is being created at this very moment!”

In Marcks’ work, who is certainly afraid of the specters of any societal ruin, the associated idea of ​​”embryo theory” reappears in a modified form. However, this time it lacks any reference to (the absence of) an independent workers’ movement. While Marcks acknowledges the limitations of “utopia’s realization,” he is confident that these can be overcome through “strategic interaction.”

“The task is to work with reality in such a way that a broad collectivity unfolds around what is realistically feasible – in order to ‘work through’ this collectivity the situation where the ‘practical possibilities for realizing’ utopia reach their limits. These limits are not simply set by objective conditions, but […] are also rooted in the inadequacy of the emancipatory subjects themselves.” ¹¹

The final telling phrase will reappear shortly and accompany us until the end of this epilogue. But first, it must be stated: In Marcks’s view, there is ultimately no decisive interaction between society and counter-society that cannot be skillfully manipulated and circumvented through social engineering. He postulates a “constant capacity for expansion of action” with regard to the purpose of “liberation” as the construction of “building blocks of counter-power.” However, this lacks a coherent theorization of a complex interaction in which, with a high degree of probability, “the existing” would again attract “the emerging,” and could actually initiate a reverse “flow of resources” once this “embryo” had undergone even a few hundred cell divisions. The “embryo” metaphor used by the public in this way is misleading. Despite all the “real-utopian” rhetoric, there is no syndicalist placental barrier, and this is not by chance, as can be implicitly inferred from his critique of the radical left:

“They tend to rationalize the lack of effectiveness of leftist principles—and thus the absence of agency—only with the notion that the conditions are unfavorable for them or that not enough has been done to promote them […] The environment is to blame for what doesn’t work in their own contexts, as it refuses to acknowledge the correct norms and thereby reproduces contextual conditions that hinder the free development of those contexts.” And: “The radical left largely lacks a practical materialism […] [Their] forms [of micropolitics] disregard elementary laws of social interaction and are detached from reality […] Neither are humans infinitely malleable, nor are the possibilities of interpersonal and transpersonal relationships infinite.”

A “practical materialism,” which in the more meaningful sense of the term would take seriously not only “human” limitations but, above all, the limitations of society within, around, and in our environment , finds only a place in the outline as a discredited Marxist straw man. If materialist considerations regarding the inherent dynamics of society were to enter the prefiguration equation, a limit would be revealed to the relativization of syndicalist methodology in this specific way. This would be especially true if “only” a few hundred or thousand people joined our grassroots organization here and now, thus preventing the formation of a mass organization. If no “masses” can be “interested” here and now without social-democratic resistance, then the answer in Marcks’ program must be: away with direct action in mesopolitics in order to increase agency!

Consequently, Marcks, coupled with his concept of a symbiotic strategy of free space, will no longer ask whether a future shift in social conditions—for example, the gradual abandonment of the class compromise by employers and/or the state, coupled with the ossification of the German Trade Union Confederation (DGB)—could make syndicalist resistance a realistic option for more colleagues again. It’s true, here and now it isn’t, so it can’t be used to “interest” masses and effectively integrate them into the organization. But the fact that this isn’t the case right now doesn’t mean it couldn’t happen again someday. The original gangster of Norwegian syndicalism, Beyer-Arnesen, wrote regarding such questions in 1998:

“In order to […] definitively slam the historical door of anarcho-syndicalism […] one would also have to deny the possibility of its revival at a time when the class struggle is intensifying and more and more workers are beginning to believe in a world beyond capitalism. The present marginality and almost complete absence of revolutionary trade unionism can very likely be interpreted as a reflection of the current general lack of confidence among workers in the mere possibility of building a world without capitalist social relations. The question should also be asked: Would building even a marginal revolutionary trade union structure at the present time serve as a means of strengthening confidence among sections of the working class? I see reasons to believe that the answer to this is ‘yes.’” ¹²

The fact that structural factors are not consistently addressed in Marcks’ program—as a negation/foreshadowing of prevailing/emancipatory forms of mediation, as a reckoning with the dominant constraints of the existing order/societal dynamics, and thus as a barrier to the relativization of principles—has a direct impact on its socio-revolutionary merit. I venture to predict that “actors who actually want to relativize their principles in a way that is appropriate for the average citizen, in order to successfully mobilize along the lines of bread-and-butter issues,” are ultimately not entirely “doomed to powerlessness.”

