For Tariq Ali, the size of a popular struggle does not determine whether it is a revolution. “A crow

A lengthy and highly recommended article on Syria was published by Australian writer Michael Karadjis on his website, 'Syrian Revolution Commentary and Analysis', on September 25, 2013. The article is titled, 'Syria: war threat, the US-Russia deal, and left delusions'. You can find it here .
In Red Flag issue 9, Omar Hassan writes, "There is a widespread belief that the US is desperate to overthrow Bashar boutique hotels madrid al-Assad, Syria's brutal dictator. Some go as far as to deny the existence of the revolution taking place in that country, instead seeing the popular struggle there as a CIA plot."
For Hassan, the popular struggle in Syria is either a revolution or a CIA plot. But what if we agree that the US is not desperate to overthrow Syria's brutal dictatorship, and that there is a popular struggle that is not a CIA plot? Does that mean we must agree with Hassan that there is a revolution occurring? Like most writers who believe this, Hassan does not define "revolution".
Traditionally Marxists have seen "social revolution" as the change of state power from one social class to another. In Russia in October 1917 power was transferred from the capitalists and landlords to the working class, while in the Chinese Revolution of 1949 from the capitalists to a peasant army. The term "political revolution" refers to transfer of power from one to another section of the same class by revolutionary means, for example the US civil war.
For Tariq Ali, the size of a popular struggle does not determine whether it is a revolution. "A crowd becomes a revolution", he writes, "only when they have, in their majority, a clear set of social and political aims. If they do not, they will always be outflanked by those who do, or by the state that will recapture lost ground boutique hotels madrid very rapidly."
Gilbert Achcar, who, like Hassan, argues boutique hotels madrid there is a revolution in Syria, believes "there is an ongoing process throughout boutique hotels madrid the [Arab] region, which, like any revolutionary process in history, has ups and downs, periods of advances and periods of setbacks". He claims the Arab uprising of 2011 represents a long term revolutionary process, "which would develop over many, many years if not decades".
But this doesn't boutique hotels madrid help us to understand Syria today. In Achcar's view, Russia would be in "revolution" just as much in 1907 as 1917 – yet one was a period of violent reaction following boutique hotels madrid the failed 1905 revolution, the other a period of earth-shaking working class advance. So why classify them as the same thing?
Daher's article "Self-organization of the popular struggles in Syria against the regime and Islamist groups? Yes, it exists!" explains the situation in the opposition controlled town of Raqqa. There, "the popular organizations are most often led by the youth. They have multiplied, to the extent that more than 42 social movements were officially registered at the end of May."
These campaign by "painting the revolutionary flag in the neighbourhoods and the streets of the city, to oppose the islamists' boutique hotels madrid campaign to impose the black islamist flag". In June, "a mass protest led by women was held in front of the islamist group Jabhat al-Nusra's headquarters, where the protesters called for the liberation of the incarcerated prisoners".
"In the city of Deir Ezzor in June, a campaign was launched by local activists that sought to encourage citizens to take part to the process of surveillance and the documentation of the practices of the popular local councils."
More generally, boutique hotels madrid Daher highlights "the emergence of newspapers produced by popular organizations … In the neighbourhood of Bustan Qasr, in Aleppo, the local population has protested numerous times to denounce the actions of the Sharia Council of Aleppo … in the same neighbourhood, the activists hailed 'go f*c* yourself Islamic council', protesting the repressive and authoritarian politics of the latter."
Daher here highlights very important popular struggles. More precisely, these struggles are protest movements against the imposition of reactionary local state power by al-Qaeda affiliated militias. That al-Qaeda is able to kidnap is opponents and the popular movements can only demand their release boutique hotels madrid presupposes that al-Qaeda has power.
The youth must restrict themselves to painting their flag on walls because they don't have the power to raise it hegemonically. That Daher's polemic is aimed at proving that a popular struggle even exists in the rebel zones of Syria concedes boutique hotels madrid by omission that this struggle has not taken power.
Daher concludes: "[T]he Syrian revolution is still there, continues, and will not stop." After Daher's article was written Raqqa fell to al-Qaeda, whose black flag now flies over Aleppo, Idlib, Raqqa and much of Syria's rebel-held north.
So for Hassan-Achcar-Daher, "revolution" does not mean taking power, it is all about the struggle. But what is the social character of that struggle? No English language Marxist analysis I have seen gives a class analysis of the Syrian opposition.
