Diversity of tactics is first and foremost an acknowledgement that different approaches exist. It is an acknowledgement of the different modes of action used to drive our struggles. It is an acknowledgement that we can disagree on the means, but still work together toward the same end. In this way, the struggle for climate justice mobilizes as many different ideas as it mobilizes different methods: demonstrations, strikes, lobbying, civil disobedience, sit- ins, popular education workshops, disruption actions, votes, etc. Some of these approaches might seem contradictory, but they are in fact complementary. The strength of our movement is in its diversity. It is in the fact that we recognize and respect different approaches. It is in how we remain in solidarity and foster communication between groups. It is in respecting activists in their choices and to enable them to get involved as much as they want, in the way they want, in the cause. This respect of diversity of tactics includes certain approaches often considered as violent by the powers-that-be. It is therefore important to question ourselves on the legitimacy of certain forms of political answers, including violent ones, to the policies of this capitalist system.
When we oppose more radical approaches to non-violent ones, we play in the hands of those in power. We play a game with the goal of reaching some transcendental absolute, however it ultimately limits the autonomy of activists and divides the movement. This violent/non-violent debate often ends on dogmatic tones and forgets the fundamental reasons of our struggles. If the use of political violence puts off many, before issuing judgment, it is important to compare the violent means of activists to the actual brutality of the system.
Systemic violence is omnipresent in our society; the problem is however that we do not label them as such. We are hypersensitive when we see spectacular violence. We are extremely receptive when we see individual violence. We have strong reactions when we see one human attacking the physical, psychological or moral integrity of another human. Faced with individual violence, we experience a strong feeling of injustice and a will to eradicate it. We instinctively fight it, it should not be allowed, it is not right, because we do not want to live in a society where violence is tolerated and normal. However, violence is normal and tolerated in our societies, but in a more insidious way. While being sensitive to individual violence, we are completely desensitized to mass violence. The system in place is effectively mastering the concealment of the active structural violence that is constantly affecting us.
Let’s take a cellphone for example. The common cellphone is, by itself, a concentrated form of violence. From its creation until it finds its way in our pockets, its path if filled with violence. It starts with wars in distant lands rich in natural resources, it passes through child slaves working in mines, to high-tech shops where workers toil in miserable work conditions, to transportation in unsanitary holds of container ships, until the said cell phone is sold by a minimum wage clerk to finally end up in our pockets.
This fabrication process can be extended to every object around us. As Marx said in his time: “The wealth of those societies in which the capitalist mode of production prevails, presents itself as an immense accumulation of commodities,”. Therefore, we live in a society which presents itself as an immense accumulation of violence.
The global economic system overwhelms and crushes millions of human beings. We don’t need to leave the country to see this systemic violence. Patriarchy, racism, heteronormative values, wealth inequalities and environmental destruction are ills that permeate our society. Inconspicuous, often invisible ills, but relentlessly violent.
With no way to denounce or to shut down this systemic brutality, it is understandable that a feeling of revolt, even a revolutionary will, takes shape. It can be seen through the means of more radical techniques, which are often described as violent, but are actually a form of counter-violence. Counter-violence because it is written in a specific context : “What we must understand, is that a riot is the language of the unheard”. These words, uttered by Martin Luther King, recall that our counter-violence represents a will to shut down the larger violent system, the root of all others. It would be hypocritical and in bad faith to express indignation and denounce the vandalism of statues of war criminals, or the broken window of a transnational corporation responsible of multiple ecocides, while forgetting the structural violence they produce.
It is important to understand that those who support more confrontational tactics are not worshippers of violence. They are not opposed to non-violent tactics. They only consider that certain tactics are more adapted to a given context than others. Tactics should be chosen in function of the desired objective, not in function of a so-called universal moral code of nonviolence. Not in function of an authoritarian moral code, which does not respect the autonomy of groups and individuals. If we want radical change, we must avoid falling in the trap of a violent-non-violent pseudo-duality. We must understand that what makes the brilliance and strength of our movements, is the complementarity of these approaches. A diversity of tactics, free of preconceptions. An inclusive diversity of tactics, open to debate and to critiques.