While they are likely to narrowly miss out in the country of the DGB despite all their “real utopianism” – perhaps it will at least be enough to create a single full-time position in the FAU? But those specifically “real utopian” actors have a good chance of realizing that “winning at almost any price means that in the end we will have indeed won” – or rather, there will only be a few hundred more ‘extraterrestrial’ activists – “but we ourselves will have become like our opponents” ¹³ and thus the door to libertarian socialism will truly close.

Surprise Egg: A Critique of Micropolitics

To avoid disrupting his power-political dreams within the FAU itself, Marcks wisely refrained from addressing the identified gaps in his prefiguration equation at various levels, instead attempting to obscure them as a purported actualization of syndicalism. As his argument progresses, he focuses, as already hinted at in the previous section with the “inadequacy of emancipatory subjects,” on the seemingly disastrous left-wing micropolitics , specifically that of the FAU: “[I]t is indeed primarily the function of mesopolitics to interest broad masses in an organization, but its capacity for connection ultimately also depends on the other levels of transformation politics.”

Anyone whose head is now spinning from the citizen’s jumble of terms should look up the difference between “meso-” and “micropolitics” again in the above section “Small Dictionary…”.

At this point comes the admittedly cleverly constructed transition to the citizen’s argument. I interpret this as an evasive maneuver in response to the vacuum created, among other things, at the level of goals and strategy. Marcks devotes the majority of his text to denouncing what he perceives as the prevailing micropolitics within the FAU, specifically its lack of effective access to its organizing objects. At the same time, he then blames this micropolitics—evident simply from the sheer volume of text and the emotional charge of the ‘sketch’—for the grassroots organization’s lack of agency.

” If, for example, the macro-political vision is not realistically corrected because the constraints that prove to be the limits of possibility in micropolitics—the laboratory of utopia—are ignored, then the real-utopian program cannot credibly convey that it is a viable alternative that does justice to the complex task of societal reorganization. Likewise, good mesopolitical approaches will not be able to unfold their potential for agency if micropolitics does not resonate with the realities of the people to be mobilized, if they cannot be integrated with effective principles.”

Since all syndicalist questions remain unasked at the meso level, but all transformation-theoretical answers are provided, the citizen shifts the explanation for the absence of agency and thus of a stable FAU mass organization to the micro level, i.e., to an allegedly lacking “effectiveness” and the “inadequacy of the emancipatory subjects” themselves. Under this latter heading, however, he primarily analyzes other FAU activists who are active without any connection to his own everyday life.

Marcks believes the FAU’s failure to organize mass mobilization stems from its organizational structures, lack of professionalization and vertical integration, the irrationality of other activists, its “identitarian closed-off” nature, and so on. But how does he arrive at this conclusion, and how does he make his arguments plausible in his transformative evasive maneuver?

“Inevitably,” the citizen begins modestly and with nuance, “ a reflection on practical experiences [of existing grassroots organizations and the FAU] must lead to a critique of the prevailing micropolitics of the radical left. For in this micropolitics, the desired modes of relating are not measured by whether they enable agency. Rather, those modes of relating identified as the seeds of utopia are themselves considered the standard by which left-wing practice must measure itself. Agency—like counter-power—is indeed desirable, but only if it arises from precisely those modes of relating that correspond to the left’s own norms of social interaction.”

And on this argumentative terrain of micropolitics, those FAU activists “who don’t want to do what the citizens deem appropriate” can finally be thoroughly and thoroughly criticized. The culprits for the lack of mass organizing have been found. What’s interesting in the context of this analytical evasion—away from society, towards the micro level!—is how exactly Marcks uses the term “modes of relationship” again at this point: In this quote, “modes of relationship” is, not inappropriately, something that belongs to the realm of micropolitics. That is, the close and intermediate relationships among members within the transformative grassroots organization itself. However, at this level, Marcks has little regard for the achievements of the ’68 generation.

“Since left-wing micropolitics understands itself merely as a reflection of utopian principles—and vice versa—there is no performance-oriented point of reference (e.g., the mesopolitical goal of mass organizing) that would qualify its inability to exert influence as a problem of weight. And these complacent principles, in which the supposed utopia is reflected, manifest themselves primarily in ways of relating that are intended to be anti-authoritarian. There is nothing inherently wrong with this impulse” —but!— “in the left from 1968 onward, it took on almost infantile proportions. Now it was no longer just about working with as little hierarchy as possible, but about defying all authority on principle. However, this also devalued competence and experience. For to the extent that the bearers of such knowledge—the most natural source of authority —were distrusted as potential agents of power, their knowledge itself lost its validity.”

