Oli Mould: Seattle’s BLM Autonomous Protest Zone and the Paris Commune of 1871: Anti-Capitalist Spirit still Lives

Oli Mould worries about co-option of the Seattle’s BLM Autonomous Protest Zone and the Paris Commune of 1871: Anti-Capitalist Spirit still Lives.

With Chaz too, the lure of “protest chic” may be too much to resist – it is after all in Seattle, one of the US’s most heralded creative cities. For Chaz to resist this, it must resolutely be a space of the oppressed and the black voices of the movement. In essence, white people can help set it up and maintain it, but they must remain silent inside it and let the oppressed use the space to strategise and mobilise.

The Paris Commune didn’t end too well, and the murmurings from President Donald Trump are that the Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone may not last too long either. But that the commune is still taught and talked about today is testament to its lasting positive effect within urban politics. It may have been brutally quashed, but its anti-capitalist spirit set an example for nearly 150 years of subsequent urban struggles all over the world.

Emphasis Mine

What a choice: co-option or destruction. There has to be other options such as expansion or evolution.

Fortunately, the reactionaries are ridiculing the CHAZ currently. This is good because it delays destruction. CHAZ should not be trying to win over the reactionaries, but to disarm them.

Ideally, CHAZ should last long enough to explore many models of self-governance, and to create a cadre of confident activists to go underground during the reactionary backlash.

Continuing the BLM protests reduces the pressure on CHAZ. The presence of many people on the streets makes the government wary of taking drastic action. Unfortunately, protest fatigue will doom the CHAZ.

Expansion of the autonomous zone model to other cities may quickly incur the wrath of the government in order to stop the spread of a good example. Such a spread will definitely spook the reactionaries and may invite action by right-wing paramilitaries to form and crush the BLM protests.

If the CHAZ survives long enough, it may evolve into something that can be tolerated by the state. This is entirely up to CHAZ itself.