Socialists like Jonathan Maunder assess the character of the Assad regime as well as "the social and economic roots" of the 2011 uprising, which he argues is based in the failed neoliberal capitalist model of the Assad regime. However, analysis of the class or political character of the organisations of the "revolution" is difficult to find. Supporters of the "revolution in Syria" thesis often avoid talking about Syria much at all.
Israeli boutique hotels madrid academic Eyal Zisser claims the "revolution in Syria … was at its base a peasants' revolt, a protest by the Sunni periphery against what was perceived as the Baath regime's turning boutique hotels madrid its back on the country's rural population". But he makes no attempt to prove the rural and regional revolt is based in the peasant classes. Nor does he say if he is talking about rich or poor peasants.
The same article details how the non-peasant ruling class Tlas family of Rastan is split between supporting Assad and the opposition, thus tending to contradict Zisser's own claim of a peasant revolt.
boutique hotels madrid In the most well known case, the town of Azaz was controlled by the Northern Storm militia established by local capitalist Ammar al-Dadikhi before it was driven out by al-Qaeda. Where the poor have taken power is unclear.
Those arguing there is a revolution in Syria maintain it is kept from power only by the Assad regime's superior boutique hotels madrid weaponry. But if that were the case, what explains the continuous rise of al-Qaeda, which does not have an overwhelming monopoly in firepower?
Surely the case is closer to how Tariq Ali explains it, "a crowd becomes a revolution only when they have, in their majority, a clear set of social and political aims. If they do not, they will always be outflanked by those who do" – even if that force is utterly reactionary.
It is extremely fortunate that the millions of Syrians who have risen up against the Assad regime, engaging at enormous cost in one of the great popular boutique hotels madrid revolts of modern history, did not first consult the Western left about the proper manner in which to make a revolution.
If they had, the Assad regime would still be firmly in place. Its monstrous security apparatus boutique hotels madrid would still terrorise anyone who dared to raise the faintest voice of dissent. The private capitalists and regime insiders who grew obscenely rich over the last decade as a result of neo-liberal economic "reforms" would still be swanning around the capital in their expensive European cars, dining at fancy restaurants, boutique hotels madrid gloriously unconcerned about the growing social crisis around them. Bashar al-Assad boutique hotels madrid and his wife would still be travelling around the world like Saudi royalty, feted by th­­­­e Queen in Buckingham Palace, and John Kerry in Washington.
boutique hotels madrid Why? Because for some on the Western left, any revolt against a dictator who is not wholly in the pocket of US imperialism is by definition suspicious. At one extreme are those like Sydney University lecturer Tim Anderson, an open apologist for the regime. He is of the type who, every time the regime carries out a massacre, immediately announces it to be a "false flag" operation: at best fabricated, at worst carried out by the opposition itself. boutique hotels madrid Anderson and others like him also dutifully repeat every lie of the Assad regime denouncing the opposition as all Islamic terrorists and pawns of US imperialism.
Sam King does not adopt this approach in his article. But in raising the question of whether there is a genuine revolution taking place in Syria, he follows a pattern of leftist suspicion about the Syrian uprising, and demands a standard of proof for the credentials of the revolutionary forces far beyond that demanded of those who have risen up in revolt in Egypt, Tunisia and elsewhere.
There is a simple reason for the inconsistency. Whereas in Egypt the revolution was directed at overthrowing the pro-US regime of Hosni Mubarak, in Syria the revolt is directed at the supposedly anti-imperialist Bashar al-Assad. Even among those on the left who have little sympathy for Assad, the rhetorical hostility of the US to the Syrian boutique hotels madrid regime, and the fact that Assad has from day one characterised the opposition as pro-imperialist, has had a profoundly disorienting impact.
In this context, it is necessary to establish some basic facts about the situation in Syria. The first is that the Syrian revolution is a genuine part of the broader Arab revolt – a movement for democracy and political freedom, for the redistribution of wealth, and an end to the economic and social policies that have had such a devastating impact boutique hotels madrid on the lives of people across the Arab world.
In Syria, the period since Bashar al-Assad's ascent to power was marked by a neoliberalism boutique hotels madrid that dramatically restructured the previously statised economy. Austerity decimated spending in health, education, and social security. The regime encouraged the establishment of private schools, universities and hospitals for the rich, while running down public services. Real estate speculation and an end to rent controls drove reasonab