Phew, the citizen is actually making my self-proclaimed job as a ‘critical critic’ almost boring, so obviously is what he offers a bluff. With this bluff of infantile anti-authoritarianism, he tries to make us accept the patriarchal ideology of a “professional and managerial class faction (PMF)” ¹⁴ – knowledge, authority: “There needs to be a validity of socially relevant knowledge in order to shape micropolitics in such a way that such knowledge comes into play.” Capiche? The Märcks of the ‘12 Theses’, an internal FAU strategy paper from 2023, took the bait immediately and applied that ideology, thankfully unvarnished, to their own ‘practical experiences’:

“Let’s finally start treating our activists sustainably. Knowledge and practical experience are valuable and fundamental prerequisites for building counter-power. However, in numerous FAU syndicates, such experiential knowledge is questioned under the pretext of fighting hierarchies or the patriarchy. This leads to activists, who often handle both union administration and core workplace work, resigning or even leaving, and each generation repeats the same mistakes.”

Besides the question of why they don’t simply channel their “experiential knowledge” into structured training courses, train new instructors on a temporary basis, and thus make themselves redundant—Marcks’ claims about “implicit knowledge” also fail to convince me here—the formulation of the ” pretext of hierarchies and patriarchy” is telling. Perhaps not entirely consciously, but quite aptly chosen, it allows me to connect my anti-Marcks sentiment with the grievances that must always be addressed in the aftermath of ’68: The authors of the “12 Theses” seem no more aware than Marcks himself of the delusional nature of the claim that left-wing radicals in the FAU unite out of the simple need to combat “natural” knowledge. It cannot at least also be about the aforementioned aim of dismantling “hierarchies and patriarchy” in organizational terms. No, there must be darker and more destructive motives behind it, directed against “competence and experience” per se . No explanation is too far-fetched when one can unequivocally and indiscriminately accuse the other of irrationality. A paean to ‘normal’ relationships, namely those of work and family, is then conveniently provided by Marcks as a revealing contrast:

” In order for a few individuals lacking social integration and experience of responsibility to try things out, the entire organization has to accept shortcomings that prevent effective organization and the pursuit of subordinate interests. In fact, one gets the impression that this model is only beneficial for a very specific social type: socially isolated people who, lacking professional and familial obligations, as well as qualifications, have a need to try out different tasks. It must seem particularly insulting to older people who are professionally and familially engaged in life and naturally always take on responsibility, that they are supposed to serve as experimental material in a kind of social therapy for post-adolescent subjects.”

In our discussions, however, comrades expressed simple astonishment, as they had never encountered such malicious “micropolitical saboteurs” in their FAU practice at the union level. Clearly, there are internal organizational dynamics that, in certain ways, hinder the external building of power. To some extent, the lack of organizational power is related to a deficient micropolitics that sometimes even hinders itself. Marcks, in particular, has elaborated on real problems within the FAU elsewhere in this “outline.” Why he then, in my opinion, addresses these problems poorly and how he uses them for his own less-than-emancipatory projects, I would like to explain in the next part of this epilogue, along with alternative solutions.

For the Marcks family, however, the whole thing also functions as a perfectly rationalization mechanism and a professional way of coping with perceived slights. Such rhetoric obscures the fact that feminist-active FLINTA* people are constantly being driven away, and that informal hierarchies based on purported experiential knowledge are cultivated, especially among ‘syndicalist’ brothers. ¹⁵ Such patriarchal bluffs then become grotesquely, and thus beautifully transparent, in the following section about Marcks’s supposedly “natural advantages of experience and knowledge”:

“This hostility towards authority, which goes beyond mere criticism of authority, is ‘infantile’ not only because at the heart of its defiant exuberance lies the immature motive that no one should have control over something one does not possess oneself. It is also so because it inevitably targets older people. Their natural advantages in experience and knowledge are perceived from this narrow perspective, which focuses on individuals rather than content and structures, as an unacceptable power imbalance. Instead of accepting such advantages and deriving collective benefit from them, the bearers of such knowledge are curtailed – and thus the knowledge itself is contained. The fight against hierarchies of knowledge, which would presuppose the recognition and dissemination of knowledge, is therefore ultimately a fight against knowledge itself.”

