Surviving Capitalism (Not) : The forgotten workers’ control movement of Prague Spring

We’ve lived so long under the spell of hierarchy—from god-kings to feudal lords to party bosses—that only recently have we awakened to see not only that “regular” citizens have the capacity for self-governance, but that without their engagement our huge global crises cannot be addressed. The changes needed for human society simply to survive, let alone thrive, are so profound that the only way we will move toward them is if we ourselves, regular citizens, feel meaningful ownership of solutions through direct engagement. Our problems are too big, interrelated, and pervasive to yield to directives from on high.
—Frances Moore Lappé, excerpt from Time for Progressives to Grow Up

Wednesday, March 9, 2016

The forgotten workers’ control movement of Prague Spring

Click here to access an excerpt from a 1978 book posted by Pete Dolack from Systemic Disorder.

This is an excerpt from It’s Not Over: Learning From the Socialist Experiment, officially published February 26 by Zero Books. Citations omitted. The omitted sources cited in this excerpt are: Robert Vitak, “Workers Control: The Czechoslovak Experience,” Socialist Register, 1971; Oldřich Kyn, “The Rise and Fall of the Economic Reform in Czechoslovakia,” American Economic Review, May 1970; and several articles anthologized in Vladimir Fišera, Workers’ Councils in Czechoslovakia: Documents and Essays 1968-69 [St. Martin’s Press, 1978]

In the past I have alluded to the fact that ordinary people have little knowledge of their history. Instead we are fed a history that capitalist ideologues have contrived to celebrate their leaders, their perspectives, and their interests. This always instills in students a sense that ordinary people must look to capitalist authorities for wisdom and guidance because ordinary people are incapable of organizing their own economy or governance. Capitalist class history keeps us docile and ignorant of our own power. Dolack with this post does his part in keeping us informed of one important incident in our history.