Such argumentative subtleties wouldn’t even require further comment; they could stand on their own. However, I can’t resist adding a quote from the comedian Till Reiners: “Gaining experience is by no means a guarantee that one will actually learn anything. That’s the only reason musicals still exist”—or power-hungry cadres and their tolerance within grassroots organizations; self-proclaimed experts seeking to immortalize themselves there, who, as ‘phantom management,’ never quite achieve their own fulfillment. (LLWAA: E, 5-7) Nowhere does Michael Schneider’s analysis of the cadres in his K-Group from 1971 fit as perfectly as here:

“Among those comrades who reluctantly gave up their bourgeois careers in order to compensate all the more brutally in the socialist movement, there is the […] infantile, but for group development far more dangerous need to dominate group members through the manipulative use of theoretical, rhetorical, organizational, and other talents—that is, to elevate themselves to a repressive rather than an emancipatory authority. These (petty) bourgeois, infantile motives and needs are, however, more persistent than all political rationalizations .” ¹⁶

Or rather

When it comes to the political rationalizations of prevailing, often less than emancipatory, relationship dynamics in left-wing grassroots organizations, all of us activist ‘aliens’ should feel addressed. These dynamics inevitably accompany a specific constellation within our grassroots organizations of the General Syndicates, which I have analyzed with Émile Pouget as ‘irregular unions’ and ‘political groups’ (LLWAA: C, 9): As ‘spaceships,’ these bring forth a mode of relating that is functionally modeled on that of the ‘professional and managerial class fraction’ (‘PMF’) to other factions of the working class.

A brief digression into the FAU’s internal debate: The reception so far has shown that this faction has been understood primarily as a biographical destiny and, at the same time, an underdeveloped sociological construct. However, it is precisely the PMF’s ( LLWAA: F ) relationship to other working-class factions that is essential to my argument. I understand it as a blueprint for all after-work activism, which thus replicates the social hierarchies of the division of labor. In the next step, I understand activism itself as one of the social production sites of new professionals and managers, namely the profession of social change.

The paternalistic enjoyment and professional advancement that accompany the corresponding relationships, forms of activity, and content are open to many and equally tempting to many, regardless of their faction or social class. Those who are active in “spaceships” for an extended period may find it difficult and perhaps even desirable to become something of an “alien.” However, my thesis has been interpreted as suggesting that only people from the educated middle class and the educated bourgeoisie frequent the FAU and the syndicate described here. That is precisely not my point. Rather, my point is this: even after-work activism, in terms of its relationship to “the others,” is a PMF job, and grassroots activism is objectively an unpaid internship for it. This simulation of profitability in grassroots organizations is fundamentally independent of individual class and factional background. (LLWAA: F, 8)

The relationship of PMF (prospective members) to other factions of the working class, whether paid or engaged in voluntary after-work activism, is, I maintain with comrades, incompatible with social revolution. Activism perpetuates the divisions of the social hierarchy in the division of labor. Those who are active in ‘spaceships’ for extended periods can hardly, and perhaps do not want to, do anything other than become ‘aliens’.

The political rationalizations in internal FAU debates don’t disguise this fact, either—the argument that one doesn’t belong to the PMF biographically and therefore shouldn’t feel addressed by the “alien” criticism. Or that the “spaceship” analysis can’t possibly be correct because a few working-class children have also become “aliens” within the FAU. Folks, we’re making it far too easy for ourselves, or rather, I didn’t think things through to the end in the book and expressed myself unclearly. In the next step, that category was then immediately twisted into a moral one in internal “debates” to pillory other cadres and their, in-depth, unexamined practices. Such behavior sidesteps the actual, relational challenge the book poses to us activists, regardless of our biographical background. End of digression.

The citizen himself, in order to bend the dominant left-wing radical discourse to his own advantage, probably couldn’t avoid adopting the concept of “modes of relating,” popularized by Bini Adamczak, at the time of the publication of the “sketch.” Only to then, admittedly in a consistently Marcksian manner, simply rationalize away its feminist point: for Marcks, “modes of relating” simply means “organizational structures,” whether on a small or large scale. However, this concept should also encompass a feminist, qualitative analysis of the networks of relationships both within and around the FAU (Free Workers’ Union), as well as conceptually within the forms of mediation of a liberated society. Such networks of relationships naturally interact with organizational and administrative structures, thus giving rise to a specific culture and personality development, ultimately resulting in specific micro- and macro-political “modes of relating.” But these, in turn, cannot simply be reduced to technical organizational structures.

Marcks’s prefiguration program already promotes this tendency, where, in a classically syndicalist ^fashion , he conflates the moment of attack—the strategic interaction with opponents—with the moment of building—the needs-driven forging of emancipatory relationships. This occurs when he attempts to align Clausewitz’s means-ends axis with his own matrix of political transformation levels. For the citizen, the strategy of struggle clearly takes precedence over relationship building: It is rarely stated how organizational relationships or forms of social mediation are actually supposed to be designed to be “inclusive and horizontal”; utopian aspirations, intended merely as “orientation,” are left as mere assertions by the wayside as soon as the citizen writes them down.

Nowhere in Marcks’s program does a change “of people,” a ‘political level of the subject,’ take place, which would only be possible through other ways of relating to one another. It is our relationships that shape us as human beings and make us individuals with an identity. An anarcho-syndicalist mesopolitics, at any rate, always understood itself, for example with Rudolf Rocker, as ‘a practical school, a university of experience, from which [the producers in the labor struggle] draw a wealth of instruction and enlightenment.’18 ^Marcks himself refers to Émile Pouget in this regard: ‘As an autonomous ‘party of labor,’ [the economic fighting organizations of the working class] should be made into the school of revolution. This meant working ‘on changing mentalities , social forms, and economic relations.”

However, as already shown, Marcks also directly overwrites this strand of historical syndicalism. Specifically, he does so by removing the principles from mesopolitics, thus purging them of the methodology of direct action and, consequently, of the socio-revolutionary development of relationships and personalities. Using a now-familiar rhetorical device of overwriting, he nevertheless astonishingly arrives at the claim of conceiving “a comprehensive model of social reorganization.”

“It would be wrong to reduce syndicalism solely to the working-class sphere. Contrary to the prejudice that it is inadequate because it focuses only on businesses, in its heyday it certainly included communitarian structures, such as tenant and unemployment assistance, consumer cooperatives, and educational and cultural associations. In this respect, it hinted at a comprehensive model of social reorganization. The task now is to develop this model more clearly.”

The Bürger program implicitly employs a banal, fundamentally contradictory mode of thinking; parallel to the purging of the FAU of syndicalist methodology in organizing struggles, something far more fundamental is lost: the, however tendential, feminist impulse of anarchism, the principle of ‘mutual aid,’ and thus the weaving of emancipatory relationships. ^In Marcks’ structurally masculine view of prefiguration, there is no room for the following questions: What kind of personality development is initiated in grassroots organizing? What kind of people are produced here? Are desirable relationships generated? What needs are (not) met here, and how ? And what kind of relationship emerges from this? Is it one of mutual recognition and comprehensive solidarity, an emancipatory one, then? Or a hierarchical master-servant relationship?

In Marcks’s claim to “constructively socialist” and “comprehensively reorganize” society, there is nowhere to be found any creative discussion of the isolated production sites of households, of the family as the site of the production of gender and labor power. This is also conspicuously absent from his enumeration of various forms of social unions. Consequently, there is no mention of the emancipatory organization of reproductive and care activities at the macro level of a counter-society. He thus exposes yet another dark side of historical syndicalism. This theoretical deficiency can also be demonstrated by examining the classical conception of ‘direct action’ as early as 1907, as cited by the Solidarity Federation:

“Direct action is a concept of such clarity, of such obvious self-evidence, that the explanation and definition lie within the words themselves. It means that the working class, in its constant rebellion against the existing order, expects nothing from outsiders, from external powers or forces, but rather that it creates its own conditions of struggle, draws its means of action from within itself. It means that, against today’s society, which recognizes only the bourgeois , the producer will henceforth rise up. And that this producer, recognizing that every form of social life is based on its respective system of production , attempts to directly attack the capitalist mode of production in order to transform it, to eliminate the entrepreneur, and thereby achieve his sovereignty in the workplace— the essential prerequisite for enjoying real freedom .”

Considering that these words were written more than a century ago, there is little room for criticism. The emphasis on producers rather than the working class in a broader sense could lead to work being seen as the exclusive arena of struggle, thus excluding the unemployed, housewives, and others […] Pouget […] stressed that ‘direct action means that the working class embraces the concepts of freedom and autonomy, rather than kneeling before the principle of authority.’ ²⁰

In fact, this syndicalist premise about the connection between the “production system” and “real freedom” should not only elicit “minor criticism.” But for the average citizen, all of this isn’t even worth a yawn. In the prefigurative circles with Marcks, feminist impulses at the level of meso- and micropolitics are absent, or rather, only appear in a cynical form. When the personal-political aspects of relationships and, consequently, personality development within grassroots organizations are addressed, it is done negatively as “social terror” or through denigration of other activists and their “ignoring of their own shortcomings.” The fourth unofficial part of the “sketch,” the book “Back to the Future: A Social Republican Panorama” by Marcks and Zimmermann, is simply a case of woke-bashing and defending the binary gender system. These are topics that were among the most popular in social media reactions.

“Compared to that, it’s…”

When it comes to the prevailing micropolitics of left-wing grassroots organizing, Marcks is initially quite right when he writes that “the Left has a problem working on substance.” Its “practice-theoretical discourses” are indeed “mostly meta- and macro-politically grounded, [thus] ruminating on ‘big’ problems […] ‘Small’ problems are met with contempt […] In micro- and meso-analytical questions […] the Left therefore behaves ignorantly.” However, it is anything but an accurate description of the FAU practice I am familiar with when he simultaneously states that a “self-referentiality of micropolitics” prevails in this and the Left in general.

“which, through its absolutization, no longer has any instance of reflection. Although it is supposed to reflect utopia (and vice versa), thus ostensibly creating a reflexive moment, the embryonic form and utopia are usually conceived synchronously. That is, they draw their principles from one and the same source: the negation of social asymmetries as found in reality (e.g., hierarchies or inequalities), against which horizontal or compensatory forms of mediation are contrasted as ‘lived utopias’. In this logic, it is essential to distance oneself from all constraints, because otherwise radical subjects would be co-opted or even corrupted, and the project would ultimately reproduce the existing power relations […] [T]he subordination or even rejection of mesopolitical objectives means there is no pragmatic moment that could challenge the self-indulgence of the utopian principles. Micropolitics (as the absolute reflection of these principles) thus degenerates into an end in itself.”

That in itself is a blatant lie: There are indeed “mesopolitical objectives” within the FAU’s syndicates. This is not the reason for their lack of agency. Rather, the societal reality is that there are no “broad masses” waiting for another, more or less social-partnership-based union, with infinitely less organizational power and a bit more democracy than the DGB, to appear in their workplaces, let alone in the workplaces of the “aliens” themselves. There are no broad masses waiting to finally join such an organization long-term and be transported via this transmission belt into the “world of self-governance” for “liberation” and “elevation.” Even for an FAU that abandoned the syndicalist path with Marcks at the workplace level — even with his revisionist mesopolitical proposals — the imagined agency needed to “get a stable mass membership organization going” alongside the existing ones would be lacking. It doesn’t matter what their micropolitics might look like.

Once this was admitted, the demand for a relativization of the principles would also be immediately called into question, since this would not result in any relevant, measurable success according to the established standard of organizing “broad masses.” Even with the derived standard of pure agency, the relativization of anarcho-syndicalist principles cannot be justified . And then one would have to take a further step back and scrutinize the analysis of social conditions, the underlying social theories, and thus also the transformation/revolution theory of the citizen itself. None of this happens; instead, in the very next sentence after the above quote about a left-wing micropolitics that degenerates into an end in itself, Marcks launches into another rhetorical bluff:

“Certainly, one could also see a commendable stance in this, namely one that does not want success at any price and rejects such power politics where the end justifies the means – and is all too often corrupted by it. This impulse is understandable. But unfortunately, the left has simply inverted the problem by now sanctifying the means.”

And how are we supposed to think this rhetorical bluff of power politics through? “Compared to that, it’s true…” and then we can add whatever we ourselves want to sanctify. With his assertions about the micropolitics of existing grassroots organizations, and in turn their responsibility for a lack of agency, Marcks is simply constructing a straw man, which he then rids with thousands of words in his “sketch.” If the citizen were to connect with the vacuum behind it, it would tear his programmatic agenda, and with it precisely those micropolitical shifts he will try to justify with it, out into the void of bourgeois space. Out into the very place where the citizen is currently adrift.

For those who find such thoughts too reminiscent of the experiences of “social therapy for post-adolescent subjects,” an “infantile anti-authoritarianism,” or even an “identitarian closure,” they should lend an ear to Thomas Ebermann, who has aged with left-wing radical dignity. He provides a lens through which the ‘sketch’ can be deciphered as a kind of unhinged realism. Ebermann categorizes certain rhetorical maneuvers on the left as “standard phrases of conformity,” ¹⁹ which we can witness in the ‘sketch’ as ​​they tear apart their black-and-red cocoon.

“This terrible rhetoric of the conformists usually goes something like this: they only know three or four phrases. Let’s say someone wants to express their affection for bourgeois democracy and the constitution of this society, then I read an article, and it probably contains the sentence: ‘One may well have legitimate objections to bourgeois democracy, BUT!’ And then something about Putin or Milošević comes along […]: ‘Compared to that, it’s…’ […] You could also say: ‘One may have doubts as to whether capitalism, with its constraints of accumulation and growth, will ultimately be able to overcome the ecological crisis – BUT! – since we all know, mature as we are, that a shift to an anti-capitalist social formation is currently not possible, we are specializing in the Green New Deal.'”

So it’s always the same: People say again, “Yes, actually I know that,” but in doing so, the knowledge they claim to possess is completely lost. It’s just a bluff. The person writing the sentence usually doesn’t even know what a critique of bourgeois democracy actually is. And when you then put that to the test and ask, “Why is a work like Johannes Agnoli’s ‘Transformation of Democracy’ so important, or ‘The State of Capital,’ what do we learn from it? Why was Rosa Luxemburg so convinced that one cannot govern capitalist conditions as a leftist?”— then the arguments have usually long since faded, and it regresses into a self-protective phrase : “Yes, there must be something there; democracy, which doesn’t give people a say in investment and the way they produce, is probably inadequate, or so I’ve heard.” In the process, the desire for insightful critique of the existing order is somehow lost in favor of a pseudo-realistic positioning. ²¹

Let’s overlay Ebermann’s analysis onto the pivotal points in Marcks’ argument, where he makes a 180° turn away from the FAU. Paraphrasing the above power-political bluff with Ebermann’s words: “Yes, I actually know there’s a problem when, with a view to efficiency and success, the end justifies the means – BUT! – since we all know how corrupted the existing grassroots organization already is by the complete reversal of the problem” – yes, what follows from this protective phrase?

From this, Marcks, speaking off the record, derives the previously outlined concept of pure agency. This has shown that the anarcho-syndicalist arguments about the presence of ends in the means – not their “synchronization” – that is, the principle-driven practice surrounding ‘direct action’ and ‘mutual aid’, have long since faded into marginal claims in the eyes of the public.

His conception of mesopolitics is, at its core—where utopia once sprouted in historical syndicalism—precisely the power-political growth that he claims in the above quote to be deliberately avoiding. To make this astonishing rhetorical bluff plausible, Marcks then has to deliver his usual sharp critique of the grassroots organizing practices he criticizes:

“ In this logic [‘lived utopias’, which conceive of germinal form and utopia synchronously], it is essential to distance oneself from all constraints, because otherwise radical subjects would be co-opted or even corrupted, and the project would ultimately reproduce the existing power relations […] it should come as no surprise that the radical left can hardly intervene in social developments anymore. For where it rejects any rationality that engages with the constraints of real power relations, it cannot develop any agency or counter-power. Ultimately, the construction of such power, even if it is intended to be emancipatory, places multifaceted demands on a movement in terms of performance and competence.”

What is happening here, and in the ‘sketch’ in general, is an attempt to shift the boundaries of what can be said and done: What is currently happening in the grassroots organizations, and thus within the FAU, is portrayed as so extreme in only one direction that Marcks’ proposals, which go in the opposite direction, can appear reasonable and merely mitigating. Yet it is precisely these proposals that represent an extreme position within the FAU and among social revolutionaries. They gain plausibility through rhetoric that lacks enlightenment and entirely arbitrary descriptions of practice. Or rather: through denigrations of practice delivered with presumptuous superlatives and intolerable one-sidedness.

From which organization, from which experiences, exactly, does this disgruntled high performer and expert speak, justifying his big ‘buts’? ​​Contrary to his own demands, he certainly does not provide a programmatic definition of the political levels “against the background of historical experiences and current conditions.”

Marcks’ conclusions, if they stem from anything at all, arise from an increasingly representative trade union practice of providing support and external impetus within the FAU’s General Syndicate. Citizens’ practical experiences, too, have very likely developed within an irregular union/political group, in one of these “spaceships” of grassroots organizing. This compromise form, which unfortunately became permanent within the FAU, is fundamentally based on a system of divisions and the emerging seeds of the union’s representative function. Because the General Syndicate is forced to approach the syndicalist model from the back end, its very organizational preconditions generate a vertical split between the “political” activist apparatus and the “economic” resistance movement on the outside, a split that certainly requires constructive engagement and containment.

Considering the organizational development and operational practices of such an FAU union, one cannot speak of a problem horizon of a future “functional transformation” ²² that only gradually emerges. Under this heading, Holger Marcks had already outlined in 2010 the problems that would inevitably develop “with increasing power” ²³ of unions : 1. the formation of new internal interest groups; 2. the lack of support for comprehensive grassroots dynamics among us FAU members as resistant wage earners; 3. the inhibited development of a vital culture of syndicalist struggle in the workplaces; 4. the tendency to develop into a disciplinary machine against independent struggles. (LLWAA: E, 3)

In the ‘sketch,’ the aim of programmatically curbing these effects—compared to Marcks’ earlier theoretical contributions—recedes to the sidelines, while the still partially fractured legitimation of these effects comes into focus. If we want to find out exactly how Marcks theoretically arrived at such a departure from the FAU, we must consider and better understand the aforementioned fundamental organizational-theoretical assumption of the inevitability of “functional change.” This assumption could most likely be grounded in a classic sociological thesis: Robert Michels’ “Iron Law of Oligarchy” from 1911, which Marcks, however, never mentions. Perhaps, once again, it is the things that the citizen has not written down that could help us gain greater clarity about his programmatic approach.

The second and final part, including a short version, will be released on September 6, 2026.

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Endnotes

1. Marcks 2018a.
   Important: In the following, I will no longer provide citations when quoting from the ‘sketch’. The quotation will then be taken from one of the three parts, i.e., Marcks 2018a, 2018b, or 2019. Any italics or inverted block citations are always my own emphasis. ↩︎
2. Tsveyfl 2023
   Update: Jonathan Eibisch pointed out to me that he already wrote some thoughts on this topic in 2021. ↩︎
3. Compare Loick 2017 for his analysis of anarchism, among other things, as a “radicalized liberalism” ↩︎
4. LLWAA: Abbreviation for ‘Better to live than aliens’, so here Heuholz 2025: Chapter E, Section 9 ↩︎
5. Compare Solidarity Federation 2024: Chapter 3 ↩︎
6. Marcks finds the self- and mutual use of the term “comrade!” silly, because it’s so apolitical. He celebrates, on the other hand, the “citoyen,” the “citizen!” of the French Revolution. That’s how I’ll address him from now on. And oh, if only one had read Marx; from this liberal wood of the citizen, one could craft the most beautiful critique of ideology. ↩︎
7. Schapiro 1932, my emphasis ↩︎
8. ibid. ↩︎
9. ↩︎
10. The especifist approach pursued by the Black Rose Federation from the USA is at least formally inspiring. Here is a diagram showing how they believe strategy development should be structured :
    ↩︎
11. The average citizen is therefore very tolerant of the “inadequacy” of us humans as we are – and thus despises the creative tension between us and the people we could become and aspire to become .
12. Beyer-Arnesen 1998 ↩︎
13. Adamczak 2017
    ↩︎
14. “The specific position of the dominant activists as wage laborers in the capitalist division of labor—and the corresponding shaping of our feelings, thoughts, and actions in relation to ourselves and other working-class people—structurally situates at least core activists of our syndicate in the ‘middle class’ or the ‘professional and managerial class fraction’ (PMF).
    
    In contrast to the ‘middle class,’ this is functionally defined: ‘Class’ refers both to a shared relationship to the economic foundations of society and to the actual relationships between groups of people, not exclusively the formal relationships between people and objects. When the social worker confronts her client or the manager his employee, they do so in an objectively antagonistic relationship. In this patriarchal-capitalist society, there is therefore a real difference between people whose work essentially consists of telling other people what to do and people who do the work that others assign them. The PMF are salaried white-collar workers who do not own any means of production.” and whose main function in the social division of labor can be described as the reproduction of capitalist culture and capitalist class relations. The task of PMF professional groups is to organize, regulate, and control the work process and the everyday life of the working class, together with many other specialists.” (LLWAA: F) ↩︎
15. For a general comparison, see Thistle Collective: Every Rose has its Thorn ↩︎
16. Schneider 1971: 77f., my emphasis ↩︎
17. Here, a form of anarcho-syndicalism, albeit one stripped of its core by Marcks, seems to resurface: In its classical conception, the structures of struggle were supposed to switch to administration at a revolutionary moment. Whether this can work from a relational-theoretical perspective—simply shifting from a rationality of struggle to one of nurturing and caring—has, to my knowledge, not been fundamentally questioned to this day .
18. Solidarity Federation 2024 ↩︎
19. Classical anarchism itself, and consequently so-called “neo-anarchism,” recognizes materialist feminism only as a blind spot. The fact that these “-isms,” with their critique of domination and oppression, seemingly possess a feminist tendency has led, from the Mujeres Libres of the 1930s to contemporary “anarchafeminism,” to a trust placed in male comrades that has been collectively and consistently disappointed. There is so much more to say on this topic—so much more to reconstruct anarchism, with Judy Greenway , from a fundamentally feminist perspective—but unfortunately, there isn’t enough space here.
20. Solidarity Federation 2024 ↩︎
21. ibid. ↩︎
22. Marcks 2010 ↩︎
23. ibid. ↩︎

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The cover image is from a video by the CNT .